Title: "Sleep tight...Quiet night..."
Author: Manda
Rating: NC/R
Fandom: Kabuki
AN: Kabuki Vol 3, In "Eye of the Storm"
There is a beast that prowls the night. With white face and red eyes. Black hair of the finest silks. It longs to rend, to tear, to kill...
...to come home.
But we're not thinking of that right now. There was an uncomfortable pause earlier we stumbled straight through when I told her simply not to kill me. It was a joke. A comfort. But it wasn't all at once. We're killers, hired guns of the highest Noh-accord, tracking down another Noh assassin who's been working alone side up for years.
There was a moment when our eyes met when I knew we both were thinking
in the black of our hearts
who could reach their weapons first
who would die if we were contracted after each other next.
But we're not thinking of that right now. And then we're talking about the rain. Sitting on the porch. I'm drawing her picture again and letting myself believe that this moment could maybe cancel out the other ones. I'm drawing her pictures, except I can't say who she is even. I don't know who she is. I know who the girl with the mask on is. That's Scarab, but this person smiling and teasing me about cramping up as I draw her...she has no name and I've never met her before today.
how can they be the same?
does she see my mask even though it's not resting on my cheeks?
and i just a Tigerlily to her?
But we're not thinking of that now. We're not thinking at all. We're duty bound to never see each other in the day light, in the night light, without our masks. No fraternization they say. They'd always said. I've never questioned it. She brought me here when I was hurt almost dying. The picture is laying on the floor somewhere I dropped it when we kissed.
it was an accident
wasn't it?
But we're not thinking of that right now. Not thinking about the friend we've been told to kill. About the rules we're breaking. About the lives of utter solitude we've confided the last few hours into each others ears about. About lives that aren't real because of the masks. Because we could be real right now to each other. For this moment.
for this night
couldn't we?
But we're not thinking about that right now. We blow hot breath into each face and shoulders, grinding our hips into each others hands. Thinking about nothing. Where there is clarity. Where there is pain and blood and pleasure mixed. Where the rain is pounding out all the sounds of our whimpers and our incoherent lives.
Where for just a moment here
and now gone
it might be a quiet night
a quiet life
