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Fifteen

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To act without thinking ...

Ran's father had always taught him the opposite. Deliberate before you commit yourself to any one course of action. Think it through. Plan your moves ahead of time.

They had played chess constantly.

The chess set that had been his father's favorite was hand made. It had come all the way from England. His father had lifted it onto the table, reverently unwrapped each piece and set them exactingly on his board. Ran had stood and watched, and when his father was done, he had turned to his son and asked, "Play a game?"

After his parents had died, he had become driven by revenge. And he had had no plan, no moves plotted out. He had let his heart and his rage dictate his actions, instead of his head. It hadn't really been clear to him until his fight with Youji in front of the Magic Bus Hospital. He was letting his emotions rule, and that was unacceptable. His anger should have died with Takatori, but it was still there, raging wildly inside him. Aya-chan hadn't woken up.

There was no justification for his actions, his murders. But he could live with that. He had to. There was no justification, and really, no explanation for his explosion at Youji either. He needed to make that right, and yet ...

The small details of what Youji wanted, and needed, and what Ran himself wanted. He didn't know.

Youji sauntered into the shop, and Ran looked up from the ledger he had been working on. The accounts for the shop were easy; he could practically do them in his sleep. It had been slow, so Youji had taken a break while there was time.

"I'm here," Youji said, yawning.

Ran turned back to his book with unseeing eyes. The small problem of the sheer proximity of the man. It had been nearly a week since he had come back, and every day he worked in the flower shop, Youji had been scheduled at the same time. It was starting to wear on his nerves.

Shuffling around the shop, Youji rearranged the flowers in their bins sleepily before gingerly settling himself on the high stool by the register and propping his head up in his hands.

He couldn't help but be conscious of every move, every sigh that the older man made. And he couldn't help feeling guilty for every wince of pain. Ran regretted his actions more and more with every day, but he still hadn't brought himself to apologize, or do anything about it, really. He had just avoided Youji, avoided talking to his teammates in general, and shut himself in his room.

Youji, blinking his eyes to clear them of lingering sleep, yawned again and stretched his arms. His atypically long shirt rode up and showed just the barest hint of tanned skin. Ran looked away, but remembered what it felt like to touch that skin. What it felt like when those lips curved against his neck. The scent of vanilla, in his nose and on his tongue.

Ran shut the book with a snap and sighed. There was a whole pile of arrangements waiting for him. He doubted his mind was in the right place to do true ikebana, but he could start on the simpler arrangements first.

He sat down at his worktable (he still thought of it as his, even though they all used it) and sorted through the small white pieces of paper. Omi's beautiful script, Ken's messy kanji, Youji's surprisingly neat hand. He had missed them. He had missed the scent of flowers clinging to his clothes, the tiny pricks in his fingers from the roses, the feel of petals on his skin, of damp earth under his fingernails. It was so easy to slip back into the routine, back into the slot he had vacated. That had been waiting for him.

Standing up, Youji cracked his knuckles. "Guess I should get back to work," he announced to the world at large.

Ran didn't look up and didn't answer. He had never been so at a loss for what to say. Usually, it was that he didn't want to speak, not that he couldn't. He felt closed off from the rest of his co-workers, and unable to bridge that gap.

"Hey, Aya." Youji leaned on the broom, which in his hands, more often than not, was just a prop, as opposed to a tool. "You need anything?"

Silently, Ran stood and slid the paper across the table toward Youji. He headed to the back, carefully selecting a vase that would complement the arrangement from their shelf. Youji had the flowers neatly laid out when he returned, and was watering plants at the front of the store in a desultory fashion. He had moved on to sweeping the front walk when Ran put the last flower in its place.

Setting the completed arrangement to one side, Ran shuffled through the requests again, picking something out that he knew they had a vase for. He made a mental reminder to take inventory sometime soon, and have Omi order them a new supply. The kid had a remarkably good eye for things that would sell. Someday, he would teach Omi ikebana. With his artistic eye and exacting personality, he would excel at it.

Someday, perhaps, when he felt human again.

The bell over the shop door tinkled as Youji came in, leaning the broom in its usual spot. "Want me to put that in the cooler for you?" he asked, pointing.

Ran nodded. "Get me the flat green vase, too," he said.

Youji looked almost taken aback that he had actually spoken, but said smoothly, "Sure."

While Youji was banging around in the cooler, Ran walked around the shop, choosing the flowers for his next few arrangements. Youji probably had been surprised, he reflected. It was easily the first complete sentence he had spoken to the man since coming back.

He had been holding them all at arm's length, really. It had been habit for so long, and he had fallen right back into the hole he had dug for himself. It was just so hard. He knew what it had felt like for them, to be abandoned. He had seen the mark of Ken's anger on the wall, the hurt buried deep in Omi's eyes, the wariness on Youji's face. You should fix that, he told himself. Before there was a mission, and that wariness killed one of them.

But what to do, when he didn't know how to say anything?

Setting the flowers he had chosen in a pile on the table, Ran sat down and rested his head in his hands. He had no idea how to cross the gulf that lay between him and the rest of his teammates, and now it was more important than it ever had before. How would they trust him again if he didn't?

Ran didn't look up as Youji set the vase carefully by his elbow. He half expected the blonde to ask him if he was all right, but Youji's footsteps moved quietly away from him toward the front of the shop. Taking a deep breath, he scrubbed his hands over his face. Now was not the time to be thinking about how to reconcile his team with his desertion. Now was the time to think about flowers.

With a conscious effort, he cleared his mind, shoving all the dark thoughts aside for a moment. The arrangement he had chosen was fairly simple, and he concentrated on the placement of the flowers, their colors and shapes, vaguely aware of Youji shifting things around in the shop.

A resounding crash directly behind him jolted him up and out of his chair. He whirled around, barely taking in the shattered pot, the still quivering leaves of the plant on the floor, before grabbing Youji's shoulder and clenching his fist.

Youji flinched.

Ran stared into Youji's eyes for a long minute, struggling to control himself, to damp down this inexplicable rage that had bubbled to the surface. He took a step back, willing his hand to let go, his fist to lower. This wasn't what he needed to do. But he was so angry, he was so ...

Unhappy, he finally admitted to himself. He was so unhappy.

Dropping his eyes from Youji's face, Ran muttered, "Inventory," leaving his arrangement half finished on the table and escaping to the back room. It was something he had needed to do anyway, and it offered him a quiet place to think, to decide what he should do away from everyone, away from Youji. Because he never wanted to see that look in Youji's eyes again.