Blood and love without the rhetoric.

The title of this work is taken from the 31 Days theme for May 26, 2007.

After ten years, Sawada Tsunayoshi has come to realize that he defines Hibari Kyouya's presence in his life by the older man's absence: that ghost of something just at his shoulder, the cooling hollow of what used to be a body beside him in the morning, those sporadic reports penned down in a strict, violent hand. Of course, that is not to say that Hibari is never there – only that Hibari is the one who decides upon the when and the where, even if it is Tsuna who is the leader between them. A Guardian, this time, calling the shots. The only one with the right to do so.

Tsuna, then, learns to value moments much like this one, moments where Hibari's not the invisible one floating somewhere beyond his peripheral vision but the living specter haunting his room in black Armani and violet silk – a creature with feral eyes and human hands. Every day presents a new lesson, and these ones teach him the art of folding: how to respond to a demanding kiss; how to yield to bruises, bites and the flick of another's tongue on his skin.

They don't fuck; they fight. Breaking things is Hibari's singular way of being intimate, and Tsuna would not have his Cloud Guardian any other way.