--50-short stories prompt: issued by Demi-kun--
Pairing: HikaKao
A/N: The 'photo' is just an expression of the scene itself, nothing else. Sorry for the confusion.
2. Butterfly
There are times when Kaoru wants to become a butterfly.
Those are the times when he wants to be alone and fly to the sky, to the sun above. To embrace the warmth and love and affection radiating from the always-bright sun.
There are times when Kaoru wishes he wasn't born.
Those are the times when his fortitude is running low and Hikaru is locked up in his room, brooding or just plain pissed. When he's alone and sad and locked inside of his own heart.
There are times when Kaoru wishes Hikaru would grow up.
Those are the times when Kaoru is concerned that Hikaru will shatter- break into small, miniscule broken shards of glass, all sharp and pointy and dangerous and shining with hurt. Like those fragile porcelain dolls, and like a heart made of glass.
-And Kaoru is afraid that Hikaru will break from pressure- like those fragile, beautiful butterflies that die with a flick of a finger and a twist of a hand.
(Hikaru says he's mature, but Kaoru knows that Hikaru is far too innocent and caring to be mature.)
There are times when Kaoru's heart aches, because he knows that Hikaru will leave him in the end.
Because he's Kaoru, and their love is taboo.
Because Hikaru loves Haruhi and Kaoru loves Hikaru, and he doesn't want Hikaru to be hurt because he's him.
Because he loves him, and because Hikaru loves everybody too much for his own good.
("He'll be hurt whichever way he goes," Kaoru says to the empty room as if conversing with an invisible person, "and I don't want to be the one to hurt him.")
And then, there are those times when Kaoru wants to be the sky.
So that when Hikaru ever becomes a butterfly, he'll be there to embrace him.
-And his heart keeps on breaking, and his heart keeps on loving, because that's all his heart knows to do.
-END