"Some say is better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all."

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Chapter 2: A Reservoir of Painful Love

As the first light of dawn slipped over the distant hills and spilled over the landscape, everything was given an ethereal golden glow, including the silver haired man who sat on his front porch with his head in his hands. He was tired for, although sleep had eventually come to him, it had been a fitful sleep full of dark omens...dark omens involving the loss of the one man that he loved above all else, Hatori Sohma.

Ayame let out a dejected sigh as his thoughts once again turned to the closed off dragon who still lay asleep within his office. He knew Hatori would never..no could never love him in return, however part of him, likely the part that had helped him choose his peculiar occupation as the owner of a fantasy boutique, still dared to hope that one day, Hatori would come to love him as well. However, the more logical part of himself, the part many of his elatives denied the existence of, knew that it was a hopelessly one-sided love and always would be. That he'd best get used to sitting on the sidelines and watching from the shadows, because that's the way it always had been and was always going to be.

There were ways to deal with this, just as their were reasons why the egotistical snake always wore long sleeves and upon them, always seemed to wear a heart full of endless energy and self-loving cheer. Yes, there were reasons, there was a way to deal with his emotional pain, and there were scars that stood as proof. They were the only visible testament to his love for Hatori, and like his inner thoughts and emotions, he kept them from view. Not even Shigure knew, or perhaps he didn't and just had yet to say anything...no Shigure was a loud-mouth through and through, much as he himself often was...if Shigure knew then everyone would have found out by now and he'd have nothing left to hide.

Luckily though, he put off an air of exuberance and self-confidence that kept most from wanting to be around him any longer than they had to, with the exception of his darling assistant Mine, and the adoring aforementioned loud-mouth, Shigure...Hatori used to be one of those people as well, but ever since he'd been forced to erase Kana's memories he'd been so distant that he no longer seemed to be the friend he'd once been. Sure the other still looked after him and helped him out from time to time but now, it seemed he only did it because of obligation to the family, or because of his position as the Sohma family physician. However, the blonde was likely just reading too far into things after having seen the strain that Hatori put himself through to forget.

It was never to move on...only to forget. Somehow Ayame knew this, it was something he could just sense, for the dragon had claimed to have moved on since the incident. But who could suddenly get up one day and profess that he had moved on after having spent every night before that crying himself to sleep, never easing the pain no matter how hard or how much he cried? No one could, of that much Ayame was certain.

He himself has never cried for the loss of love, for the one he loved had never shown him love. Sure he'd dated a few girls and guys during his high school years, but they had meant nothing to him, and when Hatori would pass by with Kana, he could see the pure, true love that filtered through the very air around them and ran through them...and he knew that it was something that he did not have with any of the people he had dated...that he did not truly love them.

Oftentimes revelations such as these would cause the snake to drop whomever he was currently dating at the time like a sack of potatoes, not truly caring about the hurt he caused, unmoved by their tears, telling his friends that he was above feeling anything for those so far below him...and sometimes, he made himself believe that. Always charismatic, always cheerily annoying, always egotistical, that was the Ayame that he evolved into then, the Ayame that everyone knew him as even today. But the question simply was, was the Ayame that everyone saw the true Ayame?

The answer was simply, shockingly...or perhaps not so shockingly depending on whose point of view you looked at it from, no. The real Ayame, the part of him that he kept locked away inside himself, had none of the self-confidence that his outer image had. Instead it feared rejection from a man he'd never have the chance to offer himself to. It loved a man as cold as ice, without ever truly expecting anything back in return. It held within itself a deep reservoir of pain depicted outwardly only by strawberry gashes.

Ayame shook himself from his thoughts and pulled back the long sleeve of the kimono that he had slipped into to keep the morning chill away. Small red marks marred the perfect flesh he had there. He called them his little kitten scratches however, if he were being truthful to himself, they looked nothing like the shallow wounds a kitten or even a full grown cat would have been able to inflict. No, a few, but enough t be noticeable, were too deep for anyone to write it off as anything other than what it was...and that was why he kept his arms hidden away at all times beneath the beautifully ornate outfits he managed to get Mine to make for him.

However, the sun was now above the distant mountains, climbing higher and higher into the sky, and Ayame knew what he had to do, what he dreaded to do...but had to do, and so, he stood up purposefully. He would not back away from this, no matter how much it pained him to have to attempt to get Hatori to fall in love with another, it was more important that he help Hatori...and this was the only way he could see to do so.

With eyes downcast, the silver haired snake slipped inside and headed for the phone. Picking it up, he dialed shigure's number, and when the perverted inu picked, Ayame made himself smile deviously, putting his masks back up to help strengthen himself. After all, he'd just come up with a brilliant plan to save their precious Hari, as only he could.

"Shigure, I've got a brilliant idea, might I talk to your little flower?" he said at once in a rush, prompting a momentary silence on the other line and then finally, a reluctant reply.

"Ah...sure Aya, hold on a second," Shigure replied, and after he'd said that, Ayame could hear him calling to Tohru, who picked up after a moment.

"Hello? Ayame, is something wrong?" she asked, her first instinct being to ask that because Ayame almost never called, and when he did, it was always to talk to Shigure...never to her.

"Ah Tohru...I don't mean to trouble you but I was wondering if you could stop by the main house," he paused for effect, but made sure the pause didn't last long enough to give her a chance to overcome her shock at his request and ask why he had made it. "You see," he continued. "Hatori is terribly ill and he's been refusing to let anyone help him...I fear he'll work himself into an early grave if he keeps this up."

There was silence a moment and then the young onigiri finally replied. "Oh no! I had no idea Hatori was sick! I'll be over as soon as I can and I'll bring him some soup!" she said.

"Alright, thank you Tohru...if anyone can help him you can," he said, those last few words hitting home, stinging him to his core and piercing his heart as he hung up, not wanting to hear her shocked, humble reply.

Golden orbs misted over, a pool collected at their bottoms and then finally spilled over. He was crying, he was actually crying. 'Pitiful, this is for Hatori...he needs her,' he chided himself, but when he leaned against the wall, his legs quivered as he let out a violent sob, and he sunk to the floor. He knew she would help Hatori, but HE wanted to be the one to do it. HE wanted Hatori's love and wanted to be allowed to openly love him in return. HE wanted and wanted and wanted..and would never get. And, with tears streaming down his cheeks and sobs still violently racking his thin frame, he reached inside his kimono into one of the hidden pockets, withdrew a small knife, and smiled the sad, bitter smile of the night before at it.

Once again he pulled up his sleeve to reveal the marred perfection of his pale arm. It was his left arm...always his left arm...but not this time...this time it would be his right. The sleeve dropped and the other was rolled up instead, allowing him a glimpse of pale, unmarked flesh..beautiful flesh. He smiled and stroked the flat edge of blade against the length of his arm tenderly from elbow downward, stopping at his wrist, where the first cut was made.

"Hatori...I love you," he whispered as the knife slipped through his flesh easily...almost too easily, but the first cut was not deep. The ones that followed however, allowed him to lose enough blood to slip into the blissful embrace of darkness... of unconsciousness, where in his dreams, he could be with Hatori all he wanted and Hatori could be with him, unresisting, unrejecting, content...happy.