This is the edited and revised version of a one-shot that sort of attacked me in the middle of
everything else, and so I gave up and figured, you know, maybe if I
humor the muse and do this one thing, Tekka will help me get back to
Working Toward with more focus.
More the fool I. Tekka wouldn't even let me work on this with
focus--it's actually turned out to be about something completely
different than it was originally going to be.
CREDITS: The idea for this fic was spawned when I read someone else's fic.
Therefore, I have to give that person CREDIT. So--the person was
Chaleur, and the fic was "Aurorae," which can be read at
fanfiction.net (this link might even work:
http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=512057). Furthermore, this fic is archived here *with* her permission. ^_^
NOTES: I'm working on the assumption that this is neither the first nor the last winter break of Mitsuru and Shinobu's high school career, but this might not jibe with the timeline. I say "might not" because the timeline doesn't jibe with itself, so it's a tough call. Yukie Nasu has freely admitted several times that in the course of the Greenwood manga, she accidentally or intentionally had some or all of the characters repeat years and that Shinobu and Mitsuru's high school careers in particular make very little sense as a consequence. So I'm just going to say that since the crew is in high school for four or five years in the cannon, it can work that way in fanfic, too. ^_^; Also: "Aniki" is a Japanese word referring to one's older brother, and it's used as a form of address. English doesn't really have anything like it, so I left it.
COPIOUS THANKS: To Imo-girl, for making this fic better, and for just general brilliance (she doesn't believe me about the brilliance, but that doesn't mean anything). ^_~
WARNINGS: None of the standard ones are necessary.
DISCLAIMERS: All of the standard ones are necessary. ^_^
Things That Have to be Done Every Year
[Wednesday, 23 December]
Mitsuru lay on a futon in the little room his parents cleared out for guests. There was normally no reason for him to be there. In fact, it didn't really make much sense that he was there, since he was used to sleeping in the same room as Sho, separated only by a screen acquired sometime in junior high. That had always been their room, even after he went away to high school. Every winter vacation he slept in that same room, and every winter he avoided or vetoed Sho's suggestion that they take the screen down.
Perhaps they weren't edgy junior high kids anymore, but Mitsuru still wasn't prepared for the amount of closeness that would entail. The integration with his family; the intimacy of it.
Saying "I am one of you."
He wasn't prepared for that.
So the screen had always stayed up.
Except that this particular school break, circumstances were a little different. This time, he'd brought Shinobu home with him.
And his mother had said that Shinobu couldn't very well be expected to sleep in a guest room by himself all the way across the temple, and since they were roommates anyway, if Mitsuru joined him that would make it seem more familiar. More like Shinobu belonged.
His mother was concerned about things like that. People feeling like they could call her "Mom" and be comfortable about it. So while Mitsuru didn't really understand the logic of her explanation, he knew she always had her reasons. Besides, for all it was a strange situation, it was somehow a relief, too. He didn't protest when his futon was moved into the guest room and spread out next to Shinobu's. He also didn't tell his mother that she needn't have worried: Shinobu could very well be expected to do almost anything, and he did almost everything very well.
He just thought, briefly, about the irony. So that Shinobu could feel included in the family, Mitsuru was relegated to the guest room. It seemed appropriate.
Even more so now, as he stared at the ceiling and discovered that it didn't matter where he lay in his (adoptive) parents' home: he still couldn't sleep.
Mitsuru turned to look at his friend, bundled up next to him, futons so close in the small space that the edges were just touching. He wasn't particularly surprised to see Shinobu gazing calmly back at him, pupils wide in the dark. "It's five minutes past three o'clock in the morning," Shinobu said. He seemed superbly unconcerned by the fact that there was no clock, or even watch, visible anywhere. "If you don't get your beauty sleep, your face will be a horrible sight in the morning."
"And if you don't get yours, you'll be even more intolerably snide than usual," Mitsuru replied. "Why don't you sleep, then?"
He knew the answer, of course. Shinobu was awake because Mitsuru had turned to look. This wasn't exactly compassion, Mitsuru knew, but more like the psychological equivalent of not exposing your back to someone. It was a reflex of Shinobu's. Also, Shinobu was perverse. He would probably fall asleep the exact second Mitsuru began to want him awake. (The ultimate assertion of masculine self-assurance is not, as some think, an inelegant show of physical strength. Rather, it is falling asleep on your opponent with your back to him.)
"Perhaps I've gotten so used to your snoring that I find the silence unsettling."
Mitsuru snorted. The insult was oddly warming, though--it was friendly in a Shinobu sort of way.
There followed a pause not uncompanionable.
And then another pause.
Eventually, Mitsuru sighed. "Oh, all right. I guess I just. . .can't get comfortable."
"You could go back to Sho's room, if you like," said Shinobu, as cool as if he had not just forced his best friend to a confession without even having the kindness to ask for it.
"No, that's not it. I never sleep there either."
"Ah."
"I never sleep anywhere in this building, really."
". . ."
"I usually just take a nap somewhere during the day while I'm here."
"Well, in that case, please continue to not sleep--you can occupy yourself with composing excuses for your unfinished calculus homework. Which you left on your desk back at the dorm, by the way."
"I hate you, you know."
Shinobu merely smirked and turned over.
Mitsuru, feeling somehow as if he had been manipulated, found himself drifting off in the middle of the third excuse.
~~~~~~~~~
[Saturday, 26 December]
"Oh, fuck it."
"Mitsuru, there's no need to keep the rest of us awake simply because you can't get over it."
This was the first time Shinobu had spoken yet that night.
Mitsuru was in no mood to be toyed with. It was their fourth night at home, and he'd been awake on average about 20 hours a day. "And just what," he growled, "are you trying to say to me?"
"Exactly what I said." Shinobu, as always, looked mildly bored with the conversation.
"Oh? And what, exactly, is it you want me to 'get over'?"
One perfect eyebrow raised a fraction of an inch at this. "You can get over it, or not, as you choose. *I* don't care one way or the other. It has nothing to do with me. However. If you decide to continue this, do it quietly, so that I can get some sleep."
It's impossible, Mitsuru thought, to argue with someone who's honestly telling the truth when he says stuff like that. And he's still speaking only in pronouns. Goddamned cryptic bastard. "Shinobu. . . ."
His roommate seemed to soften a little. "You know, Mitsuru, why you can't sleep."
And then Shinobu indicated with a turn of his head that the conversation was over for the night.
~~~~~~~~~~
[Monday, 4 January]
Mitsuru stared at the ceiling. It had exactly seven and a half cracks in it. Seven and a half, because the seventh sort of branched, and it was unclear whether to count the branch as part of the whole or a crack in its own right.
He found himself thinking that tomorrow he should get a little plaster and work on them; a few of those cracks looked as if they could become serious. Just because he didn't want to inherit the temple didn't mean he wanted it to go falling into rack and ruin.
The temple. . .it had to have been sometime in junior high that he'd last had a decent night's rest here. It had started out as restlessness, and gotten steadily worse, until (around the time of the high school entrance exams) it became full-blown insomnia. Shinobu had said that Mitsuru already knew the reason he couldn't sleep. And if his friend had said so, it was probably true. Which meant Mitsuru should probably try to figure it out, so that his conscience wouldn't plague him about it for the rest of his life. Smug all-knowing bastard, he thought, meaning Shinobu.
"I suppose that's true."
"Gah!" Mitsuru startled so violently that for a moment he was tangled in the coverlet. "Quit reading my mind like that!"
"Who's accusing me of mind reading? Could it be the idiot lying next to me who blurts out everything on his mind without realizing he's talking?" Shinobu replied.
"But, but--" Mitsuru spluttered for a while before he realized that the other boy hadn't actually denied anything. Which meant that Mitsuru was probably right. Which meant that, for whatever reason, Shinobu was taking an interest in the matter.
Not that there was any point in trying to get Shinobu to admit it.
"All right, fine." He settled for attacking the problem that he'd been occupying himself with all night in lieu of sleep. "Do you really think I know what's going on?" He didn't bother trying to clarify his reference; Shinobu would know. Shinobu always knew.
There was some comfort in that. Smug all-knowing bastard or no.
His friend sighed softly. And then the body in the futon next to his turned itself over to face him, and a calm, familiar voice told him he was an idiot.
At least, that was what Mitsuru had fully expected to hear--instead, the voice said, "Yes. I really do." And equally familiar eyes regarded him with something akin to sympathy. "And eventually you'll figure it out."
The voice sounded as it always had, but the eyes were kind. "I'm cold," said Mitsuru, and slid over to the edge of his futon, curling closer to his roommate's warmth. He allowed his head to gravitate to Shinobu's shoulder, which Shinobu bore with an expression of martyrdom on his face. They reclined in silence. Eventually, his roommate closed his eyes and was still.
Mitsuru lay there into the first pale rays of morning sunshine, thinking.
~~~~~~~~~~~
[Wednesday, 6 January]
The last morning of their break dawned chilly bordering on cold. For what might've been the first time in their acquaintance, Mitsuru was up and getting dressed before his roommate, watching little puffs of air rise from his mouth as he breathed. They were just barely visible. As he pulled on his sweatshirt he debated the pros and cons of waking Shinobu up, just for the pleasure of being the one to do it.
"Someone's mislaid his laziness this morning," Shinobu said without opening his eyes.
Mitsuru was both too cheerful this morning and too used to Shinobu doing this kind of thing to be disappointed at the lost opportunity. "I've figured it out," he said.
"Oh, have you? My congratulations."
The congratulations doubtless would've been more effective if there had been any inflection in Shinobu's voice as he replied. Nevertheless, Mitsuru grinned. "Yes, and you're just bitter because you had to get up early just to foil my evil plan."
"You mean the one to wake me up by tickling me? 'Plan' would hardly be the word."
"Fine words from the defeated party."
"Defeated party? I was of the understanding that it was your 'plan' which got foiled."
"Yeah, well, I figure going up against you, anything that gets you the least bit put out counts as a win. And I did make you wake up--you just did it as a pre-emptive measure instead of in response to actual tickling."
"And you're even stringing together sentences, too--can this be the same Mitsuru I usually greet in the morning?"
"Bastard," Mitsuru said fondly.
Shinobu smiled, finally opening his eyes to look at his friend. "You're welcome," he replied.
After he closed the door behind him, he padded across to the kitchen. His mother greeted him there with a broad smile and a cup of coffee. "Mitsuru! Good to see you up so early! It's a great morning." As usual, she either already suspected or was supremely unconcerned with the reasons for his unusual behavior. Anyone would tell me I'm lucky, Mitsuru told himself, vaguely chastising. Why does she put up with me? How can she still love me so much?
"It's a freezing morning, more like," was all he said aloud.
"Well, the coffee's hot! And I'm cutting up some cucumber, and there's eggs in the bowl on the table. Would you like some toast?" She slapped him heartily on the back and then resumed bustling around the kitchen, making breakfast for everyone and lunch boxes for him and Shinobu to take back with them. "You can bring some to Sho when it's ready. He still eats it with milk, like a kid." Her voice was fond.
Mitsuru found an almost out-of-practice smile creep up on his lips.
"Actually, I think maybe I'll bring Sho to the toast."
His mother just winked at him as he padded over to Sho's--his and Sho's room.
~~~~~~~~~~~
"Sho? . . .time to wake up, Sho."
"Nnnnn."
Having, he felt, completed the obligatory verbal attempt, Mitsuru decided he could pounce in good conscience. Masato Ikeda woke up soon after, choking. "Stop. . .ti-tickling. . .me!"
Mitsuru's grin merely got more devilish. "Time to wake up, Sho-kun."
Caught between laughter and a stomachache, it took several minutes and sporadic cries of "Mercy. . .! Aniki! Mercy!" for Sho to really digest his presence properly, and get in a look at the clock. It also took an elbow to a certain tickler's ribcage.
For just a split second, though, before Sho had really wakened, when he'd been still a child. . . . There'd been a look in his eyes as he'd recognized Mitsuru, here, tickling him awake. Astonished. Raw, bleeding, naked.
Pleased.
It was probably worth the bruise, Mitsuru reflected, even if it did hurt more. He absently rubbed his side, and winced.
"YOU IDIOT!"
Right, so he'd seen the clock, then. "Sho--"
"*Mitsuru*! It's only six a.m.! We don't have to be up for another hour and a half! What are you *doing*?!"
"Well, it was important."
Softer: ". . .what are you doing here?" A wary voice. As if Sho didn't quite want to trust his luck.
"I think I've finally figured it out. You know, this sleeping thing."
"This. . .what?"
"Sho, I think it's about time we took down that screen."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I know this fic was a bit impenetrable to some people in its first incarnation (I take full responsibility), and hopefully this edited version fixed it--but if not, the title is in a sense the key to the whole thing. Think back to when Mitsuru and Hasukawa visit the temple in the OAVs.
Anyway. Email comments and criticisms--harsh ones are fine--to cutter_tekka@hotmail.com . Support Tekka's starving ego!
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