Sunset
It could have been minutes or days that they spent there, her head on his shoulder, his feet stretched out in the water, slacks rolled up and shirt untucked, looking more gloriously real than he'd ever looked on set. They spoke of memories like people, old friends coming back to visit, pointing out signposts and souveniers from their trip home, rejoicing in every act and word that they savored for the span of a life. She nestled into his side, her arms wrapping around him as the sun started to set and their words finally fell quiet.
The water was painted vibrant reds and oranges by the sun's lengthening rays. Kyoko whispered of the art she saw, a mosaic of autumn breaking and reforming in the rippling waves. Ren was still, suddenly too quiet. His face had lost the light and peace of their kingdom; a darkness stealing across his memories too quickly for her to mistake. This was the same demon of fear that had possessed him after Katsuki's near-miss in street racing.
"Kuon?" she called, her hand reaching up to touch his face. He flinched, his eyes tearing away from the red spreading over their stream. His skin was clammy with sweat.
"I-" he paused, his eyes searching desperately for a place to land. He stood, sliding out from under her, turning his back to the water as if he needed a physical barrier to protect himself. "It's late; I think it's time we go home."
Kyoko shook her head, standing and moving quickly to his side, clasping his hand in hers again. He looked down at her small hands trying to cover his and a smile flickered briefly across his features before dying again. "No," he said softly. "I mean… home." She frowned, then understanding burst across her features.
"America," she said softly.
He nodded. His hand waved behind him, gesturing at the red-tinted water. "This place is so beautiful," he said, his voice sorrowful. "And yet at the slightest touch of red, my mind loses it way straight back…"
"To Rick," she finished for him. She knew how important Rick was to her, and though a part of her raged against him feeling such cruel emotions in their glade, the other side cried out for his rescue. This was a place of rebirth and hope, of losing pain and finding joy. She wrapped herself around him, praying with all of her strength for his freedom.
Softly, carefully, she formed words, each one a plea for his release. "Rick loved you, Kuon. Every word that you've said about him is a testament of your love for him and his for you. You were brothers." She raised his hand, still clasped in hers, to her mouth, kissing his skin gently. A tug, asking him silently to turn. He hesitated, then shifted to face her, her features silhouetted against the blood-red stream. His face crumpled, a small whimper escaping him as he reached for her. She held back just long enough to meet his gaze and show him she was real before allowing him to collapse around her.
"Dream your dreams of him here, Kuon," she said, the words falling like an incantation. "He gave his life for you to live; let him live on in joy and hope, not in fear and mourning."
Kuon stiffened beneath her touch. She waited, ready for him to break and turn, running from it all; hoping he would stay. The silence grew torturous, but she waited, and he breathed. A deep, shuddering breath. He stepped out onto his rock, the one from which he'd leapt high into the air, and stood looking over the water. She moved to stand on the shore beside him, her hand resting on his leg. He spoke then, words starting in a disconnected jumble but swiftly forming and merging to roll out of him like their stream, pouring out the stories of concerts, of late nights, of shared fast food bargain meals and thrift stores and boxing lessons. Of street cars and homework on the floor of his bar, of his bandmates and Tina and the smell of leather. Rick's life was full of noise and kindness, merging into a cacophony as healing as their bubbling brook.
The sun dipped below the horizon as he spoke and she listened, and the water slowly relinquished its vibrant red, shimmering dusky pink, then deep purple, then glistening black speckled with hundreds of diamond stars. Just as slowly and inevitably, his voice started to lull, the stories becoming gentler, merging with a smile, a faint sigh that could have been a laugh, a pause pregnant with hope. When he finally ran out of them, he stood, his back arched gracefully as he stared up at the night sky. He traced a single constellation, then looked down at her, his face aglow with starlight.
A leap and he was flying again, soaring through the air impossibly high, the night sky playing tricks on her until he landed whoosh by her side, rising from the impact with the same unearthly grace she remembered as a child.
His hand was warm and solid on her cheek, a visceral reminder that this was no fairy prince; he was hers, a man, every bit as broken and beaten and triumphantly persevering as she. He brushed her hair out of her face, the mundane move somehow made achingly tender by this moment. The air around them was chill and full of the chatter of a nighttime forest, the sky dark and speckled with the bright stars of a new moon. She could barely see him, but with every nerve alive to his presence, his skin warm on hers, she didn't need to. She knew him, knew his soft cedar and linen smell, knew his graceful fingers and steady hands, his kind eyes with limitless depths, his sweet kisses and soul-healing embraces.
His voice broke the spell he'd cast, only to weave a stronger one.
"Marry me, Kyoko," he said. "Stay with me forever."
She could have sworn the entire brook leapt with her heart as her mind reeled beneath the weight of his words, taking in only the fantastical myths of a forest at night. Was that a fairy beneath the tree, peeking at her, beaming with magical wonder at the words hanging in the air between them? Did the trees themselves suddenly spring to life, their leaves twirling in dance at their joy in who was before her? Surely the stars themselves were winking at her, beckoning her to speak.
He touched her lips, his thumb pressing lightly at the corner of her mouth, reminding her she needed to speak; that the forest and fairies would not do it for her.
"Oh Kuon," she whispered, words failing her. "Yes." His arms swooped around her, crushing her to him, lifting her off the ground to meet him face to face.
'Again," he urged.
"Yes!" She said, laughing as he spun with her, his feet slipping slightly on the stony bank. They laughed, and danced, both of them absolutely certain the forest itself was dancing with them.
"A thousand times yes," she whispered, mostly to herself. "Forever a yes."
