A/N: I'm sorry that this isn't a Daijoubu update but I have had this thought rattling around in my head for awhile and then had to wrestle with it to get it on paper. Writing has been an argument with my brain lately. There might be more for this idea later on in other one shots, no clue but this is what I've got so far. Before we get underway I would like to put a potential TRIGGER WARNING on this for depression, suicidal thoughts/idealization, that sort of thing. I know that's par for the course in Evangelion but this work and any works that may be later tied to it are intended to be playing around in that field a lot. I just wanted to give that a proper warning.

Disclaimer: I do not own Neon Genesis Evangelion.
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Shinji is fairly young the first time he sees Death. In truth, he can't remember much about it at all. It was his mother's funeral, he knew that. He had been in a room full of people; upset and confused. And somewhere, standing a little ways away from the rest of the mourners, was a boy with pale skin, snowy white hair, and eyes as red as fresh blood.

Shinji didn't know who and what he was looking at then. Only that it had been easier to stare at the boy with the oddly soothing glow than accept that Yui Ikari was well and truly gone.

The strange boy is the clearest part of Shinji's memory and the only comfort he had in the days that follow. His father leaves. Shinji is left in the care of a stranger and finds himself utterly alone. At first, Shinji misses his father, but over time the feeling sours. All of his feelings seem to sour until it is simply easier not to have them at all if he can help it.

In the following years Shinji tries to go through his life as quietly as possible. He is an average student, he keeps to himself, and tries to fill up the nothing inside of himself with his SDAT player.

In idle moments, of which there are many, Shinji thinks about dying. Sometimes he thinks of things as sudden and violent as throwing himself in front of the morning subway or maybe off of the school roof. Other times it is the contemplation of dying for another person; that he could finally just give up and still have people think well of him. Others still are things like contracting a fatal illness or simply dying in his sleep. The idea doesn't make him happy, exactly. More like it provides a strange comfort that it will all end eventually. The thought of death is a relief.

Shinji never acts on any of this, waiting for an uninterested fate to do for him what he does not do for himself.

When he begins high school, Shinji moves into a small apartment by himself. He is no more alone than he was before and there's a sterile sort of peace to having a place that is truly his. His father sends him money every month and Shinji hates it but uses it anyway.

He falls into a mindless routine in an unlived life and the days continue to pass.

Shinji isn't sure what sets the day apart from other days but he has shaken off the people he knows at school to walk home by himself again. The walk to the subway is one he knows well so he isn't deeply aware of every moment. Somewhere by a bridge he crosses he hears a steady buzz of sound that goes against the music in his earphones. When he takes them out he realizes the sound is someone humming. The first thing Shinji notes is the song being Fugue 2. the second is the pale boy sitting on the bridges railing and watching the traffic below.

Shinji can't help but be startled still, his limbs settling into like he's suddenly a photograph and not a person. He knows this boy. The same one who had been at his mother's funeral. One that he had daydreamed seeing out of the corner of his eye so many times. It's surreal and hyper real all at once. He looks like he is Shinj's age. dressed in an orange shirt and blue jeans, and looking just the same as always.

Shinji feels like he's intruding but cannot bear to walk away. There is something powerful here and he does not want it to vanish. The brunet swallows against his dry throat. "Um... pardon me."

The pale boy turns to look at Shinji with something akin to surprise. His red eyes glance around and then focus again on Shinji. "Yes? How can I help you?" And then he does the strangest thing. He smiles, as if Shinji talking to him is something to be happy about.

The thought makes Shinji flush. "Did you know my mother? I mean, I saw you there. At her funeral." Internally, he cringes. No one starts a conversation that way but somehow speaking to the other teen came so easily that his thought just pops out.

Soft red eyes regard him and the easy smile stays in place. "I suppose I did in a way. I know you too, Ikari Shinji."

Those words should have frightened Shinji but somehow he is still at ease. "Who are you?" He asks instead.

"I am Kaworu. Nagisa Kaworu." The teen replies, "but I suppose humans recognize me better as an angel of death."

That should have been it. That should have been the moment where Shinji decides the boy is crazy, made some excuse, and gotten as far away as quickly as possible. But it isn't. Maybe it's the spring warmth of the day, maybe it's the way Kaworu is smiling or the song he had been humming, but Shini walks over to rest his hands on the railing. His eyes stay on Kaworu though and maybe it is Shinji himself who is the strange one.

"It's nice to meet you, Nagisa." Shinji says, as if the angel was just like any other person. He isn't though, Shinji does not think he would ever have started talking to anyone else like this under these circumstances. Rather, it must be something uniquely Kaworu that eases the words, the being, out of him.

The pale teen blinks. looking both surprised again and confused. Then the smile comes back, "just Kaworu is fine, Ikari."

"Shinji is fine, too."

Kaworu's red eyes look at him in a way that might be fond.

Shinji's insides warm and he takes a glance at the traffic Kaworu had been watching before. "What were you doing out here?" He asks with a genuine curiosity.

Kaworu kicks his legs back and forth. "People-watching is a hobby of mine." A faint breeze ruffles his hair, brushing the strands against his cheeks.

"O-oh." Shinji's blue eyes went to flick over the cars again. "Are they really that interesting?" He asks, still curious. From what he can see they were just a blur of colors in a rushed, badly ordered rainbow going by to where ever in a hurry. There weren't really any people to watch, hidden away in their vehicles like children's toy cars.

"I think so." Kaworu replies, "I wonder where it is they're going to. What they think about and who they'll talk to. Just watching them so caught up in living without pause or hesitation. There is something fascinating and wonderful about it, but also isolated and melancholy. How they so seldom seem to reach out." There is something to the angel's voice as he speaks, wondering and wistful.

Shinji's eyes are now firmly on the traffic below as he listens to Kaworu speak. The colors drift past, almost blurring into each other as they speed along. It is hypnotic, like a call pulling out the thoughts he usually keeps hidden. "It's all so pointless, though." He finds himself saying. "People are short-sighted, loud, and cruel. And after all the struggling against everything going wrong, they die anyway. Sometimes I think it would be better to..." He doesn't finish his sentence, he doesn't have to. Kaworu understands, that is the feeling that Shinji had.

The silence doesn't hang unaddressed for long. Gently, Kaworu lays his hand on top of one of Shinji's. It should be unpleasant, unwanted, but Shinji finds the contact comforting. Kaworu is warm; he feels alive, not cold and dead. "There are philosophers that life is pain and that Mankind cannot interact without causing hard to others. But I don't think that it's the entire truth. Humans are lonely so they strive to communicate in many different ways. Through their arts, through their books, and..."

Shinji turns his head back to Kaworu, surprised to see the angel staring right at him. "And?" Shinji prompts softly, wanting to know but not wanting to disrupt this pleasant strangeness that lies between them.

"Though body language." Kaworu finishes, loosely curling his elegant fingers around Shinji's hand. His red eyes look at Shinji intently, like he was the only thing the angel could see. "I find all of it beautiful." It doesn't feel like they are talking about art anymore.

"Huh?" Shinji asks helplessly. He feels warmer, inside all the way through. Like Kaworu's words are reaching in and chasing away the empty coldness.

"You're beautiful." Kaworu says, "and yet so lonely. I wonder if that's why you can see me? Because you have been broken and left longing for death."

Shinji wants to refute the first part of the statement. An angel calling him beautiful? But Kaworu has said something he wants to pursue. "Other people can't see you?"

"Not unless I've come in their final moments." Kaworu begins to smile again. "You are a very fascinating individual, Shinji."

Shinji blushes, "I'm not really, though." He continues before Kaworu can say anything to it. "Isn't it lonely?"

"It can be, yes." The way those red eyes look at him so kindly as the wind plays with his hair, it is cleat to see that Kaworu is the beautiful one.

The brunet swallows, an idea striking him that makes nervousness and something like hope fizz in his chest. "Would you like to come to my apartment? I've lived alone since high school so it wouldn't be weird. And I could make tea." He hopes he won't push Kaworu away with this but he wants to stay with him.

Kaworu gives him that look again, was all of this really so surprising? Well, given what the silver-haired angel has said this whole conversation is an entirely new situation. "I'd like that very much Shinji." His grip on Shinji's hand becomes more certain as he gets off of the railing and back onto the bridge.

Like the rest of the day so far, tea with Death feels more natural than it probably should. But then again, Kaworu is an angel of death, Shinji reminds himself. He is far too beautiful to simply be 'just death'.

Somehow they have ended up sitting on Shinji's living room floor, mugs of tea in hand, instead of at the table. Sunlight from the glass balcony door pours in, making the angel almost glow.

Kaworu cradles the mug in his pale hands, sipping it slowly. After a long moment the mug comes back from his lips and he smiles softly. "It's nice. The way the heat soaks in wherever it touches is very comforting." He looks Shinji straight in the eyes. "Thank you."

For his part, Shinji starts blushing again. "It's the least I could do after asking you over so suddenly." He pauses to take his own drink, the steam wafting up from the tea nothing compared to the heat already on his cheeks. "And besides, I've never done this before. So..." He trails off, unsure of what he wants to say. All he really knows is that he wants to keep talking to Kaworu.

The sight of the silver haired in Shinji's dull little apartment, that is the center of his insignificant life, is somehow natural. It makes the space inviting and beautiful, as if all of Kaworu is spread out to whatever he touches. The sound of him speaking only magnifies the feeling. "I've never been asked over before but I think the way you so it must be the best way."

Shinji blinks, both perplexed and deeply flattered. "Why?"

"Because it makes me happy."

Shinji is sure his face must be the color of Kaworu's eyes but he finds himself smiling at it. "Earlier, you were humming. Do you like music?" He asks, attention focused on his guest.

"Music is the deepest and sincerest form of human expression." Kaworu replies, gaze full of affection. "I'm very fond of it."

Shinji shifts as he sat to pull out his SDAT player. "I don't have a stereo, but would you like to listen to some with me?"

Kaworu moves over to sit next to him. "I would love to."

Shinji doesn't normally share his music tastes, he doesn't want to be criticized by anyone saying it was bad. But he feels confident in sharing pieces of himself with Kaworu. Like he knows that Kaworu will find something to like in them. It's a sweet, peaceful, certain feeling.

Losing track of their shared time is easy, even as Shinji watches the last rays of the sunset fading from Kaworu's eyes. He still looks just as ethereal in the dark.

"It's gotten late." Shinji says softly, even noting this he doesn't move to turn on a light. He doesn't want to. It is too good like this. Kaworu's warmth right beside him and good music filling the calm quiet. Blue eyes look to their hands, Kaworu's is resting comfortably on top of his own. It's nice.

"I suppose it has." Kaworu says pensively. He takes in a breath and begins to stand up.

A flash of something that is not quite panic, but just as sharp, goes through Shinji. He reaches out without a second thought and grabs the other boy's slender wrist. "Wait."

Kaworu stops in his motions and looks at Shinji. There is confusion in his eyes, an innocent lack of understanding, but no judgments. He doesn't speak and waits for Shinji to finish his thought.

Heat fills Shinji's cheeks again like it never left but he doesn't let go of Kaworu's wrist. He is struck by the realness of the moment; the stillness of the air around them, the soft warmth of Kaworu beneath his fingers, and the tight insistent feeling that Shinji does not want him to leave. "Do you want to stay? You don't have to go, I'd be happy to have you here." Shinji can feel his pulse pounding thick in his veins, his lips are buzzing from the words he's just said, and a fluttery feeling he dares not call 'hope' dances nervously in his chest.

Kaworu's confusion shifts to wonder and for a long second he just stands staring. Then a slow smile pulls at his lips. "You keep saying the most surprising and wonderful things." He says in a voice that held a mix of awe and adoration. Then the angel sits down again much closer than before, the length of his side pressing lightly to Shinji's.

The brunet is smiling back, unable to help himself from it. He's simultaneously light and floaty like champagne bubbles while being the calmest he has felt in what seems like ages.

They are holding hands again and it's a strange, gentle kind of perfect.