Saitou Hajime liked to ponder. He was quite good at it, actually, and it was not uncommon to find upon the old Wolf (none of them were really comfortable with mentally referring to him by a given name, even one as impersonal as Saitou-san) sitting in a darkened room, smoking a cigarette and contemplating for all he was worth. (Which was, of course, a very large amount.)
The rookie coppers had taken to carefully checking empty rooms for breathing and tiny glowing lights (as would be caused by cigarettes) before entering.
The more senior ones had taken to sending a rookie on any errand that might take them into a darkened room, rather than go themselves.
So really, when the light went out in a certain room and no one had seen the Wolf leave, it was not remarked upon overmuch. There was a slight shifting away from the room, rather like the five-times-daily turning toward Mecca of the Muslims in reverse, but other than that, nothing much.
This was in all probability a good thing – Saitou was not very pleased with his current choice of musing material, and that did not translate well into dealings with others.
He blew out a long stream of smoke and glared at it as if had done something personally offensive to Saitou. Why was he in this mess, again?
Oh yes, that's why.
The ahou.
The brash, annoying, impulsive, dimwitted, loyal, hot-tempered, aggravating, foolish, fascinating, loutish, persistent, reckless, attractive ahou.
…
….
Oh, shit.
How did those three extra words make it in there?
Because there was no way in Hell he would ever use them when describing the ahou, not while he was in his right mind.
Tokio would know.
It was tempting, oh so very tempting to go to the woman who had succeeded in becoming his best friend (even if she had failed rather miserably in becoming the love of his life) and ask her what to make of it. He had to fight down the urge to run to her house (not their house, how could it be when he spent more far time at the station than he did even in the same neighborhood as the house) and spill out all his troubles into her patient ears like an adolescent boy.
But he knew what she would say, and so he didn't.
That still didn't give him any comfort, though. Why wouldn't this just make sense?
Some things don't make sense, Sai-sama.
Of course, it also helped that he seemed to have acquired, over the years, a chibi-Tokio that lived in his head, accurate down to the last nuance in tone and that not-really-hated-nickname.
Somewhat.
Why not? Satiou barely suppressed a wince. That sounded petulant – even in his thoughts – and Saitou Hajime didn't do petulant. Ever. End. Of. Story.
Because they don't. Again that implacable tone, that never-ending calm with just the slightest hint of wry humor that never failed to drive a point home.
Well what is it, then? Saitou growled at the little apparition he would swear had taken to floating at his ear, just above his shoulder. If you can't tell me why, then you can tell me what, at least.
Silly Sai-sama. You know what it is.
There was on e of the advantages (or disadvantages) to living with a person for ten years, even if you had probably spent more than half that time out of her company. Saitou didn't even need to think to see the expression she would be wearing now, should he have actually been talking to Tokio.
It didn't matter though.
She was wrong.
And he didn't care what Tokio said, or would say if he asked her.
It wasn't possible.
At all.
Saitou realized that his cigarette had gone out some time ago. He growled softly, lit another one, and glared at the darkness until he fell asleep.
*******************
Ugh. I was sick yesterday, so there was absolutely no way in hell I would have been able to write anything, and I'm still sick today, so there's no way in hell I'm making up the lost chapter until at least tomorrow. I'll make it up, no doubt about it, but at least gimmie until I can go a day without wasting to lie down and be violently sick on all those people/things that insist on moving fast/being brightly colored/moving me fast/being loud/in any other way promoting the tossing of cookies.
God, I hate the flu.
April-san: Yes, real life sucks, doesn't it? Things would be so much better without it. And I like writing interactions – which is why I write so much of them – so I'm glad you like! My problem is that (I think) I tend to focus almost completely on the interactions and pretty much write out the background, and the characters who aren't currently doing anything. *must fix … must fix …* 'Preciate the encouragement!
Nicky: Oh, don't feel bad. Honestly? I just made up that bit on the spot – I've never given it a bit of thought until right then, when I'm like – "hey! He's got 'k-a-t' in his name! Sweet!" And that bit was meant to be somewhat funny, so I'm glad it was (for some reason, half the time I try to write funny, it just comes out stupid.)
Kuroyousei: You're back! *glomps* Now … lot of stuff to respond to, so, in order of the chapters as you reviewed them:
28: It's not a very nice feeling is it? I spent my entire 8th grade year like that – with next to no friends and no one I'd really want to be friends with … *shudder*. Well, that's long gone and dead, and I'm never going to have to go back (thank God!) Aoshi is quite the complicated puzzle, isn't he? And of course, Katsu will solve it – it just might take awhile. ^_^
29: Indeed. I figured it would probably be a bit too soon to have Aoshi break out into a mile-wide, 1000-watt smile, accompanied by song-and-dance routine, so I went with this instead. ;) And significant fluff is still fluff, right? Much like hospital food is still – technically – food. (Oxymoron alert!)
30: Wow … that's um … pretty much it, really. No, no wait … wait … yeah, that's it. Hit the nail on the head, there. And that's … pretty much how Aoshi's going to rationalize it to Katsu later (seeing as how I'm not really sure if Katsu can be "rational" on this subject). And, obviously the next chapter didn't detail the story, because this is it, and this is obviously not Katsu's story (somehow, I don't think you're that disappointed, though) but maybe the next one will … or maybe I'll leave it ambiguous and let you decided exactly what happened, sorta like I did with the Katsu-life-story thing (although not really, because I'm going to tell you most of what happened in that, just not right now.) I'm not really sure. Think I'm leaning towards ambiguity though – no way I'll be able to come up with something as good as most people reading this have imagined with just the few facts I gave them.
And hey, if you want to start writing your own evening update, that would rock. I seriously think I would swoon from happiness. And I'd try to make a point of reviewing every chapter (even though I might not, for, as previously stated, I suck at giving reviews) so … uh … that'd be just fine. (pleasepleasepleaseplease?)