I can't sleep.
My head... hurts from crying.
I don't know how long I've been sitting here... or how long it's been since I've even shifted my weight. I'm just staring ahead with no focus, forehead propped in my hands, elbows aching from resting on the lid of the piano keys for who knows how long.
It's my fault he's gone.
Sora wanted me to drive him away, and he did everything in his power to make it happen. I know this. The signs were all there, and no amount of kindness I could ever show him would stop that urge to escape. It frightens me, knowing I could feel his pain as if it was my own. Maybe my need to help him was just some selfish desire to soothe my own suffering, giving another person the comfort I'd lost with mum's death. If that's all it was, what right do I have to chase him, to force help he doesn't want? Sora is a wounded animal, pierced to the core by all the arrows and spears that his life cast at him, lashing out in fright because fear is all he's ever known.
I finally slide off the piano bench, moving about the apartment in a daze. Everything feels unreal, the rooms quiet and diminished somehow by Sora's absence. Without his biting personality and his blaring, angry music, my home-- our home-- is empty. A fresh wave of tears sting my eyes as I go to make tea, needing something to settle my unhappy stomach. I notice a paper on the counter as I set the kettle on the stove... a homework paper with Sora's name scrawled at the top, along with a big red A on it. It takes me a minute to realize that it's one of the poems I wanted to read so badly, the ones he kept wavering about showing to me. I fill my infuser with loose Earl Grey and set it in the teacup, glancing over the shaky writing.
"... and where shall I go when the light
Has faded into some nameless dusk?
Home, forward to the place that comforts me
Take comfort in the darkness
Solace in the arms of night
For in the dark, find memory of dawn
All the sweeter for the coming
Of evening, silent and still
Light not a candle in the eve,
For you shall find the sun
More brilliant for it.
Fear not the dark, mourn not
The loss of day, be sweet
As lovers, hand in hand."
The world feels like it's fallen even further away now. How could someone so cold, so cynical, feel this deeply?
It's simple. He's none of those things. Sora's walls have slipped time and again, in half-smiles he can quickly stifle and pretend never happened, but here is concrete proof that nothing inside him has died. There is no lack of hope, only a blindness that keeps him from recognizing it in himself.
God, how can anyone survive feeling this way? If my heart ached for him before, now the pain is all but crippling. I haven't gone after him when I should have, and now he surely believes that I hate him. If I don't find him, he'll die out there in the cold, bitter and lonely. I can almost feel the chill myself, gooseflesh prickling along my arms and legs.
Why am I still standing here?
The kettle is just starting to whistle, faltering and fading as I turn off the heat. I race from the kitchen, barely remembering to grab my coat on the way out.
It's only been a few hours. He'll be alright... even if I don't know which way he went, I will find him.
After the first hour, my fingers and toes were numb. The second hour, everything was numb. Now I've gone somewhere beyond not feeling, deeper than utter emptiness, and this is how I've been waiting for the end. I'm sitting in the snow in an alley, my jeans soaked through, and wondering why I'm still alive. I must have frostbite by now. I close my eyes, listening to the hiss of cars cruising along slushy streets, and dream.
Riku, standing in the waves.
Riku, standing in shadow.
Riku, standing between me and utter darkness, his body luminescent and translucent, his arms shielding me from all harm.
I couldn't take his hand then. I couldn't save him then.
How could I let him save me now?
I press my hands to my face, feeling the grime on them, the road grit embedded in my skin. I'd slipped as I ran down the street, scattering the few late night pedestrians in my way. My palms sting, but I don't care. It's been so long since the last time, long enough that the first sob hurts. It wrenches from my chest, constricts my throat, bubbling up in a wellspring of heartache. Everything I'd wanted to do, everything that should've given me my escape and granted me the melancholy security I believed I needed... it was done, and I hate myself for it. There is no escaping that. I can't ever take it back. I only wish my body would stop torturing me and just die already. I've always believed I'd just wink out of existence, my consciousness snuffed like a candle. Fuck the afterlife. If living is this painful, who needs eternity to remind them of every mistake? I curl tightly into myself, hugging my legs so I can bawl pitifully against my thighs.
"Please... if anybody's l-- listening... if a-- anybody c-- cares... just... make it s-- stop...."
The wind howls down the alley, blowing my hair into my face. It sounds like it's laughing. I can't listen anymore. I reach out with one hand, groping blindly through the snow, until I feel a dull ache in my fingertip. I look out the corner of my eye, seeing my blood staining the dirty drifts. I've sliced myself open on a piece of broken glass, a thin ribbon of red outlining the sharp edge. It's fascinating, really. Sniffling, I gingerly pick up the shard, uncurling my other arm. The underside of my arm is so pale, so fragile... it will barely take any pressure at all....
Something smacks my hand so hard, the glass breaks in my grip. Somehow, I'm not cut further by the flying fragments.
But Riku is. He rips the remaining piece from my fingers, throwing it aside. He's bleeding from a pair of small gashes across the back of his hand, his eyes wild with fear. I stare up at him dully as he takes my hands in his; I can feel him shaking.
He's crying. How... strange.
"... how did you find me?" My throat feels dry. It hurts to talk. My fingers are pins and needles in Riku's grip, his warmth bringing life back to them. No, no, I don't want to feel....
"I don't know...." He sounds as strangled as I do, the British accent more pronounced than I've ever heard it before. He closes his eyes, leaning forward until we're resting forehead to forehead. "Sora, please forgive me... I should never have hit you...."
"I provoked you... you did exactly what I wanted you to do...."
"Which is why I shouldn't have done it."
One hand moves to thread his fingers into the hair at the nape of my neck. It's a gentle touch that soothes me. The voice that should be screaming at me to push him away, that no, it's wrong for him to be so close... it's utterly silent. All I can hear is Riku breathing close to my face and a soft, sad trill, like crystal ringing in my ears.
Oh god, it hurts so much when his tears fall on my face. They burn me from within, warming my whole body back to life from the edge of oblivion. Everything prickles, and I start to shiver as the cold bites into me.
"You're frozen through... come on."
He pulls me to my feet, supporting me when I barely have the strength to stand. I don't see the Lexus anywhere, so he must've gone after me on foot. Crazy bastard. I stumble once, my prickling toes making me clumsy, but Riku holds on tight. I don't know where we're going, my legs moving with a will of their own to follow Riku's lead. We make our way along the streets for a little while; apparently I didn't get too far away from the apartment before I collapsed in the alley. It's just far enough that we're not quite home by the time my shivering reaches epic levels. For a moment I swear I'm having another seizure, but Riku doesn't panic. He just veers into a little all-night diner that we've visited a few times since I moved in.
The warmth of the diner washes over me, and I nearly melt into a puddle on the spot. The waitress that sees us first clucks in sympathy, ushering us over to a corner booth away from the two or three other patrons at the counter. Riku finally lets go of me when he's sure I'm not going to tumble out of the seat, taking his own place across from me. Coffee is brought immediately; I want to gulp it down, not caring if it scalds my tongue and my throat, but my hands are still shaking. I manage to get a grip on the mug so I can sip the dark brew slowly. Riku says something to the waitress, who hurries back into the kitchen. He reaches over when I finally set the empty mug down, checking my hands and arms for frostbite. Thankfully, I seem to have been spared.
"I was so worried about you...." It's so simple, but there's a gravity in his voice that forces me to swallow the lump in my throat.
"If you don't mind, I'd rather just forget all of this ever happened. If you want me to go back to the apartment with you, I will. But I don't want to talk about this."
"Then what happens the next time we have a fight? This won't go away, Sora. It all has to come out in the open."
I say nothing, staring down into my empty mug. Eventually the waitress comes back with two bowls of tomato rice soup and two grilled cheese and ham sandwiches for us. I nibble at my sandwich as she refills my coffee. Only when she leaves does Riku sip his soup.
"Nobody wants to hear about why I'm an ass, Riku. Not even you. It's not part of human nature to give a shit about people like me."
"Stop telling me what I do and don't care about, Sora." Riku's face is stern, but his eyes... I look away from those soulful eyes. The way he looks at me makes me want to lean against him and fall asleep on his shoulder. "Please, for once in your life, trust me."
I try to protest, but for the first time I can remember, there's no words of protest waiting for me, no way for me to snipe at the evils of the world. Riku waits patiently, taking a bite of his food now and then. I polish off my sandwich before I find the strength to speak.
"I wanted you to throw me out."
Riku nods. Of course he knew about this all along. Even though I played on his temper to get what I wanted, he knew exactly why I was doing it. His only fault was in not being able to control himself for that one moment.
"If I just tried to leave, you'd come after me. I had to make you hate me so much, you'd never follow me."
"Why, Sora? Why are you afraid of me?"
A spoonful of my soup, taken in the pause between my words and his, almost goes down the wrong way. Is he reading my mind? Or am I that transparent? I cough and pound on my chest a little, Riku watching me all the while. Finally I catch my breath, though I still can't meet his eyes. I lay my spoon in the bowl, my hand resting on the table close to it.
"... I can't take it anymore, Riku. I can't handle being hurt time and time again. What happens when you get bored with coddling some poor kid from the ghetto?"
"... bored...?" He whispers it, and I can see the deep hurt in his expression. "Sora, I didn't take you into my home on some whim. We were both alone, and it was killing us. I hoped... we could help each other."
"I'm so tired." I rub at my eyes, only to start when I feel Riku lay his hand over mine.
"I know. You've been keeping this in for a long time. Look, just finish your soup and we'll go home. We have time to talk about this later. But at least you got this much off your chest, right?"
It's funny, but he's right. Just admitting this one secret to him has made me feel a little better. I think if he tried to lie to me about his feelings, I'd know. It's like we're open books to each other... we just need to understand the language a bit more. I nod once, earning a smile from Riku that I wish I could return. But right now, I think my face will crack if I try. Call it habit, I guess.
We finish in a surprisingly comfortable silence, and I'm amazed at how much lighter and warmer I feel. There's no bad feelings between us, and all I'm worried about now is the lasting repercussions of my actions at the party. I probably landed Riku in some seriously deep shit after that stunt. Thinking about it, I realize I don't have the best personality for getting seriously drunk, especially if I want to avoid sticking my foot in my mouth up to my hip-- again-- in the future.
I don't argue when Riku pays the check, since I'm pretty much broke as usual. He gives me a hand, helping me out of the booth, and together we head back out into the snowy evening.
"You realize it's Christmas Eve now, right?"
Come to think of it, he's right. When we got back from the party, it was about eleven p.m. on the twenty-third. A quick glance at a bank's outdoor clock confirms that it is indeed two-thirty-seven in the morning, with a temperature of twenty-seven degrees. No wonder I'm so frigging tired.
"Hn. When we get back, don't expect me to wake up anytime before next year."
"You and me both."
Riku pauses on the sidewalk just outside the diner, listening. Over the sounds of the City That Never Sleeps, I can hear the diner's outdoor sound system piping quiet music into the night. Mandy Moore, I believe. "I Wanna Be With You." Pop, but it's a pretty song. I suddenly find myself thinking of Aelan, but that's suddenly interrupted when Riku pulls me into his arms, an uncharacteristic grin on his lips.
"I love this song."
"What are you--"
"Shhh...." The grin becomes a gentle smile, his arms holding me close.
And he starts slow-dancing with me on the sidewalk, in the falling snow.
What am I feeling now...?
"Riku...," I murmur, my heart suddenly fluttering in my chest. Snowflakes sparkle in his hair and on his clothes, one tiny crystal clinging to his lashes. Another melts on his cheekbone, rolling down creamy skin like a tear. I can smell his cologne, feel the warmth of his body through his coat, and for the first time in my entire life
in any life
I feel safe.
I feel wanted.
I feel....
become intertwined
I....
no matter what
"Sora...."
I look up.
Right into his eyes.
And there's nothing I can do to stop it.
Nothing to make me want to stop it.
Oh god, I'm falling out of control, and he's the only one who can ever catch me.
He leans toward me, those long pale lashes flickering closed, and I tilt my head back in answer, the world going dark as I shut it away past my own eyelids. My heart thunders in time with the quickening of his breath, something far beyond ourselves quivering in desperate longing within me, like the sound of a thousand souls in harmony. I can't describe it any other way, such an otherworldly feeling more beautiful than anything else in creation.
Save for the single touch of warm lips to mine, shy and gentle, a spark that burns deep into layers of pain and exposes the core of my heart to the sun.
This time, my tears have nothing to do with pain. This time, the only loss I experience is that of losing myself to another, in the awkward, uncertain, but precious touch of flesh to flesh, tongue to tongue, and breath to breath.
I will never be cold again.
TBC