Author: Swythangel
Email: [email protected]
Title: Phenomenal Noumenal
Type: Series
Teaser: Aya-chan has finally woken up. Will Ran be able to tell his sister about his relationship with Ken?
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Er, that Ran has a sister who was comatose the whole series?
Warnings: AU, yaoi or maybe shonen-ai…
Disclaimer: Weiß Kreuz is theirs, you know who they are so I won't even elaborate on that ^o^
Keywords: Aya, Ran, Ken, RanxKen
Phenomenal Noumenal
Part 6
The bell tinkled as the door was pushed open, signaling the entry of a customer and Ken turned from where he was arranging a bouquet to smile engagingly and offer his traditional greeting.
"Irraishaimas…..se" The greeting never made it fully to his lips as he stared at the two girls in front of him with an expression akin to shock. An expression mirrored by three others in the shop with him.
Standing before them were two girls who could have been twins, two beauties with the same raven tresses and bright happy eyes. One was very familiar, Aya-chan…and the other was also familiar, a face from the past…Sakura.
Ken's heart dropped as a dreadful feeling came over him.
/Not her. Not now. I can't handle this right now./ The freesia stalks crushed into a hand whose grip had turned vise-like.
"Minna, I want to introduce you all to my new found friend, Sakura! Sakura tells me she already knew you guys so I asked her to drop by, renew old acquaintances."
There was a well-meaning inflection in Aya's words and somehow Ken knew that Sakura had told Aya of her once infatuation with Ran.
"Konnichiwa, minna-san." Sakura said, dropping her eyes and blushing when her eyes alighted on the redhead on the cash counter.
"Hey there Sakura-chan! Long time no see." Youji said lazily, grinning at the lithe beauty while he helped Omi set up the window display, staying amazingly clean amidst the ribbons and twigs that littered the spot he was occupying..
Omi just waved, his mouth was holding dozens of baby breath stalks meant to grace the main bouquet on display and he couldn't open his mouth to speak under pain of picking up said stalks from the floor.
Ken dredged up a weak smile. It was all he could manage as shock set in. It tinged his skin pale under the healthy tan and did not escape the notice of his ex-lover's sister who watched his reaction with a penetrating glance.
"H..hi, Sakura-chan."
With that he turned away quickly to immerse himself in his work or at least tried to…because it was preferable to seeing what he knew would happen next…
"Niisan! Aren't you going to greet Sakura?"
***
"I'm not hungry, 'Niisan! I'll just go up and do my homework." Aya said cheerfully as she waved to the three sitting on the dinner table before darting up the stairs. She was in exceptionally high spirits.
The lecture Ran had for Aya on skipping meals died unsaid as his sister darted up too fast for him to stop. He glared at Aya's plate instead.
"Ken-kun's not eating too. He told me he was too tired." Omi said between bites. "Went up to his room almost immediately."
"You must be losing your touch, Ran!" Youji said laughing. "No one wants to eat the dinner you made."
Ran didn't say anything as he picked up both unused plates and put them away. As he did so his thoughts were on the boy upstairs and what he thought about what had happened in the shop.
***
There are more than 10 levels of pain, each one of different intensity. A stabbing prickle, a bone-deep ache, a sharp thrust…Ken was sure there were a lot more. He was constantly finding new ones each day.
/I'm seriously thinking of it as an art form, this discovery of pain and how much one can bear before one actually snaps./ Ken thought to himself as he stared glassy-eyed at the darkness around him, unmindful of the music drifting in.
/Will I snap?/
He seriously doubted it.
/Through hell and high water, I have passed with Weiß. This isn't so much, is it?/
It shouldn't be so much.
/I didn't snap when I supposedly 'killed' Ran in that staged confrontation. I came perilously close to the brink but I didn't snap. If that could not snap me…/
It really shouldn't be.
But it was.
Ken shoved his face into his hands, closing eyes that burned with dryness.
No tears threatened. There weren't any tears left in Ken. They had all gone out of him after the third day. All that was left was numbing pain and emptiness punctuated by relief-giving bouts of small pleasures when Omi or Youji would do something funny or sweet to brighten his day.
The past days transcended Hell itself. Ken had never had to try so hard to smile in his whole life. The simple act of stretching face muscles into an uplifting grin seemed to take more of an effort than it would probably take to lift a forklift.
Who was it that said "It takes only six muscles to smile"? Ken would really like to meet him and beg to differ. It takes more than that…far more.
It was fortunate that Ken was the master at it because although Youji and Omi might suspect that something was brewing, they'd never see it by the way Ken behaved. That much Ran could count on Ken for.
He had been his usual cheerful self, going about the shop and apartments with the same vim and vigor he always did, complete with his usual nosedive trips. If they ever noticed the brittleness of the smile or the almost fanatically chipper mood, no one asked.
No one dared take up the challenge in the velvet brown eyes. A challenge that everything was not as fine as they appeared to be.
/Ken Hidaka! The Great Actor./
But here in the darkness of his room, Ken could let go of everything and simply be.
No smiles, no frowns, no nothing. Just be.
And *being* meant being one big mass of pain.
It was his idea of coping.
Ken's theory was this: If he allowed the pain complete control, maybe, just maybe it would all run out one of these days.
Of course the body's and the mind's remarkable tolerance for pain was legendary in and of itself. It might be a long time before the pain started to ebb.
A long time…
/No! I cannot afford a long time. I cannot wait for too long, not and still sane. I want to go on with my life, not be suspended in this state./
Ken turned over unto his stomach and sighed into his arms, almost in time to the crescendo of the music that his stereo was playing. It wasn't the usual music he put on but his current frame of mind begged for this…Gregorian chanting filled the room.
A blond head stuck itself halfway inside Ken's door with an unreadable expression on his face. "Is this funeral music? Did someone just die?"
Ken glared at Youji and threw a pillow in his direction. "Idiot!" Ken grumbled as he flipped over.
"Seriously," Youji said as he flopped down on the bed beside Ken, "this music gives me the creeps. It's like something you'd only hear in a cemetary or a monastery or something."
"That's because it *is* something you'd hear in a monastery. Its Gregorian chanting, you uncouth boor!" Ken said, pushing Youji off the bed as he glared at the blond.
"Ouch! Like you're any couther?" Youji said grinning up at the out of sorts Ken.
Ken lifted an eyebrow at the grammatical error but didn't say anything against it. "And who said you could go into my room without permission?"
"Used to be that I had a friend who liked having me around and wasn't this grouchy about me trespassing." Youji sighed dramatically as he settled himself back into Ken's bed amidst the brunette's protests.
A grin twitched at the edge of Ken's lips at Youji's melodramatic display. The older assassin never failed to amuse Ken and despite his black mood it seems that Youji could still charm him out of it. "Used to be that *I* had a friend who respected my privacy."
"Well that was when there was something private I could barge into and embarrass myself with." Youji said flippantly then realized his mistake as soon as the words left his lips and Ken's face fell at the unexpected comeback.
"God. I'm sorry Ken." Youji put out an arm on Ken's shoulder. "I didn't mean for that to slip out."
A glassy eyed Ken swiveled to face him with a cheery grin on his face and an overhearty voice. "Nothing to be sorry about, Yotan! Nothing at all."
/Isn't there, Kenken?/ Youji thought to himself as Ken whacked him on the back and mumbled on about something insignificant. /A fool can see through this fiasco./
Youji could see the strain at the corner of Ken's eyes and the almost wild cheerfulness in the bronze depths of his eyes. Each word that fell from Ken's lips was calculated to be cheery and to turn attention away from him. Like he didn't want to discuss the more important issues.
Youji might not be saying anything but he knew the nonverbal signs too well. Could write a treatise on how to appear alright when he wasn't, actually. And Ken was far from alright.
Youji was tired of pretending that everything was alright.
"Ken." He broke into Ken's chatter with a seriousness that made green eyes soft. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"Talk about what? There's nothing to talk about. You know I hear there's an F-1 race on for tonight and Michael Schumacher is going to --"
"Bullshit!" Youji snorted. "Cut the crap. I know you too well Hidaka. When you lock yourself into your room and babble on about nonsensical things I know there must be something wrong."
Ken blinked once at Youji before the cheerfulness dissolved, like wet cement against a raging river, and anger blasted at Youji. "Why don't you just stay the fuck away from my affairs, Youji. Nothing's happened. What if I just like to stay in my room by myself, is there a problem with that?" Ken's chin raised in defiant challenge.
"It would not have been a problem, Ken, if you weren't moping."
"Who's moping?"
"You never play anything like this music Ken. Something must be wrong."
"What's wrong about it?"
"Its too…mournful and not particularly your type of music."
"And what is my music?"
"Rock, jazz, hell I don't know…. Just not anything this mournful."
"Its *Not* mournful. Its chanting."
Youji snorted. A particularly desolate voice rose up from the CD as if to emphasize Youji's point. "See?" Youji said.
Ken glared. "Just shut up, Youji. Nothing is wrong."
"Come on Hidaka! This is me, you're talking to, your friend! I know what's going on with you and Ran."
"Nothing's going on!" /And I mean that in the most literal way possible. There is nothing between me and Ran./
Youji rolled his eyes and sighed, picking himself up from the bed. "When you're ready to talk Ken, I'll be in my room, alright?"
"And when you're ready to stop this nonsense, you can come talk to me."
Youji shook his head at the stubborn brunette sitting on the bed with his chin jutting out with a look of concern. Through the tough façade, Youji could see the redness in brown eyes and the lines under those eyes that showed just how "alright" Ken really was.
"Stubborn." He whispered as he closed the door.
As he turned towards his own door, a voice interrupted him.
"Youji-kun?"
He swung around to find a smiling Aya looking at him with focused intent.
"Why, if it isn't the prettiest member of this household!" He said, putting a flirtatious smile on his face. "What can I do for you, Aya-chan?"
"We need to talk."
TBC ^___~ Comments onegai?
Email: [email protected]
Title: Phenomenal Noumenal
Type: Series
Teaser: Aya-chan has finally woken up. Will Ran be able to tell his sister about his relationship with Ken?
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Er, that Ran has a sister who was comatose the whole series?
Warnings: AU, yaoi or maybe shonen-ai…
Disclaimer: Weiß Kreuz is theirs, you know who they are so I won't even elaborate on that ^o^
Keywords: Aya, Ran, Ken, RanxKen
Phenomenal Noumenal
Part 6
The bell tinkled as the door was pushed open, signaling the entry of a customer and Ken turned from where he was arranging a bouquet to smile engagingly and offer his traditional greeting.
"Irraishaimas…..se" The greeting never made it fully to his lips as he stared at the two girls in front of him with an expression akin to shock. An expression mirrored by three others in the shop with him.
Standing before them were two girls who could have been twins, two beauties with the same raven tresses and bright happy eyes. One was very familiar, Aya-chan…and the other was also familiar, a face from the past…Sakura.
Ken's heart dropped as a dreadful feeling came over him.
/Not her. Not now. I can't handle this right now./ The freesia stalks crushed into a hand whose grip had turned vise-like.
"Minna, I want to introduce you all to my new found friend, Sakura! Sakura tells me she already knew you guys so I asked her to drop by, renew old acquaintances."
There was a well-meaning inflection in Aya's words and somehow Ken knew that Sakura had told Aya of her once infatuation with Ran.
"Konnichiwa, minna-san." Sakura said, dropping her eyes and blushing when her eyes alighted on the redhead on the cash counter.
"Hey there Sakura-chan! Long time no see." Youji said lazily, grinning at the lithe beauty while he helped Omi set up the window display, staying amazingly clean amidst the ribbons and twigs that littered the spot he was occupying..
Omi just waved, his mouth was holding dozens of baby breath stalks meant to grace the main bouquet on display and he couldn't open his mouth to speak under pain of picking up said stalks from the floor.
Ken dredged up a weak smile. It was all he could manage as shock set in. It tinged his skin pale under the healthy tan and did not escape the notice of his ex-lover's sister who watched his reaction with a penetrating glance.
"H..hi, Sakura-chan."
With that he turned away quickly to immerse himself in his work or at least tried to…because it was preferable to seeing what he knew would happen next…
"Niisan! Aren't you going to greet Sakura?"
***
"I'm not hungry, 'Niisan! I'll just go up and do my homework." Aya said cheerfully as she waved to the three sitting on the dinner table before darting up the stairs. She was in exceptionally high spirits.
The lecture Ran had for Aya on skipping meals died unsaid as his sister darted up too fast for him to stop. He glared at Aya's plate instead.
"Ken-kun's not eating too. He told me he was too tired." Omi said between bites. "Went up to his room almost immediately."
"You must be losing your touch, Ran!" Youji said laughing. "No one wants to eat the dinner you made."
Ran didn't say anything as he picked up both unused plates and put them away. As he did so his thoughts were on the boy upstairs and what he thought about what had happened in the shop.
***
There are more than 10 levels of pain, each one of different intensity. A stabbing prickle, a bone-deep ache, a sharp thrust…Ken was sure there were a lot more. He was constantly finding new ones each day.
/I'm seriously thinking of it as an art form, this discovery of pain and how much one can bear before one actually snaps./ Ken thought to himself as he stared glassy-eyed at the darkness around him, unmindful of the music drifting in.
/Will I snap?/
He seriously doubted it.
/Through hell and high water, I have passed with Weiß. This isn't so much, is it?/
It shouldn't be so much.
/I didn't snap when I supposedly 'killed' Ran in that staged confrontation. I came perilously close to the brink but I didn't snap. If that could not snap me…/
It really shouldn't be.
But it was.
Ken shoved his face into his hands, closing eyes that burned with dryness.
No tears threatened. There weren't any tears left in Ken. They had all gone out of him after the third day. All that was left was numbing pain and emptiness punctuated by relief-giving bouts of small pleasures when Omi or Youji would do something funny or sweet to brighten his day.
The past days transcended Hell itself. Ken had never had to try so hard to smile in his whole life. The simple act of stretching face muscles into an uplifting grin seemed to take more of an effort than it would probably take to lift a forklift.
Who was it that said "It takes only six muscles to smile"? Ken would really like to meet him and beg to differ. It takes more than that…far more.
It was fortunate that Ken was the master at it because although Youji and Omi might suspect that something was brewing, they'd never see it by the way Ken behaved. That much Ran could count on Ken for.
He had been his usual cheerful self, going about the shop and apartments with the same vim and vigor he always did, complete with his usual nosedive trips. If they ever noticed the brittleness of the smile or the almost fanatically chipper mood, no one asked.
No one dared take up the challenge in the velvet brown eyes. A challenge that everything was not as fine as they appeared to be.
/Ken Hidaka! The Great Actor./
But here in the darkness of his room, Ken could let go of everything and simply be.
No smiles, no frowns, no nothing. Just be.
And *being* meant being one big mass of pain.
It was his idea of coping.
Ken's theory was this: If he allowed the pain complete control, maybe, just maybe it would all run out one of these days.
Of course the body's and the mind's remarkable tolerance for pain was legendary in and of itself. It might be a long time before the pain started to ebb.
A long time…
/No! I cannot afford a long time. I cannot wait for too long, not and still sane. I want to go on with my life, not be suspended in this state./
Ken turned over unto his stomach and sighed into his arms, almost in time to the crescendo of the music that his stereo was playing. It wasn't the usual music he put on but his current frame of mind begged for this…Gregorian chanting filled the room.
A blond head stuck itself halfway inside Ken's door with an unreadable expression on his face. "Is this funeral music? Did someone just die?"
Ken glared at Youji and threw a pillow in his direction. "Idiot!" Ken grumbled as he flipped over.
"Seriously," Youji said as he flopped down on the bed beside Ken, "this music gives me the creeps. It's like something you'd only hear in a cemetary or a monastery or something."
"That's because it *is* something you'd hear in a monastery. Its Gregorian chanting, you uncouth boor!" Ken said, pushing Youji off the bed as he glared at the blond.
"Ouch! Like you're any couther?" Youji said grinning up at the out of sorts Ken.
Ken lifted an eyebrow at the grammatical error but didn't say anything against it. "And who said you could go into my room without permission?"
"Used to be that I had a friend who liked having me around and wasn't this grouchy about me trespassing." Youji sighed dramatically as he settled himself back into Ken's bed amidst the brunette's protests.
A grin twitched at the edge of Ken's lips at Youji's melodramatic display. The older assassin never failed to amuse Ken and despite his black mood it seems that Youji could still charm him out of it. "Used to be that *I* had a friend who respected my privacy."
"Well that was when there was something private I could barge into and embarrass myself with." Youji said flippantly then realized his mistake as soon as the words left his lips and Ken's face fell at the unexpected comeback.
"God. I'm sorry Ken." Youji put out an arm on Ken's shoulder. "I didn't mean for that to slip out."
A glassy eyed Ken swiveled to face him with a cheery grin on his face and an overhearty voice. "Nothing to be sorry about, Yotan! Nothing at all."
/Isn't there, Kenken?/ Youji thought to himself as Ken whacked him on the back and mumbled on about something insignificant. /A fool can see through this fiasco./
Youji could see the strain at the corner of Ken's eyes and the almost wild cheerfulness in the bronze depths of his eyes. Each word that fell from Ken's lips was calculated to be cheery and to turn attention away from him. Like he didn't want to discuss the more important issues.
Youji might not be saying anything but he knew the nonverbal signs too well. Could write a treatise on how to appear alright when he wasn't, actually. And Ken was far from alright.
Youji was tired of pretending that everything was alright.
"Ken." He broke into Ken's chatter with a seriousness that made green eyes soft. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"Talk about what? There's nothing to talk about. You know I hear there's an F-1 race on for tonight and Michael Schumacher is going to --"
"Bullshit!" Youji snorted. "Cut the crap. I know you too well Hidaka. When you lock yourself into your room and babble on about nonsensical things I know there must be something wrong."
Ken blinked once at Youji before the cheerfulness dissolved, like wet cement against a raging river, and anger blasted at Youji. "Why don't you just stay the fuck away from my affairs, Youji. Nothing's happened. What if I just like to stay in my room by myself, is there a problem with that?" Ken's chin raised in defiant challenge.
"It would not have been a problem, Ken, if you weren't moping."
"Who's moping?"
"You never play anything like this music Ken. Something must be wrong."
"What's wrong about it?"
"Its too…mournful and not particularly your type of music."
"And what is my music?"
"Rock, jazz, hell I don't know…. Just not anything this mournful."
"Its *Not* mournful. Its chanting."
Youji snorted. A particularly desolate voice rose up from the CD as if to emphasize Youji's point. "See?" Youji said.
Ken glared. "Just shut up, Youji. Nothing is wrong."
"Come on Hidaka! This is me, you're talking to, your friend! I know what's going on with you and Ran."
"Nothing's going on!" /And I mean that in the most literal way possible. There is nothing between me and Ran./
Youji rolled his eyes and sighed, picking himself up from the bed. "When you're ready to talk Ken, I'll be in my room, alright?"
"And when you're ready to stop this nonsense, you can come talk to me."
Youji shook his head at the stubborn brunette sitting on the bed with his chin jutting out with a look of concern. Through the tough façade, Youji could see the redness in brown eyes and the lines under those eyes that showed just how "alright" Ken really was.
"Stubborn." He whispered as he closed the door.
As he turned towards his own door, a voice interrupted him.
"Youji-kun?"
He swung around to find a smiling Aya looking at him with focused intent.
"Why, if it isn't the prettiest member of this household!" He said, putting a flirtatious smile on his face. "What can I do for you, Aya-chan?"
"We need to talk."
TBC ^___~ Comments onegai?