THIS I PROMISE
Shuichi's back was as stiff and as straight as a plank of wood as he and Maki made their way towards his unit. Lips tight, face hot, and a cool sweat beginning to run from his hair down his temple, Shuichi deduced that he was, in fact nervous. Very, very dreadfully nervous. What the Ultimate Detective could not deduce however, was the 'why'. "It's not as if we've never been alone with each other before! She came into my dorm room dozens of times back then, and I even went into hers once or twice! So what is this?"
He let his gaze wander over to the other sole occupant of the elevator as they headed down to his level. As usual, she seemed as cool and collected as she ever did, which at once seemed to both annoy him and confuse him even further.
"Maki doesn't seem to think it's a big deal. So what am I getting all bent out of shape for?"
The gentle 'ding' of the elevator arriving at it's destination snatched Shuichi from his musings as the doors slid open and he proceeded out and down the hallway, quickly approaching his door.
"Okay Saihara, whatever this is, just knock it off already! This is stupid! It's just Maki! One of your closest friends! There is nothing about inviting a friend into your house for tea that should be making you lose your cool! After everything you've been through, the sheer hell that you've endured and survived, THIS is what you're going to let get to you? What, are you nervous about her seeing your place? There's nothing wrong with your place! It is completely and utterly just plain average!
"Are you nervous about you two being alone in your apartment? Again, she's been in your room before! And you know that she would never do anything to you, so what is your deal? You're acting like a kid who's having their test graded right in front of them, or a teenager letting someone else use your phone and worried they'll find 'stuff' on there you'd rather they not see! Or like some dolt on his way over to pick up his prom da-!"
"You forget how doors work, Shuichi?"
Shuichi was pulled like a hooked fish from his internal interrogation and found himself staring straight ahead at his front door. He looked to his right, as if thinking that there had to be further for them to go. Then to his left, past Maki, wondering how in god's name they got here so fast. Maki had an eyebrow arched and her arms crossed, not understanding what exactly was going on with the young detective. He had been standing there, staring into his door, as if trying to gaze into it's very soul, for a whole ten seconds before she had decided to speak up.
"Huh? What? No! Of cour- no! Of course I know how doors work! Come on Maki Roll, don't be ridiculous! What a silly thing to say! Me, not remembering how doors work. Ha! That's- that's funny, you're funny, Maki!" His sentences came short and haphazardly with all the grace of a hippo on roller skates, and as strained as the strings of a piano. Maki's only response was to furrow her brow.
"Then... why aren't we going inside yet?" Then, very suddenly, her face softened slightly and she looked down at the ground more with a grimace than a glare. "Unless you'd... rather I don't come in..." For some reason, the very notion made Maki feel somewhat... cold, and something she hadn't felt since before their time at the Academy...
Lonely.
Shuichi flailed and sputtered out any and all denials of her train of thought, as if trying to shoot the very idea out of her mind, "Wha- NO! No, absolutely not! That isn't it at all! Of course I want you to come in, that's why I invited you in the first place!" Maki lifted her crimson gaze to meet Shuichi's ashen one, a questioning furrow wrinkling her brow.
"Then what are you waiting for?"
Shuichi, at an utter loss for words, and feeling the weight of the day finally coming down upon him, decided to just tell her the truth... but also, a bit of a lie.
"Sorry, I just... got lost in thought, I guess. Lots of cases to deal with and file, and then what you told me on top of all that. It's a lot to process, you know?" Maki's eyes softened as she looked down to Shuichi's side, rather than directly at him.
"Oh, right..." The sudden timidity of her tone made Shuichi regard her with a questioning gaze of his own. Maki wasn't usually the type to simply let herself wilt mid sentence like that.
"Maki? Something wrong?" Maki shook her head, causing her twin tails to ripple back and forth behind her.
"It's nothing, forget it. Are we going to go inside or not?"
"There she is." Shuichi giggled to himself before he began fishing in his pocket for his keys. As he pulled them out, he readied himself with breath in his nose and out through his mouth. There's was no sense in stalling anymore, and frankly, nothing more to stall with for that matter. He produced his house key from his pocket and penetrated the keyhole, feeling the tumblers click and clack over the key's peaks and valleys, before at last, releasing the deadbolt from it's prison and turning the knob.
Shuichi stepped into the darkness of his apartment first, flipping on the light for the kitchen before turning back around to get the door behind Maki.
"Did you um... want me to take your coat?" He was entirely unsure as to the proper protocol for when you invite someone into your home, seeing as how he never had any company. Ever. Before he could contemplate whether that fact was pitiful or not, Maki responded,
"No, it's fine."
"Ah, um, alright then. Oh, uh here, lemme just ah..." He trailed off as he headed deeper in to switch on the living room's lamp before turning back to Maki, "Well um... here it is. This is my place. I know it's not much, but you know, I mean... for a single guy, living on his own, I think it's more than enough."
"Mmm, it's nice. I've always been a little curious as to what this building looks like on the inside. You're able to afford this place all on your own?"
"Well, I could, but the uh, landlady is a friend of my uncle's. It's actually why I live here. My uncle was worried I wouldn't be able to handle the 'big, tough city full of hooligans and ne'er do wells', so he called in a favor of a friend of his. And, for whatever reason, she absolutely refuses to let me pay the full rent."
"Hmm, must be nice. Having someone to care and look out for you."
Shuichi furrowed his brow as he watched Maki look across his bookshelf.
"That's right. It's easy to forget sometimes..." To him, she had always seemed so small. Too small to be able to handle the immense weight that had been thrust upon her all her life. Losing her parents, being all but forced to become a child assassin, having to kill her own friends, her best friend dying, on top of everything that happened back at the Academy... Shuichi couldn't comprehend how such a small girl could handle so much pain and hardship. In fact, it was a miracle she was even still alive at this point. Shuichi was pulled from his musings at the sound of Maki's voice.
"Edgar Allen Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle, Virginia Woolf, Victor Hugo, Cormac McCarthy, Margaret Atwood, Leo Tolstoy, Agatha Christie; good god, do you actually have time to read all these?" She continued eying his rather sizable collection of novels. Shuichi couldn't hold back a smirk, both at her inquiry, and at her resilience.
"I like to read, there's nothing wrong with that, right? Plus, the majority of those books, I had already read before moving here."
"Then what was the point of lugging them all over here when you moved? I can't imagine they were very light."
"I don't know! I might get the urge one day to read through one of them again, you know. I just like knowing that they're always there, always ready if I ever need them." Maki pursed her lips and began absentmindedly toying with one of her ribbons of hair.
"Fine. I get it... I guess." She turned her back to Shuichi again, pretending to be very interested in a Dostoyevsky novel she pulled off the shelf. He couldn't help but chuckle at the familiar sight. Whenever she felt pushed into a corner enough to where she had no choice but to either agree with someone, or try to deflect, she would always play with her hair and bite her lip, and for whatever reason, her cheek would puff out ever so slightly. Shuichi had always found it rather endearing. Cute, even.
Shuichi's self awareness suddenly snapped like a rubber band as the thought flew past his mind like a formula one race car. "'Cute'? Maki? I mean... yeah, sure. But also, NO! I mean, yeah I had once said I thought her playing House with her friends was 'cute', but I mean, that was more the act ITSELF being cute, not her!... right?" Determined to move on from this bizarre and out-of-nowhere train of thought, he fussed his way over to the kitchen.
"Right, so um, tea! Do you have a preference, Maki?" She looked over to see Shuichi through the window separating the living room from the kitchen hurriedly going about gathering up a kettle and some mugs.
"Something with caffeine. I've still got things that need to be taken care of before my night is over."
"Oh... well uh, are you sure it's alright for you to be here then-?"
"It's fine!" Maki uttered with more force than was really necessary, catching Shuichi off guard. Make clenched her teeth and crossed her arms in front of her chest, looking towards the floor. "It's fine, really." She clenched herself in upon herself, tightening her arm's into her abdomen, "Please, just... I'd just like to have some tea for a little while... is that alright?"
Shuichi's mouth hung slightly agape, taken aback as he was by her forcefulness. There was only one other time he can recall ever seeing her as she was now, the smallest she had ever been. Right now was no where near the level of back then, but it was still there all the same. Shuichi couldn't say for sure what it was that could possibly be going through Maki's head at that moment, though, as a detective, he could speculate. But it probably wouldn't be a very good idea to air out those speculations at the moment.
"Yeah, of course it is. Don't worry, you can stay as long as you like, Maki Roll." She peeked up at him through curtains of rosewood, finding a warm sense of reassurance and comfort in his voice and words. It flowed through her body, from her head down to the tips of her toes and fingers. This feeling of... safety, of familiarity. This feeling like, if ever she had no where else to go, nothing else to rely on or turn to, if she found herself on the opposite end of the scrum line with the world... she could come here. Where she wouldn't be turned away, where she wouldn't have to fight. Where she could just be Maki Harukawa. The girl had she never been given the chance to be.
"Right... thanks."
She turned back away from Shuichi, out towards the black abyss of night that lay just beyond half a centimeter's worth of glass. A night that was dark, and full of terrors. Terrors with which Maki had unfortunately become far too familiar with. The light from inside Shuichi's apartment only extended so far out into the darkness, barely passing the railing of his patio. A lone lighthouse in a deep, black ocean, guarded by jagged claws and teeth that would seek to rip and tear her apart. Coming back to this life... it had been one of the hardest things Maki had ever done. After they escaped, it hadn't taken long for them to find her.
They always found her.
No matter how far out of sight they would appear to her, they would always be there. A shadow from which she could not escape. Forever anchored to her feet, weighing down every step she took. Their reach as the enormous, ensnaring tentacles of the kraken, determined to wrap and constrict around her and pull her down into the cold, dark depths of despair, the likes of which no teenager should ever be forced to see. Depths to which the shapes of humanity's perverse and depraved, wanton cruelty glowed in their hideous, luminescence. Depths that would become her grave if she ever stopped fighting, ever stopped sporting the gills that had been sewn into her from night upon night of never ending agony.
Maki was pulled back into the light, away from the biblical maw of the darkness, as her keen hearing picked up on Shuichi's footfalls. She turned her back to the night, allowing herself to seize and hold dear this moment in the light. This moment when the Holy Salvation Society, the aching in her heart and the pain in her gut, the cold, still, and silent loneliness of her own apartment, the color of fresh blood and the smell of gun smoke could all be kept at bay outside of Shuichi's door. He handed her a steaming, black mug with a dark blue interior with a small, yet strong and reassuring smile.
"I hope you don't mind black jasmine."
She took the mug into her hands and felt the heat sting against the cold skin of her fingertips. She brought the steam up to her face and inhaled deeply the dark, earthy, and floral fragrance that rose from the cup. The warmth felt as though it traveled up into Maki's head, enveloping it as a freshly warmed, fluffy comforter would around her body. Releasing the tea's essence from her mouth, she could not keep the tiniest of smiles from gently tugging at the corners of her lips as she gazed into the steaming, dark caramel colored pool that lay within the mug.
"No. No, I don't mind at all." Shuichi's smile widened as he lifted his red and black striped mug up to her. He didn't fully understand why he was doing this, or what exactly it would accomplish, but in the moment, he just instinctively felt that he needed to do something. Something, anything, that would take Maki away from wherever she had just been. He could see, that while she faced away from him, she seemed to disappear; spirited away from him, off to someplace that he could not follow. Somewhere he didn't wish to follow.
He took her all in; so small, so unimposing at the moment, so filled with a vulnerability that he knew she would never allow anyone else in the world to see. In her short time on this earth, she had endured hardships that would have irrevocably broken any others. So much had been taken from her; her friends, her family, her childhood… her first love. All gone. And they would never be coming back. And yet after each trial, after each soul crushing chapter she made it through, after yet another piece of her humanity was stripped away along with whatever was being taken from her that time, she still had to press on. To another killing, to another long, lonely night, to one more precious, irreplaceable person being snatched up in the uncaring, gnarly fangs of fate.
Even knowing all this, and even having shared a handful of these experiences along side her, Shuichi still could not fathom how deep and how pitch black dark the depths of her despair ran. She didn't deserve it. She didn't deserve any of this. He knew it, and he knew she knew it as well. That's why she had entrusted him with this task, this task that he considered more sacred, more important than any case he would ever face in this, or the next life time. A case that was not for money, or even for himself, but a case for the salvation of one of the most important people he had left in his life.
"That's right. This is why I'm doing this, right here in front of me. The reason for the long nights, the tired mornings, the chill in my bones when an alert is sent out at 3AM, all the crap Honda puts me through, chasing case after case, trying to prevent what often seemed to be the inevitable: Maki. Not the Ultimate Assassin, but Maki, my friend. The one who has entrusted me with her future happiness."
Maki eyed his raised mug, a light, questioning gaze piercing into the offending dishwear. However, it was soon replaced by an amused eye roll, followed by the light, thick clink of ceramic tapping each other.
"Idiot." Shuichi chuckled at the toothless insult, so full of mirth as he was at her normal, combative spirit piercing through the clouds that had darkened her visage. In unison, they both lifted their mugs to their lips and allowed the warmth of the tea to spill into them.
Outside, a strong and tempestuous wind rose and blew about the night. It whipped and swung, lashing treetops that sent storms of leaves soaring into the void of the night. It howled a ferocious and hollow scream as it tore through the air like a caged beast. But try as it may, Shuichi's front door, back door, and windows kept it at bay. No matter what lengths it would go to tear into the soft, warm glow that was as a beacon in the dark gloom, the sacrosanctity of this moment between the two friends would not yield to it's bark and bite.
For now, if just for now, Maki was safe.
Yes, come tomorrow, the cruel horrors of the outside world would grasp her in it's jaws once again.
But in this one, brief moment... the Ultimate Assassin felt what she thought might be what it feels to have a home
A/N: Hey everyone, sorry this has taken a while. And on top of that, it's not even that long and basically NOTHING happened in it! I know. I, unfortunately, have a very finite amount of inspiration in my tank that I also happen to burn through very quickly. My MPG sucks balls. As such, I usually have to wait for it to refuel before I can even try to continue with my writing. As usual, more was supposed to happen in this chapter, but we ran out of fuel rather quickly. Some of you may have noticed that I have another DR fic up now, this one a ShuichixKaede affair. While I do really think that Shuichi and Maki just sort of fit together too perfectly for anyone to deny, I do also really love Shuichi and Kaede. They're just so fucking cute, I can't help it!
Anyway, that will also be using up fuel for the time being. However, rest assured that it will not be any longer than five chapters, at most. I swear. All it is is fluff, and there's only so much stuffing you can shove into a plush before it just can't take anymore. I honestly don't know when the next chapter might be up. Inspiration and creativity are fickle mistresses that never leave me their number, so I usually just have to wait until they eventually decide to come back around on their own. I hope you all will be able to be understand and be patient with me.
As always, PLEASE tell me what you think! I've asked for people to point out anything that they either don't like or felt was weak in my writing, previously. However, it seems that it's surprisingly difficult to get negative criticism coming my way. So, if you don't have anything mean to say about my writing, then please, tell me what you DO like. I honestly don't understand what makes my writing appealing to people, so I genuinely want to hear from you guys on what it is, so that I can try to hone those strengths while I wait around to begin working on my weaknesses. Thanks so much in advance for your kind words, critiques, patience, and understanding!