Kin no Shuichi
Written by: Chochowilliams
Disclaimer: I do not own Gravitation or the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.
Summary: Things were good. Or so Shuichi thought, but one mistake by Eiri could throw everything they've worked so hard for out the window.
Chapter Summary: Shuichi is fed up with the way Eiri has been treating him and lets his feelings now.
Warning: M/M, romance, angst, OOC-ness, language, Shuichi/Eiri, implied Eiri/oc, implied Shuichi/oc
Insert: "Slip Into My Skin"
A/N: Thank you to Sammy, Miyabi-Elegance, lilgurlanima, Acherona, Kaoru Sayuri Kamiya, for your reviews. I always love hearing from you guys.
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Chapter 10: Slip Into My Skin
One Month Later
To most people, Eiri Yuki was an ideal candidate to be the perfect husband. Most people would be wrong. That is nothing more than the ideological view from admirable fans who know absolutely nothing about the man behind the mask. All they know is what they see. Or what they want to see. There is more to Eiri Yuki then his stunning beauty and incredible talent. But most people don't care about the truth. All they care about is what they perceive to be the truth. Their version of reality is all that matters. Anything less goes against the natural order of things.
Nora Roberts. JD Robb. Nicholas Sparks. Jane Austen. Georgette Heyer. These are only a few of the great romance authors who compose a novel that provides an escape from reality for the reader. She is transported into the story and becomes the damsel in distress, going through the trials and tribulations and anxiously waits for Prince Charming to come and rescue her and take her away from all her troubles to a place where together the two of them can live happily ever after. Fans of romance novels often assume that just because the authors create such believable tales of romance and love and angst a couple must dig through in order to be together at the end to live that "happily ever after" that we all strive for in life that the authors themselves were just as romantic. I don't know about other writers, but when it comes to Eiri Yuki, people would be wrong.
My Yuki is the least romantic person in the whole universe. He would not know what "romance" meant if a dictionary slapped him upside the head. Well, okay, maybe I'm exaggerating just a tad. Yuki can be very sweet when he wants to be. A romantic he is deep inside. Way deep down inside. As in at the bottom of a bottomless pit deep inside. The problem with Yuki is that he holds a tremendous amount of fear inside of him. This fear keeps him from expressing all that love and romance that most people believe he to be brimming to the fingertips with.
I understand that. I really do. All too well. Being with Eiri Yuki, one has to be willing to make concessions. Sacrifices have to be made. While I know that he loves me, I can count on one hand how many times I've heard him say, "suki dayo" to me and could still make a fist to knock you out. Because of this deeply rooted fear that was born within him out of a horrendous past, Yuki might never be able to say those magical words to me. But I could live with that. Because I know without any acknowledgement from him just what I mean to him and how he feels about me. Anyone can say, "I love you", but how many of those people can claim they know what it actually means?
I love Eiri Yuki. I love him to death. Always have. Always will. I love his choppy layered dirty blond hair as soft as silk. His cold, piercing hazel eyes golden like the sun. His androgynous face that in sleep resembles an angel and a vicious heartless demonic devil when awake. His finely chiseled cheekbones and sharp jaw. I love the sight of the bright, glowing moon shinning in the midnight sky above his wide rounded shoulder, the taste of tobacco on his lips and the woodsy smell of smoke that clings to him like cologne. I love the heaviness of all 74 kilograms of him pressing down upon me. His hot breath caressing my cheek. His words whispering sweetly in my ear. That low din he makes as he thrusts inside of me over and over and I especially love that beautiful smile that only I get to see. Even those times when he is mean and nasty. When he pushes me away and turns cold. As those sweet nothings he whispers in my ear turn into frozen daggers that pierce my heart one by one, I still love him. When our gentle love making turns into a brutal, bloody massacre, I still love him. Because as demonic as he can be, those times when he shows those fluffy white angel wings and golden halo are becoming more and more frequent. Those times that used to be as few and far in-between as a blue moon, I cherish.
Life with Yuki is becoming more bearable. I suffer less from my bouts of depression and my separation anxiety has all but vanished. But at the beginning, it was not like that. It was so unbelievably difficult, but despite the hardships, I stayed with him because I loved him.
I love him.
No matter who is besides him. No matter who he brings to his bed. I am the only one in his heart. The only one in his eyes. I am the one he loves. The one to have, to hold, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, for better or worse, till death do us part.
But just once I would love for him to slip into my skin. To be able to spend one day in this world, in this relationship in my shoes. Sometimes, I don't think he gets it. I try and try to explain what his constant yo-yoing emotions do to me, but he always brushes the words aside as if they were nothing. It could be that he does that out of a deep sense of guilt that he tries desperately to ignore, but sometimes, it is so hard to tell.
And yet I still love him.
But here I sit in my home studio. I'm supposed to be working on this new track for our next CD. "The Power of Love". Supposed to be, being the key phrase. But instead I write. My pen flying over the sheet of notebook paper.
It's been a month since Yuki confessed to me in a poem that he had committed the most grievance of sins. A month since I woke besides someone that was not my 186 centimeter tall husband. Things have been rocky, but are slowly getting better. I love him and he loves me. So for the sake of that love and for our daughter, we are working things out. Things have to work out because I belong to him and he to me. Without the other, we both are not whole. Someone once said that you do not need to be a rotting corpse in the ground to be dead and that certainly pertains to Yuki and me. No doubt. So, in order for the healing to continue between us, Yuki needs to know. He needs to know just what it means to slip into my skin.
Finished, I set my pen down and picked up my notebook. Sitting back in my chair, I read what I just wrote.
I wish you diets that do not work
I wish you endless nights of solitude
Weaving grooves into the floor
I wish you a cold bed
I wish you a worried lip
I wish you anxiety attacks
I wish you unbidden thoughts of doubt
As you listen to the ticking of the clock
I wish you time trapped in quick sand
I wish you a silent partner
I wish you a ceramic figurine
Shattered on the living room floor
I wish you a wash of tears
I wish you a screaming floor
I wish you a groaning door
I wish you rustling sheets
As your lungs begin to burn
I wish you an unstable bed
I wish you a wall of warmth
Enclosing you from behind
I wish you a heavy vice
Strapped around your waist
I wish you a soon
But not a fork
I wish you a promise
As you smile and say my name.
Satisfied, I tore the sheet out of my notebook and pushing the chair away from the desk, strode out of the studio and purposefully down the hall towards Yuki's office.
He looked up from his laptop as I entered. "Shu?" he asked, slipping off his glasses. He looked tired. Not unusual when a deadline was fast approaching.
Without a word, I crossed the room and set the paper before him. Then turning, I exited. Feeling suddenly lighter than air, I skipped down the hall humming.
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Back in the office, Eiri turned his gaze from my retreating form to the paper. Curious, he picked it up and slipped on his glasses. His curiosity turned to confusion as he read the words on the page. His bewilderment soon gave way to realization and became a heavy vice in his chest. All the air expelled out of his lungs as he flopped back in the chair. The poem fluttered out of his hand. A look of torture flickered across his face.
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I was in the living room playing with Sayo when I sensed a sudden presence behind me. When I turned around, there he was. Eiri sat down on the sofa. I stood up from the floor and sat down beside him, leaving our daughter to play with her mass of toys on the pink blanket my parents bought for her. I curled against Eiri's side as he draped an arm around my shoulders.
Together we sat there watching our little Sayo as if hypnotized. For how long? I'm not sure. But then the words I've been so longing to hear filled the silence.
"Sorry."
I smiled.
"And…I love you," he whispered in my ear.
My heart swelled. Beaming, I snuggled deeper into my Yuki.
---TBC---
Preview: "From a Certain Point of View"
A/N: In my poetry class we had to write a response poem. So, I decided to write a response to my "Saru Mo Ki Kara Ochiru" poem. That is the poem from the last chapter, btw. "Slip Into My Skin" I wrote from Shuichi's pov to Eiri. So, what do you think?