I caught him one night, one hand brimful with more pills than I've ever seen him take. He had never resorted to medicinal
solutions before, not for headaches or colds or anything else that might prompt the need for them. "What's that for?"
He dry-swallowed an army of them right before answering, "Don't worry, they were prescribed. This is the least they could
do, since therapy was out of the question."
"I don't think you were meant to take so much."
"There aren't any long-term side effects or anything grave if I overdose, I looked it up." He smiled. "I want to live.
Living means more than surviving."
I picked up the bottle, examining it, as if it would reassure his safety.
"Norepinephrine... Serotonin..."
Omi shrugged, sighing. "My body can't seem to perceive the 'anti' part of anti-depressant."
I sat down beside him, taking great care not to begin tempting myself to touch him again. "Maybe you were meant to do it
the natural way, then, like you used to. Like we did, together. Sometimes."
He seemed to have found nothing worthy to reply with, hesitating before responding. "I'm sorry, Ken. Am I bringing you down?"
he asked with a frail smile.
"Kind of." I ran my hand through my hair, feeling slightly conscious about my movements. Because if not, my hands might
find their way all over him again. "You're still turning to other things when you need something. Haven't we-- I mean.
Damn it. It took us so long to build what we had. Can't we... go back to that? What do you want from me? What else?"
If these drugs were doing anything to make him happy, he was a doing a miraculous job of hiding it. "I don't know what I
want! I don't... I don't need anything else from you, you're everything already..."
His eyes seemed to glaze after that, his voice fading away. "Omi?"
"It's all wonderful, a wonderful wonderland! Full of..."
"...Wonder?"
"Yes, Ken! Yes! That's what the world should be, a wonderland." He glanced up at me, with a smile that empowered me to
protect him, with a smile that weakened me and stripped me of all my strength. "Where the butterflies can't be harmed,
and the tulips are free, where the dandelions are floating always and forever. And they all love each other, but none
of them ever get hurt. There's nothing to fear in this garden of steel."
Narcotics were speaking through my friend's lips. I tried not to shudder. "Omi. Are you really happy now?"
"Very much so, thank you for asking. I feel like... Like snowflakes would feel, in the very beginning of winter. And I
am descending and descending and descending and never landing, swaying with the lovely breeze atop these children waiting
for me to grace the tips of their nose..."
"I mean, are you really happy? Meaning you'll still be happy, even after that drug wears off?"
He giggled, a lofty, lost sound. "I still have so many bottles left, silly. And it will never end. I'll continue sinking
in the soft snow, my endless and frayed white blanket, unfurling where the roses bloom beneath it..."
I took his shoulder in my hand, the pressure of my grip as intense as my stare. "You don't need those pills, Omi, believe
me. Trust me. You can do this natural way, and I can help, if only you'd let me!"
"N-no. You. My wonderland! My wonderland, it's... disappearing! I want it back--"
I used the hand I had put on his shoulder to grab his elbow, preventing him from taking the bottle on his table. "Omi,
listen to me. Please, ssh, just calm down. Stop. You don't need that. You need--"
"I do need it! I need those short moments of not caring. I just want to stop thinking about it all!"
"You want to stop... caring? About everything? Aya, Youji and me? Ouka?"
Omi stood rigidly, mouth agape, as if horrified with himself. "No, never!" And after a while, "Yes." He all but fell on my chest, leaning
his head partly on my shoulders. "Ken," he murmured, as if pointing out that the sky was blue.
I put one hand around him by bridled instinct, a ghost of a touch when compared to the comfort I was usually all too happy to
offer. He seemed to notice it, too, that while I was holding him like I meant it, I was holding him like I had meant to
solace him otherwise. "Ken? Why are you touching me like that?"
"Like what?" Like I'm in love with you and I've been hiding it for all my past lifetimes?
"Like... you're scared of me." He lifted himself from the warmth we shared, his eyes accusing me. "That's it, isn't it?
I frighten you. I'm a lunatic, I've been driven mad, and I frighten my friends!"
"Yes, it frightens me! It frightens me that you have to make use of these anti-depressants, instead of just... Just..."
"Just what?! I'm sorry if I'm not like you, Ken, if I can't simply nod along and smile at everything that comes my way!
I'm sorry if I tried too hard to be like you, but found out I was too in touch with reality to do that.
I'm sure it would be nice to live in utter simplicity, and I'm flattered that you're still trying to recruit me in your little
organization of ignorance." It wasn't even insulting, really. It was just the fact that he said it.
He saw me, swallowing heavily and trying to restrain my emotions. "Oh... Oh, Ken. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I don't know
what came over me! I didn't mean that, I really didn't!"
"I know." For the most part, I guess.
He was near me again -- instinctively, of course -- curving around me for support. "What's wrong with me? I'm so
sick. I get sicker, more wrong... I'll try to let go of it all, I really will. I'll give up my wonderland for you."
"Thank you." I calmly put a hand on his head, lightly stroking him, having never needed so much to be calm before. I hoped he
wouldn't object to me minimizing the contact we've gotten so comfortable with, and I was pretty much praying that he
wouldn't ask why.
"I'm sorry, Ken, I'm so sorry. Please forgive me, I'm just so... I get so crazy sometimes and I--"
"Ssh, it's okay, you keep me sane."
Yohji was laughing at the sight of Omi in what could best be described as a disproportionate tanktop. Thin layers of perspiration coated his forehead and the skin beneath his eyes, and his bangs were making a big commotion -- that is, more so than usual. "Omi, how can you be sweating in this weather?"
"It's a side-effect of the anti-depressant," he explained. "And besides, the snow's melting."
"I thought you said you weren't going to take those anymore," Yohji said.
"I am. Well, gradually. It's dangerous if I just stop it altogether." Omi licked the third ice cream he had purchased within
a span of ten minutes. And, much to my libido's dismay, his tongue decided to operate in its painfully methodic way. And
no, it was not helpful the way Yohji was leering at me in apparent amusement, knowing fully well how the picture of Omi's
tongue caressing something was providing my inner turmoil. "My head aches. And so does my back," he complained mildly.
There was now a palpable tension in the air, and I'm sure it wasn't brought about by my imagination. Every single person
in that room -- Yohji, Aya, Omi and myself -- knew that I would've normally be behind him in an instant, ready to knead
the tightened muscles on his back.
I was staying put, and the silence was practically imploring me to go by tradition, if nothing else.
Thankfully (or so I thought for one nanosecond of my life), Yohji made his way to the boy, placing his hands over
Omi's mostly bare shoulders. "Must be brain freeze from
all the gallons of ice cream you've shoveled into that bottomless pit of a stomach. Really, if I didn't think you liked
deserts before..."
Omi, sensitive back and all, moaned in gratitude, muttering a less grateful, "Shut up, Yohji."
The older blond laughed and noticed me watching them. All the while, of course, I was thinking that I will not glare at Yohji, I will
not glare at Yohji, I will not glare at Yohji... "Now, Omi, if I didn't know better, that almost sounded like you were
trying to seduce me."
"What?!" Both Omi and I reacted to what should have been just another one of those Yohji-isms. The difference being, Omi's
reaction was more flustered, while mine was closer to enraged. "I've never seen anyone more perverted than you," I said,
sounding disgusted. "Geez, Yohji, he's Omi. You know better." The message was technically correct, just misleading as
hell.
"Yohji's in love with someone," said... Aya.
Yep. Aya had just disclosed that little piece of information.
The three of us turned to him, similar amounts of shock, for similar reasons. Possibly not so similar in Yohji's case.
"Yohji's in love with someone?" Omi tried out the words himself, but it still sounded wrong.
"What--?!" Yohji barked.
"Why didn't you tell us? Who is it, who is it?" Omi turned to Yohji, excited to try and extract an answer from the older
blond.
"Yeah, who is She Who Does Not Know What She Is Doing? Or who she's doing, actually?" I had to admit, I was
curious.
Yohji did not seem amused. "Shut up, all of--"
Aya cleared his throat. "Wrong pronoun, Ken."
"Aya!!"
"You mean... A guy? Really? Yohji, I thought you only liked women older than eighteen!" Omi laughed, looking quite intrigued.
"So, you have a 'boyfriend'? Do we get to meet him, huh, Yohji?"
"Shut up! Fuck you, Aya, you're not Schuldig--"
"Thank God," Omi piped up.
"--or something, so it's not like you can read minds. All you can do is-- Anyway!" All he could do is what?
"How dare you accuse me of this slander!"
Aya was on the verge of a very, very smug grin. The muscles on his face were practically jumping because of the restraint.
"I'm sorry, maybe I misunderstood. So, what exactly did you mean in saying you are infatuated with me?"
Needless to say, three pairs of eyes widened considerably.
"You--! LIAR!!"
"Please. Why would I want to fabricate a tale like-- What?!" As if those two couldn't act more like they were
on drugs, Yohji yanked Aya out of the shop, practically carrying him out. As he slammed the door behind him,
Yohji could be heard screeching shrilly about besmirching his masculinity and so on and so forth.
Leaving me, of course, alone with Omi.
Which explains the whole spectacle. Yohji probably sensed the strain I put in the midst of us. I was pretty sure that he felt
he could perform some good-meaning intervention and make it look like he wasn't interfering. It didn't fully explain why
Aya had gone along with it -- or why, come to think of it, he initiated it in the first place. Does that mean even Aya,
lovable-but-with-the-emotional-intelligence-of-a-popsicle Aya, could see what was going on?
"What... was that all about?" Omi wondered. With good reason.
I shook my head. "Yohji, and this inherent insatiable hunger to meddle with other people's affairs.
He just wants to leave us together because... he thinks there's some problem we have
to resolve together, which there obviously isn't. I don't know, he's such a freak."
From his corner of the room, Omi bit his lip. "Are you sure?"
"Am I sure he's a freak? Positive. Want some proof?" I said with a smile, to assuage the words.
"No, I mean. Are you sure that we have nothing to resolve?"
"Omi... Why would you think that?" Because I let him. (Or was that a rhetorical question?)
He sighed into the cone he was holding, nibbling at it insecurely. "I don't know, maybe I'm just paranoid. It just seemed
like you never want to be alone with me nowadays. I thought you were mad at me, because you never... We don't... You know."
I laughed, and it almost hurt my ribcage. Somewhere in that region, possibly a bit higher and closer to my chest. "You really
are being paranoid. I saw that in your research about the drug. I also read all these other terminologies, but I never could
pay attention to words with more than four syllables. Anyway, it's all in your mind. We're okay."
"We're okay?" he repeated tentatively, words slapped carelessly together.
It was getting decadently easier to lie. You can never tell if that's a good thing, or a bad thing.
"We're okay."
[[ Wow. Amazingly, I've only recently realized that this thing has no plot. Believe it or not, it just struck me now. -_- But, hey, we've gone this far. You might as well humor me and read the final one or two chapters, right? ^_~ Those are coming shortly, I promise. ]]
