Recommended listening: White Dove by Sakamoto Ma'aya
My Angel
Chapter 15
Hisoka walked behind Diego as they strode in silence to a small hut. It was Diego's place. Hisoka had been there many times before, enjoying Diego's company and his cooking. The hut was small, a thatched wooden roof lining across the top of the wooden structure with old-fashioned window frames back from just after the Elizabethan era. The windows were stained glasses designed with multitudes of colors, various shapes that shone inside when the sun overhead hit it just right. Dragonflies, birds, foxes, lions, all creatures that were made by the one God danced across the wooden golden-brown floor as Hisoka walked inside.
Hisoka let a faint smile trace his lips. The polished floor was the same as ever, shining golden brown against the sunlight that hit it through the clear pieces of the stained multi-colored glass where the shapes almost seemed to move against it, as if welcoming him. The kitchen was green granite with oak cabinets dotting one wall. Already, Diego was in there, setting up a few pots and taking out some things he had made himself from the natural resources of the Heaven.
Hisoka padded quietly into the kitchen. "What are you making?" he asked, his voice opening the offer of help should it be needed. After all, Diego was doing more for him than he could ever repay him for.
Diego turned around and gave Hisoka a small smile. "Chicken and sliced burdock root over noodles." (1)
Hisoka managed a small lift of his own lips. Diego truly was his friend. He had known what Hisoka had craved ever since he had left. "Sounds great," he exclaimed, his voice still its monotone, but having a small tint of happiness in it.
"You can go sit down and I'll get this ready," Diego said, giving Hisoka a light push out of the kitchen. Shrugging, the ashen blonde teen walked over and settled by the window, sitting on the sill as he gently flicked the lock open, pushing out the glass and erasing the figure of a panda on the wooden floor. The emerald eyes gazed out across the heavenly land, taking in the way the wind blew through branches of even the thickest trees.
"What are you thinking about?" he heard Diego ask from the kitchen. Hisoka tore his gaze from the outside heaven and glanced towards the kitchen. Diego was leaning against the counter, looking at him, hands gripping the counter's edge. Hisoka frowned for a moment before he looked back out again. "The wind."
"Doshite?"
Hisoka shrugged. "It reminds me of a lot of things. Things you can't see, but you feel them and know they're there."
"Like guardian spirits?" Diego supplied as he turned to stir the sauce in the pan on the stove.
Hisoka nodded, letting out a calm breath. "Aa. We're there, but mortals can't see us. Most of the time, they can't feel us, but for those select few, we're like wind itself. Except when it's necessary to show ourselves to our client; then we're just like them, but somehow... inhuman."
Diego brought the noodles up from the pot of boiling water; testing one before dropping them all back in to cook for a few more minutes. "That's true, but we were all once like them. They will evolve into us and fly to this Heaven when their time has come or evolve into demons and be cast into the fires of Hell."
Hisoka nodded mutely. Diego glanced up to the angel on the windowsill. For some reason, the aura around the empath seemed... lonely, despite his best friend being just across the room. Diego turned to the noodles again, bringing them up and separating them into two bowls. As he got the chicken and the sauce together, he asked, "You miss him, don't you?"
Hisoka snapped his head up in surprise, giving Diego a "how-did-you-know" look before he slowly nodded again, eyes softening as they looked at the stained glass reflection of a tiger that seemed to run across the floor, stalking its prey: the reflection of a rabbit. How odd it seemed... Hisoka felt like the rabbit, being chased down by the predator that would follow until his last strength gave out. Hisoka knew who the tiger was in this.
Velken.
The angel was trying to get him cast out of Heaven. But why? No angel could feel hate in Heaven, at least not exactly. They can feel anger and that anger could become the rage that could cause them to dislike... or be the rage that consumed their soul and cast their souls down to the mortal world, wings burned to black ashes, and even farther, down through several levels of Hellish flames.
But that didn't matter right now. If Velken hadn't been cast down before now, his rage wasn't fully developed to be demonic. That was both good and bad. It meant Velken wasn't a demon in disguise, which had very low possibility in likeliness and that he was just another angel, but bad because he could get away with some things. Like earlier.
'He called me a whore,' Hisoka thought with anger resounding from the base of his spine. 'He was trying to get me to fall from the Path... because of what I feel for Tsuzuki...'
At the thought of Tsuzuki, all anger vanished, replaced by a warm feeling... and another feeling. A lost feeling; the sense of loss was tied into his heartstrings and beating against his chest. It felt painful. Hisoka took in a deep breath and the pain receded slightly.
"Diego?"
The black-haired angel glanced up at Hisoka as he placed the plates down on the small table. "Hmm?"
"Did you feel lost when I left?"
Diego froze for a moment, purple eyes glancing to the teen at the windowsill, locking with the green eyes that seemed almost afraid for the answers he could give. Diego stood and walked over to Hisoka. "What do you mean?"
Hisoka looked down at the floor again, seeing that the tiger was close to the rabbit now. Hisoka shut his eyes for a moment. "You already said how much you cared for me... and when I left to guard Tsuzuki... did you feel lost?"
"Do you?" was the responsive question.
Hisoka felt a hand on his shoulder. He slowly nodded and the hand on his shoulder gave a gentle squeeze. "Then you know how it feels."
Hisoka opened his eyes and turned his head up sharply to stare at Diego. "If I had known, I wouldn't have left!"
"You had to. It's your duty."
"But—"
"No buts," Diego cut in, giving the green eyes in front of him a harsh stare.
Hisoka had to look away. "I don't wish it on anyone."
"Anyone who does isn't fit to be an angel."
Hisoka frowned. How had it all come to this? People say that comfort came in groups. Diego was right next to him and yet, Hisoka had never felt so alone. He closed his eyes when he felt a hand on his forehead. He felt it slide down to cover his already closed eyes. "Hisoka, listen." The sentence was spoken into his ear in a hushed voice. Hisoka bit his lip to keep himself from talking.
And he did listen.
He could hear the wind rustling the trees just beyond the meadow out back; he could hear the soft paws of the foxes as they strode across the grass, he could hear the birds chirping as they flew across the vast ever-blue sky, but mostly, Hisoka could hear a heartbeat. It wasn't his own, but it was near him and he could hear its normal beats, the beats that kept it going. They neither sped up, nor slowed.
"Wakata," Hisoka murmured and the hand uncovered his eyes just as he opened them. Diego gave him a smile before gesturing to the food he had placed down just moments before.
"It's going to get cold," he said with the same small smile. Hisoka nodded and they took their plates. They both said their own respective words before taking the first bite, chewing it slowly, as they always trained their tongues for this meal.
Hisoka closed his eyes. Oh how he had missed this... the spicy sauce rolled over his tongue and the hot chicken intensified his taste buds, setting his mouth on fire. But it wasn't a bad fire; it was a fire that reminded him of being with Tsuzuki, oddly enough.
Tsuzuki...
Hisoka placed down his fork as he finished his meal, not ten minutes after he had begun. He saw Diego look at him, but Hisoka said nothing. His eyes began to burn with determination, the green irises reflecting the fire that he had kept within him for so long.
He was going to win over at this trial.
Even if it killed him.
