DISCLAIMER: SKIP BEAT! and its associated characters are the creations of Yoshiki Nakamura. This author claims no ownership of Skip Beat or any of its characters. All other rights reserved.
Author's Note: The word for this one is "Cruel."
NGL, when I saw the word was "Cruel" I thought "Ohhhhhh I can write about a hundred one shots just for this word, but a good portion of them would probably require any number of trigger and content warnings, and possibly a ratings change." XD So instead, I went with this idea I've been kicking around for a while. I might go back and do a fluffy 'cruel'-inspired one-shot, too, just to balance this one out.
This is an alternate chapter five to Daughter of Kyoto (lol, yes, an AU to an AU!), and it is dedicated to yamwhatiyam/Miss Mika Namariya. We were talking one day about a Kyoko who was truly emotionally stunted, someone who was thoroughly resistant to Kuon's overtures for friendship and love. This is how I think it would have gone had Kyoko rejected Kuon altogether that night.
Quick summary: In Daughter of Kyoto, Kyoko returns back to Kyoto and to the Fuwa ryokan, where she is adopted and made heir to the property. She's emotionally withdrawn after her experiences with Sho and with her failed LME audition. Meanwhile, Lory sends Ren/Kuon back to Kyoto for a forced vacation after his failed Katsuki and a slump in his acting career. In Chapter 5, the two of them go out to the Gion Matsuri and Flirting Ensues. However, in this version…that doesn't quite happen.
Grimdark Matsuri
Kuon was at sixes and sevens, walking back to the ryokan with her. This grown-up Kyoko wasn't who he expected. When he found her this morning—literally running into her as he made his way to the riverbank—she was as cold as the night before dawn. If it hadn't been for the distinct color of her eyes, he wouldn't have recognized her at all. Gone was the friendly, chatty little girl who wandered around the forest with him calling him a 'fairy prince.' Even when she recognized him as Ren Tsuruga, there had been little of the fiery girl that had sworn revenge at her LME audition. Instead, she was as closed and as tight as a jewel—and as hard.
He could see how hard she worked as the Okami-san in training, his meals were always precisely calibrated, as was every service he'd requested. But it was like watching an automaton. In an effort to draw out the person she'd been, he'd taken a chance asking her out to go to the Gion Matsuri and had been surprised when she accepted. But being at the matsuri had been…odd and awkward. All his efforts at flirting with her had fallen flat, though he hadn't been rejected outright. It was a humbling experience. Girls had always gravitated to him, his good looks meant he never really had to try very hard. But this evening was different. He'd tried everything he could think of to get her to open up, making up excuses to hold her hand, finding a way to draw her close as they watched fireworks on the riverbank. She hadn't protested, exactly. She'd held his hand when they walked through crowds, acknowledging how easy it would be to get separated in the throng of people. But as soon as they cleared the crowd, she would drop his hand like a hot iron.
Oh, she was unfailingly polite, a perfect hostess indulging a pushy American. Conversation flowed in a perfectly pleasant manner. He had the feeling she was well-practiced in the art of pouring drinks to the ryokan's upscale clientele. But she never laughed at his antics. She never responded to his compliments. The only true smile she'd given him was when he insisted they go to a diner to have hamburgers with egg. It was only a small spark—like a flint striking steel—but it gave him hope. Enough to think that part of her had warmed up to him…maybe. Wasn't a single spark enough to ignite a flame? But he had to concede—his attraction to her felt thoroughly unrequited.
And now it was time to say goodnight.
Kyoko bowed and said, "Oyasuminasai."
He bowed back. He was holding the hair ornament he'd bought for her on the sly, after watching her silently admire it. He wasn't sure whether he'd have enough courage to give it to her, and he was going to turn around and just…call it a night before he made an awkward evening even more awkward. Perhaps he could give her the kanzashi by proxy, put it into a little package with a card and then give it to the Okami-san as a thank-you present of some kind. He was going to take this cowardly way out. But just when she'd turned away, he found that he had to try and give it to her in person after all. "Wait!" he called out.
Kyoko turned around, a look of surprise on her face, and he gently placed the kanzashi in her hair. He allowed himself the liberty of smoothing an errant lock of hair that had escaped her bun and placing it behind her ear.
But instead of blushing or thanking him, she'd gone white.
"I'm sorry, Hizuri-san," she said in a dead voice. Her hand reached back to pull the kanzashi out of her hair, and he was dismayed at how quickly she removed it. She treated it as if it were cursed. The words he heard next were cold and cruel and landed on his heart like icicles. "I cannot accept this."
"It…it's just a gift," he stammered. "I saw you admiring it and I thought…"
"No, Hizuri-san," she said. "I will not accept this."
"I…thought perhaps when you said we could be friends that…"
"This is not the kind of gift one gives to a friend," she said, her voice flatly relentless. "And I am not willing to be a person that you give a gift like this to."
She held it out for him to take, and as soon as his palm opened, she dropped it.
"Goodnight," she said. Her back had already turned.
He stood there like a standing stone watching as she walked away.
He was still there when she saw Yayoi-san in her office, and overheard her report. "I believe Hizuri-san had an acceptable time at the Matsuri, Okami-san," he heard. Yayoi responded, asking a question which he couldn't quite make out. "Yes, he did—nothing serious, just trying to hold my hand. Nothing worse than a drunk oji-san at the bar."
He wanted the earth to swallow him up. Nothing could be more cruel than this dismissal. Oh, it hurt his ego, certainly, to be dismissed as just another drunkard pawing at her. But it felt so wrong. Didn't she feel it? There was a red string that tied them together, pulling them close across time and space. It was a certainty, as real as gravity and the sun and the sky.
That night, he curled into a little ball on his bed, wishing he'd fought harder against this bizarre forced vacation that Lory had made him take. If he'd never come to Kyoto, he could've been spared this mini-sojourn into hell. He clung to the image of that single real smile she'd given him and thought hard about how to pursue her. Because he couldn't just give up, could he? Should he?
No. He wouldn't give up. Some things were worth fighting for.
