ryuki 100 fluff challenge.
theme 10. double edged sword.
"Ruki," he says, his nose hidden in the deep darkness of a pot of boiling water, "can you at least tell me why?"
"Pass the salt."
His face remains in the pot, away from her tearing eyes. "Ruki. I need to know."
"You're going to poison the soup with your breath."
"Ruki, please."
"Why do you need to know, Ryou?" She picks up an onion, mercilessly chops it into paper thin slices with her sharp knife. "I'm not changing my mind. It's not going to make a difference at all."
"Please, Ruki. Humor me."
Beggars drop dignity for things they really, truly want- you can't be truly proud and scrape the floor at the same time. It is impossible to say that Akiyama Ryou hasn't gone to great lengths for her. He's saved her from death. He's gone on bended knee. Akiyama Ryou has sang, has danced, and has done it all to charm his way into getting everything from free lemonade to a discounted sports car. But these things are trivial, light jokes that he makes- the outcomes don't matter. He floats above it all, a puppet master hidden inside the laughing, joking blue-eyed puppet. His dignity is never really gone.
"Who said I ever loved you in the first place?" Her words, she knows, are unnecessarily harsh. But they leap out of her before she can stop them. And strangely enough, she's unrepentant, savoring the cruelty as she buries whatever's left of her heart with each blunt stab of her tongue. If she does this right, he'll live with his dignity intact, she'll leave with her heart gone. They'll stay standing after it all falls down.
"Then why did you put up with me? Didn't you ever love me? Even just a little bit?"
He raises his face from the boiling water to look at her. She can see him struggle to keep things light, to keep things consequence-free. He has always been too proud to beg, even when it kills him. For a moment, she wants to take it all back, to abandon stupid loyalty and character for heart and hormones. She chops faster, concentrating on everything else, anything else. It's just stupid chemicals, she knows. In the end, whatever "love" she had was just hormones. Chemicals that blind an eye and send illusions of things that aren't really there into whatever your "heart" is. It was simple biology- hormones neatly packaged and delivered from neurotransmitter to neurotransmitter via the brain's electricity. Love is nothing but microscopic bits of fluid, the heart a bundle of squished, wrinkled matter. Whatever she's saying, she tells herself, is simply going to affect the tiny bits of chemicals in his brain, probably only for a month or two. Eventually, they'll settle and he'll be floating in happiness again. For Ryou at least, things will end happily.They always do, in the end.
Ruki has never been good at lying to herself.
Telling him will end this all, severe it, and let them continue on with their now-fairytale lives. She knows this; it's a fact that she's established and accepted in her life. No more shaking, no shivering, no tripping up after making it so far. What she does today will smooth things over, and life will continue on as it should. They'll get the normal, happy lives that they've always wanted. Ruki takes a deep breath, pretending to take a break from the onions, and plunges into murder.
"I asked you to pass the salt, you know."
"Forget the stupid salt!"
She flinches, and he continues, more quietly. "I need to know. Tell me, Ruki, please."
He's still standing, his back is rigid, his mouth tight. But his eyes are begging her, and seeing this, Ruki wants to start life over, press reset, and change everything for him. She knows that what she's being completely unreasonable, but in the end, when all the trivial things are pushed aside, she's never turned down any of his requests. She doesn't follow him like some obedient pet- she's never come close to that, and never will- but really, truly, when he asks her, in some odd, round about and grumbling way, Ruki will answer him.
Until now.
Her nose settles on a distraction. The scent of onions and the heat of boiling waters is all she feels, all she smells, the only pain that she has right now is the smell that makes her eyes water. That's all, that's all, that's all. She has to do this, she knows. If she doesn't finish it off before it gets too late, she'll never be able to do it again.
She remembers something Jeri told her once, a long time ago. You always hurt the one you love, for their own good. And that's what she's doing now- she's justified. This is for his good. She stares back at him, freezing her eyes into cold, empty holes. If they're leaking now, it's the onions that are causing the icebergs she's conjured in place of her eyes to melt. Nothing else.
"I prefer not to, Akiyama Ryou."
"Did you do all of that for nothing, Ruki? I seriously thought—"
She turns away. Her hands are blurs now, mixing with onions and steel. There is no answer to his question, simply purple eyes turning red around the corners. She tells herself its because she's being cruel, shutting him out. That maybe she never really did love him enough to put him above everyone else's. That things are better off as they're going to be. Her dwindling honest streak prods her, but it too is buried with the rest of her guilt. Today, Ruki is merciless, slicing him down with her double edged sword, ignoring any of her own heart's blood spilling out in her attack.
"Oh really?"
He blurts it out. " I thought it would be you, okay? I seriously thought that I had found the one. For once."
She slides the onions into the pot, and the water hisses angrily. "And yet you're engaged. And I'm married. So I wasn't the one after all."
"Ruki, all I'm asking—"
"Hand me the wine."
Heavens knows she needs it. Maybe the soup doesn't, but she pours a generous amount of it into the pot anyways, wrinkling her nose at the thick, bitter smell. If she stays unattached, calm, unmoved, then she will be unaffected. And anyways, eventually, it'll all be over with and she can cry over it when no one's watching, when the happy endings of her friends' lives are secured.
"—did you ever love me, Ruki?"
She picks up another onion, and begins chopping once more. To tell the truth or to not tell the truth? The answer is obvious. She's going to lie. For her sake, for her husband' sake, for Ryou's sake- for the whole friggin world. She tells herself that it's for the best. One sacrifice for a hundred happy lives seems like a fair enough trade.
"No."
And after this, it's all down hill.
Ryou smiles, playing it off. "Well, that really helped my self esteem. I'll send my therapy bills to you, pumpkin."
"Your fiance's a therapist, Ryou. Get an employee discount or something."
Life will be dull. But maybe dull is the answer to some form of stable happiness. Dull will last, dull won't change. And in the stability, there will be some sort of happy ever after that will somehow work out and last, one that won't hurt a hundred other people for the sake of two. She can tell he'll be content, eventually. His fiancé? Overjoyed. The drama that has built up over all these soap opera triangles will finally die off, and the curtain will close.
For a moment, all she wants is to have everyone else in the world die so she can go do whatever she wants to. No duties, no conscience, nothing. But coming to her senses, Ruki laughs at this ridiculous piece of greed, and out of habit, Ryou laughs as well. And for a moment, everything is a bit closer to being okay.
"You're not crying, are you?" His stupid concern and his stupid caring and his stupid habit of hanging on are all making this infinitely harder. "Ruki—"
"Of course not. It's the onions." She concentrates on stirring the soup. "I never cry."
"Of course. I forgot."
Life goes on. No one dies of heartbreak, and if people cry, they don't admit it. There is no eternal misery or constant heartbreak. Soup is served, people go home laughing, and slowly, the curtain closes with a rusty sigh on the what could have been that is no longer there.
Ruki and Ryou have a happily ever after.
It's just not the ending that they hoped it would be.
-sorry sorry liahime.
liahime actually really truly has about seven chapters waiting in the wings. And they're all about 90 percent done. I just can't write the stupid endings! (There's always some stupid problem with each one- like this garbage ending. I'll try to hurry though. I'm so far from a hundred.. ack.. ) I was experimenting with this new style with this shot, and I completely totally failed. As normal. I'm probably going back to my old style instead of this choppy fragment thing… it's not working out for me at all. It's too much like my own thinking process, and then I get all depressed, and then I have to go watch corny old cartoons.
Anyways. Moving on…
readers, feel free to chip in with ideas whenever. I need truckloads of inspiration please? I love you all for reviewing, and I'll try to get a big fat reply page up ASAP.
-liahime.