30 Hugs – Theme 5 Collide

Disclaimer: All LOVELESS characters belong to Kouga Yun.

You only ever meet strangers on the street.

All of the people Seimei is on familiar terms with he can see on the street, but these people are still strangers. They are only acquaintances, after all; only acquaintances that know his name and face but nothing more. All of his classmates are strangers too, because the other children are too filthy for him to socialize with. So when they wave to him as he weaves through the crowd with his mother, Seimei doesn't wave back.

Occasionally Seimei likes to hold his mother's hand. It soft and warm like his infant brother's. Misaki is more than happy to walk hand in hand with her eldest son for the sole reason that she detests sharing him; although, her curly-haired son pays the most interest to his mother anyway.

With Misaki leading him, he never crashes into the yucky strangers swarming the street. Not that he, Aoyagi Seimei, would into people under any circumatsances. That would be preposterous. Seimei's balance and gracefulness is much too perfect for that.

However, it is possible for another being to initiate the collision. Curiously, only once does a stranger stumble into the little Aoyagi without raising in Seimei's mind an overwhleming desire to take a hot bubble bath and clean himself off.

He is another boy Seimei's age wearing sequined jeans and a short, tawny safari jacket. He does not look where he is skipping – Seimei thinks it is more of a horse-like prance. The lack of attention could be attributed to the scraggly black hair swarming around his girlish face as he skips. In fact, the boy could easily pass as a girl.

Except girls know Seimei doesn't like it when they accidentally tumble against him, especially when he is shopping with his mother for groceries. And this boy/girl does not hesitate to dance right into Seimei.

They both fall to the ground, making a lump of black hair and childish limbs. The stranger is on top of Seimei, his nose presses against the wavy black hair beneath Aoyagi's ear and his leg has Seimei wedged beneath him.

Seimei cannot believe how dirty he must be at this moment, laying on the ground where all of Japan's shoes have trod. What is even more odd is the peculiar shock that sears his body in a pleasant, burning sensation: like when Misaki puts too much hot water in the bathtub for Ritsuka and him to soak in. Even though he wants to push the clumsy boy off some unseen force compels him to let the other lay there for a minute more.

Now the stranger is looking down at him, his rather long hair gently slapping the sides of Seimei's face. "Cute ears; you'd think they'd help with your balance." Then he is standing again, not offering Seimei a hand. He stands there, looking down at Aoyagi with a haughty smirk until Misaki helps her son up to his feet again and begins to fuss over him.

It is difficult for Seimei to keep an eye on the boy with his mother fretting, but his eyes meet those of the boy's one last time before the boy quickly says, "Akame Nisei," and sticks out his tongue, spinning and darting off.

Misaki hugs her son, rubbing behind his ears protectively. "Ichigo, you aren't hurt?"

"Moom, don't call me that! I'm seven!" A whine is the correct answer because she smiles and releases him, but Seimei is still having trouble concentrating. Akame Nisei…

That stranger makes him feel complete; the same feeling that comes over him when he holds Ritsuka. Maybe they would run into each other again. Then Seimei could tell Akame Nisei what his name was.

Then he could meet someone more than a stranger on the street.

Err… I have trouble writing a seven year old Seimei. And I don't think the age differences between Seimei and Ritsuka are correct. Seimei was 17 when he died, right? And Ritsuka was ten… so seven years difference 7 year old Seimei + infant Ritsuka . Yup, that's what I've come to conclude.

Anyway, not much SeimeixNisei action here, but I wanted to write about their first meeting (whenever that would be). So it's a little AU, but oh well. Works for me.

I feel bad; I wanted to make this one longer but I'm dead tired and don't feel like it.