Yutaan: HAPPY POST-HOLIDAYS! ::passes out truffles:: I won my truffles in a Christmas game! Go me!

Ashley: Ahem. Yes. Well, Yutaan's sorry she didn't update last month, and she gives you truffles blah blah blah and all that lovely crap….

Yutaan: OH! ::ceases eating truffles:: You're right. GOMEN NASAIIIIII! I'M NOT SURE IF ANYONE REALLY CARES IF I MISS AN UPDATE BUT GOMEN NASAI ANYWAY!!! To apologize, I am handing out my candy.

Ashley: Disclaimer thing - who the hell would think we own it?

Yutaan: ::nod nod:: Yeah, then it'd be a yaoi. …or at least Kurama would get more screen time.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 6: Proposal? ()

"I love you." Kurama's voice sounded dry and scratchy, the words grating against each other. They bit at one another in an endless contradiction – friendship to love, mistakes to intent, hope to fear, pleading to pride. The meanings of the different sounds became clear a moment after the release, like sound rolls by in a tidal wave after the object has already passed. Just words – little words, amazingly small, yet so powerful that a single expression, a single movement by the other person can bless or destroy someone else's entire world.

The someone, of course, was Kurama, and the bearer of his destiny was standing awkwardly across from him – a certain small, blood-eyed, black-haired demon. The little wonderful evil words surrounded him, hanging in the air like a perfume.

Acceptance - instant and complete joy. Rejection – utter and cruel punishment. But sometimes, what is even worse is the pause, after the phrase has been spoken, and all hopes and dreams and wishes and fears are balanced on the tongue of the receiver, a knife-edge to the throat….

There was no response to Kurama's utterance. No wavering of expression, no slight movement of limbs; the garnet-flashing eyes did not even blink. Only someone standing very close could have seen the nearly imperceptible change, more in spirit than in body, and every aspect of that alteration screamed uncertainty.

Kurama paused, and then, with a hint of panic in his voice, added, "I've loved you ever since I met you." Still nothing. Hiei's eyes flickered and became guarded and cold. Instant death.

The red-haired youkai rose suddenly to his feet, brushing one hand back through his long locks and seizing Hiei's hand with the other, turning the palm upright. He drew his signature, his rose, sweet and soft and fierce with thorns, and slapped it down hard into the smaller demon's hand, forcibly curling both their fingers about the stem. Blood welled in beads from the intertwined fingers and slid silently down the two wrists, ruby shards on snow. The next four words were spoken in an unintentionally harsh way, jabbing the air with barely concealed desperation, pleading for a reply of any kind:

"Do you love me?"

Hiei flinched, just barely, obviously trying to steel himself, but undeniably wincing away from the closeness of their two bodies. Everyone saw it. Hiei saw it himself, and his face closed off for good, defensive against anything and everything. Kurama not only witnessed, but felt the refusal.

There was a deadened silence.

Finally, when the quiet had become heavy enough to smother, suffocate, drown someone in their own shattered world, Kurama said softly, "So… I've made a mistake, then?" Nothing more was said, but the soft sushing sound as Hiei drew back his hand, the single drop of Kurama's blood, spiraling alone through the air and crashing to the floorboards, spoke volumes.

A slight pause. Then Yusuke said, making a face, "Oh, okay. Fine. That was good acting. You get ten points for that." He put up ten tally marks on Kurama and Hiei's side of the scoreboard. "Damn, I thought 'Rejected Lover' would get ya. Okay, next up – Botan an' Keiko. You guys get 'Harry Potter Drunk'." The girls glared. "C'mon, you said think of a new game if I don't like Twister. Acting is fun. Be Harry!"

Hiei hmphed, went back to his corner and sat in his chair with a clang, glowering at anyone who dared to engage him in conversation. As everyone went on with the game, no one noticed that he'd discreetly slipped the rose inside his cloak.

…Well, except the authoress, and she was far away and too busy cackling to do anything.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yutaan: Longer than usual! I must say, the melodrama is nearly killing me, but I hope you guys enjoy it, and can believe I write like this on purpose. I can write in a serious way. Really. I can. …I just don't…. Ah, an' thanx to all my wonderful reviewers! Mwee! AND SPECIAL THANX TO KURAMAFANGIRL11, WHO I AM CONVINCED IS MA SOUL SISTAH. ::huggles the reviewers:: Your comments are the food of the fic writers! Feed meh, please!

Ashley: ::reading notecards:: And you guys, even if you think your ideas suck, leave them in a review. Or else, we've got one - or maybe two - chapters left, and then Not What It Seems is dead.

…Well, isn't that cheery….