Title: Love Becomes You
Author: sereace
Warnings: Unconventional pairing, unrequited love…Please, I beg of you, if you can't picture anyone else but the original pairings together, don't read this anymore, then go on and flame me. Or, if you do flame me, at least be responsible about it. CCs are most welcome.
Notes: Timeline: When Lei went to Japan the first time in the Meteor Garden 1 series. Supposes that Lei is in good terms with his parents.
"Why?"
Such a simple question really, but Lei wondered why, exactly, can't he answer that. Not that he didn't know what to reply, quite the opposite in fact. He knew the answer, knew it without doubt, he just couldn't say it—them. So he settled for silence. He wondered idly when it would last.
"Because Ah Si is your friend?"
Lei looked up and met the gaze of his mother. He was sure she could read him, as he was sure he could not read her.
"Or because she did go?"
The statement was like a knife hurled straight to his heart. Truth hurts.
"For someone so intelligent, you can be so stupid."
The words rushed out of his mouth before he could even think about what he wanted to say. "Mother, you cannot possibly know—"
"Yes, I could, and yes, I do. The only difference between us is I did something before the situation became irreparable."
"What difference would it make if she did chose me? She suffered enough from Dao Ming Feng—and we live in the same world." He shot back, his tone very much the same as his mother's—forceful, if not bitter.
An eyebrow arched in question, as he saw, at the corner of his eye, his father's sudden movement. His shoulders tense, the patriarch of the Hua Ze family looked like he was contemplating on bashing his head on the table, or bashing his wife's head on the table. Lei was intrigued—his father was never like this. In fact, his father never tensed, period.
"Who am I, Lei?" There was almost a sly note in the way she said it, and it made Lei wary of her intentions.
He hated these kind of questions—it was always the simple question that catches one in a trap, however small it is. But no matter, if his mother can elude this, so can he. So he answered plainly, passively, "My mother."
"And who is your mother?"
"Hua Ze Ame, a Lady in the Royal Court of Japan. The cousin to the fifth degree of the Reigning Royal Family."
"What else?"
"The wife of Hua Ze Chang, top ten of the richest men in the whole world."
A twinkle in his mother's eyes, before she laced her fingers, and laid her hands on top of her knees. "I am Hua Ze Ame, as much as I am Hanazawa Ame, am I not?"
Lei nodded, albeit tentatively.
"Your grandfather is Hanazawa Shinji, fourth in line to the throne, and your grandmother is Tenno Reina, daughter of the aristocrat Tenno Hasegawa and Kaioh Makiko, correct?"
Again, Lei reaffirmed what he knew since he was born.
"You know all these, do you not, my son?" Hanazawa Keiko started, starting to rise from her seat. "What you do not know is Kaioh Makiko was a daughter of the cousin of the man you know as your great-great-great-grandfather Kaioh Akira."
Lei looked at his mother, his temples beginning to throb with where he was thinking this conversation would lead to. "Yes, I do not know that."
Hua Ze Ame stifled a wry chuckle. "Of course you do not. Why else would I tell you?"
Hua Ze Chang looked at his wife and then his son, before he sighed. This was going to be interesting.
"Mother…"
"Ikari Amaya's father, Kaioh Takasugi, was the only cousin of a daimyo in the Bakamatsu era. Her husband had died while on travel, ambushed by a group of samurais who worked for the rival of our family. At the same time she was pregnant, Kaioh Akira's wife died, due to complications of child-bearing. Kaioh Akira's wife was five months pregnant, and so was Ikari Amaya."
Lei could practically see where his mother was going, but he was intrigued as well. He never would have thought his mother's family would have a history as intricately patterned as this.
"The family disputes were growing, and internal battles began to grow out of proportions. The question as to who would rise to the title daimyo was undecided, and naturally, everyone wanted to rise to power, to take the title for himself, more for pride than for honor. And that was going on without them knowing of the fact that Kaioh Akira's wife had died, as well as the child she carried, technically the heir of Kaioh Akira." She paused, turning to Lei. "So you could begin to imagine…"
Lei nodded. Yes, he very well could. Dimly, he noticed his father rising and heading for the bar. His mother continued.
"Ikari Amaya was drowning in her despair—her husband was dead, she was eight months pregnant, and her father was beginning to get buried with his debts. Kaioh Takasugi was a good-hearted man, but he was not made as the Daimyo, the head of their family, for no simple reason. Though he was almost a decade older than Akira…he reveled in gambling, in the women, in all that money could buy, and that was with the fact he depended only on what his cousin gives him."
Hua Ze Ame paused, and took a dainty sip of her wine from the flute. "A scandal was threatening to break out that would have rendered the Kaioh family in shambles—Takasugi had impregnated a woman-child, barely sixteen of age, while he was nearly in his thirties. It was unforgivable sin then, and is reparable only by death."
Lei saw a flicker of disdain in his mother's eyes.
"Only reparable by the death…of both parties." She started, voice barely above a whisper. At the far corner of the room, He Ze Chang watched his wife under hooded eyes. He did not want this part of the story himself, and he knew how much she loathed this as well. It was better to stay away anyway, until she gets to the part where he enters their family.
"They lived in hiding—all the four of them, under the reason that many wanted their deaths. The arrangement started out with five people involved—Kaioh Takasugi, Ikari Yoji, Kaioh-Ikari Amaya, Kaioh Akira, and Kaioh Makiko. Ten months later, only three remained. Kaioh Takasugi, Kaioh-Ikari Amaya, and Kaioh Akira. One was pregnant, the other gambled and drank, the last attempted to hold on to the family he knew he had to lead. All three were beginning to wallow up in their own misery. Their relatives were demanding to see Kaioh Akira's wife, and eventually his heir, even if they argued the fact was still to be decided. They were all in danger of being disowned by the Kaiohs…they had not allowed any visitor, messenger whatsoever to come in contact with them for the last nine months. In a last desperate attempt, when Amaya was giving birth, she made a deal with Akira—that he keep the child, and keep the family together. Akira would not have agreed, for the child was a girl, but Amaya begged him, assured him that she would not have it any other way."
"She was dying, she knew that—she had lost too much blood, been in labor for so long, and she wanted her child to have a future. Out of reverence to her adoptive uncle's wife, she had named her child Makiko."
"Obaasan." Lei said monotonously.
Hua Ze Ame, once Hanazawa Ame, nodded.
"Ikari Yoji—what family did he come from?"
Lei's mother smiled. "From a long-line of samurais. He guarded your obaasan's life then, before they fell in love and got married."
"He had no title, yet he was accepted into the family…"
"Kaioh Akira was a good hearted man. He loved Amaya like his own child, even when their age difference hardly differed. His word was the law, and those who disobeyed wished their fate met death."
Lei pressed fingers to his temple, before slowly rising from his seat. The woman—his ancestor, reminded him much of Shan Cai…how she would give anything for someone who mattered to her…and how he gave that up, one of the primary reasons being the family conflict—second to that Ah Si was in love with her, and she was in love with Ah Si. He stared down at the figure of his mother, his face as stoic as usual, but his eyes…"Which is why you never mentioned how Shan Cai would never fit in our world—because you knew, you know, that you could make the family accept Shan Cai, being a direct descendant of Kaioh Akira, and that the power he yielded then, you still have now."
Hua Ze Ame looked at her son, and met the glare with her own eyes burning in intensity, wherein behind it was curiosity—why the steely-edged tone? She nodded slowly. "Yes."
"And that as well is saying I gave her up for nothing."
"Lei." The voice of his father seemed distant, so far away. It barely registered. He reached for his goblet, but did not drink it.
"I gave her up, for Ah Si. I did not fight in the least, knowing the fact that if I did, and if I did win her, even in courtesy of Dao Ming Feng, this family would not have accepted her. I am bound to this family—if I do not take over we will fall, and I would not be able to fight for her as Ah Si have."
He looked at his father, his eyes the only part of his body expressing something that supported the subtle anger in his words. Neither parent noticed the hand grasping the glassware was tightening. "I gave her up to have a better life with Ah Si, thinking that she would have an easier life with Dao Ming Feng than with the Hanazawas, and now you are telling me that whatever decision I make the people I have foremost on my list why I cannot be with Shan Cai would accept?"
"Lei…" Came the placating tone of his father. His mother only watched with mild interest, her sense of foreboding unheeded.
Hua Ze Chang crossed the room in quick strides, and soon he lay a hand, comfortingly, he hoped, on his son's shoulders.
In that instant, the sound of glass breaking filled the room, and if one listened carefully, would hear the sound of blood dripping from a hand to the carpeted floor.
Notes:
Chapter 2: Swarovski Diamonds are not mine, if it were, let's just say I won't be slaving for my Chemistry grades right now. *snickers*
Reviewers: Thanks a million you guys! I know I take my time updating…I always do. And it seems, even if my dreams, sleeping, awake, or otherwise, are plagued with thoughts of these two wonderful couple being together, my mind just won't cooperate, organize itself, and just write.
To all the special mention people: you all know who you are. Thank you for believing in me as much as you all do. It means a lot.