So much to say, and yet not much at all. This fic is one I hold near and dear to my heart.

Ratings of future chapters will be increased to M. There is KuroFai and FaiYuui; but this really is about the KuroFaiYuui alloy. 5 parts total. Set in the SHG universe, but with a few tweaks.

Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle/Shiritsu Horitsuba Gakuen and their characters do not belong to me.

Ternary

Part 1: Someone to Love

orange
is the glimmer of sunset as we link pudgy fingers
and yearn through a too-high window
orange is the seep of crimson through yellow roses
(our blood, your love)
ivory bleeding into sunshine into red-rimmed jealousy

i.

The sun shines bright overhead, rimmed with wispy clouds and birds fluttering high in the sky. People are calling out to each other for soccer ball passes; there is the sharp rattling BREEP of referee whistles, and the pattering of dozens of sports shoes on red rubber track. The school bell rings, and it's as if the hilly foundations of the school are vibrating right along with it.

Fai cares about none of that. He's tripping and loping along the crisp verdant grass of the school field, hurrying to catch up with the only boy in his class taller than he is. (Yuui doesn't count, Yuui is his height.) "Kuro-rin!" he calls, "how was your weekend?"

"Huh?" Tall, Dark And Handsome turns around, crimson eyes narrowed at him, and Fai smiles the brightest smile he's got. His stomach gives a jolt. (His stomach always gives a jolt.) "What d'you want?"

It's common knowledge that Suwa Kurogane is seeing that other tall, stoic guy on the archery team, Doumeki Shizuka. The girls coo about it when they see the pair along the corridors, ties and shirts and pants neatly pressed, towering and dark-haired and without any interest for common fare like them. Fai watches them sometimes. (He's been watching for months, now.) It makes little bubbles of jealousy eat into his gut.

"I'd just like a date with you," he blurts hopefully, like the many other times he's tried pestering the other boy (because how else is he to get Kurogane to look at him?) He tries another smile. "I promise I'll try not to call you silly nicknames!"

Kurogane huffs irritatedly, keeps on walking. Fai skips along at his side, pushing his chewed thumbnails into the joints of his fingers to remind himself not to throw his arms up like he always does when he's excited, or nervous.

"Please? We could be good together," he continues, licks his dry lips. His heartbeat thuds loud in his ears. This boy in front of Fai is almost everything to him (there is Yuui too, but this is different). Red eyes are half his world (Yuui makes up the other half), intense shades of ruby he dreams about and yearns for. This boy is brave and strong and honest and all the things Fai aspires to be but can never attain.

"You've bugged me countless times," Kurogane says eventually, gracing him with a sidelong scowl. "Do I have to say it plainly so you know?"

"Know what?" Fai echos. "If we don't go out, how would you know if we're a match?"

(All he wants is a touch. A hug. A kiss. Please?)

"I don't have to," the other boy mutters. "Look, Flowright, you aren't my type. It's as simple as that."

"I'm not—" He blinks, and blinks again, trying to absorb those words even though his mind vehemently refuses to. "I'm—"

"There won't be an 'us'," Kurogane says, and it feels like he's pushing a very sharp knife into Fai's chest, inch by slow inch. "Listen to the way you talk, and ask yourself if I'd want to put up with that. Think about it."

His feet drag to a stop and the edges of his vision cloud over, like he's watching the back of the other boy through a tunnel that's growing increasingly longer.

By the time he stumbles to the boys' locker room, Yuui is hovering at the narrow doorway and glancing up at the stream of students trooping down the concrete grandstand stairs for their next class. "Fai? What took you so long? I saw Kurogane and— Fai?"

His brother is a blur of sunshine hair and large blue eyes and Fai sucks in the first large gulp of air he's managed in a while.

It hurts, and Yuui's tight hug doesn't help remove the ache trapped within his ribs.

They're late for their next class, Yuui's cleaned him up so his bloodshot eyes and red nose aren't all that obvious. When they mumble their apologies and step into the classroom, Fai keeps his head down and forces himself not to wonder if Kurogane is happy now.

ii.

Yuui isn't fond of Kurogane.

Fai knows it's because of what the taller boy did that morning on the school field. If anyone hurt Yuui like what Kurogane did to Fai, Fai wouldn't be able to forgive them, either. As it is, he doesn't know what to do with the constant hollow in his chest, so he tries to ignore it.

It seems to work after a while, after he's suppressed his heart and feelings so it doesn't hurt. Fai still smiles for Yuui—he remembers how to smile with both his eyes and his mouth, and he wonders if Yuui knows. He doesn't feel as happy anymore, doesn't feel as sad anymore, doesn't feel very much at all anymore. But it works, and so he's fine with it.

He doesn't talk to Kurogane anymore, either.

iii.

Life goes on.

He wakes up in the same room as Yuui, reaches over to hold Yuui's hand over the seam of their beds pushed together, and they talk about their dreams of the previous night. Yuui is the one to make coffee and chide Fai for adding too much sugar to his, he is the one to throw a quick omelette together while Fai brushes his teeth and trips over the scattered pillows on the floor.

Fai scribbles the last of their homework (he makes sure to cross t's the way Yuui does them, and write fours with the gaps at the top), shoves the papers into their bags, and lounges around while his twin tidies the rest of their little apartment. He writes the letters to Ashura in his writing, then pretends to be Yuui and writes his portion, too, and hands the crinkly sheets to Yuui, who proofreads the letters on their way to school. Fai holds his hand so he doesn't trip.

Sometimes, he thinks about Kurogane, and wonders if the other boy would accept his brother, if Yuui were ever the one to love him instead. He doesn't know if whatever he felt for Kurogane was love, but it was so strong and pounded in his veins that it could very well be. It has since been swept into a cupboard and locked up so it doesn't hurt.

He wonders if Kurogane misses him at all. (Probably not.)

He wonders what Kurogane is doing with Doumeki, if they walk home together, and whether they kiss and have sex. (He could be so much better than Doumeki, if he had the chance.)

Sometimes the girls whisper that they've seen Doumeki with Kurogane out on the streets somewhere during the weekend, and Fai pretends not to hear and walks quickly away.

Once, he asks Yuui, while they're waiting at the foot of towering apartment buildings for a traffic light to turn green, "what if you pretended to be me? You're more like Doumeki than I am. What if Kuro— Kurogane doesn't mind blonds? What if you tried chatting him up?"

(You're not my type still rings in his head, and he knows that he can never be silent and stoic like Doumeki.)

Yuui stiffens; his fingers tighten around Fai's. "No."

(At this point, Fai can sure be as apathetic as Doumeki, though.)

The blue eyes staring back at him are cold, and his twin clenches his jaw. "I think you're better off staying away from Kurogane."

He tries to tease. "Do you like him yourself, Yuui?"

Yuui frowns, and a flicker of anger touches his eyes. "Don't even suggest that, Fai," he hisses, "you know how I feel about him. He hurt you."

Yuui never confronts Kurogane about that incident. Fai thinks he should be indignant, but he isn't. He's happy that Yuui still loves him more than anything else in the world, and he loves Yuui just as much. Maybe even more so.

iv.

It is close to the end of the school year, and they're filling out college applications whenever they have time to spare at home. Yuui's desire to enroll in the famous Italian culinary school is burgeoning; Fai knows it's the one place that will take his twin's skills in the kitchen to the greatest heights.

He loves Yuui, so he doesn't mind that Yuui will be away from him, if it means it'll help his twin succeed in his dreams of becoming a chef.

It doesn't stop him from missing Yuui even before he leaves. His own college applications are easy—he doesn't need to have them translated and so on, after all, and there are plenty of colleges in Japan offering chemistry as a major.

(He likes things that go boom. Especially when they go boom.)

Fai snuggles close to Yuui one day while they're on the couch watching a cooking show on TV, between practicing Italian phrases with each other. "Yuui," he whispers, "have you thought about what it's like to kiss?"

It's occurred to him plenty of times before, when all he had was eyes for Kurogane, and later on, crushes on random boys around the school. But the romances he's fantasized about have never come to fruition, and the glorious ideal of saving oneself for a special romantic partner has grown jaded and moldy with time.

"We've talked about this before, haven't we?"

"We've talked about it," Fai answers with some reluctance, "but I've had enough of talking. I want to know. Please?"

Yuui smiles at him then. "I thought you'd never ask."

Yuui is special—the most precious person in the world to him. Fai returns the smile and leans in, and they learn to kiss with the TV shining bright in the background.

(They do other things, too, things that feel like explosions, and Fai finds himself hooked.)

v.

College isn't as lonely as he imagined it to be. Fai works part-time as a tutor, makes a few friends in his course, hangs out with them, and rushes back home in time for video calls right when Yuui wakes up halfway across the world, in a pretty, sunbathed apartment in Italy.

They talk about school, about food, about classmates and neighbors and what they're having for dinner. Yuui nags at Fai to ration his sugar in between extolling the usefulness of different types of knives ("I'll show you how to use a fillet knife when I visit—" "But I don't like fish, Yuui!") and Fai recounts the speed at which sodium acetate crystallizes through a round-bottomed flask ("Please don't try to do that at home, Fai—" "But I want to make a special gift for you!").

They have fun, and time flies. Yuui's course spans three years—he works full time at a large restaurant as a line cook after he graduates (where he was only a part-timer before), and listens to Fai's complaints about his final year project when he wakes up in the mornings.

Fai doesn't think about Kurogane anymore.

His hurts have knitted together slowly over the years; he learns to trust and be happy again. Sometime in his final year, he hears about a volunteering program through one of his lab friends—teaching English to children in orphanages. It resonates with him, helping those who are bereft like Ashura helped him and Yuui, and he signs up for it.

There is something gratifying about teaching another, and watching them as they learn to walk and run. Among others, he takes under his wing two girls in the orphanage he visits—best friends—one with deep blue ribbons in her hair, and the other with scarlet earrings. Blue-girl is shy and awfully quiet, and Red-girl stays by her side with a vengeance, in case Bluey needs protection against bullies of any sort.

They grow on him like moss on wet rock, and by the end of the school year, they're able to understand a variety of English words and speak a few simple sentences. It strikes Fai suddenly that he could do this forever, imparting skills that help, and when he tells Yuui that during their next video call, his twin smiles and asks if he's considered teaching as a profession.

Ashura agrees to the additional year of schooling; Fai takes up another part time job to help cover the costs of his tuition, and he fits his orphanage visits around more classes, jobs, and video calls with Yuui. He doesn't have time for much else.

vi.

Another year passes. Fai graduates with his teaching license after numerous tests and a stint as an assistant teacher, and sends countless applications to schools across the country. Some schools bite; he interviews at a handful. The first to offer him a position is a private school—Horitsuba High. The director, Ichihara Yuuko, is tall, sly, and utterly too tickled by his interview.

"You can relax," she tells him on his first day, slings an arm around his shoulders and guides him around the campus. The faint scent of alcohol on her breath is unmistakable. "It's okay to crack jokes, you know!"

He is bewildered by her lackadaisical attitude at first—but when she swings by his office at the end of his first day and offers him some quality sake, he accepts, and she sets her bottom on his (rather empty) desk and drinks right from her knee-high bottle. The neckline of her dress gapes; her thighs are plainly visible through the high slit of her embroidered satin dress.

"Ichihara-san," he blurts in astonishment. Even if this is a private school, it is still very extraordinary for one's employer to be casually drinking on one's desk. After one's first day of work, no less.

"Call me Yuuko," she says drunkenly, but her smoky eyes are sharp and calculating behind her glasses, and he knows she means it. "Everyone else does."

The school director is insane—he tells Yuui as much in their video call that night.

vii.

It doesn't take Fai long to warm up to his colleagues and work environment. Yuuko encourages madness, partakes in it herself, and it shows in the ludicrousness of staff events (balloon smashing, dressing up as animals, and so on) organized every quarter or so.

His tentative requests to hold explosive demonstrations in the chemistry lab are resoundingly approved. Yuuko doesn't bat an eyelid when he adds large chunks of pure sodium to a beaker of water and they fizzle and catch fire and explode; neither does she hum a disapproving word when he drops gummy bears into molten potassium chlorate (the class oohs and ahhs at the brilliant white light and plumes of smoke that billow from the mouth of the test tube).

In barely three weeks, he is comfortable in his own skin and back to his cheerful, bubbly self, and in two months, he's built a reputation for himself as the Crazy Chemistry Teacher, climbing through the laboratory windows as Yuuko is wont to do. The students love him.

Needless to say, he gets along with the director very well indeed.

viii.

Yet another year passes. Fai continues his visits to the orphanage, Yuui is promoted to the sous chef position in his restaurant in Italy, and the elderly gym teacher in Horitsuba High retires.

Fai expects the replacement to be someone fun, knowing his employer's strange recruiting habits, but when Yuuko calls them around in the staff room to introduce their new colleague, the chemistry journal he's dragged his eyes from nearly falls from his limp hand.

Six years after their high school graduation, and Suwa Kurogane is back to haunt him.

Kurogane hasn't sighted him yet—he's standing with his back to Fai, frame taller and shoulders broader than Fai remembers (but he just knows it's Kurogane, because hardly anyone else is that tall, has that foreboding a presence). Fai tucks his journal and hands into his deep lab coat pockets so no one can see him fidgeting, sidles up close to the math teacher to bump shoulders and ease into a friendly chat so he has someone to look at other than the one person who shakes him even now.

They're in the middle of discussing the current math syllabus when Kurogane turns and freezes at the sight of him. For a heart-stopping moment, Fai forgets how to move his mouth to form words—

Think of Yuui, who is calm and brave!

—And he's relaxed his face into the most professional smile when he looks up into the crimson gaze that had plagued his thoughts so long ago.

"Flowright-sensei." Yuuko introduces him smoothly. For a moment, Fai hopes to be able to pass himself off as his twin. "Our resident chemistry teacher. We call him Fai."

Recognition flickers through deep red eyes, like a demon identifying prey, and Fai feels his stomach evaporating so quickly he doesn't have time to condense and salvage it. "Hi! How do you do?" he chirps, falsely bright, and wishes that the long, lingering stare didn't scrutinize him quite so thoroughly. He feels more naked now than six years ago, somehow, more susceptible even though he knows to ward his heart against anything so frivolous as love. (There is Yuui, but Yuui is different.) "My name is Fai. Please take good care of me."

(He wants anything but, he wants to get out of here, but this is the custom and he can't break from it.)

"The pleasure is all mine," Kurogane rumbles, dark eyes tracing his face, his expression unreadable. "Please take care of me."

The words are starkly ironic and Fai feels his smile turning brittle at the corners. He clenches his fists in his pockets, certain that Kurogane bears some sort of dislike towards him from before. It feels like forever before Kurogane looks away, and at the first possible convenience, he bolts from the staff room.

Fai takes refuge in the prep room next to the chemistry lab. He's lost all appetite for breakfast, and all he wants is to curl up into Yuui's side and forget the past ever happened. (It's one in the morning in Italy and although Yuui hasn't gone to sleep yet, it's too close to class for him to start a call, and the prep room is too public besides.)

He takes deep gulps of air, reminds himself that he was probably nothing to Kurogane, that Kurogane should have ceased to think about him, and that he rarely comes into contact with gym class routines, anyway.

(What happened to forgetting about Kurogane?)

He throws himself wholeheartedly into teaching, pays special attention to the explosive experiments, and hides in the little orchard behind the science labs to eat his lunch.

Fai makes sure to climb into class through the windows.

ix.

That night, Yuui is all frowns. "I should come visit," he blurts suddenly, voice a little tinny through Fai's headphones. The sun is bright on his face and his cheeks are rosy, and Fai wishes he could reach through the computer screen for his twin. "I know this is hard for you, Fai—"

"I'll be fine," he reassures Yuui, even though he doesn't think so. Essays and worksheets are beginning to pile on either side of him. "You're working your dream job and they can't spare you for too long, you know."

His brother argues back, golden hair wet from his shower, a perfect reflection of his own. "I don't trust him, you remember what he did—"

"I'll avoid him," he says uncomfortably, even as he remembers the tightness in his chest when Kurogane looked at him the only time this morning. Anxiety knots his stomach. "It isn't that difficult to."

"But you can't hide forever, Fai, there's a staff event coming up," Yuui retorts. "I'm coming to visit you."

"You don't have to," Fai protests. His cupcake lies forgotten on his desk. "I can take care of myself, Yuui."

They argue more, and in the end, Yuui concedes. "Fine," he says, "but you have to tell me everything, and if he does anything to hurt you, I'm coming over immediately."

"I'm older than you, you know." He pouts childishly. That argument has never worked in the past, and he doesn't expect it to work now.

"And I'm the more responsible of us," his better half replies from halfway across the world, precious and beautiful and so very much adored.

x.

Is it possible to forget your first love?

V.

Rubber soles squeak on the smooth, tan floor of the school hall, high-pitched noises that carry above the constant shift of bodies back and forth along a series of basketball courts.

Fai grins in delight. He's cornered his prey and is fluttering about in front of him, looking up into red eyes and waving his arms in an attempt to block a shot.

"What will you do now, Kuro-rin?" he crows, taking pleasure in their proximity. Nothing has changed between them—he is still pining after this boy, and Kurogane is still with Doumeki. He thinks he might be willing to settle for second-best.

Kurogane dribbles the large, striped ball, studies him calmly. Fai makes no move to steal the ball away.

"If you want something so badly," the taller boy says, gaze flickering towards the students circling closer around them, "then grow a spine and reach for it with your own hands."

Fai doesn't think much about it at first; he grins and leaps to counter Kurogane's jump, but the ball sails over his fingertips and into the hoop, and Kurogane's team cheers.

Later on, as he reflects on it, Fai thinks the other's words may be a cue for him to try harder. He thinks that maybe, just maybe, he stands a chance.

IV.

He falls deep and hard, and he doesn't know it until he catches sight of two dark heads one day, walking down the sunlit corridor outside the biology labs. The songbirds are twittering loud and clear, and for a moment, Fai thinks to call out to Kurogane with one of his embarrassing nicknames that the latter so dislikes.

The words are on the tip of his tongue when Kurogane reaches over and bumps the back of his hand against the other boy's. The other—Doumeki Shizuka, from the next class—reaches back. For a moment, their fingers tangle, and Fai stares in unadulterated shock.

He looks to Yuui helplessly; there is a hint of sorrow and resignation in his brother's eyes.

"You knew?" he breathes, and it feels like there's something squeezing tight around his chest. That hadn't been a trick of the light if he wasn't the only one who'd seen it.

Yuui looks away, the corners of his mouth turned down. "Let's go, Fai," he answers quietly, taking Fai's hand and giving him a light squeeze. "I hoped you didn't have to see that."

They head for Yuui's piano club gathering, Fai trailing behind his twin in a muddle of shock and hurt. Yuui wants to protect him—he knows that instinctively, and doesn't blame Yuui for it. But Kurogane is taken. Kurogane is in a relationship and not available—he likes someone else, and somehow, that thought hurts a lot more than it should.

III.

For all that Fai is flamboyant, he hides a lot.

Everyone knows the attraction he harbors towards Kurogane by now; he teases and showers the boy with nicknames, a different one each day, and half his heart he wears on his sleeve. The other half, he doesn't share, like the way he ducks his head when Kurogane breezes by the picnic bench he occupies with Yuui during their free period, the way he chooses to keep his mouth shut when he spots the taller boy decked in his keigoki and hakama in the kendo club room, moving through kata with his bamboo sword.

Once, he's hurrying down the sweeping concrete staircase that leads to the round orange tables before the canteen proper (there are stairs everywhere; the school is built on a hill), when he misses a step and slips.

Yuui has promised to play for him on the piano by the tables and he's late meeting with his twin because the chemistry teacher held him back to discuss some special project, but all that goes out of his mind when he's flailing and trying to regain his balance, and failing miserably.

His breath rushes out of him when his tailbone connects joltingly hard with the edge of the stairs, and he's trying to curl his (too-long) limbs into himself in the time he skids bumpily down the rest of the unforgiving steps, pain blossoming through his body.

When he reaches the base of the steps in a heap of bruised-but-intact bones, he blinks dazedly through the aching, wondering if anyone saw, whether Yuui saw—

"Are you hurt?"

Fai looks up, and Kurogane is striding towards him in full kendo regalia. Shame washes through him (he's never wanted to show this boy his ugly side, only his very best, because ugliness makes people back away) and he covers it up in a hurry, giving his classmate a mega-watt grin.

"My tailbone hurts, Kuro-pii," he sings, tries to wave weakly at the other. "Will you rub it for me?"

Kurogane snorts; his eyes are slivers of red, and he extends a hand towards Fai.

Fai doesn't know what to think as he stares at the hand, until Kurogane growls, "Are you going to get up, or not?"

He places his hand tentatively in the larger one proffered (it's the first time they touch like that and Kurogane's palm is warm and calloused), and he's heaved up onto his feet in a swift motion, like breaking through the surface of a pool into sweet air.

"Watch where you're going," Kurogane says gruffly. "Exams are coming up and you can't afford a broken arm."

It's not often that someone other than Yuui and Ashura shows him concern like that, even in the face of him making a fool of himself. Everyone else wants something in return for care—affection, popularity, and so on. Kurogane sweeps a critical glance over him, then turns and walks away.

Fai stands alone at the foot of the stairs, watching the other boy's diminishing silhouette, and the last few moments play in a never-ending loop in his mind.

II.

They're on their way home from school, crossing the road, and in the distance, Fai sees his new classmate toeing a wandering kitten away from the busy street.

The kitten begins to rub itself against Kurogane's leg; the boy freezes for a bit, then crouches and picks it up by the scruff of its neck.

"Yuui," he whispers, nudges his twin, and nods towards the boy. "Look."

They reach the concrete pavement on the other side, watch in silence as Kurogane sets the animal close to a clump of bushes and walks away. The kitten follows; Kurogane talks at it, warning it to stay away, and it pays his words no heed, picking its way daintily back towards him. The sound of Kurogane muttering irritatedly to himself reaches their ears; he tries to nudge the cat back to the bushes.

"He's such a grumpy puppy," Fai tells Yuui, smiling before he is even aware of it. "I think I like him."

I.

The chair clatters next to him, the second-to-last student assigned to his seat based on the height differential their form teacher has sorted them into. The tallest should sit at the back of the class, after all, and Fai is no stranger to that.

"What's your name?" he pipes cheerfully to deep crimson eyes, olive skin, and jet black hair. This boy is the only one taller than he and Yuui, complexion dark for how much he seems to be a native of this country; a stark contrast to his own pale Scandinavian skin.

His new seat-neighbor flicks a casual, steady look at him, and Fai gets the distinct feeling that those eyes see deeper than he means for them to.

"Suwa Kurogane," comes the deep rumble.

Something skips a beat in his chest; he rolls the name on his tongue, says it in his mind. "It's too long," he tells the boy, "What if I called you Kuro-rin?"

His new neighbor narrows his eyes. "My name is Kurogane."

"Fai," Yuui hisses warningly from his other side. (Yuui is right. He doesn't do this often.)

"Kuro-tan? Kuro-pon?" Fai suggests, and ducks a violent swipe aimed at his head. "Kuro-mi?"

"No fighting in class!" the teacher calls from the front, and Kurogane snatches his hand back, glowers at him. Fai remains smiling.

He's got a cute guy sitting right by him, and he can't see why it isn't the start of a wonderful school year.

xi.

Fai lies awake in bed a week after Kurogane's reappearance, staring at the whitewashed ceiling deep in shadow. The memories are back, hazy around the edges; they resurface when he doesn't need them to, haunting him long after the fact. It's minutes to Monday and he can't sleep.

Look, Flowright, you aren't my type. It's as simple as that.

Time has whittled down the sharp edges of those painful moments, though there are certain things that never quite stop hurting, not with the sort of separation they had. He's never really fallen out of love with Kurogane, just... buried those feelings. Burned them off in a white-orange blaze like a gummy bear in potassium chlorate. It was the only way he knew to stop the hurting, after all.

He wonders if Kurogane is still with Doumeki, whether they broke up or whether Doumeki will come to see him on the school compounds like Yuui does when he visits from Italy. He wonders if Kurogane has changed much, and what the other has been up to all these years. He wonders if Kurogane is living next door, down the corridor, or on the floors below (he hasn't allowed himself to linger long enough to find out).

Fai drags his forearm over his eyes; he needs to stop thinking.

Spring is moving across the land in the form of warmer temperatures and awakening crickets, whose chirping carries loudly on the breeze edging in through his window. He thinks about Yuui, who is just a little higher in latitude half the world away, and who is experiencing the change in season at the same time he is. (It's nice knowing that some things stay constant.)

Sleep doesn't come easily to him tonight; he rolls back onto his stomach and pulls the sheets over his head, and those red eyes are back, piercing through the darkness. (He wonders if Kurogane has settled in already, whether he likes Yuuko, if his students quail at his sheer grumpiness.)

Fifteen minutes later, Fai is pulling his boots and jacket on, and slipping out of his apartment to go for a walk. It beats stewing in memories and questions and what-ifs. He wants some fresh air.

It turns out that Kurogane's apartment is smack dab in the middle of the hallway, because the door opens, and he steps out in a set of old flannel pants, paired with a T-shirt emblazoned with fading mobile suits from one of the Gundam series that was so popular a few years back.

Fai's first instinct is to do an about-turn and march the other way, because there isn't just one stairwell—it's just that the one he's headed towards opens closer to the little park near the teachers' dorms. But Kurogane has spotted him, and it's plain rude to ignore a fellow colleague when it's clear that you've been walking towards them. His gut clenches and he focuses on setting one foot in front of another, bright smile at the ready.

Then he glimpses the possible evidence of Kurogane's interest in anime and the trepidation turns to an almost-snicker, a near-hysterical release of stress.

Fai beams extra-bright and waves. "Nice night out, isn't it?"

He doesn't know how to address Kurogane. The nicknames still hit a little too close to home, and it's a little too late to try and act like Yuui. Maybe.

Kurogane flicks a cursory gaze over him, turns around to shut his apartment door. There's a bag of what looks to be trash dangling from his other hand.

Fai decides that the best way to put distance between them is to be polite like Yuui (who is right about things a lot of the time), so when the gym teacher says nothing more, he brushes past the man with a casual "I'll be seeing you around, Kurogane-sensei!"

Red eyes sharpen, bore into his back, and Fai flees down the corridor.

He doesn't stop until he's reached the swings behind a copse of trees, heart thudding furiously in his chest like he's done something incredibly wrong and he's about to be found out and be punished for it. (Like when he'd drunk himself silly and texted Ashura in the middle of the night. Like when he'd confided in a classmate about cheating, and the classmate had gone running to a teacher, who had gone to Ashura. Ashura had not been happy both times.)

(Fai has learned that ugly things aren't meant to be shared. Hurt comes out of letting others see your bad side.)

(Yuui is different. Yuui sees all of Fai and doesn't judge him for it.)

When he's certain that Kurogane has been left far behind at the apartment block, and that he's alone at the playground with sodium lamps glowing comforting orange around him, Fai slows his pace, trudging across sand to squeeze himself onto a swing. He's too old for this, but he's slim enough that there's still an excess of reinforced rubber curving around his butt, even if it's a bit of a tight fit.

The chains squeak noisily when he begins to swing, low at first, then higher, kicking his legs so it feels like he's flying, higher and higher until there's only the maroon-tinged sky above him, edged with ink-black tree canopies, and street lamps that promise warmth and safety. The constellations he spots are the same as they always are this time of year, the same as what Yuui sees from the light-polluted Italian city he lives in now.

It takes a while to get there, but when he's whizzing through the air with the wind in his hair and his hands tight around skin-warmed chains, Fai takes comfort in thoughts of Yuui, that someone out there still loves him, even if Kurogane never has and never will.

α.

(It is very unsettling to hear "Kurogane" in that voice. "Kurogane" is colder and more artificial than the silent treatment years back, but he'll be damned before he admits to preferring "Kuro-rin" over his real name.)

.

(orange)
it is the tabby kitten you plucked away
it is the basketball we held from you
it is the comfort of sodium lamps beneath purple-silk sky as
canis major growls threats at gemini
all three locked in the infinity of the winter hexagon

A/N: I'm not sure if there's a KFY fic like this out there.. the idea just sprang into my head one day and wouldn't let go. :)

The poem "Orange" is written by me. I'd wanted to borrow one instead, but there wasn't any that fit this story, so. There is really such a thing as the winter hexagon, and the canis major constellation (Big Dog) really is in it with gemini (the Twins). ;) Coincidence?

Would love to hear your thoughts on this, be it about chemistry, school, first loves, or anything at all. :) It was so surprisingly easy to write the relationship between Fai and Yuui in this fic.