Yu Yu Hakusho: Black-Glass Pheonix
Our feet made pounding sounds as we ran, one chasing, the other fleeing. He wasn't supposed to have seen what he did. It wasn't supposed to have happened. I tried to stop him.
"Hiei! Hiei, stop!"
He kept running. I couldn't keep up. He was going too fast. He was always faster than me.
"Hiei, matte!"
He didn't stop. He always stopped before, when I asked.
"Please, Hiei!"
He wouldn't stop now. He'd never stop now.
"I can explain!"
I could, I really could. But that explanation would not be enough, I knew. He was broken, I had broken him.
"Hiei, ONEGAI!"
I had broken my dark angel.
"Onegai…"
It was my fault.
"Onegai, Hiei…"
It wasn't supposed to be this way.
"…Hiei…"
I stopped running, dropped to the ground, and cried. Cried and cried as my dark angel ran and ran away from me. I had broken my dark angel. I had broken my black rose. I had broken my other half, my love. Now I would pay the price.
It started to rain later that night. Rain and rain and pour like the heavens were crying over our parting. The forbidden partnership, a dragon and a fox. A youko and a jaganshi. The legendary Youko Kurama and the shunned Forbidden Child.
It was gone. It was all gone. Our love, our friendship, our trust, our bond that made us us. It was gone.
I half-expected him to step up to my window, knock on the glass, hiss and curse when I took my sweet time to open it just to see him wet. I half expected to see those demon-red eyes, see that hair like black fire, that skin like ripe peaches. I half-expected him to be there. He wasn't. He never would be, not any more.
He was an oxymoron, the child of a forbidden love. He was fire…and he was ice. He was dark…but he was light. He made shadows and cast them. He was power and he was weakness. He was harsh and cutting…and soft and loving. He was everything and nothing. He was an angel of darkness, a harbinger of death. He was a black phoenix from the flames. But even phoenixes could die. Could break and shatter like the precious glass they were.
I treated him with the utmost care, with the utmost caution. I never wanted to let him go; I wouldn't, I refused to let him go. I need him… He was glass and I was fire. I could melt him and not hurt him. I could melt him softly. I could have made him an angel…my angel. My sweet, fiery, dark angel.
Now I never could. Now he'd never be mine. Now he'd never be what he could have been. All because I made a stupid mistake. So instead of melting him, I had shattered him. I broke him into a million, million pieces and he wouldn't let me pick them up. I doubted they could be picked up. I'd somehow miss that little sliver of everything that made him my Hiei. No, he'd hide that piece from me. He'd hide it and never give it back.
I felt them, running down my cheeks. Running down and pouring down like the rain. I couldn't make a sound, but I could feel them. Tears. Running and pouring and dropping, but never crystallizing. No, that was Hiei. His tears were gems, gems of indescribable worth. Mine were just saltwater. Just saltwater, and his were gems. His were worth something, mine were nothing.
Nothing I could say, nothing I could cry would be worth him. He was worth more than sorrow and regret. He was the black-glass phoenix, the broken black-glass phoenix. He was worth more than my tears. He was worth more than anything in any of the three worlds.
The black-glass phoenix, can't you see him lying there? That's Hiei, all broken and shattered. That was my hand that dropped him. That was my folly that missed him. That was my fault that he was down there, lying in pieces and more pieces. Can't you see him?
But as I look again, I see one thing that isn't broken. His wings, they're shattered. His head, cracked. His feet are nothing but shards. But there is one thing, one thing that I was able to put in before the glass hardened.
It's red there, shining up at me, lying on the floor dejectedly. It wasn't his heart, he must still have that to live. No, it was his soul. His warm soul. And now I hear some words, some faint words whispered on the wind.
"Kurama, if you hear me, know you will forever hold my soul in your hands."
Yes, love. I hear you. And I shall forever treasure the little red piece of unbroken glass you have left me.