I've had this kicking around in my mind since I read Neil Gaiman's Sonnet. This man is amazing. So here it is. Enjoy?
Disclaimer: I don't own FB and I don't own Sonnet. I can only hope to match Neil Gaiman in talent.
Sonnet 155
He stood in his room for the last time, he knew. It wasn't that he was forced to leave it. Rather, he knew that the time had come for him to move on. He had spent many years of his youth there, learning to live after being frozen in a steel cage for so long.
He was done now, he knew. And he needed to find another place to lay his head. This room wouldn't do any longer.
He was an adult, or close to one. He was starting another chapter in his life and had to go on and close this one. It was done.
He ran his hand through his orange hair as he contemplated the bookcases in front of him. It would be hard to pick and choose which books he would take with him. The new apartment wasn't that spacious, even for one person; much less two. He was going to have to be picky and he wasn't sure if he was up to the task.
His hand ghosted over well worn copies of adolescent favourites, but he still couldn't come up with a single title that he wanted to put in the box at his feet.
He sighed and forced himself to look at the books on the shelf, to pick and to decide. After a few minutes of stillness, his hands began to move out of their own accord. The Catcher in the Rye went in first, then Perks of being a wallflower. The Court of the Midnight king. Memoirs of a Geisha. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Stardust. Good Omens. American Gods. The Handmaid's Tale. The Blind Assassin.
They all were carefully deposited into the box and he only paused a few times here and there to flip through the books as memories flooded his mind briefly and he got the warm feeling that he was choosing the right books to take with him.
He stopped though, when he looked at the battered, irregular editions of the Sandman trade paperbacks hastily crammed into the shelves. He pulled them out and sat down on the mat. Carefully smoothing down curled edges, he opened one of the volumes at random and flipped through the short tale of Orpheous, Lord Morpheus's doomed son.
He took in the vibrant colours and the way the words fit, spilling like beautiful winding rivers of prose across the painstakingly etched drawings on the page.
At first, he had only been skimming through the story. Before he knew it, he had been sucked right into the tale, his packing and melancholy all gone as he drank in the tale of the tragic Dream lord.
"Finally found you. "
The spell was broken by the coolly amused voice of his cousin Haru, who was going to be his roommate for the time being.
It had been a shock to the rest of the family and to Tohru when Haru had announced that they were moving out together. They had all assumed that he would live with Rin and that Kyo would placidly remain in Shigure's house.
It was true that he had been expecting to move out with Rin, but she had declined the invitation. Not because she didn't love him any less, but because of her need for independence. She wanted to be free, to live her life as she chose for once, rather than being forced to live like others chose.
And that freedom included being on her own, without relying on Haru to save her from everything and everyone.
So Haru had looked around for another flat-mate and had been utterly surprised to have found Kyo wanting to also move out and strike out on his own. So they had agreed.
"What's going on, Kyo? It's not like you to get so distracted from the world."
Kyo's face turned slightly pink at the comment.
"Why isn't it like me? Can't I be quiet for awhile, Haru?" Kyo shot back, slightly irritated.
Haru shook his head and walked over to Kyo, moving close, but leaving enough space lest the jumpy man reach out and thwap him on the head. Although he wasn't as violent as he was when he was younger, he still had the occasional tendency to lash out over minor perceived irritations.
"It's not an accusation, so quit being so defensive. It just…surprised me." Haru finished as he reached up and pushed some white strands away from his face.
"It's not like you to be so…unguarded…It's nice." He finished hastily when he saw the angry gleam in Kyo's eyes.
Kyo only looked at him suspiciously for a few moments before he nodded and turned back to his book.
"It's kind of a privilege, in a way, you know." Haru commented after several minutes of silence between them.
"What is?" Kyo asked, pausing his reading to look, really look at Haru.
Haru smiled and reached over to caress Kyo's cheek with his thumb, making the older man's breath hitch in his throat.
"Seeing you like this. I'm sure that not too many others have ever seen this side of you, Kyo." Haru commented quietly.
Kyo's face turned redder at the comment, but he didn't turn away. He had never gotten fully comfortable with Haru's tactile need to express his affection to people, but he had gotten used to it. Over the years as he had begun to shed more of his prickly defensiveness he had learned that a touch didn't necessarily mean a challenge or a prelude to sex. So when Haru touched him, he let him. He wasn't fighting anymore. It was okay to want touch.
"No. It's not like I want everyone to see me like this. There's too many chances to get hurt otherwise." He replied softly. He looked at Haru steadily for a moment before closing the paperback and putting them into the box.
He was finished packing.
"I didn't think you'd be into these." Haru commented once he felt Kyo had gotten his composure back. Even though they had agreed to be roommates and had fallen into a casual, almost easy friendship that had barely been there when they had gone through their tempestuous teenage wasteland; Kyo would always hold back. Haru hated to admit it, but he sometimes felt that Kyo's psyche was like the fabled river Styx: too deep and too dark for anyone to ever find the mysteries inside it.
Kyo shrugged.
"He's a good writer. This is what Shigure would want to write. If he ever got his head on right." Kyo deadpanned as he finally got all the books in properly, making Haru stifle a laugh at Kyo's caustic commentary of their other older cousin's writing.
"If that's true, I should read them then." He stated as he looked into the box.
"Do you have all of them?"
"No. I'm missing the last one. Haven't been able to find it yet." Kyo replied, tamping the irrational curl of defeat at the thought. Rationally, he knew it was just a book. He could always try to borrow it from the library or look it up online. But the part that had forced him to keep on fighting for so long hated to admit that he had failed even in that small aspect.
Haru knew the set of that mouth and didn't even try to comfort Kyo. He knew that his cousin hated the idea of failing and was probably bound to snap if it was even implied he had.
"Do you mind if I read them sometime?" Kyo shrugged.
"As long as it's not right now, why not?"
Haru blinked. Was Kyo actually making a joke?
"Now could you get your hands out of there? I really should finish packing."
"Uh. Sure. Yeah." Haru stammered, taken aback with the finality of the moment.
"I'll be downstairs with the others…unless you need more help."
Kyo shook his head and waved him away.
"It's one suitcase. That's all. I never had that much junk anyways." Kyo told him, making him feel slightly sad and guilty at the matter of fact statement. He himself was a hoarder and had mementos and books crammed everywhere in his home. Compared to him, Kyo was utterly Spartan. He had no need for possessions, because everything he needed was inside his skin.
"Okay then. See you downstairs."
"I won't be long." Kyo told him in a quiet voice, his eyes a dark shade of orange that made Haru wonder whether he meant something else other than the packing.
"Hey." Haru greeted the inert lump on the couch. Closing the door quietly, he kicked off his boots, letting them land on the rug with a muffled thud before moving closer.
Kyo's face was still flushed, he could see that much with the aid of the dim light seeping in through the blinds. He must have been cold too, because he was wrapped up in one of Haru's sweaters and had a blanket tightly wrapped around him.
Kyo frowned in his sleep before blinking and finally opening his eyes.
"You're back? How long was I asleep?" Kyo asked, yawning halfway through the sentence, making Haru's eyes soften at the cuteness of it.
"A good five hours. Don't worry about it. You need it. You want some tea?" Haru asked as he picked up the discarded bags of groceries and padded to the kitchen.
"Yeah. I'll get it myself tho. You're not my mum." Kyo replied, feeling irritated and lazy, despite being warmed by the kindness Haru had always shown him, even when he was less than gracious in return.
He should have just shut up and not argued, but he still felt like he was imposing himself on Haru. Despite the many times he had been assured by Tohru, Kazuma and Haru that it was pointless to think about things like that and to accept kindness and give it in return, he couldn't really banish the feeling that he was being a burden to them.
"It's cool." Haru told him as he picked up the tea-kettle and carried it over to the sink to fill it. Kyo growled and tried to reach for it.
"I said I'll do it." He hissed and made another swipe for the kettle only to be left clutching air and losing his balance.
Haru's eyes widened when he saw Kyo falling. Right towards him. Acting on instinct, he let go of the kettle and caught Kyo. Which then made him drop the nearly full kettle right on his foot.
"Oh FUCK!" He would have loved to yell even more profanities, but was stopped when Kyo put his hand over his mouth and somehow managed to half-drag, half carry him into the bathroom a stone's throw away from the kitchen.
Haru was breathing hard against Kyo's hand, the corners of his vision going blurry as his cousin, despite being sick, carefully positioned him on the toilet.
"Here, give me your foot." Kyo ordered him thickly, removing his hand from Haru's mouth before taking out the first aid kit from the cabinet, which was well stocked due to their infrequent tendencies to occasionally beat the ever loving tar out of each other.
Haru gulped a few breaths, still fighting to keep his temper from spilling over and causing an even bigger problem and either causing a physical or verbal match that would simply wear them out and do nothing to solve the problem at hand.
"It doesn't look too bad. Does this hurt?"
"OW! Fuck! Of course it does, you fucktard! A FULL kettle fell on my FOOT!" Haru roared, trying his best to ignore the tears that were threatening to leak from the corners of his eyes.
"I know. I know. I'm sorry. I just have to check that nothing's broken." Kyo replied calmly, completely taking the wind out of Haru's sails and calming him down completely. He had expected Kyo to call him a moron or yell back at him. To have Kyo apologize so directly…it was quite stunning. At any other time, a mumbled "sorry, ok." Was the most he would have gotten out of him. If he hadn't been in so much pain, he would have made some passively teasing remark about it, to watch Kyo squirm, just to assure himself the situation was normal. But this time, it looked like he would have to ponder it and deal with it later.
So he managed to keep quiet as Kyo did more poking and prodding before putting on some ointment and wrapping his foot up tightly.
"There. Stay off it for a bit." Kyo whispered as he sat down on the edge of the tub.
They sat in silence for several minutes, each of them staring at each other as if they could figure out what had just happened. They both could sense that something had changed in the space of twenty minutes, but neither of them could exactly say what.
"So…we do pay rent for the other parts of the flat, you know." Kyo finally stated as he got up from his seat. Not only was he getting a headache trying to figure out what the hell was going on between them, his arse was hurting from sitting on the edge of the cheap tub. Also, he was sure that there was something kinda weird and off about lounging around in the bathroom.
"Huh?" Haru asked, watching his cousin as he walked towards him. Kyo sighed.
"I don't know about you, but I'm kinda getting the heebie-jeebies and sitting around in the bathroom, of all places, isn't helping matters much." Kyo explained roughly as he pulled Haru to a standing position and wrapped his arm around his cousin's waist.
Haru watched him curiously, surprised that Kyo was doing such a thing.
"Just don't get weird about this, or I'll hit you so hard your grandchildren are going to feel it." Kyo ground out as he began to maneuver himself and his burden into the kitchen, while said burden was trying hard to not laugh.
Kyo heard the muffled snorts, but ignored him. A little laughter was an ok price to pay for things to be somewhat normal again.
"We're going to have to get another tea kettle, you know." Kyo informed him. Haru looked up from his steaming mug of hot tea just in time to see Kyo trying to hammer the dent out of the tea kettle before finally putting it back on the burner in disgust.
"You know it wouldn't have happened if…"
"Can it, I know. I still want to complain about it, though. It irritates me." Kyo growled as he grabbed his own hot mug of tea and milk and sat across the table from Haru.
Haru couldn't help himself and started sniggering at the off-handed comment while Kyo only looked at him with an expression of intense suffering.
"Am I your clown now? Am I here to amuse you?" Kyo muttered, rolling his eyes.
Haru's response was to laugh harder, while Kyo finally ended up sulking quietly and drinking his tea without saying a word until Haru finally controlled himself enough to actually have a conversation.
"I'm sorry. That was just funny. I've been living with you for what? Three months now? If I knew getting injured was going to bring out the comedian in you, I would do it more often." Haru frowned at that…"We'll…if it isn't so damned painful, that is."
Kyo stared at him as if he was utterly retarded before getting up to go to the sink. On his way there, he reached over and smacked Haru on the head.
"Ow! What was that for?"
"You tell me, Captain Obvious." Kyo shot back as he rinsed out his cup and then hopped on the counter.
"You going to need to go to your room or will you be fine at the table? I gotta finish up the conclusion to a paper I'm working on."
Haru raised an eyebrow at this. He didn't have anything to do in his room, really. But he knew that Kyo got really bitchy if he was interrupted in the middle of an assignment so he opted to go back to his room. Besides, he needed to think about the little interlude in the bathroom.
"Don't worry about it. I'll get to my room. It's not like it's that far anyways."
Kyo's eyes darkened as he watched Haru get up carefully and try to limp away to his room. He wanted to yell at him to stop being so stupid and just accept help when Haru put his injured foot down and let out a string of colourful curses that made Kyo wince.
"Here, you idiot." Kyo said wearily before hoisting his cousin into his arms and carrying him to his room despite his loud and often salacious protests.
He didn't say anything. Not even when he prepared to unceremoniously dump Haru onto the bed.
Well…he tried to, that is. He probably would have succeeded if it hadn't been for the straps on the back of his trousers tangling with Haru's right leg as he thrashed about, sending both of them tumbling to the bed.
Silence followed soon after. Silence that was only broken by the occasional grunt, jerk and tearing of fabric as both of them tried to disentangle themselves from each other, yet failing miserably.
"I give up. This is just too fucken weird." Kyo finally muttered as he let his head fall heavily on Haru's chest.
Haru frowned in the darkness.
"Give what up?" Haru asked.
"Living together. Maybe it wasn't a good idea."
"Why do you think so?"
"We're acting weird. I don't understand it. Not how you act. Not how I act. Nothing fucken makes sense anymore. It's like someone changed the fucken steps to the dance when I wasn't looking and it's fucking me up."
"It's okay to say you're scared, Kyo. It's not going to make you seem like you're weak or pathetic. No one sees you that way."
A moment of silence passed between them as Kyo thought about Haru's words.
"I'm not scared. Just…annoyed at myself. I changed along the way…I know I don't act anywhere near like I used to. The way I see things, the way I feel about people…it's all changed…and I feel lost. And that pisses me off."
Haru didn't reply right away, since he was too busy putting the pieces together regarding Kyo's behaviour. He had overlooked the fact that they were close friends and living together. He had simply assumed that it was just a natural progression of a friendship that had been revived after so many failed starts, so much anger and confusion on both sides. He never thought things had changed that drastically, only that they had finally been allowed to progress like they should have.
But now, looking back, he finally understood why there was sometimes tension between them. Why tonight had felt right…yet stumbling at the same time. Something was going to give. Kyo already knew that. What he didn't know was what exactly was going to give.
They lay in silence before Kyo finally managed to get them both untangled.
"I'm going to work on that paper. Call me if you need anything."
Haru didn't say anything and Kyo got tired of waiting. Sighing irritably, he turned and left the room.
Haru listened as Kyo stomped over to his room and shut the door with enough force to make it screech. Sighing, he put his hands behind his head and stared at the ceiling.
Something was going to change. He just hoped it wouldn't be too devastating when it did.
Both of them were busy that upcoming week and barely saw each other. It was paper after paper, exam after exam. Studying and writing took up most of their time. The most words they had exchanged were about four, when Kyo had asked Haru to pass the milk the one lat night they had stumbled into the kitchen at the same time.
Haru knew that they were going to have to talk again, but he knew it would have to wait till the semester ended. Both of them were edgy and he was sure if he even breathed a word of that particular topic to Kyo, he would get his arse handed to him on a platter.
So he buried himself in his work and went to visit Rin at her university, but even those visits were losing their charm. Rin was either in her studio, finishing up projects or distracted. He knew she was slipping away from him, Not in the same way that she had slipped away from him when they were younger. That was simply her way of trying to protect him from their family. No. This time…he knew it was because they were growing up into different people than they had been when they were young and trapped.
He realized it when he was lying naked in her futon, watching her brush out that long hair of hers. He dimly recalled hating it when it was short, since it meant that it would never envelop him in a curtain scented with jasmine and grass when they made love. He had always loved her hair, loved her body.
He watched her, and with a pang, suddenly realized that it was a detached way in how he was watching her. Not with love and loyalty as he had when he was seventeen. Even sex hadn't been the same as before. It had been good, but very cool and almost impersonal. As he thought about it more, he realized sex had steadily been progressing that way for a while and once he really thought about it, it made him wonder how he had missed it changing to that.
"It's like someone changed the fucken steps to the dance when I wasn't looking and it's fucking me up." Kyo's words flashed into his mind as sat up and pushed the covers away.
The steps had changed. He saw that now. Not just for Kyo, but for him also.
Rin watched him get dressed in the mirror she kept by her bed and her pulse quickened. She knew it was over. Had known it for a few months. She knew that deep in her heart, she would never stop loving him. He had helped her stand on her two feet, had given her unconditional love when she had needed it the most. Had given her his body as well.
But now that they were free, she knew that it was selfish to keep clinging to the past. Especially now that they were growing into adults and into separate and highly different people.
She waited until he had his shirt on before putting her brush down and turning around to face him. She owed him that much at least.
"Don't say anything." Haru told her, his voice melancholic as he spoke. He looked straight into her eyes and she saw he knew it too. He wasn't angry. He was simply resigned. He knew the chapter had now closed in their lives.
"We understand each other then?" She asked as he stood up and went to the door to retrieve his coat and his shoes.
He paused in getting ready and nodded.
"We'll always meet on the same level, Isuzu. Never forget that."
"I know. But not right now."
"Yes. Not right now. Good bye."
---
Kyo was sitting at the kitchen table, one of his textbooks open in front of him. Haru thought he was studying at first and moved quietly to the fridge. He pulled out a coke and was about to go to his room when a soft mewling sound made him pause in his tracks. Curious, he came closer and saw Kyo was sleeping rather than studying.
Laughing softly, he debated in waking him up and sending him to his room when he noticed the scratched out lines, doodles and other words on the paper.
That was odd. Kyo, despite all his faults, was obsessive about his notes being clear and legible.
Pushing his hand aside, Haru found a smile tugging at his lips when he noticed the little cartoon doodlings of chibi cows, dogs, cats and sea horses that decorated the borders. Glancing at the text, he could see why Kyo would doodle. Introductory economics wasn't exactly the most thrilling class to study for.
He moved his hand even further and was surprised to see a poem copied out in surprisingly elegant calligraphy.
"Sonnet." He mouthed to himself as he bent down for a closer look and began to read:
"I don't think that I've been in love as such, In plays and poems someone understands
Although I liked a few folk pretty well.
Love must be vaster than my smiles or touch,
For brave men died and empires rose and fell
For love: girls followed boys to foreign lands
And men have followed women into Hell.
There's something makes us more than blood and bone
And more than biological demands...
For me, love's like the wind, unseen, unknown.
I see the trees are bending where it's been,
I know that it leaves wreckage where it's blown.
I really don't know what "I love you" means.
I think it means "Don't leave me here alone."
Underneath the poem, he saw that Kyo had written:
"Why is it that Neil Gaiman could write this…yet I don't have the balls to say it to him?"
He stood there in utter shock for how long, he didn't know. All he knew was that he finally understood the tension and Kyo's words about the changing steps of the dance and his own use of the analogy. It was true then, things had changed. And it had completely taken him by unexpected surprise.
He left the room quietly and went to his own room to think.
-8-8-8
"You know, even though we pay for power, I'm not going to get mad if you use it." Kyo joked as he flicked on the switch in Haru's room.
"Huh? Oh yeah. I was going to turn it on. I guess I just forgot." Haru muttered as he looked down and saw the coke he had grabbed was still unopened.
"What's wrong? You usually aren't that absent-minded. Things with Rin okay?"
Kyo asked as he flopped down next his cousin, his tone a little worried.
"Nah. We broke up. This time it looks like it's for good." Haru replied, feeling touched at the fact that Kyo was concerned about him.
"Jeez. You okay with that? Kyo asked him quietly after awhile.
"I guess. I loved her since we were little, but…it was like you said that night."
"What night?"
"The night you made me drop that fucken kettle on my foot! That night."
"About someone changing the steps to the dance when I wasn't looking?" He asked as he finished wracking his brain for the answer, since he was sure that Haru wasn't talking about him saying "fucken" every second word.
"Yeah. Things had changed between me and her, but I didn't see it. And then when I noticed…It was too late. The time had passed, if there ever was a time, to go back and make things like they used to be."
He fell quiet and looked at Kyo through his bangs.
"Was that what you meant that day?"
"Yeah. I guess that was it. I used to be…well…not really close with you. But then, somewhere along the way, we started talking more, and agreeing on things. I didn't think anything of it when we moved in together. But one day, I was sitting at the table, drinking tea and you were making cereal or something…and it all just clicked. The tempo was wrong, the song was different…and I got scared. Especially when I found myself realizing that this was what I wanted. This was what it was supposed to be like."
Haru nodded and opened the can of pop. It all made sense to him too.
"Then you started asking yourself what the hell love was, right?"
"Yeah…hey…you read my notes, didn't you! You little…" Kyo's anger stopped cold when Haru reached over and cupped his cousin's face with his hand.
"I won't leave you alone here, Kyo."
Kyo's face paled and he looked down at his lap.
"Will you do the same for me?" Haru whispered.
"I have been doing it all along, haven't I? Why would I stop?"
Kyo said softly before Haru leaned in and kissed him.
Finis
Notes: I know Rin and Haru are together, but then I thought about how they would be as they got older and were freed from the curse. Rin is a horse and all the horses I know need someone to stand by them, but they also need to be their own people and free, hence the reason why Rin would eventually grow apart as she explores being her own person and being free. No malice intended.
Why I chose this pairing was because the feeling I get from the Haru Kyo friendship is that if Kyo had gotten his head out of his ass a little earlier, Haru wouldn't have had to turn to Yuki for adoration and a deeper friendship.
If they had a chance to be friends, they could probably end up in a physical love and or a deep bond of friendship.
Kyo's character is kind of sharp as when he was younger, but once he would find his place in the world, he would probably be more thoughtful, more perceptive, less selfish and less wrapped up in his own angst fest.
And this is technically an AU, so hence the lack of curses and other stuff. Sonnet was written by Neil Gaiman and the reason for the title is cause of Shakespeare's 154 sonnets. That's about it.