Title: Scars

By: Aizawa Sakura

Disclaimer: Gravitation with characters belongs to Maki Murakami.

Summary: Shuichi loses his will to live. Tatsuha falls in love with him and is prepared to do anything to save his life. Even send him to Japans no.1 Casanova.

Author's Note: Where am I going with this? I don't know. And I'm sorry for the wait.

…………….

Chapter Seven

I'm not kissing him. I am not kissing him. The thought was violently running through Tatsuha's head. I am NOT kissing him. And yet, he was. Held him close. Kissed him hungrily and forcefully. Shuichi was not responding nor refusing him. Not kissing him back, but didn't try to get away either. Tatsuha carefully bit down at Shuichi's lip in order to make him open his mouth a little more. Then he suddenly realised something: This act could ruin everything. Shatter the trust Shuichi had come to develop for him. Perhaps even make him fear him. Make him hate him. For it is easy to hate things you fear. People you fear. I am not kissing him. I am not destroying the chance I had. I want to save him. Help him. He had to stop. He had to stop, and then he had to explain to Shuichi why he had done it. He pulled back, but didn't let go of the other boy.

"I'm sorry" he breathed into Shuichi's ear. "I didn't mean to do that. I so sorry."

They seemed to have frozen. Locked in a position where they could do nothing else than look at each other. Brown eyes met amnesty ones. And for the first time, those purple orbs held an expression. Conveyed a feeling. Confusion. Shuichi did not understand. He couldn't grasp what had just happened. It was too weird for him. His first kiss. Gone. He decided to fall back into the loneliness he had lived in for the past months. He had shared something with Tatsuha, something which somehow made it impossible for him to ask him about Hiro. He wasn't ready to communicate. His first real kiss left him confused and blank.

Tatsuha saw it, and it filled him with…fear? No he thought. No, no, no! but it was to late, happened to fast. For a moment, Shuichi's eyes were alive, burning with emotions, the next there was only confusion, and then, gone. The boy was gone again.

"Shuichi!" Maiko shouted while running down the slight hill towards her brother. Her brother in Tatsuha's arms. That bastard kissing him. Rage, her blood running hot through her veins.

"Get away from him" she spit when she reached the two boys. Not that she needed to, Tatsuha had already backed away. She grabbed Shuichi's arm and jerked him away from the man, just for good measures.

"I'm taking you home" she said. "I'm taking you home now" she turned to Tatsuha "you will never get close to him again." She began to walk, fast, dragging Shuichi with her. Tatsuha left behind. Stunned, he stood, not knowing what to do. Just knowing that it was painful to watch Shuichi go. Then he found his voice.

"You are not going home tonight" he said.

Maiko spun around.

"I'm not?" she shouted, "I'm taking Shuichi home! You can't stop me! Try anything and I'll call the police, god damn perv! Shuichi is just an innocent child compared to the likes of you!"

Okay, so that was a punch in the face. Perv? Tatsuha thought. Shuichi is just a child compared to me? But I'm still underage! Then again, he didn't know Shuichi's age. Yet, being called something like that by Shuichi's sister hurt him.

"I'm not going to stop you" he said. "If you wanna go then go. Because that's what you'll have to do. There's no more busses today." He turned around and started walking back to the house.

"Wait" he heard Maiko say. "We'll come with you. I'll stay over, and then we will leave with the earliest buss in the morning."

And so they followed him back to the house. Once there, Maiko quickly disposed of Tatsuha when she dragged Shuichi up the stairs, got into the room Shuichi had been staying in and violently slam shut the door in Tatsuha's face before locking it. Tatsuha wandered back to the first floor while wondering why he had bothered to follow the Shindou siblings up the stair in the first place. His father was nowhere to be seen, but he found Mika sitting in the kitchen. She was dressed in a knee long black dress and was gently sipping from a glass of wine. Tatsuha threw himself down next to her.

"Hello sis" he said. She gave him the rather usual 'what the hell's wrong with you' look.

"What's up with the kids?" she said, obviously referring to Maiko and Shuichi, "The old man's turning this place into some kind of troubled youth's centre or what?" Tatsuha did not answer.

"Do you have any more of that stuff?" he asked her gesturing towards her glass of wine.

"Yes" she said "but I plan to drown the whole bottle by myself, you don't like it anyway."

"It's not like I don't like it, I just happen to prefer beer."

"I know" Mika said, smiling, while getting up and walking over to the refrigerator. "Which is why I bought you this" she returned to the table with a wine bottle and a can of beer which she offered her brother. Tatsuha accepted it, smiling a little when saying:

"Thanks, it's even the real thing, not that vending machine crap which makes you sick if you drink too much of it."

Mika gave him one more of her 'what's wrong with you' looks.

"Little brother, all alcohol makes you sick if you drink too much"

He ignored her.

"You're troubled" she said, sipping from her glass"

"How do you know?" Tatsuha asked.

Mika smiled.

"You're not drinking"

Tatsuha promptly drowned half the can.

"You're not too happy yourself" he said.

"And what would make you say that?"

Now it was Tatsuha's time to smile.

"You're drinking" he said.

"It's nothing"

"I could say the same. However, you're drinking Chateau La Mondotte Saint-Emilion 1996 (1) so I don't believe you. What happened, what did he do?"

"You know me too well. We were supposed to spend this evening together, you know, good food, good wine. But…" she paused to empty her glass "…he had some troubles at work and decided to go out and get smashed instead." She reached for the bottle and refilled her glass.

Tatsuha sipped his beer, "Sure sounds like Touma" he offered. Then he decided to tell her about his own problems.

……………………………….

What the hell am I doing here? Hiro asked himself where he was sitting at a small table at the far back of some small pub. In fact, it was the same pub they had gone to when the blonde stranger had treated him to a meal. What he was doing there? He didn't want to admit it, but he was waiting, waiting and hoping they would be able to meet again. He had just started to consider leaving, when the blonde stranger walked through the door. He recognised him right away. Same pale skin and small frame. Same blonde hair and effeminate looks. Hiro stood and walked across the room.

"Hello" he said when reaching the other man, "You come here often?" The blonde turned to him and, when he recognised him, smiled lightly.

"Not really. One or two times a month, at the most."

"Oh, ehm…" Hiro found he had a hard time coming up with something decent to say.

"Can I…buy you a drink?

The blonde seemed a bit surprised at first, but eventually he nodded and his smile became warmer, more natural.

"Anytime, Hiroshi-kun."

……………..

It was quiet again. Shuichi stared at the ceiling. His sister curled up at the other side of the bed, sleeping. Since they got back to the house, Maiko had not said one word to him. He hated it. Slowly, he brought his hand to his face. His fingertips against his lips. He had not imagined that his first real kiss would be with a man. In fact, he had never imagined a man would kiss him at all. Not like that. It had been… a bit of a shock. That Tatsuha would do it. He didn't really understand. Why would Tatsuha want to kiss him? It had happened so fast. It had been violent. Rough. Awkward, somewhat similar to silence. Slowly, he got up from the bed and got dressed. He unlocked the door and tiptoed out of the room. He would not go back to the silence. The kiss however, as he recalled it, had not been unpleasant. Maybe, he even wanted to do it again.

…………….

There was a reason why Mika was the older sister. Somehow, while listening to Tatsuha's tale, she picked up on details he had missed, found red strings he had overlooked, and created a picture he had not seen.

"This kid, I don't think he's depressed because he can't talk anymore, if that was the case he wouldn't open up to you. You have given him something. Kissing him was, indeed, not a very bright thing to do, but if he, you, can overlook that, I think you'll be alright."

"I don't understand-" Tatsuha began, but Mika motioned to him to keep quiet.

"It's simple really, all you have to do is put the pieces together. Kid used to be a singer, which probably means he listened to a lot of music as well. His sister said he used to joke a lot, or playing around with his friends. As you put it, I believe she even said that 'He would never shut up'. Apparently he lived with a lot of noise around him. Hence, he probably wasn't very found of silence."

"I still don't understand"

Mika sighed, looked down on her empty glass, poured herself more wine. For a moment, it seemed like she was giving up the explanation, then her eyes seemed to focus on something far away, and she started again:

"He is not unhappy because he can't talk, but because no one talks to him" she said, slowly, convinced. "And, if I'm right, his sister showing up tonight and deciding to take him back home was about the worse thing that could happen. He doesn't want to go back home, he rather stay here. With… Tat…you, Tatsuha. Because, you…talks to him."

"Ehm, sis, you're acting weird. You sure that isn't the alcohol speaking."

"It's not. I know I'm right about this."

"How can you be so sure?"

Mika smiled then.

"Because said kid has been standing behind you for some minutes now, nodding at every

word I've said."

-The Next Day-

Though it was early, the streets were already crowded, the people noisy, the air rich in smell. It had been Mika's idea.

"How do we prevent Shuichi's family from taking him back home?" Tatsuha had asked.

"Go away" Mika had answered.

"Yeah, right." Tatsuha said, "Where to? Should we perhaps go to live in the mountains

where no one could find us?"

Mika growled.

"People get lost in the mountain every day, they are easily found again. Little brother, you are not thinking big enough."

"Ehm… a bigger mountain?"

"No, stupid! You should go to Tokyo." She reached over, picking up a pen and a paper lying on the table. She scribbled down an address and passed it over to Tatsuha.

"Just go there" she said.

Tatsuha starred on it. If Shuichi had felt any kind of hope of getting away, it was shattered by the look on Tatsuha's face. The man had gone pale, very pale.

"I can't" he breathed. "I can't do that."

"You can" Mika said. "It's time."

And so, they had gone.

…

Tokyo, the capital city. It took them some time to find their way to the place Mika had told them to go. Tatsuha seemed stressed, which made Shuichi slightly worried. During the seven stores lift ride Tatsuha tried hard to breathe slowly, not quite managing the task. Finally standing outside the door, Tatsuha hesitated. Then he slowly lifted his hand and pressed the buzzer. It took a while before anyone come to answer the door, but eventually, they heard the sound of footsteps and then the door swung open. The man standing before them looked western. His skin was pale and his hair blonde. He was dressed in black pants and a white shirt and he looked down at them with the narrowed eyes of a cat.

"Tatsuha?" he said in a low voice. "What are you doing here?"

Tatsuha took a deep breath.

"Hello" he said but seemed unsure how to continue, "Long time no see… Eiri"

…………………………..

End Chapter Seven

AN:

It's been what? One year? One and a half year? I'm guessing most of the people who used to read this fic gave up on it a long time ago. Yet, I hope some of you are still here. The past year or so has been hard on me, that's the one reason I can give you for not having updated. I have also more or less left Gravitation fandom. I hope I can find it in myself to actually finish this now that things are better. I'm truly sorry if it turns out I can't.

As always, please review and tell me what you thought of the chapter, Good? Bad? Did it suck? Was it the best thing you've ever read?

You are our sunflower.

Reading notes:

Chateau La Mondotte Saint-Emilion 1996

Somehow I can't really see Tatsuha pronounce that. It's a real wine though, it's rather expensive. Approximately $608 a bottle.