I feel this chapter physically and mentally drained me. Gotta get used writing about feelings again...
Please enjoy~
...
IN THE PREVIOUS CHAPTERS
The dreadful meeting between Squalo and Giordano finally arrives! What wil happen next?
...
The inside of the Ferdinando ristorante practically didn't change at all since those days.
When was the last time Squalo crossed that street to reach that familiar double door? Ten, twenty years ago? More? Yet, the sensation had remained the very same as the first day: brown tiled floor matching the warm colored brick walls sprinkled with sepia photography of customers who had visited the restaurant for almost half a century now (some famous, some completely unknown, it didn't matter to the owner), tables covered with clichéd white and red checkered tablecloths, a heavy smell of lemon, sausage and tomato sauce escaping from the kitchen, and Frank Sinatra's suave voice playing on the speakers.
Even though there were few people in the restaurant, no one seemed to notice when Squalo came in. Nonchalantly, the silverette scanned the other occupants: at his right, a couple sitting by the window bay; at the counter, a businessman drinking a cup of coffee while silently shaking his head to the rhythm of Fly me to the Moon; a noisy bunch of kids, maybe college students, drinking beer at the back of the room, just few meters away from the businessman; and of course, behind the counter, Ferdinando… no, it wasn't him? A massive middle aged man that look like the owner, but younger. The man was busy yelling at someone in the kitchen.
"Che stupido!" The man as yelling at someone in the kitchen, his arms meanwhile making big movements above his head. "Alberto !... A-Alberto! Stop arguing, testa vuota! You're just a dumb brat, yesterday you were still sucking on your mama's titties. Don't talk back to me and just do what I say! No more mistakes this time! Or tomorrow you can look for a new job in the newspaper, got it? I did you a favor because my father was a friend of your father, pace all'anima sua. But if you mix all the orders up one more time, I swear to the Lord…"
The angry Italian man suddenly paused as he finally saw the silver haired man standing by the entrance. His lips stretched into a large smile, all signs of the previous anger gone and forgotten as he slowly walked to the silverette, as though he just saw a ghost. "God, I can't believe it… He said he was waiting for someone, but I didn't know… I didn't think…"
"Voi, long time no see, Giacobbe." Squalo uttered with difficulty as he let the other male hug him tightly against his hairy chest.
"I can't believe it!" Giacobbe was almost weeping. With a huge grin, though, he kept on tapping on the silver haired man's shoulders, hard enough to make the latter scowl. "You were small like this (he had his hand at the level of his knee) when you left! I can't believe it's you!... the old man would be so happy to see you now… Ah! Che diavolo sto facendo? He's been waiting for you, now I remember, come here, boy. He's there, at his usual seat."
"Yeah, I know."
Giacobbe faintly pushed Squalo's back, hinting the silverette to move to his left. The long haired man only had to take two steps to see, well hidden behind a line of ficuses, Vito Girodano, peacefully smiling at the younger man as he paced towards him.
…
Before we go any further and in order for the reader to understand what is going to happen starting from here, and also how everything turned out the way it is, it is crucial that we go back one year ago, back in Namimori, by the end of July.
On a gray, rainy day.
It was some times after his graduation. Hibari Kyoya could recall it very well because back then he was standing at the corner of that street, soaked to the bones (Kusakabe would always carry an umbrella for him). However, he didn't feel like seeking for a shelter. Rather than that, Kyoya was simply standing there under the boughs of a willow tree, soaked, silently, ridiculously staring at the couple across the street.
It was a very creepy situation, even Kyoya could tell.
The couple was kissing – or at least, Kyoya assumed they were, because half of their faces were hidden behind an umbrella. In spite of that, just from the look of that hand that was firmly grabbing a thin chin (they were both men), the brunette could exactly say who those two were.
His chest felt heavy, the blood under his forehead was rushing faster than usual. All along his body, opposing sensations were clashing; he could feel alternatively numb from the cold, right from his toes to the tip of his fingers, or feel like a crane whose feathers were being torn one after the other.
Indecipherable thought were running in his wild mind: things Kyoya wished he had done earlier, words Kyoya wished he had said earlier; everything was mixing in a crazy gibberish fashion Hibari could barely catch on.
It didn't look like the couple, absorbed in their delight, could see him. This didn't even last five minutes, but it lasted six weeks for Kyoya.
It was the first time in his short life the young heir was being heartbroken.
It's funny how the scary, irritable prefect was nowhere to be found in that Hibari Kyoya. Everything was so damn simple at that time; now he was losing his head.
The rain was resonating louder in the young man's ears.
In that kind of situation, reactions may vary very differently from a person to another. This one would go stuff their mouth with ice cream till they sweat sugar, this one would vent nonstop on the phone and go on for hours and hours at their friends' or parent's expense; another one would burn the clothes their ex left in their house, and another one would just start crashing random stuff around them.
This last option was what Kyoya chose.
And the closest thing to him at that moment was a beautiful Bentley which just happened to be parked near him. Kyoya couldn't care less about the owner of the car being there or not. Right when the couple disappeared God knows where, Kyoya kicked one of the outside mirror.
Obviously, the car alarm went off.
"What the hell…" A familiar voice resounded from behind Hibari. "My car…"
Yes, it was the blond's very same car Hibari had manhandled some times ago.
'Crap.' Kyoya thought when he saw the Cavallone heir with his mouth wide open with shock, his eyes full of incomprehension eyeing alternatively his destroyed mirror and the former prefect, with his umbrella dangerously tilting aside because of the utter shock he had just received. In his free arm there was a paper bag. Even under the rain, the smell of hot croissant fresh out of the oven dead hit Hibari's sensitive nose. Oh, there was a nice bakery store nearby, Kyoya recalled, as though that detail had some sort of magical power at that moment.
"Why?" Dino blabbered, on the verge of tears. "Just why? Why me? What did I do this time? And why are you here?"
Anyway Kyoya didn't feel like talking. He was breathing heavily, or so it seemed to him. "Don't take it personally, herbivore. I'm leaving."
"Wait! You're not going to leave just like this! Don't think I'll let you go just like last time…" Dino yelled as he grabbed the brunette's wrist. The croissants all fell on the ground.
The latter surely didn't expect such a harsh pull because he slipped on his foot and almost got his head hit the pavement if Dino hadn't pulled the smaller male back to him. Kyoya felt Dino's touch incredibly cool on his skin. "Hey," Dino frowned with concern, "you're burning up."
"I'm not." Hibari replied, his voice even, his face (although it was starting to grow redder) as composed as usual. Nonetheless, Kyoya didn't make a move to free himself from the blond's iron grip.
Ignoring those last words, Dino pressed his forehead against the other man's.
"You're burning with fever." The blond's frown grew deeper. "How stupid for you to be out walking the streets with that downpour!"
"I wasn't."
Quickly, Dino unlocked his car and shoved the weakened brunette on the rear seat. Hibari was shivering terribly, still let the blond do as he pleased. His body felt heavy and light at the same time. His blurred vision would now and then go completely white from the fever. That day, for the first time in years, he blindly let a complete stranger take care of him.
Just few seconds later, he wasn't in any state to hear the blond getting inside and driving him to the hospital anymore. He didn't hear Dino reprimanding him. He didn't even feel the taller man carrying him out in his arms again, the latter's hand from time to time brushing strands of hair out of his face.
'Stupid herbivore,' was the last thing Hibari thought before completely blacking out.
The young heir of the Hibari clan would always remember that day for being the most embarrassing day of his life.
For someone who was taking pride in never relying on anyone, you can picture how awkward Kyoya felt the day after, when Dino visited him at the hospital. He didn't want to talk about the incident. He only wanted to repay his debt to Cavallone as fast as possible.
The reader may now have a more or less precise idea of how Kyoya found himself going together with Dino Cavallone to that boring party that Xanxus altogether with Byakuran, Dino and Bianchi attended in Rome.
And there we're back again. Just imagine that Grand Hotel's entrance again, the glamorous crowd, the delicious wine and Xanxus and Alessio fighting like cat and dog in the luxurious hall of the hotel.
But now, we're standing a little further from them, in a private lounge where a gorgeous young man in a tailored white suit with jet black hair is quietly sitting on a huge sofa, his legs crossed, his pale eyelids concealing two beautiful obsidian irises, humming the music that was being played in the next room.
"Tetsu." Hibari called. "Where did that stupid herbivore go?"
A door behind the dark haired youth opened and Kusakabe appeared, bringing with him two champagne flutes.
"It seems like Mr. Cavallone is busy handling some kind of trouble in the hall at the moment. He's sending you this (Tetsuya put the glasses on a coffee table near the brunette) and told me to warn you that he may come back a little later."
"Why is that?" Hibari scowled as he took a sip of champagne.
Kusakabe smiled awkwardly. "I think he got into little trouble with friends of his… Well, that's what I could see when I left him earlier."
"Humph."
Hibari's eyebrows furrowed even more. Who the hell did that blonde herbivore thought he was? He was Hibari Kyoya, for Heaven's sake! He was doing that idiot a favor by following his lonely ass around, and that protozoan airhead was just ordering him to stay in that creepy room and wait for him while he was having fun with his congeners? He, Hibari Kyoya?
Kyoya bit his tongue. He couldn't say he wasn't to blame either, though. After all, it all started because of his weakness. If he didn't let that Cavallone see him in a moment of vulnerability, if his pride had allowed him to just turn his back to a (Hibari's throat tightened bitterly at that thought) benefactor, instead of letting that man toy with him like this, things would have been different.
But well, it's not as though, after one year, he didn't grow accustomed to being with the blond.
The dark haired heir turned his head. At the opposite side of the lounge, a small indoor garden was greeting his bored eyes. There in a pebble corner, vivid green ferns, human-height philodendron, blossoming peace lilies and other plants whose names were unknown to Kyoya growing vivaciously regardless of the complete lack of light in the shut space. However, instead of soothing the young male, this sight only irritated him a little more.
Kyoya didn't like those plants. They were different from what they had in his garden, back in his mansion in Japan. He wanted to see the dark Japanese pines that had been in his garden for centuries; instead of those willowy indoor plants, he wanted to see the blazing scarlet maples bordering the rocky road that was leading to their gate. He wanted to open a window and see the usual bed of irises and weigelas and azaleas he'd grown up with.
"That's enough. I'm out." Hibary abruptly announced. He got on his feet and swiftly strode to the same door Kusakabe had used few seconds ago.
"Oh, very well, Kyo-san." Kusakabe smiled. "Do you want me to come with you?" A single look from the brunette was more than enough for the taller man to understand that his Boss wanted to be alone. "Okay, then, I'll call you when Mr. Cavallone arrives."
"Perfect."
Quickly, Kyoya crossed the long corridor that was separating the lounge from the hall. The place wasn't as crowded as before, but it still was enough to make the brunette lose the little patience he had. The smell of expensive perfumes, the smells of costly meals and human flesh were mixing in the air, and even if the hall was pretty vast, it almost made Kyoya sick. He wanted to get outside, as fast as possible, but more and more herbivores were getting on his way. As he tried to turn tail to go back from where he had arrived, he bumped into someone.
"You stupid…" Hibari Kyoya mumbled angrily but the face of the person he had just bumped into made him unable to continue his curse.
"Oh, isn't that Hibari!"
A familiar face. And it was certainly the only one face Hibari didn't want to see at the moment. However, unlike their previous "encounter", Hibari could show the other person a perfectly unruffled and almost haughty face.
"Yamamoto Takeshi." Hibari greeted his former university pal with the gloomiest expression on his placid features. "What are you doing here?"
Yamamoto opened his arms wide in an attempt to draw the smaller brunette 's attention to the dark blue, brand new suit he was wearing. "Ah! Ah! I got invited. By Gokudera. You remember him, don't you?" Yamamoto replied with his usual bright, artless smile. Oh yes, that angry one with the silver hair, always hanging with the baseball player. Of course Kyoya remembered him. He remembered him so much, even now thinking about him was leaving a bitter taste on the young heir's tongue. "What about you?"
"I'm accompanying someone." Those few words almost scorched Kyoya's lips when he pronoucend them. On the other hand, Takeshi didn't seem to notice the grimace stretching on the smaller male's mouth. Kyoya wanted the conversation to end right there, and instead of that, Yamamoto just asked him what he was so dreadfully apprehending.
"Oh… Who is that? Someone I know? From Namimori U?..." At that moment, the questions flowing from the taller male would have never ended if Yamamoto didn't feel his arm being pulled from the back. "Hey, Gokudera! Guess who I found here?"
"Che."
It was indeed the young silverette who was viciously clenching at the baseball player's arm. Unlike Yamamoto, Hayato's costume was in very noticeable wine red tone, with bronze details on his cuffs and pants that were gleaming in a dull way, just enough to be easily noticed, but not as much as to stand out in the crowd.
At the minute the silverette set his eyes on Hibari, the former's eyes opened wide. "Y-You! What is he doing here?" Hayato stuttered. "Weren't you some kind of a Namimori shut-in?"
"Too loud." Hibari grunted.
"Hibari says he's accompanying someone too." Yamamoto replied on Kyoya's behalf. "What a coincidence! Gokudera also asked us to come here with him because he didn't want to be here alone with his sister."
"Shut up, you baseball freak!" Hayato burst, his face as red as a beetroot. "I've never said that! I just told sis that this party would be boring as hell and I didn't want to play her pet's role just because she couldn't refuse her invitation! She's the one who said that I should bring some friends with me!"
"Huh."
"What's so funny about it!?"
"I've never said it's funny."
"Your face completely says that!"
"Come on, Gokudera, don't make a scene now." Yamamoto chuckled.
"I'm not!" Gokudera pulled harder on Yamamoto's arm. "Anyway, we're leaving! I can't find sis anywhere. Let's look for her. I don't wanna get lost in this kind of place."
"Oh, okay then. Bye, Hibari." The taller dark haired male waved friendly at Kyoya before looking back at the silverette. "Anyhow, even if she forgets you here, we still can directly go back to the hotel room, can't you? Because she gave you the key."
Gokudera blushed. "Shut up! I'm not staying there alone with you-"
"I mean, with Tsuna."
"…Oh, it's alright then…" Still blushing, Gokudera sped up.
"Wait, Gokudera!" A laughing Takeshi ran behind him.
The two friends slowly got engulfed in the crowd again. That incident made Hibari's teeth grind. Obviously, he was feeling angry. Why did he have to run into those two idiots even so far away from his hometown? Talk about bad luck.
Yes, he was angry, but not that kind of angry. Few months ago, he would have felt that sourness in his stomach again. But now, he felt more annoyance rather than sheer anger. And who's fault was it that he had to go through that? Dino Cavallone.
"Oh, so that's how things are…" A voice raised from behind.
Hibari suddenly felt someone leaning on his left shoulder. It startled him.
"What the-" He looked back to see who was the fool who dared taking such liberties with him. Once more Kyoya grimaced. "It's you."
"You don't have to look that disappointed." Dino joked. "I'm hurt."
"That's the point."
"Ah! Ah! You're always so funny. Oh, but I thought you would be waiting at the lounge?... Of course, you wouldn't." The blond quickly added when felt the daggers form Hibari's eyes literally digging in his skin. "So," subtly, Cavallone was directing the brunette to the buffet. Surprisingly enough, Hibari complied without voicing any complaint. The blond knew too well that Hibari had a soft spot for nice food. Dino picked some canapés then started goofily bringing one after the other in his mouth. "Will you tell me this time? Back in Namimori you practically didn't tell me anything about it. Come on! You at least this to me! After all, I'm like your knight in shining armor, aren't I?"
The appetizer were delicious. They instantly made the blond look happier as he ate more and more of them, while, on the other hand, Kyoya's mood was getting more and more deteriorated. Seeing the airhead so jovial after only having a pair of cannellini bruschetta, Kyoya tried one as well. Well, it was yummy.
"There's absolutely nothing I have to tell you."
"Kyoya, you're so stingy!"
"And what if I am?"
"You really are… Even though you looked so cute back then. All crying and all."
Once more, Dino startled the smaller man when he brushed the latter's hair with his hand. With everything that had happened before, Kyoya didn't even think about pushing that hand away anymore. What for, at that point? Moreover it didn't feel that gross. It made Dino's smile widen. It was like trying to tame a wild cat.
"Herbivore. Who was crying? I'll bite you to death." Hibari hissed.
"You see," Ignoring the threat, Dino just went on, "I've already told you this last time: you don't have to keep your guard up that much when you're with me. You and I aren't that different."
In another person's mouth, those words would have sounded utterly amiss, but a single look at the Cavallone heir told Kyoya that the latter didn't mean it bad. Still, it was annoying.
"Humph. And what about you, Cavallone?" Kyoya said as he grabbed toasted raviolis from a plate near him. "You were desperately chasing after that professor. I guess things didn't end up very good for you either."
As a reply to that provocation, Kyoya was expecting the blond to get angry, to sulk, to laugh his acting laugh like Hibari once saw him do in one of his movies, or at least to not say anything at all. However that half-embarrassed, half-hurt grin Dino gave him somehow disconcerted the young man.
"Yeah… I guess I didn't look very cool, did I."
An outlandish feeling, like some kind of a dull sting, crept from Kyoya's chest to his throat. What he felt at that moment… was that regret for hurting the blond? How stupid. Two minutes earlier, Kyoya was still angry at him for making him tag along to that party. And before that, Dino had also pissed him off by making him meet with Yamamoto again, even though indirectly. Well, to sum everything up, Dino was frantically getting on his nerves, for many reasons. And in the same time, it felt childish, almost funny to get that pissed off because of something that ridiculous.
That Dino Cavallone was a funny guy, Kyoya pondered when, all of a sudden, everything hit the young heir like the first cold wind of winter: Hibari was there, in the middle of a new city, doing something he would have never done by himself if it were all up to him, just because that Cavallone asked him to. Hibari was well aware he could have declined the invitation, if he really wanted to. Yet, in the end of the day, he came. If he had been alone, Kyoya would have laughed at that situation.
At that moment, Hibari cast a glance around him, his gaze embracing the whole hall of the Grand Hotel. Around them, the crowd was getting thinner and thinner. The party had moved to another part of the hotel, the atrium, as a waiter explained them. Did they need guidance to catch up with the rest of the party?
"Nah, that won't be necessary." Dino yawned. "It's almost one in the morning and I have to be up early tomorrow… no, I mean, uhm, today?..."
"Certainly, sir." The waiter bowed politely. "Will you need a wake-up call as well? I'll just notify the reception staff. What is your room number?"
"Oh, yes, I'm staying in room-"
"That won't be necessary." Hibari cut off, out of the blue. "We're going to leave now."
"Ah? Leave? For where?" A dumbfounded Dino asked.
"To my hotel." Hibari answered. He looked at Dino dead in those chocolate eyes. "You said you were here with friends. Won't they be looking for you?"
"I don't think so… at least not until early in the morning."
"Very well. We're leaving."
"Okay… I mean, okay, but why?"
"It's to show you my gratitude, Cavallone." Kyoya spoke with that very natural high-and-mighty air that suited him so well. "An herbivore like you should feel grateful for that."
Leading the way, Kyoya beckoned the blond to follow him outside the hotel.
t Dino dead in those chocolate eyes. "You said you were here with friends. Won't they be looking for you?"
"I don't think so… at least not until early in the morning."
"Very well. We're leaving."
"Okay… I mean, okay, but why?"
"It's to show you my gratitude, Cavallone." Kyoya spoke with that very natural high-and-mighty air that suited him so well. "An herbivore like you should feel grateful for that."
Leading the way, Kyoya beckoned the blond to follow him outside the hotel.
TBC
