Standard Disclaimer: Yami no Matsuei © Matsuhita Youko, Central Park Media, et al.
Rating: G (Intimations of shonen ai)
Summary: It takes 25 hours to get from Kagoshima to Okinawa by ferry. Tsusoka.
AN: Thanks to my beta, the wonderful Nicolas V. Feedback is love. Enjoy.
Amaranths
By Dorian Gray
"Hey" is all Hisoka says as he drops his bag on the hotel bed. Tsuzuki hears him clearly through the open door. He's standing on the balcony, just a wrought iron grate and a railing fixed to the building with long, black screws. Under his feet he can see the sidewalk three stories down, the hotel entrance, people walking. The railing is flimsy and when Tsuzuki leans forward he imagines sad, translucent faces hovering between him and the concrete below.
Two days on earth and he's killed five people.
Three stories, he thinks, the fall won't kill me...
"Tsuzuki..." A question, a warning. Hisoka is still hesitating by the bed. Finally he sighs, a typically Hisoka sound, mostly exasperation. "There's something I want to buy before we go back." If Tsuzuki listens very carefully, he can hear an invitation there. If he listens even more carefully, he can heard Hisoka's wariness and insecurity. And the concern, well, Hisoka is pretty good at hiding that.
Turns out, Hisoka doesn't really need to buy anything of course, but they end up walking along the waterfront anyway, searching for a store that carries whatever it is Hisoka's pretending to look for. Hisoka must have been more worried than usual, because he doesn't even complain much when Tsuzuki drags him into a delicatessen, only rolls his eyes and scoffs when Tsuzuki offers him a bite of pie, only glares when Tsuzuki gets whip cream on his face trying to spoon-feed him.
Hisoka sits across from him, chin propped against the palm of his hand, watching Tsuzuki. The restaurant is dim and shadowy compared to the summer sky outside and Tsuzuki's eyes are the color of blackberries. He watches as Tsuzuki scrapes the last traces of cream off the red and white plate, a faint sound of metal on china.
Hisoka tells himself he's getting soft and will pay for in the end. Tsuzuki laughs quietly and says the peach pie was the best he's had in a long time. They walk into the sunlight again, warm and bright with a white glare, and continue to look for a store that, by definition, they will never find, passing old stone warehouses and little shops displaying expensive foreign clothing. Along the way something catches Tsuzuki's interest. He stops and looks out at the bay, at a white ferry, its red flags dancing in the wind; reaches out and draws Hisoka over, pointing with his free hand.
"That one," he says. "Let's go."
Hisoka glares at the fingers wrapped around his arm, but doesn't move. "We have to check in before six."
But Tsuzuki just smiles and shrugs in that way which still gets under Hisoka's skin.
"Come on." Tsuzuki doesn't give a reason, just tugs Hisoka up to the booking office and buys them two tickets on the ferry, which is leaving for Okinawa in less than an hour.
"You're just wasting your money," Hisoka objects. "This is ridiculous."
It is, it is, thinks Tsuzuki, but you're not pulling away.
The taste of warm peach pie still lingering in his mouth, the company of a dear friend, good weather and half a day's freedom on earth, sometimes it's enough to make Tsuzuki think life would be worth living if only he deserved it.
Hisoka is with him. Tsuzuki has learned it's better not to ask, because then Hisoka will have to say no even if he wants to come. Especially if he wants to. Hisoka is like that. So just grab him and go. He'll complain but he won't mean it. He'll have fun but he won't smile.
Hisoka cares for Tsuzuki, and Tsuzuki doesn't understand why.
The ferry is heading southwest. Okinawa -- all these years and he doesn't think he's been there before, but he knows that's not true and he's just forgotten. They say the shops around the airbase have the most authentic western desserts in all Japan, he tells Hisoka, and Hisoka just sighs.
They're at the back of the boat, the wind curling around them, flying back to Kagoshima. The sunlight and the warm day and the cold wind mix into the oddest sensation, not hot, not cold, both and neither. Hisoka is resting his crossed arms on the railing, trying to look sullen, but Tsuzuki knows. He knows Hisoka is glad to be here. And when Tsuzuki shifts a few feet down the deck, without even realizing Hisoka follows.
The sea is blue under the blue sky -- green where sunlight slides through the tips of the waves, edged with white foam. Grey seabirds turn and dive. There's the rumble of the engine and the rushing of the wind and the cry of the gulls and Tsuzuki is laughing.
"What's so funny?" Hisoka's eyes are the color of sunlight through water.
"I don't know. Nothing. Everything." The wind steals the words away, flings them over the waves, towards the dark, rocky shore.
Hisoka makes a small, dismissive sound in his throat and turns windward, resting his elbows on the railing. The wake spreads out behind him, two white lines in a blue sea. On the dock, Hisoka said this was the stupidest idea he'd ever heard, getting on this ferry; asked Tsuzuki in his most patronizing voice if he had any idea how long it would take to reach Okinawa.
Maybe it is stupid, thinks Tsuzuki. But Hisoka came.
They buy cold drinks from the vending machine inside, sit on sepia-colored folding chairs with no padding and feel the ferry vibrate around them. Small squares of plexiglas line the walls at even intervals, diffusing a faint yellow light throughout the room. The cabin is warm and dark, quiet without the roar of the wind in their ears and they speak in whispers. They don't talk about the case, about murders or restless spirits caught between worlds, only unimportant things -- books and gardens and that time the printer cartridge broke and sent ink all down the front of Tatsumi's suit. It's a lazy, meandering conversation and Tsuzuki does most of the talking. But Hisoka watches him with a kind of fascination that neither of them notices; feels the words wrap around him, filling the air he breathes. Tsuzuki lists all the things he'd like to see in Okinawa, tapping his half-full soda against his leg for emphasis: Nakagusuku Castle and Churaumi Aquarium and the endless beaches of white sand. He's smiling in a way Hisoka doesn't see very often, something far away in his eyes.
The patches of light march slowly across the floor, turning the ship into a sundial. Hisoka looks down at his watch. It's almost five. They throw away their empty cans and walk back into the chill, laughing wind; watch the sun sink into the water, leaving a faint red thread along the horizon.
Night comes quickly, deep blue-black and tiny points of light. No one is looking at the man and the boy at the back of the boat. For a second the sky and all its gradations of color are visible through them as they fade away, faintly luminous in the darkness. They're not even a quarter of the way to Okinawa.
Thirty six passengers got on a ferry.
The next day thirty four disembark.
No one notices the difference.