Promises to Keep, chapter 6
"Options"

(I really should be cleaning my apartment instead. Oh well... it'll still be a mess tomorrow...)

When Yukito came back to their little gathering in the courtyard, his face was flushed and he was panting as though he was badly out of breath, but he was laughing too.

"Yukito-san?" Sakura asked.

Yukito half-sat, half-collapsed into a chair beside her, and said breathlessly, "He's stronger than I am... and he was so... so completely terrified...! My heart's still pounding as though I've run ten miles..." Leaning on the table a little for support, he grinned up at Touya. "You'd have won that bet, too..."

"You okay?" Touya asked, concerned by his breathless, faintly trembling exhaustion.

"I will be," Yukito said. "Just... let me catch my breath..."

Sakura turned a ferocious scowl on her brother. "You see? You shouldn't torment people like that! Both Yue-san and Yukito-san..."

Yukito shook his head a little. "It's all right." With a soft, wistful smile, he gently folded his hands over his pounding heart, and murmured to his other half, "We're safe, really. I promise -- no one's going to let the children hurt you."

"From anyone else," Touya said, "that would have been acid-dripping sarcasm. How do you manage to say things like that so sweetly?"

Yukito blinked wide, honey-golden eyes up at his lover. "Why would it be sarcasm?"

A little awkwardly, Touya shrugged and rumpled Yukito's hair. "...I just don't know anyone else who could say something like that with a straight face. They're four-year-olds, for Pete's sake. Real big and scary."

"It doesn't matter if a threat is real or not as long as it feels real," Yukito said. "I think fear needs to be comforted, not denied -- whether or not it's a necessary fear. That might be something Clow-san never understood how to help Yue with."

"I think you're just too damn nice for this world," Touya said ruefully. "Lucky for me, I love you that way."

Yukito shook his head a little. "Lucky for me," he said, "I've always had you to protect me from the world. As long as I've been alive, I've had you. I haven't had to face things alone the way Yue has. So you're right; I am too naive, and I hope I'm not encouraging him to open up just to be hurt again. We both need you to keep us in balance, you know. I'm still so much too young..."

"You are not," Touya said, bending over to touch their foreheads together so that he could look straight into Yukito's eyes. "Sometimes you're older and wiser than I'll ever be. You, not just Yue. And I told you, I love you both just the way you are."

Sakura was blushing furiously, and paying far more attention to eating her crepe than was necessary. Tomoyo, on the other hand, was glued to her camcorder's viewfinder again. She'd managed to position herself so that she got both the young lovers and Sakura with her crepe into the frame, and she looked utterly delighted with the world.

Yukito smiled up into Touya's eyes, and curved his hand against his lover's cheek in silent, adoring joy. Touya tipped his head just enough to brush a kiss against Yukito's palm, then said a little huskily, "We're having the rest of this conversation later. Away from the videocamera."

"But I was enjoying the conversation quite a bit," Yukito replied, still a bit breathless, although for a different reason. "Particularly the part where we stopped talking."

"Yukito-san!" Sakura squeaked, embarrassed.

"But don't you think he owes me, for making Yue so frightened and all...?" Yukito turned devastatingly unfair wistful-aching-puppydog eyes toward her; Sakura was slowly turning as red as her Christmas dress.

Utterly deadpan, Touya retorted with half-lidded eyes, "In other words, you're angling for some ice cream too."

"Exactly!" Yukito replied, all sunshine and bounce again. "Except it's so hard to decide which flavors; there's so many options..."

"In other words, one of everything?"

"No," Yukito said thoughtfully, "because then some of it would melt before I could eat it. Hmm..."

"Let's go," Touya said, grinning despite himself. "Tomoyo-chan, what flavors do you want?"

"Oh... green tea and ume," she said. "Thank you, Touya-san."

"No problem." He looped an arm around Yukito's waist, partially to steady him in case he was still feeling shaky, and partially simply to hold him. Yukito snuggled into his arm with a happy sigh, and put an arm around Touya too, which took all question of 'just supporting an ill friend' out of the picture.

People turned to look at them as they stood in line at the crepe-sellers, standing so close, and so unselfconscious about it. Yukito's sheer effusive delight in something so simple as ice cream practically lit up the room by itself; Touya laughed with him now, instead of standing a little bit away and just smiling.

A few years ago, Touya would have been too self-conscious to hold Yukito in public; now, though, he was learning acceptance of such open intimacy from Yukito's serenely confident joy in their love, and Yue was slowly learning it from them both. It wasn't that they hadn't experienced prejudice -- far from it, in fact -- but Yukito let any kind of slurs or insults melt away, because they couldn't touch the truth of his love, and Touya didn't like beating people up when Yukito was standing there smiling at him.

It was a mellowing of a rather limited sort -- Touya felt no qualms about beating up anyone who insulted or threatened Yukito as long as his snow bunny wasn't standing there so gently watching, and he'd earned a couple more black belts in the past few years, because it still felt necessary to keep up the ability to fight back when someone pushed a grudge too far. But still, Touya hadn't actually hospitalized a bigot since they'd graduated from the university, and now he would stand holding Yukito in the middle of the mall and laugh with him at the kittens on the paper the crepes were wrapped in.

Sakura had thought she'd never see it happen, just like she'd thought she'd never see Yue truly laugh; her brother and her guardian had been good for each other in so many ways, in whichever form he wore.

Just as he had feared the children's innocent delight over his inhumanity, Yue would never have dared to stand so close to Touya where all the world could see them. A human-seeming male lover was one thing; an inhuman male lover was something else, no matter how Yukito and Touya both assured him that with his wings hidden, he could pass more easily than he thought.

But Yue's own strengths were very different than both Yukito's and Touya's. When faced with mockery and hateful slurs, Yukito simply stood and smiled and accepted whatever was flung at him, whether words or fists; and in the same situation, Touya lashed out. Yue had had centuries to learn how to duel with different weapons, including sharply edged words alone -- and words wouldn't get you expelled from the university; Touya's last serious fight, where he'd hospitalized a man who'd physically attacked Yukito, nearly had gotten him expelled.

All of them had things to learn from each other, and joys to share. Even if Yue never learned when to simply let go of the vigilance of his guardianship, or if Yukito never learned to stand his ground and fight back, or if Touya never learned when to just stop teasing -- there was joy enough between them, and they balanced each other well.

The baby stirred within Sakura's distended womb, and she sighed and touched her fullest place with a wistful hand.

"Oniichan would have made a wonderful father," she said to Tomoyo, gently rubbing the taut roundness of her abdomen. "That's the only thing that Yue-san and Yukito-san can never give him."

"They'll make wonderful uncles," Tomoyo replied. "And if they want someone to carry a child for them... I'm sure we can find someone willing. I might even consider it myself. Watching how you've become so perfectly radiant with your pregnancy, Sakura-chan... I'm almost jealous sometimes!"

"Jealous of this?" Sakura asked, startled. "Of not being able to tie your own shoes without help, and your back always, always hurting, and looking like a whale, and oniichan telling you that you look like a whale, and never being able to sleep through a night for being kicked in places it shouldn't be possible to be kicked, and... what's to be jealous of?"

Tomoyo simply smiled at her, and said, "Your crepe's going to drip."

"...Oh!" She licked at the trickle of melting ice cream hastily, then took another bite.

Between the two of them, Touya and Yukito were carrying four crepes back from the ice cream shop; Touya handed Tomoyo hers, then took a bite of his own, and Yukito happily took a bite from each of the two he held.

"The monster's the pregnant one," Touya said to him, and licked a stray drip of ice cream from his fingers. "What's your excuse?"

"I'm eating for two too, you know," Yukito replied, as serenely cheerful as ever. "I keep hoping one of these days Yue's going to admit that he actually likes it when I eat mint chocolate chip ice cream! It's the only flavor I've ever heard him 'wake up' for."

"Yukito-san? Is Yue-san 'awake' right now?" Sakura asked, a little anxiously.

Yukito paused to consider. "I think he's trying not to be," he said, wry. "Cute kitty crepe wrappers are just a dreadful offense to his dignity, you know."

"Can you... um... can you ask him to not be awake when we go shopping for him? I mean, really and truly not listening at all? I want to really surprise him with his present, and it's so hard to know whether or not he's 'watching', and..."

"We know," Yukito said. "He understands. When we go shopping for him, he's promised he won't watch or listen at all."

Sakura breathed a great sigh of relief.

"If you're that worried about it, why didn't you shop for him when it was just you and Tomoyo-chan?" Touya asked wryly.

"Because I need Yukito-san in order to be able to buy it," Sakura said. "And... I need to talk to Yukito-san by himself too. By himself. Just for a little bit. But it's... it's very important..."

Touya blinked, several times. With an utterly bemused expression on his face, he said, "You're not buying Yue sake or something, are you?"

"No!" Sakura said. "Of course not! He wouldn't like it."

"Then what else would you need someone over twenty-one to buy?"

Looking miserable, Sakura said, "If... if Yue-san's not asleep yet... then I don't want to talk about it out loud..."

Touya choked on his crepe as another thought occurred to him. "You're not... God, Sakura, tell me you're not buying him some sort of kinky 'adult' toy or..."

"ONIICHAN!!!"

Heads turned from several directions; Sakura, blushing about as pink as Tomoyo's ume ice cream, buried her face in both hands.

Touya, however, was still fixated on the terrifying vision of his pregnant little sister and his far too innocent lover walking into one of Those Shops and looking around at types of toys they shouldn't have any business knowing about. "Monster, that wasn't a 'no.'"

"Yes it was!" Sakura wailed, half muffled by her hands. "I'm not buying Yue-san anything perverted or alcoholic or anything like that! I don't need someone over twenty-one! I need Yukito-san."

Touya gave her an assessing look, then nodded a little grudgingly. "You promise?"

"I promise," Sakura said.

"Because I really couldn't stand it if Yue opened something like that in front of Dad."

"I KNOW~!" Sakura wailed. "Neither could I!"

Tomoyo observed quite calmly, "Touya-san, I think it's fairly obvious that you're the only one who was thinking along those lines."

Touya's cheeks colored a little, and he took a too-emphatic bite of his crepe, so as to have an excuse not to answer for a while.

Yukito was a little pink-cheeked too, but he managed to keep his voice fairly steady as he said, "I'm happy to come shopping with you, Sakura-chan. To whichever store you were thinking of. Which I'm quite sure was far more innocent than what your lecherous big brother was imagining."

Sakura nodded a little, still hidden behind her hands.

Yukito gulped down the last three bites of his crepes, then reached over to touch her shoulder gently. "Come on," he said, coaxing. "Let's go shopping for Yue, and the two of us can talk. --He says that he's 'closing his eyes' and he won't look out again until I tell him it's all right."

"Really...?"

"Really." Leaning closer, he asked, "Would you like to tell me now?"

Sakura shook her head, looking out just enough to glare at her brother. "Oniichan will just laugh at me. And if he doesn't know, then he can't slip and talk about it with you when Yue-san doesn't know he shouldn't be listening. --Let's go."

Much to Yukito's amusement, Sakura didn't say a word aloud about their destination; she simply led him there. To a shoe store. Specifically, to the boot section of a shoe store.

A little bit puzzled, Yukito asked, "Why would To-ya laugh at you for bringing me to a shoe store, Sakura-chan?"

Twisting a lock of hair around her finger, she took a deep breath, and got most of it out all in a rush.

"Because I feel so badly for Yue-san in the wintertime, I hate it when my feet are cold, he never complains but then he never would, so I thought I should find him a pair of winter boots, but the problem is his clothing is white and lavender, and, well, white's not very practical for boots, they show stains like crazy when they're not magic, and I'm not supposed to use my power right now, but they don't make lavender boots for men, but you're not very tall, so I thought maybe we could find you a pair of boots in the ladies' section that would fit Yue-san too, except I know he's a different height and everything but your shoes seemed to fit him today, but I just know oniichan would fall on the floor laughing if he knew I brought you to shop in the ladies' shoes department and I didn't want either of us to have to put up with that, and maybe this is a silly, stupid idea anyway, maybe Yue-san doesn't like shoes, he's had all those years to get them if he wanted them, it's just that I don't know if he doesn't wear them because he doesn't like them or because that's what Clow made for him to wear, and anyway I don't know if..."

Smiling, Yukito reached out and set his fingertips against Sakura's lips. "I think he'll be delighted," Yukito said, confidentially.

"...Really?"

"You're thinking of him, kindly and sincerely," Yukito said. "You're thinking of what he might want or need, as himself, and as a person in his own right, not just half a person. I'm sure he'll be both delighted and honored."

"...Oh." A little shy, Sakura said, "Then you don't mind either...? That I had to ask you to come with me and try on women's boots...?"

"It'll be fun!" Yukito said, earnestly.

"You're not embarrassed?" she asked, in an even tinier voice.

Yukito shook his head. "Not unless you want to put me in stiletto heels or something," he said. "I couldn't stand up enough to tell if they fit or not; I'd either break an ankle or my neck!"

"No high heels," Sakura said hastily. "Just normal boots. Except for the being lavender part. And... um... soft and warm inside. That's all."

It took them about half an hour of looking; Yukito's feet were small for a man's, but large for a woman's, and slender as well. Finally they settled on a pair, though, and bought them, and Yukito hooked a hand through the handle of the bag and followed Sakura out of the store humming to himself.

"Back to To-ya and Tomoyo-chan, then?" he asked. "Shall we give Tomoyo-chan a call on your cell phone?"

"No," Sakura said, quickly, and a little desperately; Yukito stopped and turned to look at her.

"No...?"

"I... um... I need to talk to you, Yukito-san. Without Yue-san listening. Please. It's... just... please, I need to talk to you..."

The urgency in her voice convinced him; he looped his free arm through hers and patted her hand gently. "All right, Sakura-chan," he said. "Let's find a quiet place to sit, and we can talk. Might I ask what it's about? You sound so... anxious."

Sakura bit her lip, then nodded a little. "I am," she murmured. "I mean... I don't have time to wait anymore, and I know Shaoran and Kero-chan will be furious with me, and Yue-san will be beyond furious, but... every day that goes by, I'm more and more afraid that time will run out before I've had the chance, and I couldn't live with myself if... I mean... well, I couldn't live with myself in the other case anyway, but... I'm saying this all wrong, Yukito-san, but... um..."

There was a bench by a brightly lit Christmas tree in one of the side corridors; Yukito led her over to it and saw her carefully settled, then sat down beside her and took her hands again. "Sakura-chan, what are you talking about?" he murmured.

"...Options," she whispered.

"Options...?"

"Options. A way for you to live, you and Yue-san. Even if I die having the baby."