Disclaimer: Haru wo Daite Ita is Youka Nitta's wonderful creation. This is only a non-monetary-profit fanwork. The lines used in Author's Notes have been taken from Essence of Purity's scanlations. No infringements intended.
If you are already familiar with the manga, you can read on. If not, the context of this one-shot is mentioned in the author's notes in the end. However, it is a manga-spoiler, so please read it at your own discretion.
In Love
Kyouya would always be the first to leave whenever they met for drinks. Tonight was to be no different than the others.
"I'll get going," he said, as Yousuke repeated the other man's customary lines in his mind, "Work starts early tomorrow."
Thereafter, Kyouya would tilt his head a little to the left and push his shiny black locks behind his ear and get up. Yousuke found this sub-conscious habit of Kyouya's unnervingly erotic. It was like an invitation - eat me - as he pushed away the errant locks and exposed the well-shaped ear. It was very teasing on Kyouya's part, Yousuke thought, to expect him to stay calm and collected after such an inviting movement.
He was jerked out of his fantasies and musings as he felt sharp pain in his left shin. Masaki was looking – no, he was glaring at him. Kyouya had just paid his share of the bill and with his coat still carelessly thrown over an arm, he pushed open the door.
Oh.
Oh! He had completely forgotten! It wasn't supposed to be like their usual nights. He was to follow him and make him submit to his love. Kyouya had been somewhat cold towards them lately and Masaki feared it was because he was growing tired of their experiments. Yousuke had replied that he had been sick of the experiment even before it started - but then it was only lately that he had realized that he was way too badly in love with Kyouya.
He got up and rushed out of the bar, only to hurry back when he remembered that he hadn't paid his share and randomly put down some bills on the counter.
When he got out again, Kyouya was nowhere to be seen.
In the busy street of Shinjuku at night, it was not bizarre that Kyouya might 'disappear' in the crowds moments after he got out of the bar. But tonight he had been wearing a hard-to-miss vibrant orange shirt and at 180 centimetres, stood well above most people on the street. Moreover, Yousuke was sure that even if everyone in the street was dressed like Kyouya and as tall as him, he would still be able to locate his love blindfolded. However, as he wandered about the street, he got progressively depressed. Kyouya was nowhere to be found.
From what Masaki had told him, Kyouya would usually walk down to the station and then take the train to where his apartment was. Yes, he would run to the railway-station and catch him there!
It was funny how unaware he was of everything around him. There were so many people and yet he couldn't hear or see anything. It was all an insignificant blur to him – the voices were muted, the people were faceless. Only one thought echoed in his somewhat booze-befuddled head – I have to get Kyouya.
He stood at the entrance, a suspicious figure in expensive clothes and diamond jewellery. A few women and not a few men cast him alluring looks and some even walked up to him but they might as well have been flirting with a wall. Kyouya was all he could think about.
It proved to be a good move. Half an hour had passed and he had been staring at the closed door of an obscure antique shop for a while. Suddenly, he stood up straight and turned right to see Kyouya walking towards the station. Yes, there was no mistaking the shiny black hair and that thoughtful expression. He had put on his overcoat and was talking rapidly into his cell phone.
Yousuke was only dimly aware of someone talking to him and would not be bothered.
He climbed down the steps just as Kyouya began ascending them.
As if drawn to him, Kyouya looked up and stopped short.
For some moments then, the time stopped for them. Yousuke felt strangely elated just by seeing Kyouya there. He had seen him so many times before – in fact, only about an hour ago. He had even slept with him quite a number of times. Strangely, never before he had felt such pure bliss at seeing him. At a later date, he would have been unable to explain – or maybe even remember – the feeling that welled up within him just then. For those moments, nothing mattered at all but Kyouya. He knew that he could live without breathing if only he had Kyouya.
"What are you doing here?"
And suddenly the world had flashed back with all its intensity. He felt someone push past him, cursing. The traffic, the sounds from the station, the loud chattering…
"I love you."
Kyouya, who had been typing something in his phone, looked up, startled.
"You…"
"I love you," repeated Yousuke. He had to say it. He had to have this man. Before he had known him, he was a different person. But knowing Kyouya had changed him in ways that he could never be himself without him. He could not exist without him. "I want you to be mine – and no one else's – ever!"
"Are you drunk?"
Kyouya's voice came out unnaturally high.
"What? That's your boyfriend?"
For the first time, Yousuke realized that Kyouya wasn't alone. There was a guy next to him. He had never seen him before and was quite sure that he never wanted to see him again.
"Yes, I am," said Yousuke, angrily. "He is mine and if you lay…"
"Oh, chill it!" said the stranger, rolling his eyes. "Don't involve me in your lover's fight! I hate that more than anything else." He glanced wistfully at Kyouya. "And you were such a good catch…"
"Leave us alone!" yelled Yousuke, grabbing Kyouya in a one-armed embrace and pulling him close.
"And just what the hell was that?"
Yousuke sighed, putting his other arm around Kyouya's waist and resting his head on his shoulder. "I can't live without you. You're mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!"
Kyouya blushed as passers-by threw them questioning glances. Yousuke was blissfully unaware of everything but Kyouya. The latter wished he could borrow some of his insensitivity. But it seemed that it was not to be so. And this situation was making him too uncomfortable. For one, he didn't like been whistled at by men… of dubious gender.
"Let me go!" he hissed, his cheeks reddening. "We can talk this over at my place!"
"You're inviting me, Kyouya-san?" murmured Yousuke huskily.
It was Kyouya's turn to go weak in his knees. Sometimes, just sometimes, he couldn't blame the women for drooling over Yousuke. His Yousuke… would that be his Yousuke, soon?
"Unless you don't let go of me right now. Idiot!"
He elbowed Yousuke and drew away from him. Shit! He was getting hard and it was all this man's fault.
But soon, he thought, as he looked at Yousuke's excited face with its mischievous grin, he would be relieved of this sweet pain and be enveloped in utopian bliss. Which was, again, not a very helpful thought.
"Thank Buddha for overcoats," he murmured as Yousuke caught his hand for a moment before falling back in step with him.
Even though their bodies barely touched as they walked together, there was no mistaking their relationship. They were enviably in a pretty world of their own - moving forward confidently towards an uncertain future. But they knew, without putting it in beautiful words, that being together was the only thing they needed to be strong. In a world which would speak to them in dialects of derision, trouble and hatred, even the silence of their love would drown it all.
Author's Notes – Spoiler Alert!
This one-shot was inspired by Chapter 3 of the first Volume of the incredibly lovely manga, Haru wo Daite Ita. In this chapter, Sawa invites over Iwaki and Katou to get the right mindset for his novel, Flesh Flute. In Sawa-san's own words, "The story is about four homosexual young men who don't have fixed partners." And so, the writer wanted to try 'group sex'.
Later on, when Katou is reading the book, a few lines from the books go thus:
"I… see…" Yousuke murmured, some part of him making others want to pity him. It sounded as if he had resigned himself to the fact that he had become serious with his feelings without realizing it. As he turned a casual eye towards the entrance, he found that the sun was still high up in the sky, and there was Kyouya, standing absent-mindedly by the front door. The sight of Kyouya cheered up Yousuke, for although Kyouya says that he dislikes Yousuke, he hadn't gone home quickly but waited for him.
So, Yousuke would be Katou and Iwaki is Kyouya in Nagisa's Fresh Flute.
Revised Saturday, 26 January 2008: I hope the grammar is a bit better than the earlier version.