Author: Swythangel
Email: swythangel@hotmail.com
Title: Heaven in Your Arms
Type: 9/9 WAFF
Teaser: Happiness is relative just as heaven is. An angel finds out that heaven is more than just a place upstairs as he falls to Earth.
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers:
Warnings: Shonen Ai, Yaoi, definitely absolutely AU
Disclaimer: Weiß Kreuz is not mine…they're Koyasu Takehito's, Project Weiß, Kyoko Tsuchiya and whoever else ^-^ "Daniel and the Angel" is an anthology by Jill Barnett in the book "A Holiday of Love". Its not mine, the idea is certainly not mine. I'm just adapting it to fit my twisted sense of storytelling.
Keywords/Pairings: BradKen
The Last! At last at last! And none too soon too…I feel like writing a LOTR Aragorn/Legolas fic and a Hikaru No Go fic. You guys don't know how much I want to…its call is like the gull's cries urging Legolas to the sea… *sweatdrops at glares* Ok, so its only after I finish Gott that is ^^
See me finished in 9! I did didn't I? *proud look*
Heaven in Your Arms
Part 9/9
Somewhere in the distance a church bell rang and woke him up. He reached out to his side, hands ready to clasp at a warm hand only to touch cool sheets…the bed was empty.
He assumed that Ken was in the bathroom though he could hear no sounds to indicate it. He wanted to go to Ken but thought that he needed some privacy so instead he waited for the younger man to go to him. Brad locked hands behind his head and stared up at the canopy with contentment.
/One night would not be enough./
Brad had never thought of marriage for himself other than the fact that he needed an heir to leave his fortune to. But as he lay down, knowing how much he wanted Ken with him for a lifetime he quickly threw any idea of marrying out of his mind. No woman could ever compare to Ken and the contentment he felt when he was with Ken.
He smiled and closed his eyes as he waited for Ken to come back to bed.
Hours after, his eyes opened. He didn't know how long he slept but Ken was nowhere around. A gnawing, fearful feeling settled over him.
Brad threw back the covers and stood up, then looked in the dressing room. The bathroom was open, the room dark.
His stomach turned over.
He rushed inside, stepping around baskets of sleeping puppies, kittens and rabbits. Ken wasn't there.
"Ken?" Brad called out, rushing back into the bedroom. Silence, like a cold invisible mist, settled heavily down on him, broken only for seconds by a sleepy meow and puppy whimpers.
Unable to stop the growing dread in his heart he shouted, "Ken!", putting on his clothes as he did so. With frenzied panic, he burst out of the gold bedroom and ran down the hall, only stopping when he was at the top of the stairs. "Ken!!" he yelled once again, Ken's name echoing through the gallery like a mocking counterpoint to his shout.
/Gott! What are you looking for in the middle of the night, Mein Herr Leader?/ Schuldich's sleepy thought butted in.
Brad didn't even deign to answer as he strode through his house on hell- sped feet, looking, searching, hoping…all the time unconsciously murmuring one name.
Ken.
***
Schuldich eventually pieced everything together from Brad's panic filled mind and flung his searching thoughts out through the house for the thought patterns that would identify the naïve brunette to him.
He found nothing.
He widened his search to the whole city, exhausting his energy to do so but he did so in vain. In the whole miasma of teeming humanity in New York City not a sliver of thought remained of the young man they had known as Ken. It was as if the brunette had never even existed.
"Now how to tell Crawford?" Schuldich mumbled to himself, ensconced in his warm bed. Green eyes flickered, disturbed beyond measure of how Schwarz' leader would take this bit of news. Surely it would do no less than destroy the leader who, Schuldich knew, had fallen for the young man in so short a time.
He wished he wasn't the one to give the news. Much as he might enjoy torturing and teasing those around him, he was not as sadistic as some would like to think. And to be the bearer of such ill tidings…
"There is no helping it." He reached out with his thoughts…
***
/Ken is not in New York City./ Quick, to the point and honest, the thought was like a sword thrust through the financier's chest, but one he had been expecting. Even before he had began his search he had known that Ken would not have answered him. In his heart, he knew…because the remarkable feeling inside him, the one that had been there since he had met Ken, was gone.
As quickly as if God had snapped His fingers. It was gone.
He stared at his hands, white knuckled as they gripped the edges of his table inside his sanctum where he had finally stopped his search, then he sagged down onto his chair and didn't move for the longest time.
Everything that he was, every laugh, every smile, every happiness he had ever experienced seem to drain away until he felt as if he were hollow inside, empty…bereft.
He rested his head into his hands and took a couple of deep breaths.
"Ken…"
He said Ken's name one last time. It was barely a whisper.
***
"For the last time Takatori, forget about the release!" Brad cut through the middle of the senator's prattle with a cold glare. "I have other things to see to least of all that. Get it into your head. I. Do. Not. Care. Fuck the release!" He stormed out, finally breaking the icy cold façade he had been maintaining since that night. In his voice anger and desperation could be heard.
A fact that made the members of Schwarz release a breath of relief simultaneously. They were of like mind that bottling it up would only make the Schwarz leader more brittle than he already was.
And who could blame him? Time was going by. A whole day.
Brad couldn't find Ken. No one could find him not even Schwarz. There was no trace of him anywhere, anywhere that money, power and extraordinary perception could look for. No one had even seen Ken leave. It was as if he had never existed…
"I fervently hope that he would actually come back and sue the hell out of me." Brad continued as he turned his back on Takatori, to stare out the window. "At least then I would know where he is."
Takatori rose from his chair, picked up the brief case he had brought with him and snapped it close. He stood there for an awkward moment, staring at the man he had thought he had pegged as a cold bastard in an agony of uncertainty and felt pity. "I'm sorry, Crawford."
Brad didn't respond and minutes later the door clicked closed. A dull roar of an engine and Brad saw Takatori's limo pull away from his driveway.
Crawford just sat there staring at the falling snow. As he relived memories of a naïve young man… Ken standing under a tree with a pile of snow on him, so much that he looked like a snowman…Ken's face looking up at him, velvet brown eyes sparkling, the crinkle in his nose as he scrunched it up whenever Ken couldn't understand something.
He remembered the mistletoe Schuldich had strategically placed. A sweet kiss. Christmas greens. The cornhusk angel atop a tree. And another angel, the only angel he had ever known.
He stood up suddenly, startling Nagi, Farfarello and Schuldich who looked at him simultaneously from their different locations in the room. He ignored them as he made his way to the hall and up the stairs. When he reached ken's bedroom, his hand paused on the door knob. He didn't quite understand it but some illogical hope kindled. Maybe, just maybe Ken would be there…
He opened the door.
And his hope died. Ken wasn't inside.
He stepped into the room because he had to, then closed and locked the door.
Puppies, kittens and rabbits greeted him but he ignored them, his gaze fixated on the bed to the piece of cloth that still lay, seemingly forgotten, on the bed…right where Ken had lain only hours before…Hours before, when his world had seemed to be perfect. When he had thought that everything would finally be different from his life before…when he had thought that love had finally been his.
Now there was just his silk shirt, nothing more. He reached out and touched it hesitantly, almost thinking that it would disappear too, the way Ken had…
But it didn't disappear. He picked it up, the silk smooth and cool to his touch, and sat down on the bed. He stared at the shirt.
Ken's scent was there with him. A piquant touch of lemon. Real.
But Ken wasn't.
A puppy jumped into his lap, then another and another. One of them was chewing on something and he gently took it from its mouth. It was the earring. Ken's earring. His hand closed tightly on it as if by doing so he could bring Ken home to him.
/Fly home to me, my angel./
The kittens crawled up the chair and the rabbits chewed on his shoelaces. He looked at them and hen at the earring, then at the silk shirt he clutched in his hands.
A moment later he buried his face in the shirt and amazingly, for the first time in a very long while, Bradley Crawford, allowed himself to cry.
***
"Ken's watching him. Constantly he watches him."
Saint Peter stopped pacing and looked at Omi. "Has he stopped crying?"
Ran answered for Omi. "No, sir." His voice was tight with tension and his glance ever did stray on the angel who knelt at a cloud's edge looking down on the world below them.
"Been like that since he came here." Youji chimed in mournfully. His intuition had been correct. Their friend had gone and fallen in love with the financier. But Youji wasn't happy to be right.
St. Peter sighed then moved across the clouds with the three angels floating in his wake, whispering to themselves.
"I would like to take a swing at that financier with my sword." Ran muttered rather wrathfully, swinging his arms like he was actually doing so.
Youji swatted his arms away and rolled his eyes. "Like it was his fault in the first place?"
"But its his fault!"
"Ran-kun, you can't make anybody fall in love with anyone else by force-"
"Who said Ken was in love with him?" The red haired dominion said stiffly, causing the two blond angels to exchange rueful glances. They ignored the dominion, knowing full well that Ran would never listen to reason.
St. Peter on the other hand continued walking until he stood near where Ken knelt clutching at the rim of a cloud with white knuckled hands and peering intently over the edge. So intently that he didn't even notice the Guardian of the Gates' presence.
St. Peter though noticed everything about the angel. He noticed how Ken's halo had no glow and how Ken's wings seemed to droop downwards like a flower whose petals had been badly bruised. He cleared his throat.
Ken raised his head and looked up at St. Peter with swollen eyes, the tears he couldn't stop were mute testimony of his pain. "He's at the park, calling my name." He told the venerable angel.
St. Peter looked down. "So I see."
Ken bit his lip and watched Brad whose head was bent. Brad's hands were shoved in his coat pockets and snow fell all around him as he walked with leaden steps from the park. "He's alone and lost. Can't I help him? Can't you or someone else help him? He's lost everyone."
"Some people have a harder road to travel, Ken."
Ken looked up at St. Peter. "I never really knew what heaven was until I found Brad."
A smothered sniffle issued from behind and St. Peter looked at Omi who was unable to hold back the tears himself. Youji comforted the younger angel…then St. Peter felt the pressure of a weighted gaze on him so he turned to meet purple eyes. Eyes filled with determination and realization. Eyes that conveyed one thought, pure and sacrificing, a thought befitting a dominion in the Lord's service.
/Give him a chance to find love for himself. Please ask Our Father in our behalf. I will bear what burden would result. Just…just let him go back to …the human./
St. Peter shook his head at Ran. /It is not our place to question the wisdom of Our Father, dominion. But do not worry, Our father in His infinite wisdom always has a plan. Now go and take the others with you. I will deal with Ken./
Ran bowed and quietly ushered the two away. When the others were gone, St. Peter turned back to Ken to find Ken's shoulders shaking. The poor angel was also hiccuping as he looked downward. "He's at the church now, praying. Hear him?" Ken paused. "I can hear him."
Saint Peter sat down on the rim of the cloud as he looked down on the world below. He turned his gaze to one man in particular--a dark and empty shape of a man.
St. Peter was quiet, then he looked at Ken for the longest time. After an eternal minute, he cleared his throat and said in a gruff voice, "So, Ken. Tell me about your young man."
***
Brad had searched everywhere. Over sideways and under, every person who had ever talked to Ken in New York, every place he had gone to, not a stone had been left unturned. And when NYC couldn't give the answer, Brad turned his formidable will, wealth and influence towards other states, other countries…there was no place where Schwarz couldn't get into.
The results?
Nothing. It was as if Ken had never existed in the United States or even in the world…
Every day Brad would sit down on the bench on the park, wanting to see Ken running in the snow, his hat flying behind him, wishing to hear the laughter. All he found was the world moving on without him.
He felt like he had always felt before, like a stranger looking into a world where he did not fit in, unwanted, lost…not even the presence of Schuldich, Farfarello and Nagi which had always been a small balm to his loneliness before soothed the ache inside.
He scoured the Washington Market, rung every bell he could find, asked children if they had seen Ken. Ken seemed as elusive as the mythological Santa Claus. He went into churches, every church and he prayed, rustily at first because he had not done it for so long, but the prayers didn't seem to have any answers.
By midnight on Christmas Eve he had walked all the way to the opera house not caring about the cold or the snow. There was a performance of Handel's Messiah scheduled.
He wandered through the crowds until everyone had gone inside. He dug into his pockets and dropped coins and bills into every dented and rusty tin can along the way.
The snow began to fall harder and faster. He stuffed a hundred dollar bill into an old dented tin can sitting by a crippled old man dressed in too- thin clothes, shivering. Brad paused and said: "The storm is going to hit sometime soon. Do you have anywhere to go?"
"I have a small apartment I share with others in Grand Street east of the Bowery." The old man tried to get up, reaching for his crutches but his hands gave way, too cold from the elements to move easily. He didn't have any gloves.
Brad helped him up then bent down to give the man the tin can. He turned and hailed a cab with a sharp gesture.
He opened the door. "I've paid the driver to take you home," He told the man as he helped him inside. He stared for a moment, looking into creased eyes that showed every hard year he lived. Without a thought, Brad pulled off his expensive leather gloves and placed them into the man's hands, closing the bent, stiff aged fingers around them. "Merry Christmas," he said, then closed the door.
For the longest time he just stood there and watched the taxi disappear down the snowy street. Then he turned and stuck his freezing hands into his coat pockets, and walked towards home, his mind returning to the ache of loss and emptiness.
He passed a Salvation Army bell ringer near the corner and automatically reached into his pants pockets. He found nothing.
He had used up the last of his money for the cab.
He started to walk on but stopped and took off his gold Rolex. He looked at it for a moment as the diamonds sparkled at him.
Time didn't matter to him anymore. Without Ken, nothing seemed to matter.
He walked back and tossed the watch into the collection bucket, then he turned and walked away.
He realized with a sudden sense of panic that the man had stopped ringing the bell. He froze, his shoulders turned inwards against the cold in his heart more than the cold outside. "Don't stop ringing that bell. Please. Keep ringing, because…" His voice dropped into a tight whisper and he stared in a place that was faraway from the present. "Every time a bell rings…"
"An angel gets its wings." The bell ringer finished for him.
"Ken?" His head shot up in disbelief. He spun around then reached out and pushed back the cap that had obscured the bell ringer's features. He found soft brown eyes dancing with lights. "Ken!"
"Brad…"
And Ken was in his arms.
"God, Ken. Its really you!" He held Ken so tightly that the younger man looked to be running out of air but he didn't want to let go…the fear that Ken might disappear again foremost in his mind.
"Let go a little Brad!" Ken laughed breathlessly.
"No."
"I'm here now. I'm here." Ken must have read the look on his face because Ken said, "And I'll never leave you again. It's for a lifetime."
Only then did Brad let go enough to let the younger man breath. "I thought I lost you." He held Ken's face so tenderly in his hands, like Ken was made of fragile glass. "I've searched everywhere, every place we've been…"
/And all the places in between too…/ Schuldich's tired thought butted in.
/Stay out of this Schuldich./
/I just dropped in to tell the kitten how happy we are that he's around. Now maybe we can have our unflappable non-neurotic leader back, hmmnnn?/
Ken laughed. Brad scowled and shoved at Schuldich. /Shut up Schuldich. Now leave us alone./
/Alright, alright. See you back home then lovebirds./
Brad snorted once. "Trust Schuldich to spoil something special." He looked back at Ken whose eyes remained lambent under his gaze.
"I have missed you, Brad."
Brad's hands went back to cup Ken's face, his piercing eyes staring at the brunette as if he intended to memorize every line and feature on Ken's face. "Nothing matters without you. I have given away more money than I have ever had before…and I will keep on doing it again if you will always stay by me. You are everything."
A tear slid down Ken's cheek and Brad's arms went around Ken again. He held Ken so damn tightly and Ken heard his whisper: "My angel."
Ken disengaged himself from Brad and put fingers to his lips, tracing the contours. "Brad?" He said wonderingly. "Your angel?"
"My fallen angel. You've come home to me."
Ken smiled up at him then fixed an odd look up at the Heaven. Ken winked then he looked back at Brad, a smile on his face only for the bespectacled man who looked at him with such love in his eyes. He leaned back into Brad's arms. "Maybe, just maybe Brad…all you had to do was whistle."
***
Somewhere near Ken three angels looked on the happiness of the couple…
"Waiii! That was so romantic!" Omi bounced up and down.
"Yes, it was." Youji said, grinning a satisfied grin. "I'm glad St. Peter and the Heavenly Father relented." Youji looked at the dominion, strangely silent behind him, a little bit of worry in his tone. "Ran? How do you feel about this?"
Purple eyes turned from the scene. "Just let that bastard make Ken cry even once and I swear I will chop him to pieces."
In violet depths Youji could see a little hurt inside for what had transpired but more than that was the acceptance of what had to be.
Ran's unrequited love would not fester in his spirit and lead to his downfall, instead he would let it go free to seek its fortune where it will. And he would go on.
***
Sometimes, when there are raised voices in the Schwarz household, particularly when Ken is near tears, a cold wind would blow into the hall and Bradley Crawford would suddenly feel the pain of a thousand needles jabbing into his head.
On these times he would feel the heat of a glare on the back of his head and a forbidding air enters the room. These are the times he knows he has to apologize and coddle his Ken or the pain and discomfort would never stop until he did so.
On these times, when the air around Brad would suddenly grow cold, Nagi, youngest member of Schwarz, would feel a relative warming in the air around him and an itch near his cheek and neck, as if something was wrapped around him and stealing small kisses down his cheek.
Strange occurrences happened in the Crawford household but whatever else was said, it was generally accepted (mainly because of Ken's proddings and insistence) that angels were the root of it all. The members of Schwarz, jaded and world-wise, disagreed of course but they did so privately or risk the wrath of Brad's glaring eyes.
And finally all was right with the world.
~OWARI~
Is it a nice ending do you think? Not too sappy? I know Brad's OOC but darn if I didn't love the original ending so much I wanted to copy it. ^^ Except Barnett never had such fun angels like Ran to play with. ^^ Poor Nagi, forever having a chibi Angel!Omi on his neck. I'm evil! ^^
Many Thanks go out to the following artists who drew me pretty piccies: Lilas-chan, Aryn, Belle, Lily, Eeyore, Lily Riyume and Erijka… Thanks also to everyone who commented and stayed with the fic. ^_______^ Its finally finished now you guys can breath ne? ne?
Email: swythangel@hotmail.com
Title: Heaven in Your Arms
Type: 9/9 WAFF
Teaser: Happiness is relative just as heaven is. An angel finds out that heaven is more than just a place upstairs as he falls to Earth.
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers:
Warnings: Shonen Ai, Yaoi, definitely absolutely AU
Disclaimer: Weiß Kreuz is not mine…they're Koyasu Takehito's, Project Weiß, Kyoko Tsuchiya and whoever else ^-^ "Daniel and the Angel" is an anthology by Jill Barnett in the book "A Holiday of Love". Its not mine, the idea is certainly not mine. I'm just adapting it to fit my twisted sense of storytelling.
Keywords/Pairings: BradKen
The Last! At last at last! And none too soon too…I feel like writing a LOTR Aragorn/Legolas fic and a Hikaru No Go fic. You guys don't know how much I want to…its call is like the gull's cries urging Legolas to the sea… *sweatdrops at glares* Ok, so its only after I finish Gott that is ^^
See me finished in 9! I did didn't I? *proud look*
Heaven in Your Arms
Part 9/9
Somewhere in the distance a church bell rang and woke him up. He reached out to his side, hands ready to clasp at a warm hand only to touch cool sheets…the bed was empty.
He assumed that Ken was in the bathroom though he could hear no sounds to indicate it. He wanted to go to Ken but thought that he needed some privacy so instead he waited for the younger man to go to him. Brad locked hands behind his head and stared up at the canopy with contentment.
/One night would not be enough./
Brad had never thought of marriage for himself other than the fact that he needed an heir to leave his fortune to. But as he lay down, knowing how much he wanted Ken with him for a lifetime he quickly threw any idea of marrying out of his mind. No woman could ever compare to Ken and the contentment he felt when he was with Ken.
He smiled and closed his eyes as he waited for Ken to come back to bed.
Hours after, his eyes opened. He didn't know how long he slept but Ken was nowhere around. A gnawing, fearful feeling settled over him.
Brad threw back the covers and stood up, then looked in the dressing room. The bathroom was open, the room dark.
His stomach turned over.
He rushed inside, stepping around baskets of sleeping puppies, kittens and rabbits. Ken wasn't there.
"Ken?" Brad called out, rushing back into the bedroom. Silence, like a cold invisible mist, settled heavily down on him, broken only for seconds by a sleepy meow and puppy whimpers.
Unable to stop the growing dread in his heart he shouted, "Ken!", putting on his clothes as he did so. With frenzied panic, he burst out of the gold bedroom and ran down the hall, only stopping when he was at the top of the stairs. "Ken!!" he yelled once again, Ken's name echoing through the gallery like a mocking counterpoint to his shout.
/Gott! What are you looking for in the middle of the night, Mein Herr Leader?/ Schuldich's sleepy thought butted in.
Brad didn't even deign to answer as he strode through his house on hell- sped feet, looking, searching, hoping…all the time unconsciously murmuring one name.
Ken.
***
Schuldich eventually pieced everything together from Brad's panic filled mind and flung his searching thoughts out through the house for the thought patterns that would identify the naïve brunette to him.
He found nothing.
He widened his search to the whole city, exhausting his energy to do so but he did so in vain. In the whole miasma of teeming humanity in New York City not a sliver of thought remained of the young man they had known as Ken. It was as if the brunette had never even existed.
"Now how to tell Crawford?" Schuldich mumbled to himself, ensconced in his warm bed. Green eyes flickered, disturbed beyond measure of how Schwarz' leader would take this bit of news. Surely it would do no less than destroy the leader who, Schuldich knew, had fallen for the young man in so short a time.
He wished he wasn't the one to give the news. Much as he might enjoy torturing and teasing those around him, he was not as sadistic as some would like to think. And to be the bearer of such ill tidings…
"There is no helping it." He reached out with his thoughts…
***
/Ken is not in New York City./ Quick, to the point and honest, the thought was like a sword thrust through the financier's chest, but one he had been expecting. Even before he had began his search he had known that Ken would not have answered him. In his heart, he knew…because the remarkable feeling inside him, the one that had been there since he had met Ken, was gone.
As quickly as if God had snapped His fingers. It was gone.
He stared at his hands, white knuckled as they gripped the edges of his table inside his sanctum where he had finally stopped his search, then he sagged down onto his chair and didn't move for the longest time.
Everything that he was, every laugh, every smile, every happiness he had ever experienced seem to drain away until he felt as if he were hollow inside, empty…bereft.
He rested his head into his hands and took a couple of deep breaths.
"Ken…"
He said Ken's name one last time. It was barely a whisper.
***
"For the last time Takatori, forget about the release!" Brad cut through the middle of the senator's prattle with a cold glare. "I have other things to see to least of all that. Get it into your head. I. Do. Not. Care. Fuck the release!" He stormed out, finally breaking the icy cold façade he had been maintaining since that night. In his voice anger and desperation could be heard.
A fact that made the members of Schwarz release a breath of relief simultaneously. They were of like mind that bottling it up would only make the Schwarz leader more brittle than he already was.
And who could blame him? Time was going by. A whole day.
Brad couldn't find Ken. No one could find him not even Schwarz. There was no trace of him anywhere, anywhere that money, power and extraordinary perception could look for. No one had even seen Ken leave. It was as if he had never existed…
"I fervently hope that he would actually come back and sue the hell out of me." Brad continued as he turned his back on Takatori, to stare out the window. "At least then I would know where he is."
Takatori rose from his chair, picked up the brief case he had brought with him and snapped it close. He stood there for an awkward moment, staring at the man he had thought he had pegged as a cold bastard in an agony of uncertainty and felt pity. "I'm sorry, Crawford."
Brad didn't respond and minutes later the door clicked closed. A dull roar of an engine and Brad saw Takatori's limo pull away from his driveway.
Crawford just sat there staring at the falling snow. As he relived memories of a naïve young man… Ken standing under a tree with a pile of snow on him, so much that he looked like a snowman…Ken's face looking up at him, velvet brown eyes sparkling, the crinkle in his nose as he scrunched it up whenever Ken couldn't understand something.
He remembered the mistletoe Schuldich had strategically placed. A sweet kiss. Christmas greens. The cornhusk angel atop a tree. And another angel, the only angel he had ever known.
He stood up suddenly, startling Nagi, Farfarello and Schuldich who looked at him simultaneously from their different locations in the room. He ignored them as he made his way to the hall and up the stairs. When he reached ken's bedroom, his hand paused on the door knob. He didn't quite understand it but some illogical hope kindled. Maybe, just maybe Ken would be there…
He opened the door.
And his hope died. Ken wasn't inside.
He stepped into the room because he had to, then closed and locked the door.
Puppies, kittens and rabbits greeted him but he ignored them, his gaze fixated on the bed to the piece of cloth that still lay, seemingly forgotten, on the bed…right where Ken had lain only hours before…Hours before, when his world had seemed to be perfect. When he had thought that everything would finally be different from his life before…when he had thought that love had finally been his.
Now there was just his silk shirt, nothing more. He reached out and touched it hesitantly, almost thinking that it would disappear too, the way Ken had…
But it didn't disappear. He picked it up, the silk smooth and cool to his touch, and sat down on the bed. He stared at the shirt.
Ken's scent was there with him. A piquant touch of lemon. Real.
But Ken wasn't.
A puppy jumped into his lap, then another and another. One of them was chewing on something and he gently took it from its mouth. It was the earring. Ken's earring. His hand closed tightly on it as if by doing so he could bring Ken home to him.
/Fly home to me, my angel./
The kittens crawled up the chair and the rabbits chewed on his shoelaces. He looked at them and hen at the earring, then at the silk shirt he clutched in his hands.
A moment later he buried his face in the shirt and amazingly, for the first time in a very long while, Bradley Crawford, allowed himself to cry.
***
"Ken's watching him. Constantly he watches him."
Saint Peter stopped pacing and looked at Omi. "Has he stopped crying?"
Ran answered for Omi. "No, sir." His voice was tight with tension and his glance ever did stray on the angel who knelt at a cloud's edge looking down on the world below them.
"Been like that since he came here." Youji chimed in mournfully. His intuition had been correct. Their friend had gone and fallen in love with the financier. But Youji wasn't happy to be right.
St. Peter sighed then moved across the clouds with the three angels floating in his wake, whispering to themselves.
"I would like to take a swing at that financier with my sword." Ran muttered rather wrathfully, swinging his arms like he was actually doing so.
Youji swatted his arms away and rolled his eyes. "Like it was his fault in the first place?"
"But its his fault!"
"Ran-kun, you can't make anybody fall in love with anyone else by force-"
"Who said Ken was in love with him?" The red haired dominion said stiffly, causing the two blond angels to exchange rueful glances. They ignored the dominion, knowing full well that Ran would never listen to reason.
St. Peter on the other hand continued walking until he stood near where Ken knelt clutching at the rim of a cloud with white knuckled hands and peering intently over the edge. So intently that he didn't even notice the Guardian of the Gates' presence.
St. Peter though noticed everything about the angel. He noticed how Ken's halo had no glow and how Ken's wings seemed to droop downwards like a flower whose petals had been badly bruised. He cleared his throat.
Ken raised his head and looked up at St. Peter with swollen eyes, the tears he couldn't stop were mute testimony of his pain. "He's at the park, calling my name." He told the venerable angel.
St. Peter looked down. "So I see."
Ken bit his lip and watched Brad whose head was bent. Brad's hands were shoved in his coat pockets and snow fell all around him as he walked with leaden steps from the park. "He's alone and lost. Can't I help him? Can't you or someone else help him? He's lost everyone."
"Some people have a harder road to travel, Ken."
Ken looked up at St. Peter. "I never really knew what heaven was until I found Brad."
A smothered sniffle issued from behind and St. Peter looked at Omi who was unable to hold back the tears himself. Youji comforted the younger angel…then St. Peter felt the pressure of a weighted gaze on him so he turned to meet purple eyes. Eyes filled with determination and realization. Eyes that conveyed one thought, pure and sacrificing, a thought befitting a dominion in the Lord's service.
/Give him a chance to find love for himself. Please ask Our Father in our behalf. I will bear what burden would result. Just…just let him go back to …the human./
St. Peter shook his head at Ran. /It is not our place to question the wisdom of Our Father, dominion. But do not worry, Our father in His infinite wisdom always has a plan. Now go and take the others with you. I will deal with Ken./
Ran bowed and quietly ushered the two away. When the others were gone, St. Peter turned back to Ken to find Ken's shoulders shaking. The poor angel was also hiccuping as he looked downward. "He's at the church now, praying. Hear him?" Ken paused. "I can hear him."
Saint Peter sat down on the rim of the cloud as he looked down on the world below. He turned his gaze to one man in particular--a dark and empty shape of a man.
St. Peter was quiet, then he looked at Ken for the longest time. After an eternal minute, he cleared his throat and said in a gruff voice, "So, Ken. Tell me about your young man."
***
Brad had searched everywhere. Over sideways and under, every person who had ever talked to Ken in New York, every place he had gone to, not a stone had been left unturned. And when NYC couldn't give the answer, Brad turned his formidable will, wealth and influence towards other states, other countries…there was no place where Schwarz couldn't get into.
The results?
Nothing. It was as if Ken had never existed in the United States or even in the world…
Every day Brad would sit down on the bench on the park, wanting to see Ken running in the snow, his hat flying behind him, wishing to hear the laughter. All he found was the world moving on without him.
He felt like he had always felt before, like a stranger looking into a world where he did not fit in, unwanted, lost…not even the presence of Schuldich, Farfarello and Nagi which had always been a small balm to his loneliness before soothed the ache inside.
He scoured the Washington Market, rung every bell he could find, asked children if they had seen Ken. Ken seemed as elusive as the mythological Santa Claus. He went into churches, every church and he prayed, rustily at first because he had not done it for so long, but the prayers didn't seem to have any answers.
By midnight on Christmas Eve he had walked all the way to the opera house not caring about the cold or the snow. There was a performance of Handel's Messiah scheduled.
He wandered through the crowds until everyone had gone inside. He dug into his pockets and dropped coins and bills into every dented and rusty tin can along the way.
The snow began to fall harder and faster. He stuffed a hundred dollar bill into an old dented tin can sitting by a crippled old man dressed in too- thin clothes, shivering. Brad paused and said: "The storm is going to hit sometime soon. Do you have anywhere to go?"
"I have a small apartment I share with others in Grand Street east of the Bowery." The old man tried to get up, reaching for his crutches but his hands gave way, too cold from the elements to move easily. He didn't have any gloves.
Brad helped him up then bent down to give the man the tin can. He turned and hailed a cab with a sharp gesture.
He opened the door. "I've paid the driver to take you home," He told the man as he helped him inside. He stared for a moment, looking into creased eyes that showed every hard year he lived. Without a thought, Brad pulled off his expensive leather gloves and placed them into the man's hands, closing the bent, stiff aged fingers around them. "Merry Christmas," he said, then closed the door.
For the longest time he just stood there and watched the taxi disappear down the snowy street. Then he turned and stuck his freezing hands into his coat pockets, and walked towards home, his mind returning to the ache of loss and emptiness.
He passed a Salvation Army bell ringer near the corner and automatically reached into his pants pockets. He found nothing.
He had used up the last of his money for the cab.
He started to walk on but stopped and took off his gold Rolex. He looked at it for a moment as the diamonds sparkled at him.
Time didn't matter to him anymore. Without Ken, nothing seemed to matter.
He walked back and tossed the watch into the collection bucket, then he turned and walked away.
He realized with a sudden sense of panic that the man had stopped ringing the bell. He froze, his shoulders turned inwards against the cold in his heart more than the cold outside. "Don't stop ringing that bell. Please. Keep ringing, because…" His voice dropped into a tight whisper and he stared in a place that was faraway from the present. "Every time a bell rings…"
"An angel gets its wings." The bell ringer finished for him.
"Ken?" His head shot up in disbelief. He spun around then reached out and pushed back the cap that had obscured the bell ringer's features. He found soft brown eyes dancing with lights. "Ken!"
"Brad…"
And Ken was in his arms.
"God, Ken. Its really you!" He held Ken so tightly that the younger man looked to be running out of air but he didn't want to let go…the fear that Ken might disappear again foremost in his mind.
"Let go a little Brad!" Ken laughed breathlessly.
"No."
"I'm here now. I'm here." Ken must have read the look on his face because Ken said, "And I'll never leave you again. It's for a lifetime."
Only then did Brad let go enough to let the younger man breath. "I thought I lost you." He held Ken's face so tenderly in his hands, like Ken was made of fragile glass. "I've searched everywhere, every place we've been…"
/And all the places in between too…/ Schuldich's tired thought butted in.
/Stay out of this Schuldich./
/I just dropped in to tell the kitten how happy we are that he's around. Now maybe we can have our unflappable non-neurotic leader back, hmmnnn?/
Ken laughed. Brad scowled and shoved at Schuldich. /Shut up Schuldich. Now leave us alone./
/Alright, alright. See you back home then lovebirds./
Brad snorted once. "Trust Schuldich to spoil something special." He looked back at Ken whose eyes remained lambent under his gaze.
"I have missed you, Brad."
Brad's hands went back to cup Ken's face, his piercing eyes staring at the brunette as if he intended to memorize every line and feature on Ken's face. "Nothing matters without you. I have given away more money than I have ever had before…and I will keep on doing it again if you will always stay by me. You are everything."
A tear slid down Ken's cheek and Brad's arms went around Ken again. He held Ken so damn tightly and Ken heard his whisper: "My angel."
Ken disengaged himself from Brad and put fingers to his lips, tracing the contours. "Brad?" He said wonderingly. "Your angel?"
"My fallen angel. You've come home to me."
Ken smiled up at him then fixed an odd look up at the Heaven. Ken winked then he looked back at Brad, a smile on his face only for the bespectacled man who looked at him with such love in his eyes. He leaned back into Brad's arms. "Maybe, just maybe Brad…all you had to do was whistle."
***
Somewhere near Ken three angels looked on the happiness of the couple…
"Waiii! That was so romantic!" Omi bounced up and down.
"Yes, it was." Youji said, grinning a satisfied grin. "I'm glad St. Peter and the Heavenly Father relented." Youji looked at the dominion, strangely silent behind him, a little bit of worry in his tone. "Ran? How do you feel about this?"
Purple eyes turned from the scene. "Just let that bastard make Ken cry even once and I swear I will chop him to pieces."
In violet depths Youji could see a little hurt inside for what had transpired but more than that was the acceptance of what had to be.
Ran's unrequited love would not fester in his spirit and lead to his downfall, instead he would let it go free to seek its fortune where it will. And he would go on.
***
Sometimes, when there are raised voices in the Schwarz household, particularly when Ken is near tears, a cold wind would blow into the hall and Bradley Crawford would suddenly feel the pain of a thousand needles jabbing into his head.
On these times he would feel the heat of a glare on the back of his head and a forbidding air enters the room. These are the times he knows he has to apologize and coddle his Ken or the pain and discomfort would never stop until he did so.
On these times, when the air around Brad would suddenly grow cold, Nagi, youngest member of Schwarz, would feel a relative warming in the air around him and an itch near his cheek and neck, as if something was wrapped around him and stealing small kisses down his cheek.
Strange occurrences happened in the Crawford household but whatever else was said, it was generally accepted (mainly because of Ken's proddings and insistence) that angels were the root of it all. The members of Schwarz, jaded and world-wise, disagreed of course but they did so privately or risk the wrath of Brad's glaring eyes.
And finally all was right with the world.
~OWARI~
Is it a nice ending do you think? Not too sappy? I know Brad's OOC but darn if I didn't love the original ending so much I wanted to copy it. ^^ Except Barnett never had such fun angels like Ran to play with. ^^ Poor Nagi, forever having a chibi Angel!Omi on his neck. I'm evil! ^^
Many Thanks go out to the following artists who drew me pretty piccies: Lilas-chan, Aryn, Belle, Lily, Eeyore, Lily Riyume and Erijka… Thanks also to everyone who commented and stayed with the fic. ^_______^ Its finally finished now you guys can breath ne? ne?