Hullo! If you've already read this on Mediaminer.org, my apologies.
Warnings:
language. LOTS of language. Also angst, Schuldig POV, future citrus, and Asuka.
Yes, I consider Asuka a warning.
Pairings: Schuldig/Yohji
Disclaimer: I think I like the denial stage. Mine, alllll mine!
Archive: The Temple of Lunacy, http://lunatic.deep-ice.com
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Summary: Schuldig's POV as he copes with life after Schwarz and Estet.
And then Yohji finds him, and things get interesting. Shitty summary, but the
best I could come up with.
Counter fic for Karen from KanaDUH!
Healing
by Anria
Part 2
I call in sick to work the next day. My head is pounding, feeling like it's going to explode any minute. I spend most of the day focusing on rebuilding my shields, creating bricks and mortar for its foundations out of nothing. That sort of thing is bound to give you a headache.
Really, a day isn't enough time. I need about a week to put the basis in place before it starts to strengthen on its own, without constant supervision. But I got yelled at enough for missing one day of work, if I miss any more I'll be out on my ass without a job and no money I'm willing to spend.
Dammit, I should have asked Kudou if Estet was still around. Is still around.
Oh well. Live and learn.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
I make extra sure to have lots of layers on when I go into work. A high-necked, long sleeved top, gloves, jeans, boots, hair falling down around my face. The boss'll probably yell at me for that one, but screw him. I want as much between me and everyone else as possible.
Kudou doesn't show up.
It isn't until the boss bangs on the counter for last orders, announcing the bar will close in an hour that I realise I was waiting for him all along.
My apartment seems lonelier than ever.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Eh, I have to face facts. He isn't coming back. He might be just as lonely as I am, but that doesn't mean he's coming back.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The days kinda blend together now. One long, unending stream of bored, bored, bored. And lonely. Mustn't forget the lonely.
Not that I really could if I tried.
Eh, anyway. I think I've pretty much resigned myself to spending the rest of my life working at this goddamn bar, handing drinks and change to men and women whose only purpose in life is to kill their liver, and via that themselves.
The door to the bar opens, and I get blasted with a shock of bloody freezing cold air. Looks like the weather finally caught up with the rest of the country and decided it was winter - which means I now freeze my ass off every night because my little shithole doesn't have central heating worth anything.
Joy. A new customer.
Feh, that bloody bar stool . . . okay, so the creak lets me know when I actually have to start work again, but that doesn't mean it's not annoying.
I make my way over to the stool, leaning down to shove a glass away under the counter. "What's your poison?" I ask, and look up.
Woah, déjà vu.
Kudou looks a little less dead this time, though.
For a moment, we just stare at each other. I can't read his face - I've discovered I'm beyond crap at telling what people's intentions are without hearing their thoughts. I can't read his expression. . . .
What the hell is he doing here?
I hold his gaze for a moment more, then say, "What do you want to drink?"
"A shot," he says without missing a beat.
"Of what?" Oookay, we're rhyming here. This can't be good.
"Anything."
So I get his bloody shot. He tosses it back with practised ease and I tell him how much it just cost him. He hands over the cash like he was already prepared - fuck off, Kudou, you're not Crawford - and . . . gets up and walks to the door? What the fuck?
I blink after him for a moment, then shake myself and move to the register to pay in his cash.
And it's only then that I notice the normal slip of paper among the more valuable bits of tree guts.
Ignoring everyone for a moment, I lean back and open the note. Kudou's written inside in butchered English; his handwriting is appalling. But right now I couldn't care less.
I'm sorry.
Sorry? What the fuck is he sorry for? For helping my shields take a temporary holiday?
. . . why the fuck would he be sorry about it? Why would he apologise to me?
The rest of the night passes in a dazed blur. I short-change one guy twice in a row and undercharge another one, and that's all I'm certain about. No matter how many times I try to focus, my mind keeps returning to Kudou's note.
When the bar closes, I get yelled at for a couple of minutes by the boss before he realises that I am truly out of it and tells me to go home, disgusted. I grab my coat and charge out into the blisteringly cold night, and stop.
Kudou's waiting for me outside, just like he did the first night he paid any attention to me outside the bar. Except that last time, he looked righteously pissed, and now he's . . . nervous? Am I reading this right?
Fuck, I can't be.
I pull on my coat and wait for him to speak. He opens his mouth a couple of times, breath steaming in the cold air, but closes it again when nothing comes out.
Open, close, open, close. . . .
Okay, this is getting ridiculous.
"Kudou, what the fuck do you want?"
He does his fish imitation again for a couple of seconds, then looks away. "I. . . ." He shivers suddenly, and says plaintively, "Can we do this somewhere less cold?"
I eye him suspiciously for a moment, then say, "Sure. Not my shithole, though - that place isn't heated worth fuck."
He almost winces at that, would you believe it. Heh, I think little Kudou might not like my swearing. Couldn't be sympathy for the cold . . . so since when did he get so sensitive about language?
Then he sighs, and his shoulders slump. "Fine, follow me."
We walk along for a while, freezing our asses off, before it occurs to be that he had a car last time I . . . okay, not the last last time, but the one before that. Before he came to the bar. There, that one works . . . the last time I met him before he showed up at the bar, he had a car. If that trumped-up buggy could be called a car. . . .
"Hey, Kudou, did you walk here?"
He glances back at me, but quickly turns his head away, watching where he walks. There's a little more in that gesture than just being careful of patches of ice on the pavement. "Yeah," he says quietly, and keeps walking.
Right. Now I want to know why the hell he walked, but . . . the silence is awkward enough. Conversation would be worse.
Hey, Brad, look at me now. I've actually learned when to shut my mouth.
Look, a flying pig.
The thought is so sudden and sharp that I trip slightly, my head whipping to the side as though I expect to find him there, staring down at me with that smug look on his face, brown eyes cold behind clear glasses. I shut my eyes, and for a second I can almost pretend that he's standing beside me. That Nagi is snickering quietly behind him, a corner of Farf's mouth quirking upwards as he stands beside me.
It's moments like these that I miss them the most. When I can almost hear them, almost see them, almost feel them.
Almost.
"Schuldig?"
I jump, opening my eyes to see that Kudou has stopped, looking back at me. "What?" I snap at him, surly that he ruined a moment in which I could pretend.
"Are you . . . are you coming?" he says hesitantly.
I would swear that he started to say something else, but at this particularly point in time I really don't care what it was. A part of me wants to yell at him, to make him go away and leave me alone so I can stay here and remember, and pretend. It gets stronger by the minute, but stronger still is the voice that tells me he's the real one, the only link I have left to my old life. And that he's just as lonely as I am, because maybe I'm the only link left to his old life, too.
I sigh, and look across the street, as though if I stare long enough Crawford will appear with Farf and Nagi in tow, and they'll look over at me, and I'll smile and join them and this time I won't be so stupid as to ignore what I have while I have it.
"Yeah," I say quietly. "I'm coming."
We walk on for a while more before Kudou stops, turning into a large apartment building. Staring up at it, I see that it is one of the newer, pricey ones - a lot of space, good quality everything. I could've had one of these if I wasn't so scared that Estet could track my spending from the old accounts.
He leads me up to the top floor. Kritiker must've paid him better than I thought if he can afford a penthouse in one of these apartment complexes.
The inside of the apartment is clean, warm, and bare. He doesn't seem to have more than the bare necessities around - well, unless you count the state-of-the-art sound and video system. And the fact that his couch is shiny new and top-quality leather. And someone did a professional job of decorating. And that what I can see of the kitchen through the doorway is shiny, new stainless steel.
To sum it up, his apartment is much nicer than my shithole. Warmer, too. But it lacks something mine has - a few pieces of dirty clothes tossed here and there, an unwashed mug on a table. Little things that make it looked lived-in, not like a showroom.
I wonder what that's supposed to tell me about his state of mind. A psychiatrist could get a lot of it, but so sue me, my intimacy with the inner workings of people's minds was usually on a more personal basis, y'know?
Kudou hangs his coat on a peg and slips his shoes off, wandering into the apartment. He doesn't look back at me, but I get this feeling that he wants to, very badly. Probably because in his position, I would've looked back.
I slip off my shoes and coat, following his example, and pad barefoot into the living room. If such an un-lived-in room could be called that. I sit on the larger of the two sofas, curling one leg up under me. I always liked sitting like that, I don't know why. Certainly doesn't make for getting up quickly, and I have to wonder why I do that almost unconsciously. If I really didn't trust Kudou, at least on some level, I'd probably have kept my coat and shoes, too.
"Do you want something to drink?"
I blink at him. He's trying to hide it, but he's nervous - and if I can notice he's nervous without my talent to help me, then he's really got a rat in his pants about something. But he's making a civilised gesture, so I nod.
He scurries into the kitchen - I'm not kidding, he scurries - and returns with a bottle of vodka and two glasses. He gives me an embarrassed look. "Sorry, it's all I have."
"That's okay," I say, and silence falls between the two of us again as he pours the drinks. I wait for him to take a sip of his before drinking any of mine.
We sit in silence for a while. I stare at my glass, but I can feel his eyes burning into me. I look up, and he turns away rapidly, a light blush staining his cheeks. He stares fixedly at the opposite wall, not saying anything.
I lower my head again, and after a moment I feel his gaze on me again. Lifting my head, he looks away quickly once again. Shit, I'm using the word again too often. Better stop.
We repeat the process three, maybe four times. As amusing as it is, the silence grows more and more strained.
Damn, this is beyond awkward.
I sigh and lean forward, placing my glass on the coffee table in front of me. "Look, Kudou," I say tiredly. "You brought me here to say something, so say it already. Then I can go home and get some fucking sleep."
Yohji blinks, then gives me a rueful smile, downing the rest of his glass in one gulp. Maybe it should say something about the both of us that he offered vodka in a normal wine glass, and I didn't blink when I took it.
He places his glass down, and then stands. What's that psychobabble bullshit about wanting to be taller than someone you have to face down? Feeling of superiority, dominance, some kind of crap like that. Heh, maybe there is some truth in it after all considering how Kudou's acting.
"I wanted to say I'm sorry," he bursts out suddenly, and I focus on his face. Yes, dumbass, you said that already. "I - I didn't know that me touching you would have such an effect. And I know it hurt you, so I'm sorry."
He stares out of the window behind me, steadfastly refusing to look anywhere near my face. Yay. Great. Get on with it, Kudou, because if that's all you had to say I'm going to rip you a new asshole.
"Um. . . ." he trails off, then starts again. "I'm not sure how to say this without you going for my throat."
"You're inspiring real confidence here."
I don't think he was expecting me to reply to that, as his head jerks down and he looks me full in the face for the first time since we got into his apartment. He looks away again just as quickly, fidgeting slightly. "I. . . ." he trails off again, then starts muttering to himself, "Why the fuck am I having such trouble with this? I can smooth-talk any woman I come across, so why the hell do I balk at telling an old enemy that I don't want to fight because we're both all that's left of those times and I know he's just as fucking miserable as I am. . . ."
"How do you know that?" I say sharply. I have a nasty suspicion growing in my mind.
Yohji jumps again, and blushes again. There's that word. . . . "Uh . . . this is the part I don't know how to say without you going for my throat."
"Just say it already," I say tiredly. "Fuck it, Kudou, I wanna go home so I can sleep."
"Okay. Um. . . ."
I. Am.
"You know when I touched you at your apartment?"
Going.
"Well, the thing is. . . . You see, the thing is. . . ."
To.
"You read my mind, right? You found out everything?"
Kill.
"It . . . kinda went both ways."
Him. Using every skill I . . . what?
"What?"
Kudou stares at some point past my head again. "You heard me."
I stare at him in complete disbelief, before groaning and burying my head in my hands. "That's all I bloody well need," I mutter. "Any other nasty surprises?"
"Well, I thought that maybe. . . . Maybe. . . ."
"Kudou, if you don't stop hedging I'm going to reach down your throat and pull out your intestines, tie them to a rock and kick you off the edge of a cliff."
Even not looking directly at him, I see him wince at that. He sighs and slumps down in the armchair suddenly, bringing his leg and one of his slender, long fingered hands into my line of sight. "Look," he says, and his voice is much more firm than it was before. "We both know we're both lonely. And miserable. And depressed out of our heads. I'm also your only link to Schwarz, and you're my only link to Weiss, as they both were before. You, Aya and Manx are the only people left alive who know shit about me and what I used to do, and neither of those two give a flying fuck. I'm the only one left alive who knows shit about you. What I'm trying to say is, can we at least try to be . . . I dunno . . . friends? Or at least drinking buddies, because I'm sick and tired of being alone, and I think you are too."
He falls silent, and even flopped motionless manages to give off a kind of tense expectancy. I remain still, head in my hands.
Well, he hit the nail on the head with that one, didn't he. Fact is, I know we're both miserable, and what's the saying? Misery loves company.
I sigh again and lean into the sofa, tipping my head to lie back on the soft cushions of the couch., arm stretched out beside me on the armrest. I close my eyes.
Fact is, even if this is the best way to stop being lonely, some part of me doesn't want to do it. Because to take up Kudou's offer will mean finally admitting to myself that they're gone, completely and utterly. I'll be letting go of one link to grab onto another one, a weaker one since Kudou didn't know the rest of Schwarz like I did.
But life goes on, and the dead don't. And I'm alive . . . but Crawford, Nagi and Farf aren't.
I guess . . . it's time to let go.
I raise my head and lean forwards, grabbing my glass from the table. Kudou watches me with wary eyes.
I smile, faintly, a mockery of my old smirk. "Fill her up."
[End Part 2]
Any good?
