A/N : Not mine. All Kouga Yun's. I don't own Loveless. I don't make any money out of it.
Another short one. At least, I can update quickly.
Chapter 7
25th, September 2005
Hello Soubi,
I'm not sure this letter will reach you on the 28th. I hope it does. Ah, yes, I've picked up a few interesting titbits about you in Gōra. You've never expressed any kind of emotions concerning your birthday and I bet you've never celebrated it. Honestly, I shudder just thinking about what Minami-sensei would have deemed an adequate birthday present for you. Somehow, I would feel relieved if you told me he never even remembered it. Anyway. I wanted to send you a little token but then the others stuck their noses in my business and decided to do the same. I assume you will guess who bought what.
Ritsuka.
Laid out on the small wooden table was the parcel's content. An invitation to a private exhibition. From Kio, obviously. He was the only one acquainted with his tastes in art. Some intricately decorated chopsticks : the Zero boys who had liked their food and had always been very vocal about it. A hand-made scarf, long and soft. As comforting as only Yuiko could be. Inconspicuous sakura earrings made of iridescent rhinestone with small pink pearls in the middle to shape the core of the flower. Ritsuka's gift, clearly. Earrings made sense. They were part of the memories they had made together. Part of how they had bonded. He instinctively put a hand to his ears. Earrings linked them still. Earrings held a special place for them both. Ritsuka. His heart ached for him. Ritsuka was right. These were tokens, not mere gifts. These objects had been chosen so that he could use them without Seimei being all the wiser for it. They had been chosen to express care and worry, affection. He missed them.
He had been taught loyalty to his Sacrifice. He had been taught his Sacrifice would be his everything. But Seimei wasn't because he didn't want it to be reciprocated. Seimei had rejected him so many times, in so many ways, he had lost count. Seimei had no care for him. He only used him as he wished and discarded him later, making it as emotionally painful as possible. He used to be sad about it. Now he was only resigned. But when he thought about Ritsuka, he felt so much anger and regret. He would have been a good master. He would have cherished him as a Sacrifice and knew that he would have been both controlled and cared about. Sometimes, he hated Seimei too. But he knew of no way to be free of his name. To him, Loveless was far more appealing than Beloved. More appropriate too. Truer. And unattainable.