Chapter 25: Open and Free

"How is your home life, son?" Shiori Minamino asked her son.

Kurama smiled. "It's fine, Mother. Living with Hiei is much easier than I expected it to be."

"Well that's good. You should really bring him around for dinner some night, dear. Kazuya and Shuuichi still have not met him."

"Yes, I know." the redhead sighed. "Will Father approve?"

"Oh, dear. You know that he already knows."

"Yes. But knowing and approving are two different things."

"Darling, you are almost thirty, and your step father has no control over your life. You have to do what makes you happy."

"You are right of course. I am very happy with Hiei."

Shiori cocked her head. "Do you think…" she trailed off.

Kurama knew what she was going to ask though. "There is no rush, Mother. There is still more exploring to be done between us. We know each other well by now, but…well…I would rather continue on like this than rush into something and ruin what we have."

"That is a wise choice." his mother replied. "I am very proud of you, honey. You've always been so good at making your dreams come true."

Kurama drove back to his and Hiei's home later that night with his head buzzing with thoughts. It was true that he and his lover knew just about everything about each other. They needed no pretenses or subtleties to interact with each other, and it made everything so much easier between them.

He let himself in and smiled at Hiei's twin who was coming out of the kitchen. "Good evening, Yukina."

"Oh hello, Kurama." the woman said softly. "How are you?"

"I am well. Just came back from visiting my mother."

"That's nice. I think Kazuma and I are going to visit mine tomorrow." there was a hint of sadness in Yukina's eyes. "I heard that Hiei took you to see her."

"He did." Kurama answered. "I truly am sorry that you lost her."

The woman shrugged. "It was a long time ago."

"That's exactly was Hiei said." the redhead hesitated, and then decided to meddle. "May I ask you something, Yukina? It's rather personal, so you don't have to answer if you don't want to."

"Sure."

"Are you and Hiei close?"

Yukina was taken aback by the question at first, then she sighed. "In some ways we are, but it's a one sided closeness. He makes it his business to know everything about me, but there are huge parts of his life that I know nothing about."

"That doesn't seem fair."

"No, it doesn't. But I trust Hiei. I'm sure there's some ridiculously noble reason why he's hiding things from me, and I can only hope that one day he'll realize he doesn't have to. May I ask you a question?"

"Please do."

"Does he at least talk to you? I would hate to think that he has all these painful secrets and no one to share them with. He loves you very much, that is apparent."

Kurama nodded. "He's told me some things, as I have told him some things. I don't think we could have made it this far if we didn't divulge some of our secrets to each other."

Yukina smiled sadly. "Well at least he trusts someone." she headed to the door. "I should go. Kazuma is probably hungry, and the last time he tried to cook, the kitchen almost burned down."

"Yes, he is rather useless in the kitchen. Have a good night, Yukina."

"You too, Kurama."

The pale haired woman was almost out the door before Kurama spoke up. "It's not that he doesn't trust you." he murmured. "He's afraid."

Yukina paused for a second, but then closed the door and left. Kurama sighed and made his way upstairs.

The sound of the shower running told him where his boyfriend was, so he stripped out of his clothes and slid on a pair of soft pajama pants. He was in the bed with a book when Hiei emerged.

"Hey." he greeted. "How's your mom?"

"She's fine. She sends her greetings and an invitation to come over for dinner at some point and meet the rest of the family."

Hiei was startled. "I thought there was a reason why I hadn't."

"Not really. My stepfather works a lot and my step brother is rarely home. I was worried about how they would react to us being together for a time, but I no longer care about their opinion on the matter."

"That's good…" the little brunette could tell that there was something on Kurama's mind. He wasn't really focusing on the book in his hands, or on Hiei himself for that matter. Hiei folded his arms and gave his boyfriend a searching look. "Spit it out." he demanded.

"What?"

"We've long since passed the point where you could lie to me about things, Kurama. I can tell there is something you want to say, so spit it out."

The redhead sighed. "You won't like it."

"You breaking up with me?"

Kurama rolled his eyes. "Don't be absurd, Hiei."

"Then what?"

A pause. Then, "I think you should tell Yukina what happened to you."

"No." Hiei replied. "See how easy that was?"

"Hiei, I am very serious. She believes that you don't trust her."

"That's ridiculous."

Kurama raised an eyebrow. "Is it? Think about how much better our relationship got once we stopped hiding things. Things were more free between us. Don't you want that with your sister?"

"I can't tell her. What will she think?"

"No one can know for sure. But she is your twin sister, Hiei."

Hiei glared at him. "I don't need you to tell me that, Kurama."

The gardener glared right back. "It seems like you do. Yukina trusts you so completely, and you repay her with nothing. She's not an idiot, Hiei. She knows you hide things from her, and yet she still trusts you. How can you live with that?"

"You have no right to meddle in this!" Hiei shouted. "This isn't your family, and you don't know what it's like! Just because everything was all free and open in your happy little suburban life doesn't mean it works that way for everyone."

"I know that." Kurama snapped. "What you don't seem to realize is that you are not that same person anymore. You're not the little boy from the foster home, or the teenager who Karasu took advantage of. People love you, and you need to let them in."

"I let you in, and look what you're doing now." Hiei muttered.

Kurama stood up in one swift motion. "I am trying to help you, Hiei. Because Yukina is the sister of the man I love and the wife of one of my best friends, and I can see the pain in her eyes every time you brush her off." the anger tightened his voice. "You claim to hate being alone, but you do everything in your power to keep people out. Not everyone in the world is out to hurt you."

"You can't know that." Hiei whispered.

A pained look filled green eyes. "I know that you are being a coward about this. And that if you continue to doubt the people who love you, you really will end up alone." With that he stalked to the door, letting it slam behind him.

Living in the same house with someone you were fighting with was harder than Hiei thought it would be. If Kurama was sleeping, he couldn't tell, since he was always in bed alone, and the couch never looked slept upon. Every morning for the next three days, Hiei woke up alone to find Kurama had already left for work. The redhead would come home from work, cook dinner, announce it to Hiei, and then disappear out into the yard where he was working on a garden. He stayed out there until Hiei was asleep, and then the whole process repeated the next day. It made Hiei's heart hurt.

On some level he knew that Kurama had been right. He was being a coward. He was terrified that Yukina would be disgusted with him if he told her what had happened. She was so pure and kindhearted. How could she still accept him if she knew how tainted he was?

Kurama still accepts you. Or he did anyway…The little voice in the back of his head reminded him. "Fuck." he swore under his breath. Looking at he clock, he could see it was nearly midnight. He knew that he couldn't go one more night sleeping alone.

Hiei kicked the covers off of him and headed downstairs and outside to where Kurama was sitting next to a bush of bright red flowers.

"Those are nice." he said softly.

Kurama looked up, a little surprised. "Azaleas." he said. "Did you need something?" The little brunette looked away, and the redhead sighed. "Hiei…I'm sorry for some of the things I said. I meant them, but I know they probably hurt you. Maybe I should leave for a while."

"Don't." Hiei said quickly. "Don't leave and…don't apologize. You were right."

"About?"

"Everything. As usual."

"So you're going to tell her?"

"Yes. I don't know when though."

Kurama stood. "Well that's progress at least. And I am sorry for the things I said, Hiei."

The shorter man nodded. "Just…don't leave."

A laugh bubbled out of Kurama, and Hiei marveled at how much he had missed the sound. "I'm not going anywhere, love. So we had a fight. People fight and make up all the time."

"But you said…"

Kurama waved that away. "I thought maybe you wanted me to since we weren't speaking. I would never voluntarily leave you." The two stood in silence for a moment, then Kurama spoke again. "You were right too."

"I was?" Hiei asked incredulously.

The redhead nodded. "Yes. I can't possibly know what it was like to grow up the way you did. I stand by my statement that you aren't that person anymore, but I don't know who you were then; I can only make assumptions based on who you are now. It isn't my place to lecture you."

Hiei was silent at that, and he was trying so hard to keep his face expressionless that Kurama couldn't resist giving him a hug. The swordsman tensed and then relaxed into the hug, bringing his own arms up to wrap around Kurama. He exhaled deeply.

"You still love me then?" Hiei asked, hating how small his voice sounded.

Kurama stared down at him. "Of course I do, Hiei! Love, my love anyway, is not so easily taken away."

"Good." Hiei buried his face in Kurama's shirt. "I missed you."

"I've missed you too. I never really realized how lonely silence is."

"I have." the shorter man whispered. "I realized it long ago."

"Well," Kurama said briskly. "I plan to make it a personal mission to keep you from feeling like that anymore.

A/N: I had originally planned to make this a much bigger fight with screaming and theatrics and all that, but then I realized that it probably would never get that far with these two. Kurama rarely loses his cool, and Hiei isn't that emotional. So this is what we've got. Don't think this is the last spat these two will get into. I love writing their differences in opinion. Up next will be Kurama's lunch with Mukuro.