Rumms: Mon dieu, le dernier chapitre! *sob*

An Unlikely Twosome - Chapter Five

The clouds scudded across a nearly-full moon, huge on a horizon that held the quiet stillness of impending morning. The day of the engagement party had come.

In the cool pre-dawn air, Kero settled on the roof of Yukito's house next to a familiar figure.

"Holding up alright?" he asked Yue casually.

The Moon Guardian looked more human than Kero could ever remember, and not just because he was in his new false form. "I… don't know," he whispered.

Kero felt a little stab of alarm. "What's wrong? It's not the spell, is it? It hasn't gone wrong?"

"No," Yue said, the ghost of a smile playing around his lips. "The spell was perfect; it's worked beyond my wildest dreams."

Kero drew his wings about his small body. "You know," he mused, "I'm tempted to ask Sakura to do the same for me. Sometimes having a human form sounds pretty neat."

Yue raised his eyebrows. "I'd wait a little before asking, Cerberus," he aid dryly. "I'm not sure our spell team would appreciate going through all that again just one week later."

"So if it's not the spell, what is it?" Kero pressed doggedly. He was sure he had a pretty good idea what 'it' was, but if Yue wasn't going to play ball, he'd just have to drag it out of him the hard way.

Yue looked at his hands folded in his lap, his face twisted with emotion. "I think… I have made a mistake," he said falteringly.

Kero waited.

"I've been confused, and selfish. I wanted to make sure of exactly what had changed within me, and so I did something that may have caused hurt. Or rather, I didn't do something." He paused, his voice quiet. "I didn't go, Kero."

Kero was way too impatient to be subtle. Anyway, it was a bit cold on the roof to be expositing for hours. "Look, Yue, what is it you're getting at? Because to be honest, it's getting a bit fresh out here and I don't want to get goosebumps."

Yue rolled his eyes, but slipped his legs back into the skylight. "Very well; come indoors. Don't wake Yukito, though."

"Good grief," Kero said, impressed. He followed him into the warm glow of the attic bedroom. "You didn't even snap at me. That spell really has changed you."

"It wasn't the spell." Yue grinned for a moment – Yue, grinning? – but it faded quickly, a troubled frown replacing it as his thoughts returned to whatever was bothering him. "I… I don't know what to do. I feel freer than I ever have done in my life, but it's… vast. Frightening. And lonely."

Kero could hardly believe it was Yue saying these things. When had he last talked about being afraid? He couldn't even remember. "You're your own person now, Yue, but that doesn't mean you have to be alone. That's why everyone surrounds themselves with people they love. Family. Friends."

Yue took a deep breath. "Yes. Friends. But I've made a mistake, Kero – and now I have to find out whether I'll be forgiven, or whether it has cost me the best thing that I could have wished for."

Kero was lost in a sea of riddles. He tried to think of a suitably grave response.

"So…" he said finally, "…does this mean you're coming to the party tonight?"

Yue laughed despite himself. He looked out of the window to where the sky was turning pale gold with sunrise. "Coming?" he said softly, with an enigmatic smile. "Of course I'm coming, Cerberus. I would not miss it for the world."

"Are you ready?" whispered Tomoyo, reaching over to adjust the straps of Mei Ling's dress, the twin of her own. Home-tailored to Tomoyo's perfectionist standards, of course.

"I think so," Mei Ling murmured nervously, looking at the heavy curtain before them. Behind it, the babble of voices was loud and widespread. Sakura had decided to hold the party in Tomoeda Park, erecting a makeshift stage especially for the occasion. "How many people did Sakura invite to this thing?" she demanded, feeling stage fright take hold. "The entire damn town?"

Tomoyo giggled. "Just about. Come on, Mei Ling, you'll be fine. I'll take the lead. This song is beautiful; it would be a crime if you backed out now."

Mei Ling took a deep breath. "All right," she acquiesced. "I'm game. Bring it on."

Tomoyo smiled, and squeezed her hand.

The curtain went up.

A huge cheer greeted them. Tomoyo walked to the microphone with grace and dignity. Mei Ling followed, feeling rather less graceful and dignified, to the piano.

She sat down; the crowd quietened. Nervously, she began to play the opening notes.

Oh god, she thought, was this really such a good idea?

The words came easily as they sang in harmony; after all, she had sung this in her head a hundred times before. But as the familiar lines washed over her, it brought with it all the heartbreak and disappointment of the last eight years.

As they swept through the first verse, she glanced out into the crowd and caught a glimpse of Syaoran, his arms entwined around Sakura, leaning in for a kiss.

Suddenly hot tears blurred her vision. She snapped her head back to the music stand, furiously willing them away. Not now, not now, please not now! If there was a worst time and place in the entire world to break down, this was it. The mere thought made her cringe.

She forced herself to breathe mechanically, her fingers on autopilot, picking out the simple melody she had written nearly two years ago. Her voice still sounded steady; that was good. If she could only make it until the end of the song…

Tentatively, she glanced up again, making sure it wasn't in the direction of the happy couple, and found herself looking at a face that she had definitely not expected to see.

Silver hair glinted gently in the light that fell from the stage. He was looking at her levelly, his cool grey eyes soft, and as she watched he gave a small smile. A smile of quiet encouragement and understanding.

Suddenly, she knew she could make it through this.

Her voice strong again, entwining with Tomoyo's, she rallied. It was alright. She could do this. She could make it to the end, no problem. Just two minutes, and then the barrage of discarded dreams could do their worst.

The last verse, and the chorus repeated twice…

They sang the final words, harmony in thirds, and held to a soft trailoff. Mei Ling gently touched through the ending notes, and the song was finished, holding on a moment of silence.

And then the noise came.

The applause was wild. Sakura and Syaoran were in the front row, their faces shining with love and happiness. Mei Ling smiled, took Tomoyo's hand, and bowed. Three times, before the crowd would let them go. She turned, the smile fixed to her face like a mask, and walked lightly behind the curtain.

Not hearing Tomoyo's call, she picked her way around the back, through the lead cables and the light rigging, down the steps at the side of the makeshift stage, and onto the gravel path that wound into the park. The smile slowly began to crumble, like bad plaster. She stepped off the path onto the cool, dewy grass, and crossed the short space to the old bandstand, almost hidden in gloom.

When she got there, she sat down on the wooden boards and cried.

It was as if everything she had kept in all through the song, all day, all the last three weeks, all her life – had suddenly broken its dam and was pouring out with no way to stop. All she could do was stand in the storm, let it batter her, let wave after wave of tears choke her until there was nothing left to cry.

She could hardly even tell what the tears were for. For Syaoran, of course, but also for something more abstract – the years of her life revolving around him that were now a lost part of her, cut off forever. There was a quote, wasn't there? The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there.

As the storm subsided, bit by bit, she felt someone sit on the bench beside her. In any other circumstance, she might be nervous – after all, they hadn't spoken since the transformation, and he hadn't come last time she had waited for him – but somehow, it was all washed away in the tidal wave that was now sweeping over her.

Yue's voice was a whisper. "I cannot bear to see you like this."

Against all odds, Mei Ling laughed.

The tears kept coming, but they were different now. She leaned her head back against the wooden pillar, eyes closed, cheeks wet and a smile tugging her lips. "D'you know… I think I've cried all the sadness out of me. Today was what I needed. It's all catharsis now. I'm just crying for memories, that's all. A life that never happened. It's all right to mourn something like that, isn't it?"

The voice was still quiet. "Yes, it is. I have done it many times."

"You finish a book you really loved, and you're sad it's over, but you close it up and put it on the shelf and get on with your life. And sometimes you might take it down and re-read bits, but you've read it before, and it never quite feels the same. Why not find a new book to get lost in, one that lasts longer? Why live your whole life re-reading a few memories, when…" she took a deep breath, "when there's something new and real and so much better waiting on the shelf right next to it?"

In her heightened emotional state, she suddenly wondered whether she'd gone too far, been too obvious. She found she didn't care. The shape of Yue leaned back, slowly, until he was resting against the pillar next to her.

After a short silence, he said lightly, "I have been re-reading the same old book all my life. I think I might take a trip to the library."

Mei Ling laughed again, this time at the image of Yue in full Moon Guardian regalia arguing with a stern-faced librarian about late returns. The sudden comedy of the picture meant she missed the ulterior meaning of his statement. "Look me in the eye and say you wouldn't crystal-attack the library staff when they tried to give you a fine."

She realised that Yue was looking her in the eye, even though she hadn't returned the favour yet. She raised her glance to his face, and took a sharp intake of breath.

"What is it?" Yue asked with a hint of worry. Probably wondering if she was going to start sobbing again, Mei Ling thought wryly.

"…Your eyes. I haven't got used to them yet."

Yue put a hand to the corner of one eye, smiling a little. "Do you prefer the slit pupils?"

"Well, the normal pupils do make you look a lot different. But I didn't actually mean the shape." It was out before she could even stop herself. Damn it, but she was a liability tonight.

Yue looked puzzled. "What do you mean?"

Might as well go the whole hog. "Something's changed. Before, even if you smiled, it didn't really reach your eyes. It's different now. There's no shield, no barrier. You just look… happy. Content." She shrugged, covering the significance of the words.

When she met his eyes again, his gaze was so piercing and unguarded that her heart skipped a beat. A smile flitted across his face, getting stronger and stronger until his eyes practically flashed with it. When he spoke, it was uncharacteristically husky, and for a mad moment she thought that he was having just as much difficulty controlling his emotions as she was. "Is that so?"

There were laws of dramatic narrative that practically demanded she lean towards him then, but even though her body was screaming do it, you idiot, do it, do it!, her nerves got the better of her. After all, she was pretty much a wreck right now. She could be misreading signals. Definitely. Almost definitely. Probably, anyway. She stood up instead, walking to the wooden steps and looking towards the bright lights of the party ground, trying to get a hold of herself.

She was pleased to hear that when she spoke, her voice was totally calm, light, sardonic. "I might have had more chance to get used to it if I'd seen more of you."

She heard him stand, too. "I… wanted to talk to you about that. I didn't come out to meet you. Forgive me – I was confused, and the spell had been so recent. My mind was a mess of thoughts and feelings and…" he broke off, sighing, sounding truly troubled. "Forgive me."

Mei Ling turned to look at him, startled by his tone. "I thought…" she began, even though her better judgement was begging her not to make a fool of herself this way, "...I thought it was because you didn't really want to meet up any more. You know, because you changed. Maybe you just needed someone to talk to before the spell, and then when it went off without a hitch, there wasn't really any point any more. You didn't need it," she said in a rush. As she spoke the words, all the fears she'd tried to keep below the surface for the last week pushed their way out. That he had only wanted a sympathetic ear; that it didn't matter if it was her or anyone else. That she had been imagining it when she thought he enjoyed their fiery bickering and silent understanding. That Tomoyo had been wrong about his motives. That she'd got carried away.

He took an involuntary step forward, his face a peculiar twist of emotions. "You thought I didn't wish to continue our friendship? That I was bored of you now I am my own person?"

"I don't know," she said with a spark of defiance, tilting her chin up. "You tell me."

For a moment, it looked like he was in pain, before a hint of anger seeped through. "I changed my body. I am not a different person. It was my fault, I know; my thoughts were in chaos and I didn't feel ready to speak to anyone. I should have at least come and explained. But do you really think so badly of me that all those nights meant nothing?" He paused, his usually graceful posture tense. "Have I changed so much?"

"I'm not sure," Mei Ling conceded softly. "That's for you to answer. The most important thing is that you're happy. And…" she hesitated. "And that you got what you wanted."

Yue raised his eyes to her. "What I wanted?"

"Yes. You had another motive in all this, if you remember. A theory to prove, I suppose, about Clow's plan for Yukito and Sakura. Did it turn out the way you thought?" This was it, she thought. She'd put all her cards on the table.

There was a pause.

"I love Sakura," Yue said simply.

Mei Ling turned away, unable to speak. She kept her face a carefully calm mask of indifference, but a bubble of misery rose in her throat; an iron hand threatened to close around her heart. What had she expected? She'd gotten carried away. Her conversation with Tomoyo had made her see things that were never there. Such a stupid, stupid girl…

"I love Sakura," Yue repeated behind her. "She is an extraordinarily beautiful, kind, courageous, compassionate person. She taught me to see the light again. I will always be loyal to her; I will always be her Guardian."

Mei Ling felt as if her world was crashing down around her. Keep calm. Don't show a thing. Wait until it's over, then walk away.

"I am not, however," Yue continued softly, "in love with her."

The silence was so loud it was like a vacuum.

Mei Ling closed her eyes, her heart thumping.

She could see it perfectly. In one second, she was going to turn around – no, swish around, the skirt of her dress swirling around her legs like Ginger Rogers' – and some romantic music was going to reach a crescendo in the background, and she was going to say "You bastard." It was a movie-perfect moment.

She managed the swish, but failed on the line. Reason being, he was closer than she'd thought. She got as far as "You b-mmgthurthm", because the way he was looking at her made her weak at the knees.

"I realised something over the last month, when I forced myself to face everything I had pushed away," Yue whispered, his voice hoarse again, oblivious to her failed admonishment. "I realised that there was no-one who speaks to me the way you do. Who lets me tease them, who doesn't let me get away with what I shouldn't, who can lift my mood when I don't know how, who treats me like an equal. I realised that whatever strange quirk threw us together, you make me feel more human than anyone else has ever done, even before the spell made it a reality. And the more I tried not to, the more I couldn't stop thinking about you."

He took a step closer, making Mei Ling's heart beat double. "I'm not asking for anything. I don't expect you to feel the same. I don't even know if I should be saying anything at all. But I'm so tired of being in the shadows, of being patient, of keeping quiet – I had to tell you. I wanted to tell you."

Another step. "Do you know when the turning point was? In the spell, when you wrote me. It was everywhere; it was inside my head, bringing me together, making me real. When I saw myself through your eyes, I realised what I was missing. What I might lose if I didn't do something."

He moved even closer, as if he couldn't help himself. They were almost touching now; she could hear how quick his breath was. She wondered whether he could hear her heart crashing against her chest so violently that she was sure it was going to leap right out.

"One word," he murmured, almost pleading. "One word is all I need. I'll go, I'll stay, I'll do whatever you want. Mei Ling…"

He broke off as she looked up, right into his eyes. Her name on his lips had sent a jolt like an electrical storm through her. It would hardly have been surprising if sparks had jumped between them.

"I think," Mei Ling said, very softly but very clearly, "That I might borrow you from the library for a while. Would you mind?"

For one moment he stared at her, his cloud-grey eyes wide. Then his mouth twitched up in a smile, and then he started laughing – a gorgeous, purely joyful sound – which was cut off as soon as she wound her arms around his neck and crushed his lips to hers.

It was even better than she could have believed.

With lightning response his hands were on her waist – he pulled her to him as if he was drinking her in. Her lips felt electrified where they touched him; she could feel him smiling against her mouth, unable to stop. It felt playful, it felt fierce. Requited. Equal.

They parted, gasping. It took a moment to recover. Yue smiled a crooked, sly smile that was so new, yet somehow so him – she had seen glimpses of it before, pre-spell, but it was a mere shadow of the real thing. He was free, and he had chosen her.

More importantly, she'd chosen him back.

"I hope I don't have to return you," she purred. "I'll probably rack up quite a fine."

He grinned, brushing a strand of hair from her eyes, making her heart skip yet another beat. "Am I to understand you don't mind re-reading me when you've finished?"

"Oh, come on," she scolded. "You're mixing up my metaphor. You're only re-reading a book when you're rehashing old memories that can't move any further. Everything about this book, I'm reading for the first time. Frankly, I hope it never ends."

Yue rolled his eyes. "I shall bypass the metaphor, if you don't mind. It's getting too complicated. Am I allowed to simply declare my intentions without the purple prose?"

Mei Ling raised an eyebrow. Over the dim grass, she could hear music drifting from the stage once more. "And what are your intentions?"

The mischievous smile played around his lips once more. She caught her breath.

"Dance with me," he said.

He held out his hand. Mei Ling took it, and he pulled her towards the crowd.

Five people – to be specific; Sakura, Syaoran, Touya, Yukito and Eriol – stared at the dance-floor with jaws to the ground.

"Well," Eriol said finally, breaking the shocked silence. "Things have certainly changed around here."

Yue and Mei Ling were dancing. Their arms were wound around each other, their eyes locked together – as the others watched, Yue spun her around and dipped her; she was laughing, and so was he, the most purely joyful sound Kero had heard from his brother since their days with Clow. The two seemed so completely lost in each other that watching them felt almost intimate. There was a fierce kind of bliss in both their eyes that made their surroundings seem blurred, inconsequential.

The difference of expressions along the row was so vast as to be comical. Touya looked as if he was recovering from concussion. On the other side, Tomoyo, Kero and Yukito were openly grinning, the only people who had glimpsed any kind of clue that this was coming. Sakura was slowly turning from bafflement to excitement, and Syaoran was spluttering with incoherent indignity.

"But, it's Yue!" he stammered. "Mei Ling and Yue! Have I just stepped into some weird parallel world or something? Since when have they even been friends?"

"You were never very good at paying attention, kid," Kero said offhandedly. "They've been meeting up sneakily since last year. If you want my opinion – which," he winked, "anyone in the world undoubtedly would, this spell business was what Yue needed to finally realise what was right in front of his nose."

"But they're –" It was a mark of Syaoran's astonishment that he totally overlooked Kero's insult. "It's Mei Ling and Yue!"

"Let's not be a dog in the manger, Syaoran," Tomoyo murmured, cutting to the heart of the matter as she usually did.

"I'm not being a –" Syaoran hissed, then hesitated. "I'm not, am I?"

"Mei Ling is the happiest I've ever seen her. That's what you want, isn't it?"

"Of course I do," Syaoran said awkwardly. "It's just that he's… well, he's…" he stopped again, confusion halting his words.

Sakura had recovered, and was practically jumping with excitement. "This is so amazing! Syaoran, isn't it wonderful? Don't they look happy?"

Kero stifled a laugh, leaving the thunderstruck line of friends and beginning the demolition of the pudding table.

On the dance floor, mindful of the stir they were causing, Mei Ling and Yue grinned at each other.

"Do you think we should go over and put them out of their misery?" Mei Ling smirked. "Anyway, they're next to the refreshment table; I want to share a glass of champagne with you."

"I've only had you to myself for five minutes. They can wait."

"The night is young," Mei Ling teased. She looked up, and exclaimed in surprise. "Look, a full moon!" She turned her gaze back to Yue, whose lips were curving into a sly smile. "That wouldn't have anything to do with you, now, would it?"

"I cannot possibly fathom what you mean," he said lightly, effortlessly avoiding her mock-accusatory glare. And before she could say any more, he drew her close and sealed her lips with his.

Mei Ling heard the resulting explosion of excited and incredulous chatter from the group by the table, and smiled into the kiss, letting the world float away. Above, the moon blazed like a beacon.

They danced until the small hours, and the moon didn't set until they stopped.

Rumms: So, I finally finished this little 'ficlet' that ended up taking a year and a half to write! I swear, these supposed quickfics take twice as long as the big epics. I'd blame it on moving, new job etc, but we all know I'm just a lazy ho.

I would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who has given this pairing a chance. I thought it was just my crazy plotbunny, but since I started, all kinds of fans have been coming out of the woordwork! I can't wait to see what people come up with - I'm retiring my Yue/MeiLing crown for the time being, so it belongs to whoever snaps it up first!

To everyone who reviewed; it means more to me than I can say :) Thank you for taking the time to write a few lines for me. Allyrian, welcome to the party, and thanks for the favourties! Help yourself to champagne :D I hope you all enjoy this chapter. Ok, so I got all gooey and romantic. Sue me! Gooey romance is awesome and you know it. In the words of the immortal T-Rex, "I'm giving a 'thumbs up'!"

/geek

:p

xx