Reediting…reediting…this is nigh impossible, honestly. I tried to write something earlier but it nearly killed me because it was so stupid. Gotta get my head cleared and publish those twenty or so stories still waiting in the back of my mind.

DISCLAIMER: I own…lessee…a couple volumes of Yu Yu Hakusho, InuYasha, and Genbu Kaiden. But no DN Angel. Too bad.

By the way: in this, the characters are about four years older than in the actual anime. So Daisuke, Satoshi, Risa, Riku, and Takeshi are all around nineteen. Dark and Krad are in their early twenties (twenty-one or twenty-two).

And also (I swear this is the last thing), all characters from the original anime, except for Dark and Krad, are Japanese, so they use "-kun", "-san", and "-chan". But no one else does. I'll have a little mini-dictionary at the bottom.


PAINTBRUSH
By Kohaku Minamoto

Stage 1
The Second Da Vinci
Or
Perverted Casanova


Daisuke Niwa was bored.

Usually, when Daisuke Niwa was bored, he'd go up to his room and paint, but right now he had too much on his mind to even think straight.

Like, for instance, his second cousin arriving from Spain.

Daisuke groaned and buried his head in the pillows, trying to block out the thoughts. His second cousin was Dark Mousy, a charismatic young man in his early twenties. Daisuke's mother, Emiko, enjoyed comparing the two of them ("Daisuke and Dark are so different!") and his father, Kosuke, would immediately go along with it ("I know. They're like the Harada twins!").

Daisuke was immensely relieved when he finally moved out and into his own apartment.

The phone rang and Daisuke reached for it wearily, knowing whom it was. "Hello?"

"Hey, kid," came Dark's cheery, confident voice. "What's up?"

"Nothing, or else I wouldn't be talking to you."

"Ouch. That hurt, kid. Really, it did."

Usually, Daisuke enjoyed having his cousin over. Dark was fun to talk to (as long as you weren't the butt of his jokes) and was a lot more worldly than Daisuke himself, but it was the first time the redhead would be having another person living in the apartment with him, and he wasn't wildly thrilled about it. He had been lucky enough to find a more spacious apartment for a reasonable price, but it was still small.

But the view was beautiful. Daisuke looked out the window, fondly watching the gondoliers row down the canals.

Venice, City of Canals. Daisuke's hometown.

"Hey, kid, you still there?"

He'd been spacing out. "Sorry, Dark. Did you want to say something else?"

"Nah. Just calling to tell you that I'll be arriving in another hour or so, so be ready for me."

"Sure. See you."

"Bye."

Daisuke hung up, setting the phone back on its cradle and stepping outside onto the balcony. A slight breeze blew though his auburn hair, tickling his face as he looked out at the beautiful city.

He remembered how his mother would tell him the story of how he, a Japanese boy, had been born in Venice, Italy. Every time his mother began it, his father would blush redder than Daisuke's hair and stutter in an embarrassed tone, but he never actually stopped Emiko from telling the romantic story in a dramatic voice.

Daisuke's mother had come to Italy as an exchange student; Daisuke's father had been traveling the world, viewing art. They had met in an art museum, and Emiko had been looking up at a painting. "It's so beautiful."

And Kosuke had said, "Not as beautiful as you."

Of course, the words were cheesier than a pizza, but it was the heartfelt tone that had caught Emiko's attention. Emiko and Kosuke had ended up talking, then dating, then getting married. Daisuke sometimes wondered how his father had screwed up the courage to actually pop the important question. Probably took him a couple years, he thought, grinning. And a little hinting from Gramps.

But Daisuke knew that he himself was just as bad, if not worse. Eighteen years old, and not a girlfriend on his record. His friend, Takeshi Saehara, sometimes teased him about being an 'old virgin', even though the aspiring journalist probably hadn't been with anyone either. He was continuously chasing after Mio Hio, an American valley girl who spoke strangely ("Come and play or die!") and seemed to think matchmaking was her soul occupation in life.

How scary.

Dark teased him a lot too, sometimes offering to hook Daisuke up with one of his former girlfriends (there were scads and scads of them), but Daisuke always declined. Partly because he knew he would never match up to Dark, but mostly because he only had one girl that he really wanted.

Daisuke sighed. Ah well…

He went inside. There was a message on his answering machine, so Daisuke walked over to it to listen.

"Hey, Niwa-kun," came Riku Harada's voice. "I just got off my job, so I was wondering if you wanted to meet me to go to the Museum of Art for a little while. They're showing stuff free today, and," she paused as though for dramatic effect, "Risa's gonna be there. So, to quote Hio-san, 'show or die!' See you at around three." Beep.

Riku Harada, the elder Harada twin, had gone to Spain the previous year for studying abroad. In the process, she'd actually met Dark (who she immediately labeled as a "perverted Casanova", much to Daisuke's amusement) and was one of the only ones who knew how Daisuke sometimes felt overshadowed by his relative. She'd recently returned, tanned and taller but unchanged in her outlooks.

Still an all-around awesome athlete. Still a stubborn mule. Still a tomboy.

A good friend, indeed.

Then Daisuke realized something, and swore to himself.

"Shit! Dark's arriving at three!"


"He's late," Riku complained, glancing at her watch. Where is he?

"I'm sure he just got caught up in a painting or something," Risa murmured idly to her twin, watching couples walk by, arm in arm and laughing together. "Whoa, who's the hottie?"

"Hey, it's Niwa-kun!"

"No, I mean the other guy! The one with the purple hair!"

"Huh?"

Daisuke, spotting the twin girls, sped up his pace. "Harada-san!" he called out, waving.

And promptly tripped. Riku winced slightly while Risa giggled, watching the purple-haired young man who was with Daisuke grab him just before he hit the ground and set him back on his feet. Daisuke, slightly red-faced, brushed himself off.

"Hehe…hi, Harada-san, and…Harada-san."

"Hi, Niwa-kun," Riku muttered, spotting Dark and recognizing him right away. "And hello, Dark-san." She spat out the "-san" like it was making a bitter taste in her mouth. Dark grinned.

"Hello to you too, Riku-chan."

"Don't call me that!"

Risa was looking back and forth between Riku and Dark. Pouting at how left-out she felt, she stomped her foot, and like a petulant child, yelled out, "Hey, I'm here too, you know!"

"We know, we know, Harada-san!" Daisuke replied nervously, turning a delicate shade of pink and waving his hands back and forth. "Uh…Harada-san, meet Dark Mousy, my cousin. Dark, meet Risa Harada-san." Daisuke was obviously not excited to be introducing his handsome cousin to the girl that Daisuke happened to be nursing an enormous crush for. Risa smiled and stuck her hand out.

"Hi."

Ignoring the hand, Dark leaned forward and brushed his lips against one of the girl's cheeks, then the other. Risa's face was decidedly pinker when he withdrew, in contrast to Daisuke, whose skin tone now resembled the color of Riku's white T-shirt. Dark grinned charmingly. "That's how we say hello in Spain," he told the blushing girl.

"You perv!" Riku screamed, drawing stares from much of the passerby and a few mutterings of 'who are they talking about?' "Quit flirting with my sister!"

Risa turned even redder. "Riku…" she muttered. "People are staring…"

Riku rounded on her twin next, becoming even angrier than before. "And you! You're almost worse! Letting him kiss you like that…"

"Harada-san!" Daisuke cried out, stopping Riku's rant. "Er…how about we go inside now?"

"Good idea!" Risa said cheerily, taking Dark's arm and pulling him inside the museum with her. Daisuke watched them go unhappily, then turned to Riku.

"Shall we?"


Satoshi Hiwatari stared up at the painting before him, ignoring the gasps and giggles of his former classmates as they passed by, murmuring things like "He's just as cute as ever!" and "I think he's gotten even more handsome…"

He was too preoccupied by the picture.

I thought I told Father not to submit any of my paintings to the museum.

He knew that his artwork was cursed. It'd only bring unhappiness and misfortune down upon everyone who saw it, just like it'd done to his father. Satoshi made a strange sound in the back of his throat, somewhere between a grunt and a strangled laugh. It seems as though I myself am cursed, he thought, straightening his glasses and looking again at the painting.

It had been from a long time ago, from when Satoshi was still painting actual people that he knew instead of scenes from his imagination. It was a portrait of his cousin, one of the people he'd painted solely because he was a familiar face.

In it, Krad was sitting in a chair at a small round table, holding a handful of feathers like a deck of cards. Satoshi clenched his fists, glaring at the picture as if his gaze alone would make it disappear. But no. Krad's perfectly structured face still grinned back at him, innocent-looking to most but hinting at danger and just the slightest bit of insanity.

"Interesting painting," said a voice next to him.

Satoshi turned his head ninety degrees to see a purple-haired young man standing beside him. He was tall, and his accent hinted at the fact that he wasn't a native of Venice, but of some Spanish-speaking country.

But it really wasn't his business.

"Yes. It is."

"Do you know the painter?"

Satoshi realized that it was an unsigned painting and let out an unconscious sigh of relief. "I don't."

"Pity." Dark stared up at Krad's face as though transfixed by it, but the frown on his lips told a different story. "I know him."

"You do?" Satoshi couldn't keep the shock out of his voice. Dark turned to him, eyes shadowed.

"Yeah. I used to know him. A long, long time ago."

And with that, the young man walked off to examine some other painting, leaving Satoshi standing as though rooted to the spot. The blue-haired boy gave Krad's smiling visage another glare, then whirled around and stalked out of the museum.

He never wanted to see his cousin's face again.

He'd be having a word with his father.


Shortish chapter, but I'm trying to improve. Review and tell me what you think! Please!

Japanese Translation
-kun: Endearment, usually for male friends
-san: Formal honorific, kinda like "Ms." or "Mr."
-chan: Endearment, usually for female friends