Note: I'm here again! Trigun is a force to be reckoned with.
This fic here is something that has been brewing in my head for a while but I haven't had the gumption to write. But! Here it is! This is taking place sometime soon after the July incident. Enjoy?
He had wandered in from the desert, his body caked in the dust of the planet and his eyes looking dusty, too. From behind dim shades eyes reflected the desert, years and years of seeing iles and iles of the same thing. His face looked like the wasteland, too—dust had caught in the creases of his features. Sipping at a drink, no ice, one might say that he looked tired. In fact, he looked as old as the planet itself.
Rose watched him with interest.
"What are you staring at?"
Rose turned to see her friend, a woman of indiscernible heritage and indiscernible age, lightly primping herself, which included indiscreetly pulling up her skirt and pulling down her blouse—an attempt to pull in customers. The bar remained quiet, however, as the woman turned to Rose.
"What d'you mean, what am I staring at?" Rose inquired, giving her corset a slight tug in an attempt to loosen it. "I can stare sometimes if I want to."
"Not with your mouth hanging open like an idiot!" Her friend replied haughtily, a red curl falling slightly out of place. "We'll lose customers that way."
"You keep 'em," Rose said. "I don't want 'em anyway."
Rose, patting a hand to her dark hair to make sure everything was in place, retired to a table, her friend following suit. Bringing out a fan, she began to bat the air with it. She glanced surreptitiously at the man at the bar, watching as dust fell from his coat every time he shifted. She wondered where he had come from, and how long he had been in the desert.
How long he had been alone.
Grinning suddenly, Rose spoke to her friend from behind her fan. "Say," she said, "I think I see some good money."
Her friend's eyes went wide and shot around the bar. "Did the mayor just walk in?"
"No," Rose giggled, "but something just as good." She smiled behind her fan. "Someone very lonely…" Rising from the table, she tucked her fan away and adjusted her attire, eyes fixed on the man from the desert. He took no notice of her as she drew closer. She registered the appearance of dark circles under his eyes.
Perking herself up once more, Rose spoke. "Hello, stranger," she said in as sultry a voice as she could muster. "I haven't seen a face like yours before."
And she hadn't, Rose realized, as he turned to set his dull gaze on the owner of the voice. What a face! she thought. Of course she had seen handsome faces before—his wasn't extraordinary, really. But this particular handsome face was obscured by something Rose could only describe as sadness—an awful sadness and confusion was carved into every feature and swam in the depths of his eyes. For a moment, she was taken aback utterly.
The desert really was in this man's face!
"Sorry?" the man said suddenly, his voice slightly grainy from the alcohol. Regaining herself, Rose smiled at him.
"Say, you look a little tired," she said coyly, leaning in close to the desert man. "If you're looking for a nice, warm bed, I've got something I could offer you…"
For a moment the man looked stunned, his lips tightening and a blush reaching all the way to his blond hairline. He looked back to the empty glass that sat on the bar. Rose looked on, amused. Hadn't he ever spoken to a girl like her before?
She giggled. "Well, I'll give you some time to think it over," she said in a breathy tone. "If you're interested, I've got a room upstairs—second door to the right." Practically at his ear now, she added in a whisper, "I hope to see you." She turned toward the staircase.
Passing the tables, her friend said, "Rose, are you sure about that one?" She crossed her arms and looked suspiciously at the desert man. "He sure looks poor. Probably just a wanderer!"
Picking up her skirts to avoid treading on them on the stairs, Rose turned to her friend, her chin raised. "Appearances can be deceiving," she said, and ascended the stairs.
The room at the top of the stairs was unlit, though a bit of moonlight filtered in through the unwashed window. For a moment, Rose gazed out the window at the desert that stretched out forever, visible from this room in the bar at the edge of town. The horizon was smooth and pulled off suddenly, as if it had been flattened with an iron and left very thin. Rose wondered briefly if that man had pulled himself over that horizon—the thin horizon reflected in his face. That man…
A knock came at the door, soft and timid. Rose's heart skipped a beat, startled by the noise, though she knew he would be coming. Men with lonely eyes always came to her.
"Come in," she called softly, and was surprised by the sudden weakness of her voice. Had she been staring at the desert that long?
The desert man entered quietly, dust falling from him as he moved and shut the door behind him. Leaning against the door, his hand still on the knob, he kept his eyes downcast and his shoulders slumped. Rose was startled, slightly, by the appearance of the man in the moonlight. The man at the bar had been stiff, on his guard, his eyes focused concretely ahead of him. The man that came to her now was a man who looked as if he had nothing to lose and nothing to gain, the stiff barrier he'd put up at the bar now completely shattered. Underneath that shield, Rose now saw, was a man completely hopeless, his face pale and drawn, his red coat hanging limply over a frame stretched thin as the horizon. Rose was stirred by pity, and she felt her heart sink for a moment.
She quickly recovered herself. "My," she said to the man, taking a step toward him, "I thought you'd never come. I was getting lonesome all by myself." When the man didn't respond, she felt a chill, and walked toward the lamp next to the bed. "Why don't we get some light in here? It feels so gloomy." The light of the lamp was dim, but sufficient in pushing back the gloom of the dark. Rose took a glance up at the man, and saw that he had taken a step from the door, his eyes rested on the bed. She smiled.
"So how do you like to do this?" Rose inquired, and immediately the man blushed. She was pleased by this reaction, regarding it as highly adorable. "Is this your first time with a woman like me?"
Bashfully, he turned his face toward the wall. "Well…" he murmured, his fists curled.
"Why don't you have a seat here?" Rose offered, patting a place on the bed. "We can get to know each other a little."
He did as she suggested with a great hesitance, sitting rigidly in the designated spot. His yellow glasses rested awkwardly on his nose as he kept his gaze fixed on the wall, away from her. Rose observed him in this position with keen interest. Could he really be so innocent? Most men would have already finished by now, a grin on their face or tears in their eyes as they cried and prayed to the saints to forgive them for their sinful act. These were scenarios Rose was used to. This severe silence was not something she was familiar with.
Rose, intending to break the silence and hopefully break this man's shell, made a move toward the bed. "You know," she said, putting on seductive airs, "you can kiss me if you want to." She sat on the bed beside the desert man, watched the breath catch in his lungs as she made this offer. "I don't let many men kiss me. Hardly any." She touched his arm. "But I like you."
Rose watched his face pale in the dim light. "What?" she asked. "Don't you know how to kiss a woman?" She could no longer keep the reigns on her curiosity. It controlled her, led her to stand in front of the man and caress his cheek with a hand gloved in satin. "Here, let me show you." She leaned down and placed her lips on his.
If the desert had any kind of taste, this was it. Against her lips she felt the man's years of hardship and toil, years of the sadness she had read in his eyes. His lips were dry and sore from the winds and the sun, but unexpectedly soft. Rose felt a chill through her body, almost like a current. She kissed deeper, searching for something, anything. The desert man did not resist, but neither did he kiss back.
After only a few moments, Rose pulled back and regarded the man with a dumbfounded expression. "You really are that innocent!" she exclaimed, her hands on her hips. "Even twelve-year-old boys know how to kiss a girl!"
The man let out a nervous, gasping chuckle. "Well," he mumbled, his voice quivering. "In my line of work, there really isn't time for that kind of stuff…" He drew in a breath that shook his body.
His pale face had become ghostly in the light of the lamp, and his whole body trembled under the weight of some invisible burden. A guilty sensation flooded Rose, something she found entirely unfamiliar. Not even when men fell to the floor crying, God, save this sinner, save this poor sinner did she ever feel a twinge of guilt. But watching the strangely innocent man from the desert, the man with the lonely face and eyes like the horizon, she felt oddly shameful.
Sitting next to the man, Rose put a hand gently on his shoulder. "Are you going to be sick?" she asked quietly, not knowing what else to make of his pale face. The man put on a weak smile and shook his head.
"That's not it," he said plainly, his voice shaking still. He opened his mouth again as if to say more, but closed it quickly once more. There was a brief silence in which guilt hummed steadily in Rose's ears.
"Tell me," Rose said suddenly, her curiosity still in overdrive. "Why did you come up here tonight? What were you looking for?"
She watched him intently, searching the eyes that were focused on nothing yet seemed to see everything. After a moment of silence, the desert man drew in a rattling breath.
"I've been alone for a long time," said the man quietly, his voice wavering unevenly as he spoke. "In the desert, there's nothing but loneliness. Everywhere else, there's nothing but death. I travel to escape from both, but they're always behind me, around me. The desert wind sings songs about it—the same lonely, sad songs over and over and over." Leaning forward, he rested his head in his hands. "It gets so sometimes I can't stand it. I get so tired. I get so lonely. I try to pretend it's not there but it is. I just want to… to touch someone, to know that someone else is really there and that I'm not alone."
Raising his head once more, the man looked scornfully toward the desert outside the window, barely visible in the light of the lamp. His brows creased and his voice shook furiously. "I don't want to be alone anymore…!"
A dreadful hush fell over the room—Rose swore she could hear her own heartbeat in the stillness, a furious pounding in her chest. She realized she was trembling. A knot formed in her throat, impossible to swallow.
"This desert…" she said suddenly, taking even herself by surprise. Her voice shook with uncertainty. "Everybody's lonely here. Everybody's sad here. But everybody continues to live." Rose turned to the desert man, feeling her eyes sting with tears. "Why do we continue to live when we're all so sad and lonely?"
When he did not respond, she continued. "Sometimes, wonderful things happen. Wonderful memories are made." She sniffed back some tears. "That's why we keep on living. We live for those wonderful times. We live because we never know what's going to happen tomorrow."
She felt her words drift on the air, waiting to sink in. When they did, the man let out a quiet chuckle into his hands, and lifted his head. "You're right," he said softly, his eyes brimming with tears. "I guess you're right…"
"Guess?" Rose said self-importantly. "Of course I'm right! Shoot." She carefully wiped her eyes to avoid smearing her make-up. "You made me cry! A strange man like you…"
He laughed softly at her manner, and offered her a folded handkerchief from his pocket. He watched her wipe her eyes for a moment, then seemed to remember something and dug in his pocket again. "I owe you money…" he mumbled, searching for some crumpled bills.
Rose looked at him disdainfully. "Out of the question," she told him. "I haven't earned anything. I won't accept it."
The man's face fell. "Well I owe you something for your time, at least," he said. Rose grinned at him playfully.
"A kiss?" she suggested. "Yes, a kiss would do fine." She delighted as he blushed. Bashfully, he leaned toward her, and pecked her lightly on the lips. "Payment received," Rose declared, and smiled at the desert man. He grinned back at her foolishly, and rose from his seat on the bed.
As he reached the door, he turned back once more to smile at Rose. "Thank you," he said gently. "You're a very kind person." Rose smiled back and nodded.
The door closed softly behind him, and Rose's smile fell immediately. She knew that his must have, too. It occurred to her that she still clutched his handkerchief, though returning it did not strike her as having any importance. Turning toward the bedside table, she clicked off the lamp, gloom finding its way into the corners of the room once more. The view of the desert became clear outside her window.
In the darkness, she thought she heard the wind murmur a song about loneliness and sadness, and her heart filled so she thought it would burst.