A.N. at the bottom. Disclaimer: S'not mine.
Mizuki and the Moon
Or Mizuki no Tsuki
By Magawa
"Sano?" Mizuki's voice rang out in the night air and left a space in the darkness.
Izumi Sano lifted his head just long enough to glance over at Mizuki in the pre-dawn light. "Yeah?"
"Have you… I mean, this is probably a silly question, but…" Mizuki faltered.
Sano smiled faintly, turning his glance from Mizuki back to the moon and stars overhead. It really was a beautiful night; clear and crisp, a full moon with plenty of soft light. "Go ahead," he answered patiently.
"Well, have you ever tried to take a picture of the moon?" Mizuki's voice was thin and wistful and her eyes were stubbornly stuck on the celestial spheres. Sano marveled anew at how anyone could have ever mistaken her for anything but a girl. Only someone as romantically inclined as Mizuki would try to capture something as large and wild as the moon.
"I can't say that I have," he answered truthfully. "Why do you want to know?"
"Well, I have. Tried that is, to uh, take a picture of the moon."
"And?" Sano was curious now, and not above a little prying.
"Well, it never turns out the way that I want it to…"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that I've tried to take pictures of her when she was big and beautiful like this, but then when I see the pictures later, it didn't capture what I saw…"
"Ah." He understood what she meant. He understood probably better than anyone.
"I mean, the moon looks so large and beautiful when we're out here looking at it, but in my photos it's always a huge black space a dot of light for the moon. Why can't I catch her at her most beautiful?" Mizuki was as petulant as a child, nearly pouting with her inability to capture the moon in her glory.
"Well, I think your problem lies in your scope."
"And if you were going to explain that to someone who doesn't know what that means how would you word it?" Mizuki asked crossly.
Sano laughed a little before rolling on his side so he could look at her. The moon gave off so much light tonight that Mizuki looked pale and ethereal. Like stone, but lit within.
"Well, then I'd have to say that when we're lying here like this, we can see everything: the moon the stars, the blackness of space. We can also see the ground we're laying on, rocks, the trees around us and so on. When we look at all of those things at once, the moon is huge and perfect. We're looking at the big picture, and seeing everything."
Mizuki's voice was small, "But then, why did the moon look so small in my pictures?"
"Because you focused too close on the moon, focused on the details and missed the big picture. You only wanted to see the moon, so you zoomed in on just that. If you'd have looked at everything the moon was, including her surroundings, you'd have known exactly who she was… And you'd have been able to take pictures of her that would shown off how wonderful she really is…"
Mizuki rolled to face him. "Are you still talking about the moon?"
Sano smiled mischievously before rolling back onto his back.
"Sano? Hey I'm talking to you! Were you talking about the moon or something else? Hey! Come on Sano! Tell me!"
It was peaceful outside. That had been the whole reason they'd ventured out. But now it was cold, and Mizuki had snuggled close to take advantage of his warmth. It hadn't taken long for her to fall asleep. Sano just wished sleep would come as easily to him.
Picking up his roommate with unconscious ease, he headed back to the dormitory. He'd put her to bed and then he had one little errand to take care of before he could fall asleep himself…
The next morning Mizuki awoke from a vague dream about the moon chasing the sun all over the sky until the sun began to chase the moon back. Except in her dream, the moon didn't realize the sun was chasing her and so they merely danced around each other, never coming close enough to burn each other with their touch, but never very far away from each other either. Shaking her head as if to clear the cobwebs from her thoughts Mizuki put it down as "weird." Time to begin the day.
But before she could hop out of bed she saw it. A photograph of last night's moon… huge and perfectly round. The thing that made this photo different from other moon pictures was that she was in it, sleeping peacefully while the moon bathed her face.
She looked soft, relaxed and incredibly female. The light cast gentle shadows over her face that made her look older at one glance and younger in the next. And while in some ways she did look soft and alive, in others she looked more like stone, a sculpted work of art. Her hair was splayed out between blades of grass and one arm was flung up to cradle her face. She looked sweet and fragile, alone amidst the darkness, and yet not alone because the moon kept her company.
Flipping the photograph over, Mizuki saw Sano's slanting masculine handwriting: 'Mizuki no Tsuki' and the date. Nothing else.
Was this how Sano saw her? Or did he even realize?
Peeking between the curtains that surrounded Sano's bunk, Mizuki saw that Sano was still asleep. She shrugged once and decided that if he asked, she'd just pretend she was sleepwalking and ended up in his bunk again. That excuse had certainly worked before.
Placing the letter somewhere she could see it, Mizuki crawled into Sano's bunk before closing her eyes contentedly and snuggling closer. She was asleep in moments and never saw Sano's eyes flutter open to watch her breathe; never felt his arm circle her waist to bring her closer to him and never heard him whisper softly, "You know, I wasn't talking about the moon… I was talking about you..."
A.N.: Had this thought about the moon while I was driving really early in the morning. I'd never seen the moon so large, or a night so full of light. I considered using different couples for this: Usagi and Mamoru (Sailor Moon) and Kyo and Tohru (Fruits Basket). But I decided on Sano and Mizuki because the metaphor fit. The other two were only considered because 1.) Usagi x Mamoru had the whole Moon Kingdom thing and 2.) Tohru and Kyo often sit on the roof and so the sky is sort of a natural starting point for a conversation of theirs. So this moon theme might come up again for me. I thought I'd throw that warning in now… :-p
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