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What As Snow: Part 3 "A New Friend"
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"Silence, so much more tiresome than loneliness, is a labyrinth."
Lyrics ~ Blue Seed ~ Carnival Babel
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"Tadaima!"
"Tadaima su!"
"We're back!"
The voices that echoed from somewhere in the house woke Kyou from his slumber... But this time he felt refreshed and alive! For the first time in a while to sat up from his futon with a wide grin on his face. He heard more noise from downstairs, recognizing the voices of Yuki and Tohru. So they made it back after all...
Kyou lay back again, deciding to stay there for a few more minutes... And while to lay, his mind travel back to the night before.
Last night he had set up a place for Haru to sleep downstairs, fining an extra futon for him to use. He guessed the oushi was down there now... The thought made him nervous. Maybe he should stay it out in his room...? Yeah, that was a good idea...
Within about twenty minutes he gave up trying to go back to sleep and instead gave into the call of his stomach, which let out a beastly roar. He hadn't eaten a thing since the evening before! Bounding from the room he quickly went downstairs to find the eating room already full of people. Haru was there, too, and he smiled immediately upon seeing Kyou. For some reason that made his chest tighten a bit... he wasn't sure why.
"Kyou," Haru said, "did you sleep well?"
Kyou grunted in response, ignoring the feeling in his chest that was slowly fading, instead turning his attention to the very attractive looking spread of food before him. He sat down next to Haru and started off by literally guzzling down his miso soup (4) which had already been set in a space for him. Haru was eating what looked like plain oatmeal while Yuki watching Kyou with mild distaste, holding a teacup in his hands. Shigure was quiet for once, sitting with a newspaper. "When did you get here?"
Shigure looked up, his eyes peeking lazily over his spectacles. "I was stuck at the post office, so I couldn't get back until this morning. The benches there were horrible to my back." T__T He moaned dramatically, but Kyou only rolled his eyes and went back to eating.
Tohru came in a minute later, and but stopped at the door with a surprised look on her face. Yuki saw this, and asked, "Doushite (what is it), Honda-san?"
"Betsuni (nothing)," Tohru said, looking a little flustered. "Gomen, but it was so quiet, I thought something might be wrong."
"Don't worry so much," Kyou said loudly before moving on to help himself with some fish (Tohru really outdid herself this morning). Then Kyou saw the book in her hands. "Oi..."
Tohru followed Kyou's gaze to the door she held. "Oh! I found this in the rice cooker. You have so many books, I thought it might be yours." She handed the book out to him he took it, mumbling, "It is mine." He suddenly felt it very hard to believe he'd been so worried about the stupid thing the day before. On the other hand.... THE RICE COOKER!!? What sort of hiding place was THAT!?
When he turned to give Haru a meaningful look he instead caught the cow staring at him, and narrowed his eyes. "What?"
"I was wondering if you're going to be busy with your book again."
"Oh yeah..." He'd totally forgotten again... Maybe he should go back to reading... but he didn't feel like it anymore. To think he'd made such a big deal about it the day before. "What about it?"
"If you're not busy I thought we could do something..."
Kyou didn't see Shigure as he peeped out at them over his newspaper, nor the wicked, knowing grin that had spread over his face. No, everyone besides Yuki remind obvious to this, but the nezumi chose to say nothing.
"That's a wonderful idea," Tohru said before Kyou could say a word, then she turned on Kyou, looking very stern, which was a difficult expression for Tohru to pull off. "You've been working yourself enough, Kyou-kun! The weatherman said to was going to snow again tonight, and so you'll have all day tomorrow to story. I hate to see you work yourself so hard!"
Hanging his shoulders, Kyou couldn't think of anything to say, something in his chest fluttered at the thought of Tohru being so worried about him... Kyou raised no protests, and the rest of the morning passed in relative silence, sides a few half-hearted, empty threats passed between Kyou and Yuki, and a few Kyou passed to Haru alone. Things were... mellow that morning, for the lack of a better word, though it wasn't really a bad thing.
When at last breakfast was over, Tohru began pulling things away, and before Kyou could even offer to help Haru was upon him, smiling like he had before.
"Come on," Haru said. "I know what we can do for fun."
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'No, no, no, no, no!'
"I'll hate it, I swear, and I'll hate you, too."
"That's not nice at all, Kyou. Just get your boots on and come out."
Kyou growled. "I don't like going out into the snow... There's nothing to do! This isn't 'fun'!"
"There's plenty to do," Haru countered, nodding to himself as Kyou finally tugged on his other boot with a scowl on his face. "Don't look so pissed off. I'll show you exactly what we do in weather like this." Then he turned and strode out the door, a disgruntled Kyou in tow.
Well, Kyou saw sorta surprised... He refused to say that he was pleased. Just surprised...
Sometime during the night the snow had turned from powdery to heavy before it had stopped falling last night, and it crunched under their feet as they walked over the ground. Kyou saw that the porch had been swept clean, probably by Tohru when she'd gotten back, and icicles hung from the roof edges. And added with the sun --which had finally made an appearance since the storm had begun-- it made the snow glitter where billions of tiny ice crystals caught the light...
Maybe it was the fact that the sky was blue with a few scarce clouds and a sun rather than a blank sheet of white that made Kyou smile... He made sure to loose that smirk before Haru looked back at him to beacon him on.
He hurried up his pace a little, now standing beside Haru as they headed toward to rock garden. The layer of ice covering the pond had already melted, and it glittered oddly --almost like the snow was-- in the sunlight. It looked very peaceful… Not what Kyou expected… It was still very quiet: there were no birds chirping, no wind, but somehow this silence wasn't as bad as it had been the night before… A pleasant silence…
And then he finally noted that Haru was glancing up at him… again and again. Kyou lifted his head to meet his gave, resulting in Haru looking down quickly. "Ne, Kyou..."
"Hm?" Kyou looked up after sitting down on a large rock on the snow-covered garden. He had to carefully knock the snow off (it's always a pain to get your clothes wet in weather like this, especially your rear). It was freezing, yes, but it was better than sitting in the snow. "What?" Kyou wondered what was on Haru's mind, especially by the way the cow was looking at him....
For some reason Haru smiled a little. "Still don't like the snow?"
Kyou grunted. For some reason he thought Haru was going to ask something else... "Maybe.... maybe not."
Haru's smile widened. "Maybe not?"
"That's all you're getting," he growled. He kicked at the snow under he boot for a moment. He didn't like boots... he couldn't move his feet at all, all he could do was wriggle his toes a little. "Besides, you haven't given me much reason to like it, either."
Kyou paused when he saw Haru move from his spot, leaning against a tree... For moment he thought Haru would want to fight or something predicable like that. But instead Haru looked around, found a wide patch of snow, then squatted down began piling it together... Or trying to. He could make a small ball, but he was trying to make a larger one.
"Baka, what are you doing?"
"I want to make a snowman," Haru said simply, frowning a little as the snow crumbled in his hands again. Haru didn't look at all happy at this, but kept trying. "Kana, Hiro and Momiji would always go out into the snow like this. Akito wouldn't like it at all, but they would keep quiet about it, and build wherever Akito was less likely to see it. We doesn't like walking out into the snow." The snow crumbled under his hands once more as he tried rolling it through the snow. "But one time he did, and he stalked over and crushed it… Luckily Momiji and the others were gone at the time. Right afterwards, I went and found them before they could ever run into Akito, told them to stay away from him, if they could, for as long as possible…"
'Predictable Akito…'
Kyou sighed, then to his own surprise got up onto his feet and walked over to Haru's side. Squatting opposite Haru, he started with the same process as Haru, making one snowball then packing it in more... Kyou couldn't honestly say he'd bothered to make many snowballs in his life... not for fun, anyway. Unless you count trying to piss someone off by punting them in the head with an "iceball" and then ducking for cover. (snicker)
In the end he came out with one, perfectly round snowball... Heeh, it was just like making a really big rice ball, no problem at all!
Kyou grinned to himself, concentrating on then rolling the snowball along the ground, making it become larger and larger, like a pinwheel shaped hunk of snow. Haru had join him, watching him carefully this whole while, pushing the snow along with him as it became heavier and heavier.
Kyou grinned, fangs showing, and standing up straight with his fists balled at his hips, almost boisterously so, laughing loudly. "HA! It's easy! No trouble at all!" He laughed again.
Haru smiled again. Why was he smiling at him so much? He only smiled like that for Yuki. It was starting to get creepy… "Arigatou, Kyou. We can both make the snowman, ne?" Kyou shifted oddly at the very thought of doing something as childish as "building a snowman," Haru smirked in a way that make one realize that even White Haru can think plotting, dark thoughts... "You know, Yuki always had trouble making these, too..."
Kyou laugh started dying for a moment... and suddenly he dived back into the snow, starting another pinwheel, his eyes burning. "Start rounding that one, THAT'S gonna be the middle!"
Haru blinked, looking down at the snow he was working with... It was already four feet tall! "Ne, Kyou..."
But Kyou wasn't listening, hard at work... And Haru smiled again.
There was more to that smile than most people could see, too... Unfortunately, Kyou was missing it as well.
"Ne, Kyou? Where should we build it? ... Kyou...? What's with that smile again... Kyou...?"
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It was well into the evening when Hatori arrived. When Shigure came back, but reconnected all the phone lines, and was almost immediately bombarded with phone calls from Mit-chan. Shigure cheerfully explained that he had sent in the papers the day before (no worries) and had even fought through a vicious snowstorm to get the task done for her. Mit, however, wasn't willing to believe one word out of his mouth, and would be arriving there as soon as she could to throttle him in person.
Having the phone line back also allowed Haru to call the main house to tell Hatori were he was. After telling Hatori of Yuki's journey through the snow from the food store.
Shigure seemed very please by his sudden arrival.
"Tori-san," Shigure greeted happily, "so nice to see your face again! I've missed you!"
Walking forward, Hatori walked past Shigure (or rather side stepped) and continued on into the sitting room, where the slipping door was left open so that they may watch the cold yet attractive scenery. But it has long since stopped snowing, and the sun was out and half basking the room in its warm grow, swiftly melting the snow that it shown directly upon. "I came to check on Yuki. This weather will do nothing for his influenza."
"Sou ka ne (is that so?)," Shigure said, the smile loosing some of it's intensity, but remain there, strong and true as always. Took a seat across from Hatori, waving a hand at him. "Ma, I'm afraid Yuki's upstairs waiting for Tohru to be done in the bath. After being stuck on a grocery store for a day they feel the need for much cleansing."
Hatori grunted. "There are much greater things to worry about."
"Such as?"
"Kyou."
His smile really did faultier this time... "... oh...? What of him?"
Hatori frowned gravely, eyes looking to the open doors. "I'm afraid the Sohma house leaders have gone to Akito since... since the New Year. Nothing has changed."
Shigure sat up a little straighter. "Nothing's changed...? But Kyou is different. We don't reject him-"
"But the rest of the family does. They know he will be graduating soon. And as far as I can tell, Kazuma-san knows nothing about this. I will be informing him shortly, though. We still have time to change things."
This gained a look of surprise from Shigure, then a sly smile. "Tori-san, going over our heads, are we?"
"Baka..."
A scream of rage was heard from outside, and the two turned, somehow expecting to see Kyou and Yuki going at it again (even though Yuki was still upstairs).
But instead they looked to see Hatsuharu run past along the deck (booted feet going "THUMP-THUMP-THUMP" as he went) then jumped off into the snow before continued on without stopping. A moment later Kyou followed in suite, though slipping on some ice-covered wood, but kept his balance while in hot pursuit. They both were clutching onto large balls of snow, chucking them at each at chance any got.
"Come back here, baka-oushi!"
"That's not part of the game, Kyou."
"Like hell it isn't, you're going-" PUNT "-ACK!"
THWUMP!
"I win this match, Kyou-kun." (5)
"Hate.. snow..."
"Kyou-kun and Haru-kun," Shigure explained, still watching as the two tussled around in the snow, Kyou not trying to tackle Haru to the ground, "have... been getting along much better since yesterday, I should say. Haru hasn't turned Black at all, but I haven't seen Kyou act at all out of character-…"
Hatori. "Baka…"
"I slipped, Haru, seriously, that shouldn't count!"
"It's your own fault you're clumsy,
"SHINE, OUSHI!!!"
"… at all." He let out a hearty laugh, nearly falling back. "Still yelling, cursing, brooding. insulting, though I'd call that teasing, myself." ^_~v
Hatori just rolled his eyes at him, then looked out at the snow. Memories of falling snow... He smiled... until Shigure looked back to him, and it was gone. He said, "Would this explain that ten-foot cat snow sculpture out front, Shigure?"
Sweatdrop. "Ten-foot… what...?"
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Outside…
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Shigure scratched the back of his head. "Er... maybe it will ward off evil spirits?"
"I think that would scare off most anyone," Hatori said flatly, looking at how the branch-arms had been carefully selected to make very vicious looking claws.
"Hehehe, yeah..."
Oh course, Tohru had found it very creative and cute. She made sure to take multiple photos before it could melt.
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Several hours later Kyou and Haru found that time had past far too quickly. Hatori had finished up checking Yuki, and Shigure had his fun torturing the seahorse. Now it was time for him to go back to the main house, and take Haru with him. Kyou felt annoyed with this, actually....
"Time to go back to the main house already?"
Haru smiled at this sentence. "Will you miss me, Kyou-kun?"
(twitch) 'Kyou-kun?' "I was just asking!"
A small laugh. "Hai. Hatori can take me back without risk of me getting lost of the way…"
Hatori was watching them from the car, arms crossed and leaning against the vehicle on the driver's side. Shigure was standing with him, chatting away, though Hatori didn't look like he was listening.
Tohru came from the house, followed by (to Kyou's disgust) Yuki. "It was so nice having you, Hatsuharu-san," she said sweetly, coming up to Haru and bowing. When she stood she clapped her hands together excitedly, practically glowing. "You have to come more often."
Haru smiled, bowing in kind. "Yes, I think I will."
Yuki gave a small smile as well, though didn't look at Kyou at all. Maybe he didn't want to start a fight today… Or maybe he was intimidated by his "snowcat" (heeheehee).
After chatting for a few minutes, Tohru bounced past them to say good-bye to Hatori and Yuki went back to the porch to wait for all of them, sitting with his legs crossed, observing. Kyou didn't like that at all, but did his best to ignore to baka-nezumi… He had more… important things to deal with.
"Kyou-kun?
Speaking of which…
Kyou crossed his arms, looking Haru hard in the eyes… "You're not mocking me with this stupid "Kyou-kun" business, are you? You starting to sound like Kagura all of a sudden."
Haru shook his head. "Iie." (No)
Kyou starred for a few more seconds… then held out his hand.
A sign of peace...
Haru looked at the pre-offered hand for a moment before taking it.
And pulling Kyou toward him so he could peck him on the cheek, and the brushing of something else that Kyou couldn't identify, but... Haru pressed their cheeks together, Haru's skinning feel warn again his chilled flesh.
"Ja ne, Kyou-kun."
"…… what the…?"
Before he even knew what was happening he heard the sound of a car door slamming shut, and blinked back into reality to see Hatori's car driving away.
"What… WHAT!? HARU!!!" What just happened!?
"Hohohoho, Kyou-kun no kawaiiii desu!"
To Kyou's horror, Shigure was there, watching him, a hand to his mouth as he chuckled giddily. Tohru was by his side, blushing bright red. Kyou spun around to look at Yuki, who was also starring with equally wide eyes, mouth actually agape.
(TWITCH) "What are you all looking at!!?"
"Ma! Ma!" Shigure chanted, "Kyou-chaaan, you're blushing!"
(TWITCH-TWITCH) "Kisamaaa… It's just damn cold out here, GET THE HELL OUT OF MY WAY!!" And he stormed past them all, Shigure still cackling, and Yuki and Tohru watching him go, Tohru happily mentioning how happy she was to see that Kyou and Haru's friendship with each other was deepening so nicely...
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To be continued in... "Epilogue: The Perfect Ending or the Perfect Beginning?"
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4) It's a fish-based soup that's commonly seen in Japanese meals, including the traditional breakfast.
5) For the rules of their snowball fight, the first person to trip, loose their foot, or fall into the snow, looses. Well, that's the fun way to do it, anyway. ^__^ Only for those who really like a good, tough snow-fighting match!
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READ and REVIEW, please! ^_^'
It sucked, I know. (BLUSH) So you know, this was my first shot at a yaoi, though I'm a strong believer in canon writing. I don't like jumping into things. I wanted to give Haru a REAL reason to love Kyou, and Haru loved Yuki for what he said to him when he was young.
I can't believe I even wrote this... and this file is about 40 pages long, too.
I made it mostly in Kyou's POV, anyway. If and when I actually post the sequel, I'll have more of Haru's POV, definitely. ^__^ Lots of EVIL Haru! Haru and Shigure are my FAV characters! And I really respect Kyou a lot, and his character is excellent to work with, what can I say?
The Sequel will contain more on the New Years party of 2001, where it was Aya's turn for the Jyuunishi celebration (can you imagine how he would act in an outfit like that??? ^__~) and exactly what happened to make Kyou so angry.
I can't honestly say whether this is yaoi or not, it depends on the way you look at it. I'm also wondering whether to make the sequel yaoi or not, but I'm not sure! Tell me what you think.
Please ask to be on a mailing list if you wish to be informed when it is posted. (shrugs) Some people want to know, and if you do, just say so.
IF ANYONE IS WILLING TO BE A BETA, let me know!!! Though I have a few in mind, if you can, it's always great to have backup!
Geuna~
