Thin as Rice Paper 9

By Nix Winter

Disclaimer: I don't own WK

Warning: I really am very attached to this story and I'm going to make it over original. Somehow, just wanted to warn, apologize, something. No disrespect is meant at all. This is just an important story to me.

Nine

His smiles didn't work at the bank either. It was completely worthless to have ungodly amounts of money in the bank if one couldn't get any of it out. Hands shoved down into second hand jeans. An honorable person would find a way to do themselves in with a little class, but walking towards home, he could accept that he wasn't an honorable person. He wasn't perfect.

It was okay just to be a pretty waste of space. He did his part to help. The path towards home lead him past the hospital again and he wondered if anyone even knew he'd been there, well other than Aya. That was really the end of that, the end of that kiss and of this painful hope for love and life. It's not like he could have looked worse or been any more worthless than he'd been in that moment. Looks did count, even if he'd never have admitted to any woman he flirted with.

Aya's looks didn't really matter though. It wouldn't have mattered how Aya looked. It had been something deeper, something in the way he moved, some fragile vulnerability under the katana sharp fuck you to the world, that had been what drew Youji. Shoulders hunched, he walked on past the hospital. It was maybe ten miles home. So he'd take his time. It wasn't like there was any shortage of people who would love him, and Youji knew it. He could wrap anyone around his finger, and after he got cleaned up, he might have to prove it.

But.

It was about who he'd love. He had loved Asuka, but not the way he loved Aya, and though he couldn't explain it, he knew it was love. Something deep that spanned lifetimes even, something that bound him. Nothing could be proven or sorted out with Aya now though. He'd let him go, and wait for the next life.

Ran

Youji would come back to the hospital. The man wasn't stupid. He'd come back to receive treatment and heal from whatever illness gripped him. Ran paced the room that Youji had been in. Maybe it was that he'd been such a regular when Aya-chan had been a guest at the hospital that they didn't bother him, just let him pace around this room that he'd labeled Youji's.

He wanted to know why Youji was so thin. He wanted to know why he couldn't have a conversation with the man he loved. He was going to kill Youji.

Omi would take care of Aya-chan. Standing there in a hospital room, a sense of family crept up on him, and he knew his parents were dead. Gone. He was the one who'd take care of Aya-chan so she had a chance now. He wanted to be done, done with family obligations and debts, revenge and rage. He wanted to be Ran again.

He leaned his forehead against the cool one way glass of Youji's hospital window and wished that Youji would come back already. The man could be anywhere and lost, dying somewhere, but Ran refused to believe that.

His Youji would piss on the moon before he'd come to his knees, Ran thought. He'd counted on that endurance. Always he'd know he'd come back for Youji, unless Youji didn't want him. He wanted to make sure, to give Youji time to decide, to fall in love with someone better first. God, he hadn't expected Youji to fade like that. His beautiful Youji had wasted away, and to keep that from happening, Ran could let go of his honor and his confusion.

He opened his eyes and honor and confusion both flashed away into anger and possession. Youji walked five stories below, shoulders hunched, blond hair flat, head down, and he was headed towards home. "You idiot," Ran hissed. He'd known there was no where for Youji to go, even if he couldn't really explain how he knew, but he'd expected him to come back to the hospital like a rational person. No. A man so skinny the hospital didn't want to let him go was going to walk ten miles or so. Ran was going to beat him to death.

Maybe he'd never been that angry in his life, so angry at the risk to Youji's life and at how vulnerable that left him feeling. He still hadn't expected the floor to move. Palms on the glass of the window, he felt the vibration and still didn't understand. Youji staggered. A hunk of concrete hit the sidewalk beside him, bounced into a black car.

A woman screamed as Ran ran towards the elevator.

"Get under something," one of the nurses yelled at him.

The floor ripped, rose like an ocean wave under him and he left the floor. His shoulder hit the wall and he slide down. The florescent lights above him shattered, spraying itself across the tile in tinkling rain. He curled up, pulling his jacket over his head. Youji. How could he pray to his ancestors for the life of a man he'd already forsworn them for? Omi would be with Aya-chan already. Youji was the one that he needed.

Fire alarms screamed and he moved forward in the red emergency backup lighting, towards the stairs, coat still pulled up to protect his head and neck.