Coroners are Judicial Officers responsible for investigating violent, unnatural or sudden deaths where the cause is unknown.
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The corridor was dead-still and terribly cold, and the murky post-dawn light made the grim, tattered wallpapers look like beckoning shrouds.
The young face that greeted him was a lie- it was not young, and it was not amiable, he would never buy that. It was around him, his own private harbinger of hell, that the air sunk several degrees. Around all his visually appealing persona…
"Good morning, Bakura," his landlord greeted softly, "I take it that you know why I'm here, right?"
Bakura shrugged, scratching the back of his head past the filthy silvery tangles. He thrust his hand forward, and dropped a couple of notes on the young man's palm, who had not guessed his tenant's intention until the battered papers were floating mid-air.
"Thank you," his landlord said, almost apologetically, almost, "I don't want to torture you, but if I don't come early then I never find you."
The older man averted his eyes. If their gazes crossed he knew he'd be stepping into unfamiliar territory, and the heavens above knew how much the thought of that discouraged him. He hated the inferior position. He hated to be disempowered.
Go away, he thought, seeing his Landlord remain a moment longer than necessary in the threshold, Get the hells away from me. But he remained in silence, just like he had been ever since that door had opened.
"You look unusually like crap today," the young man commented.
Bakura muttered something under his breath, but not even he himself would have made sense of what he'd intended to say. He only knew he was tired and underslept, had another eternal day ahead, and oh, it was just driving him insane, that cold that oozed from the gentle-looking young man before him.
He wiped his face, oily from sleep (he needed to take a bath too, badly) pinched the bridge of his nose, fidgeted ever so slightly, he finally said under his breath, "Get away from me."
His interlocutor's eyes widened slightly, he already had large, bright eyes, but Bakura could tell, or smell it, or whatever it was the damned man did to him, and then his pretty little mouth shaped into an 'o', and the godforsaken temperature dropped again lower, and Bakura felt that he was about to implode.
"That is a bit of a rude thing to say, Bakura," his landlord commented, and it became evident that he was intended to actually have a conversation with him. A bloody. Damned. Conversation.
With him. He groaned. He did not deserve it, the guy knew how he could not stand him.
"It's because you throw your weekends into a dumpster," the young man was reasoning, ignoring Bakura completely, "You know, I can hear you alright, e-every single Sunday morning. You're kind of a wreck."
"Save it, Landlord," was all Bakura found it in himself to say, and rather curtly, too. He could have done more, then again, he daren't.
"You know I know," the young man said smoothly, and that alone sent a single shiver down the older man's spine he could never for the life of his prevent. And everything looked grimmer and more sinister as the corridor became awash with begrimed morning light.
You know I know you know I know you know I know- Had he shouted it, had he screamed it, it wouldn't have damaged his sanity that much. It was something that they could consider normal but
It
Was
Not
Normal
DAMN, DAMN! Bakura struggled to keep a more or less straight poker face as his insides churned and his mind screamed a terrible rhapsody of I-want-out-of-here.
His mind. The mind of the man who looked at death everyday in the face and that's it. No greater deal. Just how many dead people did he say hello and goodbye to every week? Insane amounts; he was all blue lips and fishlike eyes, blackened nails and when not, bloodied corpses severed members, crusts of blood bile gore everywhere and he, was, still, sane.
Maybe he had an occasional nightmare.
And there, gentle and shrouded in a mystic halo of grey morning shine, stood his Landlord, driving him utterly over the edge.
"You can always ask nicely," the young man commented.
Bakura, poker face. "What the hell," he muttered.
"You don't need to endure it if you don't want to," he offered, "You could trust me… accept them."
Them-them-them… the reverberations in the narrow corridor, each felt like an ice-cold needle digging into his flesh.
"you could very well join them, in hell," Bakura spat, wading into the very same dangerous grounds he'd so carefully been avoiding-
"Take it back," his landlord said calmly, "They don't like it that you talk like that."
Bakura had to wrap his arms around his frame to steady the trembling. "I take it back," he said slowly, and shut the door in his Landlord's very noses.
.
.
.
.
Water, as it trickled down his naked back, was like redemption. If he ever managed to get out of the shower, he was sure the scales would be indicating he was weighing less, what with the insane amounts of weekend indolence in which he'd indulged.
But the dead really don't care much about how the living look or smell, right? Probably it was better if he stinked anyway, it saved the trouble perhaps of smelling corpse and death everywhere- that was why he was that skinny anyway, you wouldn't eat with much zeal either if all your food smelled like the mortuary.
He left a trail of watery footprints on the chipped parquetry floor, drip, drip, and suddenly it was like an avenue of bloodied feet pursuing him, and—
No, he ordered himself firmly, You're not slipping into paranoia, you bloody wreck, he acknowledged he was a wreck, but he refused to become a paranoid one. He rubbed all the water and badly-rinsed conditioner off his hair with a towel in shameful condition; towel he discarded to the floor where it would remain until the next time he bathed, whatever.
Bit by bit he'd have to cave in, he was losing it slowly. He refused to. But he was on his way.
Perhaps he could start by tidying himself up a bit? Cleaning the apartment, washing white goods that looked and reeked like the corpses he dealt with daily… If he gave it thought for some seconds, it disgusted even himself. And now the soles of his feet were stained light brown from the discoloring parquet.
He got on his dark working trousers, pulled on the heavy black leather boots, threw on the navy blue uniform.
On his back, bold, white letters read the name of his profession.
He grabbed his coat, stuffed his keys and wallet into his pocket and went out to the corridor. He'd not closed the door when he remembered he was forgetting his cigarettes, not the lighter, which he carried always around in the wallet. He came in again, he fished a crumpled package on a desk.
He shut the door loudly, went out to the grey streets without an umbrella.
A/N: As promised to Hana-Liatris, well, she reviewed, so I updated this chappy!
Thanks tons to Bakura's Guardian Angel for the encouraging review ;)
We all smell the plot coming up soon, right?
I must especially thank Punk Rock Kitsune who was totally awesome and included this humble story in her group, Bakuras FTW ! (in here http :/ www .fanfiction .net/community/Bakuras_FTW/93637/ )