Spoilers for the end of the Sakura Cards arc in Card Captor Sakura! Do not read if you don't know who Yue is or what Touya does in relation to Yue. Oh, and beware of shounen ai. All characters belong to CLAMP (as usual).
There's a small reference to my fiction Complexities, but it's not really necessary to have read that to read this.
Touya was sprawled on his bed, flicking through his math textbook for the answers to double-check his math homework. Not that any of it would be wrong - he had Yukito to help him, after all.
"Sakura-chan spoke to me today," said Yukito, sounding wistful. The pale-haired boy was on the floor leaning against the bed, his own math homework long finished and neatly piled up beside him.
"Did she?" asked Touya, interested. /I wonder if she confessed to him about how she 'feels'.../ The thought worried him slightly.
"Mm. She told me..." Yukito hesitated for a moment.
"Yes?"
"She told me I should tell you something."
Touya sat up and leant back against the wall, long legs curled beneath him. "Go on," he encouraged the smaller boy.
Yukito blushed. "Um..."
Touya felt a sudden, completely irrational, wave of fear wash over him. /Don't be ridiculous,/ he told himself. /There's no one you'd trust more than Yuki with your sister, is there?/ But it still hurt. And he wasn't certain it was the sort of hurt that came from concern for his sister.
/Yukito said he loved you once... You remember that, don't you? He probably didn't mean for you to hear, he said it so quietly./ But then, it was so hard to read Yukito. How could Touya know whether the other boy had meant it as a brotherly, familial kind of love, or any other?
"To-ya, I..." He dropped his eyes from Touya's. "I..." He sighed.
"Yuki?"
"She told me that she Likes me..."
Touya froze.
"But... I told her that her that what she felt for me was really the kind of love she feels for her family, because..." He took a deep breath. "Because the person I love is Sakura's brother."
/Sakura's... brother./ He tried to get his mind around the concept. "Yuki, I..."
"You don't have to say anything, To-ya. I know you probably don't..."
Touya interrupted him quickly. "That's not true."
"You... what?" Yukito blinked at him.
Touya looked intently at the floor.
"To-ya? To-ya, look at me?" pleaded Yukito.
Touya looked up again, meeting his friend's hazel eyes, somewhat embarrassed. A bright smile spread over Yukito's face. Touya knew he was in for it now.
"What's not true, To-ya?" he asked, in a tone that was all too familiar to the dark-haired boy.
"Nothing!" said Touya, gruffly.
Yukito scrambled up onto the bed and leant over his friend. "No, tell me..."
Touya looked at his friend, feeling rather like a rabbit facing a hawk. /How ironic./ "I, uh..."
"Mm?"
"You. Idiot. I love you."
Yukito kissed him.
~ * ~
That night, hardly for the first time, Yukito slept in Touya's room.
However, it was the first time they'd slept together in the same bed, curled together like dozing kittens.
The first time Touya woke that morning was at about three, to find Yukito's other half - Yue, he reminded himself - sitting on the side of the bed, regarding him thoughtfully.
He gave the 'angel' a long look. Hundreds of questions ran through his mind: 'what are you doing here?' being the most important - and most obvious. Eventually, he just settled for, "why?"
"I wanted to thank you," said Yue, reprovingly. "Yukito is very happy now."
Touya laughed, quietly. "You don't need to thank me for telling the truth. I didn't do it just to make him happy, I did it for us because not telling him would have torn us apart. And I don't want that." The thought of how close he had come to losing Yukito forever still gave him chills.
Yue regarded him expressionlessly. "So you do love him, then?"
Touya felt himself blushing, which only made him more embarrassed. "Yes."
Yue looked vaguely pleased.
"And how about you?" asked Touya, suddenly feeling mischevious.
"I'm sorry?" said Yue, looking somewhat startled.
"You. How do you feel?"
Yue seemed somewhat panicky, although it hardly showed on his face. "I... I don't understand."
""Yes, you do. Come on..." Part of Touya was wondering what he was saying. The rest of him was too tired to care.
"I... I don't dislike you," said Yue, eventually.
Touya felt himself break into a wide grin. On impulse, he pulled the other being into a warm hug. "I don't dislike you, either," he said, teasingly.
Yue stiffened, and the room filled with light. Touya was left holding the slowly waking form of Tsukishiro Yukito.
"Touya?" murmured Yukito, sleepily. "What happened?"
"Your other form felt the need to talk with me," said Touya, feeling uncomfortable. "You could say that we reached an understanding."
Yukito blinked at him. "About what?"
"Oh, just that I really do love you," he said casually, gently lying his friend back on the bed. "And that he and I don't hate each other." He moved his lips over Yukito's in order to punctuate his point.
"Oh," said Yukito, when they broke apart. "I..."
"Sleep," ordered Touya, cuddling up next to his snow bunny. "You've had a trying day."
"So have you," muttered Yukito, but it didn't stop him from snuggling closer and closing his eyes tiredly. Within minutes the pair were sound asleep again.
~ * ~
Touya awoke at around seven next morning wondering why he felt so warm. Then he realised he was being held, very gently, around the waist. He rolled over enough that he could catch a glimpse of his companion.
Yukito. The events of last night flooded into his mind. He'd almost forgotten. Almost.
He rolled all the way over so he could see his friend's face. Yukito was sleeping peacefully, pale hair falling in all directions over the pillow. The arm that wasn't around Touya's waist was under his own cheek. He looked deceptively sweet and innocent.
Touya resisted the urge to run his hand through the other boy's hair, and instead gently shook him. "Yuki..."
Pale eyelashes fluttered, then opened. "To-ya?" said Yukito, sleepily. He blinked up at him.
"It's the festival today. We should get up."
Yukito sat up, somehow managing to look both adorable and completely unenthusiastic. "It's early yet," he said, glancing at the clock. "We can stay a bit longer."
Touya frowned.
Yukito poked him in the forehead. "I know you're still tired. Lie back down. Sleep."
"But..."
Yukito kissed him and somehow managed to guide him back down onto the bed. Then he wrapped his arms back around Touya's waist and buried his chin in the crook of Touya's neck. "Sleep," he ordered.
Against his will, he felt himself growing comfortable again. Yukito's soft breathing against his neck was almost hypnotic in its smoothness. Despite his better judgement, he decided he could quite happily lie like this for a very long time.
/So this is what love is. It's a snow bunny that loves to tease and order me around, adores mathematics and is kind to everyone, no matter who they are./
He thought of the ghosts in the woods and the spirits in the park. He thought of his mother, whom he would never see again. But Yukito in his arms was more real, more fulfilling, than even the odd glimpse of his mother had ever been.
He couldn't regret.
~ END ~