for blue skies
A/N: Listening to dramatic music puts me in a dramatic mood, so here we are. Wrote this faster than usual, and thus may suck more than usual. Lol sorry. Have fun, I think.
There has to be a name for this.
He never looks for her. Only lets himself see her when she deems herself fit to be seen.
He never says anything she doesn't need to hear. He calls her ugly and she buries her fist in his stomach, sending him flying. This is all the conversation they need.
If he feels something whenever his hand accidentally brushes against hers, he considers it an unnecessary addition to their dynamic. And he has no time for the unnecessary.
Over the passing years, he finds himself changing his insults. Cow. Pig. Pigs and cows are still useful to the society, yes? Seaweed pubes. You do not know what a maiden's pubes look like, idiot sadist!
But he can't call her ugly without feeling ridiculous now, not when he is constantly dreaming about red hair between his fingers. There is violence in the way he wants her. During one of their fights, she bleeds everywhere and he imagines raking his nails down her back hard enough to draw blood, then licking all of it off her.
His subordinates bear the brunt of his frustration. There is violence in the way he hates himself for wanting her.
He gets better at controlling himself. He tries to ruin her day whenever he gets the chance, takes her on if she's pissed enough, and now he can even touch her bare skin without flinching. As if she can hurt him. As if he will let her. He is the one who does the hurting. That's just the way it works.
You didn't show up yesterday, China. You finally admit you're too much of a chickenshit to fight me?
Her expression is haughty. I was on a date, chihuahua. Not everything is about you, yes?
She is like a kick in the gut. Huh. Is he blind, dumb, desperate, or all of the above?
She swings her umbrella towards him, he draws his katana, and for a while, everything is as it should be.
Nothing is as it should be.
The guy is like something from a fucking soap opera. He fulfills every romantic cliché ever made and she's ridiculously happy about it.
She has someone else to complete her day.
He doesn't need her to complete his. He has his blade, a superior to assassinate, enemies to cut down. Just the basics. But the basics will do.
Anyway, this is the way out he has been looking for. He can pin her down and hit her without fantasizing about pinning her down somewhere else and hitting her in an entirely different way.
Sometimes the guy watches. The guy is turned on by how badass she is, he knows. He knows. The guy is friendly and tells him he thinks the Shinsengumi are so cool and is he the Captain of the 1st Division, that prodigy?
She gives said prodigy a look imploring him to hold back whatever jackassness usually leaves his mouth.
Yes, is all he says, because it is the only insult-free sentence he is capable of. He tells them he has to go back to work because the guy is slinging his arm around her shoulders like she's his, which she is, but does he have to stand there and watch?
(The guy has a name. She told him. But he doesn't care. He doesn't care.)
Sometimes he sees the guy while he's patrolling. The guy greets him like they're old friends. The guy tells him he likes spicy food, too.
(She talks about him? To that guy?)
The guy is a year older than her. Is the kind all the girls want. Is apparently smart and responsible and shit. The guy runs a shop he inherited. The guy's shop is relatively successful. The guy has likes and dislikes and hobbies and interests and fetishes and guilty pleasures and hopes and dreams and fears and failures and successes. Has family, friends, enemies, rivals. The guy is a real person.
(He doesn't care.)
The guy walks her home. Holds her hand. Buys her sukonbu. Watches her eat sukonbu with that look in his eyes. Obviously wants her. Kisses her like he understands what her mouth means. Probably kisses her somewhere else.
The guy knows how beautiful she is.
(But he doesn't care.)
(He doesn't care.)
(And he doesn't think she's beautiful, really.)
People are asking him out of nowhere if he's okay.
He thinks it's unnecessary. He is okay. He is so okay he could kill a certain someone, tie him to the rear of a patrol car, and drive around the city dragging the corpse across every street he has walked with her just to show everyone how okay he is.
If he were to be honest with himself, he expects—wants them not to last. Surely, the guy will get tired of her. Will realize how much of an idiot she is and how much damage she can cause to him and his wallet. Surely she will get bored. This is just her experimenting. Just seeing what it's like to date someone.
And he will get rid of this feeling.
But weeks, months, years pass and the guy still looks at her like every star shines out of her ass, she still spends more time with the guy than with him, and he still stays close to her like the moron that he is because he is her friend and her rival and hers and she doesn't even fucking know that last one.
I do not get to see your stupid dogface as frequently as I used to, yes?
What's this, China? You miss me?
She scowls. It is simply annoying, yes? Do not assume idiotic things!
He sighs. I suppose I can sacrifice a small part of my valuable time to beat you up more often.
Her hand wraps around the handle of her parasol, he slides his katana out of its sheathe, and for a while, everything is as it should be.
After another tough draw, they both lie on the grass beside each other, panting. He turns slowly to look at her. He wants to say something but he doesn't know what that is.
Sadist?
What?
She reaches out, pokes him in the cheek, and just stares at him like she's looking for something. He doesn't know if she finds it, but she smiles a little. Nothing. You just look as disgusting as ever, yes?
There is a name for people who yearn the way he does.
Selfless, Kondo-san says.
Idiot, Hijikata-san suggests.
Die, Hijikata-san.
The guy goes to him, before anyone else, and tells him he is planning to ask her to marry him.
She is not there to hold his jackassness back.
I don't give a shit which idiot condemns himself to an eternity with that pig.
The guy is shocked. The guy just wants to know what her 'precious friend' thinks. If he approves. If he will let him make her happy. If he will let him take care of her for the rest of their lives. And perhaps some advice regarding asking her families for her hand?
Yeah, whatever. Both of her families are insane and you're likely to get killed. Might be better to elope. But they'll find you anyway and you'll be dead twice before you even get to fuck her.
The guy doesn't know how to reply to that. He looks stricken.
He grins. But I'm sure you'll be fine.
He leaves because even he has limits.
It's getting pretty hard to breathe. He's probably sick or something.
(She's probably going to say yes.)
It dawns on him slowly: she's going to get married.
She's going to get married and he doesn't know what to do.
Kondo-san slams his fist on the table. Isn't it obvious? Stop her! Fight for your happiness! Convince her that you are the one! That is the way of men!
Hijikata-san just looks far, far away, and then at him. He shakes his head. Idiot.
You're useless, Hijikata-san.
But he is also right.
Stop her already if you want to, Hijikata-san tells him later when he sees him lingering at the doorway.
Like I'd do anything you tell me to, Hijibaka.
He has done nothing the entire time. Why should he now?
He'll just have to watch, just like everyone else. He has survived so far. Changing things is just troublesome and unnecessary, and he has no time for the unnecessary.
The sky is gray and falling. He is lying down in the middle of his living room floor, alone but for the sounds of the rain.
He thinks about how he will react when she breaks the news to him. Express disbelief, of course, that someone is willing to marry a hideous little pig like her. And when she invites him to the wedding, he will have to sound bored and uninterested and be a general tsundere about attending. Then he will attend. He will watch.
He will watch.
Fuck, he says to the ceiling.
The ceiling says nothing.
He turns to his front and bangs his head against the floor. What the hell is he doing?
He listens to the rain tap-tap-tapping on his roof and trickling down gutters and pipes. He hears his own loud and heavy breathing as if he is sitting somewhere inside his own body.
He feels vaguely pathetic, but he's not in the mood to care. Besides, there is no one to see him like this.
A series of knocks on his door makes him lift his head for a moment, then lower it back down. He rolls lazily toward the door, still unwilling to get up.
More insistent knocking. Then an extremely familiar voice: Sadist?
The way she speaks has him standing in an instant. He crosses the room in a few strides and slams his own door open.
She clearly doesn't have her umbrella. She is soaked from head to toe, clothes clinging to her shape, long hair dripping. But all this does not distract him from the fact that she's crying.
China, is all he manages to say. He jerks his head, inviting her in.
She enters hesitantly, her usually proud frame hunched over as she hugs herself. It twists something inside him, but he keeps his expression neutral as he watches her for a moment, then heads to his own bedroom to take out dry clothes.
His mind is completely blank. He lays his own shirt, a pair of pants, and a towel on his bed.
When he comes back out, she is still standing where he left her, looking lost. His throat feels unbearably tight.
Shower if you want, he tells her. Then change.
Sadist, she says again, and she sobs a little.
The sound reaches into his bones and unravels him. He doesn't know what to do. China, he says. I'm not going anywhere.
For once in her entire life, she does as she is told. He waits for her outside his bedroom, leaning against the wall. He continues listening to the rain while it drones on as if nothing in the world has changed. There is violence in the sky's indifference.
When she comes out, she looks less miserable, but all the more vulnerable. Her hair falls in wet, tousled ribbons around her now-dry face. His shirt, buttoned all the way up to the collar, hangs on her shoulders and almost reaches past her thighs. She has forgone pants and he closes his eyes briefly to steel himself.
She sits beside him, the side of her arm touching his. Too close. Too close. But he doesn't move away.
He can feel her looking at him, but he still doesn't know what kind of expression to make, so he stares ahead.
She speaks first:
He proposed.
He knows. He knows and he doesn't want to hear this.
She tells him anyway.
I said no.
That makes him look at her. Whatever she sees on his face makes her snigger, but only briefly.
He waits for an explanation, but it doesn't come. They just stare at each other as if it is all they know how to do.
Why? he finally asks.
Her gaze roams his face. I don't know.
Is it just him or is she closer than before? Why aren't you with the boss, China girl?
I don't know.
Why are you here?
I don't know.
What the hell, China? You inventing a new brand of idiocy or something?
She's the one who ends up kissing him, but he kisses her back because he already has about a dozen patents on new kinds of idiocy.
He gets quickly addicted to the warmth of her mouth, the texture of her tongue. The little sound she makes with her lip between his teeth. The softness of the back of her neck beneath his fingers. His free hand runs feather-light down her hipbone, her thigh, and she is pulling him down with her as she lies on her back. Her hand fists around the front of his shirt, the other tangling itself in his hair. Her legs wrap around his waist. He draws away from her, breathing hard, and traces her jaw with his tongue. She tastes like tears and rain.
He places his palm on the floor beside her head and pushes himself off her.
China.
Her eyes are dark, her cheeks wet. What?
Why are you crying?
She blinks. I don't know, she says, and it's like a faucet being turned. She begins to sob, her small, small hands covering her face, her entire body shaking. Her legs loosen around him.
He rolls off her and lies beside her, their arms not quite touching. Maybe because it finally occurred to you that you just said no to the only dumbass willing to tolerate you. Now you're going to grow into a decrepit old crone, shooting people who disturb your old-lady nap.
Instead of laughing or insulting him back, she cries harder.
For fuck's sake, he mutters, turning to her. He gathers her into his arms and she clings to him. Why did you say no if you're going to act like this?
I do not want to get married, stupid sadist!
Haa? You never shut up about getting married!
No, I do want to get married!
Make up your damn mind already!
...just not to him, yes?
His voice sticks to his throat and he's unable to speak for a while.
Don't 'yes?' me, China. A twisted little piece of shit like you has no right to be picky when it comes to husbands.
I do not want to hear that from someone who is a twisted giant turd!
Whatever. No one else will take you as bride now.
She tilts her head; her hair brushes against his lips. Then what are you doing here with me, sadist?
He pulls her closer. He thinks hard about the answer. He really does. I don't know.
Ha!
But she doesn't press him, and he doesn't say anything else. They lie there in silence as if it is all they know how to do.
Probably exhausted from crying, she falls asleep easily, her body relaxing against his. He, on the other hand, feels more awake than he has in years.
It's not like he loves her. There are other names for this; he just doesn't know what they are. Sometimes he thinks he has found them in the way her bare leg rubs against him, or when she picks her nose like the graceless gorilla that she is, tries to hit him with the results of her excavation, and he dodges and this is what finally makes his entire day.
Nah, he can't possibly love her, he thinks as he breathes her scent in, trying to fall asleep.
#
A/N: Sorry for the vague-ass ending. May or may not turn into a two-shot or something. I like vague-ass endings though. Also, trying to keep Sougo in character takes up more effort than I'd like, especially when I'm being dramatic like this, but I find that writing from Kagura's POV is even harder. So here we are. Do tell me where I went overboard with the drama and if Sougo is OOC.