"Mina?" It was a small whisper amidst the huge, deafening crowd. Yet, incredibly so, the person it was directed at had been perfectly capable of hearing it. Or maybe she and her beloved had turned around prompted by the unnerving feeling of being watched. Either way, Mrs. West could not contain a gasp at the horrified expression of Soma. Did she really feel guilty as her face hinted or was that just surprise?
Agni grew considerably uncomfortable, as did his boss if him changing his footing was anything to go by. They both felt dread settle in their stomachs, though for different reasons each.
"I thought…" he felt devastated, and he had no qualms letting it show on his face; his unfocused eyes, the gaping mouth, the tears already prickling, "that maybe you…" he could not bring himself to complete the phrase it was too painful to say her heart had been won by another.
Mina's face was rapidly changing. Her frown being taken over by a disbelieving face, and maybe the 'are you an idiot?' that got out of her mouth wasn't meant to sound as harsh, but it did. And so did the ranting that followed. "Did you really think I cared for you in that way? I was your babysitter because your parents paid good money for me to do it and I was studying college at the time," her face was absolutely flaming with rage, and Soma seemed as loss as to what to make of it. Should he… answer? "Besides, I'm a grown woman, I can choose what I want for myself. And a bratty child has no say in it." Her brown eyes were slightly glassy, which made the situation all the more awkward. It was difficult to decide whether rage or some kind of sadness had taken over her facial expression, but Soma knew that whatever it was, it meant he was no longer welcome in her life.
Something in him, a part he not always listened to, told him that retreating was the wisest way to go about it. He suddenly felt so tired and didn't want to deal with all this.
"…I see. I'm sorry," he muttered, eyes now locked with the concrete ground. He was being closely watched by some people nearby and he felt shame wash through him, "we were together all that time, but I never bothered to acknowledge nor try to understand your feelings at all." I just assumed that maybe love was something you grew into. He lifted his gaze, and there was still some hurt on it, but it didn't hinder the radiance of his smiling mouth. "I promise I will become a man you can think of in that way, be proud of. Even if you don't want it," I want to prove myself, not just to you, Mina, but to myself as well. The scolding words from little Ciel the other day, and your not-so-gentle rejection. I hope I can change for the better. Ah, Agni looks about to cry, did he… somehow know this was going to happen? I guess that, since he was a little closer to Mina than I was, he could foresee it. He bit the inside of his cheek and looked around; with a sigh, he started to make his way through the crowd and towards the entrance. Trying his utmost to ignore the curious glances thrown his way.
"Prince! Wait!" It had taken a couple of seconds for Agni to wake from his stupor, his eyes couldn't take the sight of the younger walking away, and so his legs tried to make up for the slowness of his brain. He caught up easily, but stopped a couple of feet away. His hand lifted dubious, not knowing if raising it towards him was all that much of a good idea. He wanted to comfort Soma, he didn't want to see him cry.
Soma stopped at the sound of his voice and turned around a little, his expression seemed normal enough, it was lacking sadness. But his eyes were also lacking his usual cheerfulness. As if he had numbed his emotions on purpose; and Agni felt his hand waver again at the sight of a void prince.
"I'll be alright," was his monotone answer, a small curve on his lips trying to be reassuring. "It's not like it's your duty to worry about me or anything," he shrugged, and his eyes became glassy on the slightest. "Just… I'll go and sleep or something." He proceeded to walk again. Agni went to follow him, ignoring the calling from his boss.
"But it's dark outside! Let me drive you to your dorm," he was perfectly aware that Soma was capable of getting a cab, walking to his place, or even going in the bus. But he couldn't help worry, the bad feeling inside him still refused to go.
Soma shrugged again and let out a puff of air, looking at anywhere but Agni. "Since I finished finals last week, I can pretty much arrive whenever until next term." He began to walk again, but didn't resist the hand that held his. He felt so very tired… yeah, the stinging in his eyes was because he had stayed up until late last night. So maybe… maybe accepting a ride wasn't so bad. Maybe…
"I still think it is not a good idea to wander around…" Soma nodded and grabbed Agni's sleeve, not daring to look up. "Let's go home."
"Thanks for the ride," his face still felt really tired, so he couldn't offer a smile nor bring himself to apologize for all the trouble.
"It was no problem," Agni assured, waiting for Soma to say goodbye. "Will you be alright?" He had to make sure, or the pang in his chest for leaving the young adult to his bearings would not stop stinging.
"Yeah, you can go back to your house. Have a cup of tea, relax." His words were dragged along a sigh, "I'll just… head there and sleep. See you around?" Soma knew he wouldn't really feel up to it next time, but at least it would stop the older male from worrying.
Agni nodded, opening the door to exit the car. "I think you have my phone number, so you can give me a call if you need anything." He ignited the car before looking once more at Soma, he opened his mouth to talk and shut it, not trusting his mouth to deliver the correct message. "I'll get going now." He then drove away from the campus entrance.
Once on the dorm, Soma laid on his bed, and sure that no-one was able to see him, let the tears flow freely across his face.
He didn't listen much when Edward awoke the next morning to hurry him into breakfast. Or when he said they should hang out in the mall and have brunch. Or that a shower would lift his mood. Or anything, actually.
Midford, worried, did the first thing on his mind and called his cousin. They might have many differences and lots of brawls, but on the important things they could agree.
"Yes, Edward?" Was the sleepy response from the high-schooler. Edward frowned given it was a couple of hours into the afternoon, had Ciel been doing something else before he called? He decided to brush it off and pass onto the important thing.
"Phantomhive! You see, um, do you happen to know what happened to Soma last night? He said he was going to some concert and right now he seems extremely down." He looked over his shoulder, worried about his friend, who was still an unmoving bundle in his quilt. Ciel, on the other side of the line, sighed.
"I do not happen to know whatever mess he got himself into. However, if it puts your mind at rest I can come over to check on him. How does half an hour sound?"
"Yeah. I'll try to keep him alive in the meantime."
"Then I better be on my way." Then Ciel hung up.
"If you can…" Edward sighed too and muttered under his breath, "he's lucky we're on break, otherwise the teachers wouldn't forgive him for missing classes…"
"Hey, Kadar."
"Hmm?" Ciel raised an eyebrow, unimpressed at his friend's behaviour but clearly exasperated with him.
"Are you not going to do something today?" He tried not to sound passive-aggressive (or aggressive at all, for that matter), but the indifference was a must.
"What for?" His voice was muffled in the quilt, and he sounded pretty tired, come to think of it. "I'm on vacation. I can be dead until next term starts."
Ciel took a seat beside him on the bed, a tired look and another sigh to his mannerisms. "And what, pray tell, has killed you?" He didn't even so much as flinch when a small sob was heard underneath the layers of cloth.
"Mina has!" Soma exclaimed before going back to sulking. He didn't even seem to breathe.
"And do you plan to stop being a cry baby anytime soon? Because, if I may remind you, you are pretty much an adult; you have responsibilities to deal with, you have a life, and you sulking will not make that woman love you back." Ciel was very aware of what had happened. Being the son of a businessman himself, he knew from not so long ago that the woman Soma sought after was already wife to another. His most likely guess was that the discovering of such fact was what triggered his friend's mood.
"If she shall not love me, then I would rather die!" Of course he did not mean those words, but a broken heart can put some really shady perspective.
Ciel rolled his eyes and stood up, "do whatever suits you best." And gave up on trying to cheer him up.
"Are you feeling quite alright? You have barely touched the shortcake you ordered." Ciel looked away from the window to stare at Sebastian. The man had just arrived and he already knew Ciel felt upset about something. He eyed the man curiously, wondering if he was sensible enough to cheer Soma from the dead-of-love. Might as well ask for advice.
"You remember Soma, right?"
"The prince of Bengali? Why of course." Ciel rolled his eyes, annoyed at his antics.
"Well, he discovered that the woman he loved was already married to her boss. And he has been sulking for the last week." Sebastian sat in front of Ciel, listening attentively to what the younger had to say. To be quite frank, Michaelis had little to no interest in such a brat, but it was fun to humour his friend nonetheless. And so he listened and tried to come up with a solution for his dilemma.
"I don't know what your thoughts on the subject are, but I think my dear friend Agni is more suited to this whole cheering-a-moping-young-adult thing, don't you agree?"
Ciel sipped his earl grey and offered a faint nod, "certainly."
And so Agni had been called by Ciel to help him take care of Soma, because he was a 'huge baby that is making a mess of himself with no effort to move on.'
Agni stood out of the campus centre now quite knowing that to make of himself. Should he… ask someone where Soma was? It would seem rather suspicious, as he was an adult, and wasn't really enrolled into college. (But he could always say they were relatives. They were both from Bengali, so their accent was not all that different; and if anyone asked about his hair, he could say it was a genetic defect.)
Just then he received a text from Ciel with instructions. "The boy's dorm is to the left. His room is number 38. Just tell the prefect you're there to check on Kadar and they'll let you in."
Might as well get going.
"Uh, Prince Soma? Are you in here?"
The only reason Soma unrolled himself out of his quilt, was utter shock. Did he… hear right? Had Agni… gone out of his way just to cheer him up? He stared gaping at the man, who was peeking from the door, trying to decide whether it was appropriate to enter or not. After a couple of seconds, he decided to risk it. Soma stopped gawking and shook his head.
"Y-yeah, come in." He sat up, still wrapped and tried to somehow hide himself away in shame. He still wasn't feeling up to talking to people. Granted, he did eat sometimes, and did something other than sulk. Turns out his mind was a great place to reflect things in.
A part of him felt really bad, his friends had been really worried about him, and the fact that even Agni, who he didn't know him all that well yet, had come to check up on him, was an indicator that something was wrong. It was hard to ignore the pang of guilt in his chest as Agni strode inside his room.
"Hey," he greeted, keeping his hands behind his back, somewhat of a bag hanging from them. "I heard from your friends you were feeling a little down and thought I might stop by."
Ah, so little Ciel had told him. He didn't bother denying it nor confirming it, Agni would know if he was lying and he already knew the full story anyway, so yeah. He wrapped himself further into the quilt and looked elsewhere.
"Thanks," I appreciate that. His mouth was still too heavy to form the full sentence, and hoped his companion would get the message. He made a movement as if to lie down again but felt Agni's hand stopping his head from touching the pillow, he stared at him questioningly through a frown.
"I'm afraid I must ask you not to lie down. You have done much of that as of late; how does it sound that you take a bath while I make something to eat?" Soma nodded, and reluctant, he got up from his bed. And dragged the quilt along with him. Agni sighed a little under his breath and set the stuff he brought from his flat on the table. Lots of spices lined up among other ingredients. He placed the canned fire in the centre and once the flame was lit up, the support and the pan.
He sure hoped Prince Soma liked home-made curry.
Soma exited the bathroom to the smell of many spices and tender meat, his eyes widened with awe and stared at Agni, who was already serving their eating portions.
"I hope you're feeling up to some curry, I heard you haven't been feeding yourself as you should. So I thought that maybe something home-made was very nutritious, and I could prepare some." He reached Soma the plate, who took it still in shock.
"Y-yeah," he sat and took some poori to eat the curry with, not minding the small droplets of water dripping from his hair onto his back. "Thanks for the food," ha gave Agni a small smile, and started eating.
To say Agni's curry was delicious would have been an understatement. To say Agni's curry seemed to be from the gods would have been more accurate.
And every time Soma wanted to point this out, Agni would deny it all and say that he felt 'incredibly flattered someone like Prince Soma thinks so highly of it,' then return to whatever task he had assigned himself.
Ah, that's right. Agni had been trying really hard to cheer him up, to the point where it seemed he lived in there more than he lived at his flat or being at work whatsoever. And Soma had made a couple of jokes about it.
"With all the time you spend here and all the things you do for me," (much to his embarrassment) "one would think you've become my servant." Agni stopped moving for a second and Soma thought he had somehow offended the gentle man, and just as he was about to apologize for what he said, Agni turned back to him with his trademark smile.
"They wouldn't be far from the truth, would they, Prince?" His heart leaped to his throat and he was at loss for words, he knew it wasn't because of the title, given he had used it so much he had no choice but getting used to it, but rather the intensity of his tender gaze and the cryptic meaning behind his phrase.
In the end, he had only managed to get out a 'yeah' and return to read his book about fauna in Africa. He reminded himself to gather the guts later and ask him what he had meant by that.
By the time the next term arrived, he was already hanging with his friends as per usual, and his thoughts didn't wander to Mina as they would. His chest swelled with pride at his accomplishments. But also at the thought it had been Agni who helped him out in the end.
I'm sorry about how long this took to come out. The only thing I can say about myself was that most of my time was spent playing computer games and being sucked by the black hole that is Tumblr. I have both good news and bad news.
The good news are that the two hardest chapters are pretty much already written (on my phone's notes, lol), so you won't have to wait too long on the cliffhanger with those.
The bad news are that I don't have a definite ending to this story and that I still need to work on the plot from chapter 5. I have a scene in mind that might suit for an ending but it's still a maybe.
Another bad news is that starting today, I'll be going to school (I'm actually heading there in an hour). So stories might be a little slower to come. This chapter was longer than the first two, so I hope that makes up for it. I'm still working on a few requests I have on my inbox, so I'll post those before working more on chapter 4. I don't think school will be all that hard, so I'll try to write as much as I can.
On the other hand, you can send me writing requests if you want, either through Tumblr or the comments section, those make me really happy and somagni needs more love, so ideas are appreciated.
Matane!