(one-shot) you
Title: You
Author: fingeredheart
Pairing: HayaRyu [Gokusen 2]
Genre: Romance, major angst (major. That is your warning!)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer(s): Nothing's mine.
Summary: I love you, the wind whispers (or maybe it is Hayato, who knows).
A/N: This is, basically, all this song's fault. My HayaRyu is unbearably rusty ): so please bear with me! Also, THERE IS ANGST. Really. I'm not kidding. The ending is pretty much open for interpretation (though I do think it leans a bit towards...what I originally had in mind). And this whole thing is pretty vague, but I was sort of experimenting or something of the like, haha. So, enjoy! Or try to. Comments are, as always, very much appreciated :)♥
Blades of grass tickle the bare skin of his fingers, soft and breezy beneath the dim morning sunlight. Streaks of colors stretch across the expanse of the sky, so close and tangible that he feels like he could touch them if he wanted to, wants to brush his finger along the horizon and draw out the plot line of his life. The air is crisp, clear and full of something new, something exciting - something just around the corner. Hayato breathes it in, folding his hands into a makeshift pillow behind his head.
There’s a pad of footsteps, a rustle of grass. Cracking open one eye, he is met with the sight of a familiar back; a lanky figure leaned back on two palms, red-orange hair splayed out against the wind. With a smile, Hayato reaches over to finger a few stray strands of hair, curling them around his thumb and smoothing the pad of his fingertip over the silky texture.
Ryu is quiet, glancing only briefly at him before tilting his head upwards, chin thrown towards the sky. His jaw line protrudes against a background of dusky, slowly coloring sky, elongated facial structure prominent in comparison to the softness of dawn.
I love you, the wind whispers (or maybe it is Hayato, who knows). It is the day of graduation, and they are going to be free, going to be brand-new and starting off with a clean slate. It is the day of graduation, and they are in love, and it’s hard to deny.
Hayato rolls over, sitting up and sweeping his lips over Ryu’s, a brush of chapped lips and oncoming sunshine. Warmth seeps through him, an overflowing kind of warmth that brims so full it aches. Ryu’s smile is subtle against his lips, hidden by the consistent press of lips on lips, the tumble of limbs and quiet, low laughter that echoes in the empty dawn atmosphere.
I love you too.
---
“Are you nervous?” Hayato’s hands are shoved deep into his pockets, stance casual as he peers through the fringe of his bangs at Ryu. After a silent moment, he turns back towards the path, spontaneously kicking up a few clouds of dirt with the toe of his shoe.
“No,” is Ryu’s curt answer, “You?”
“Of course not,” quick to reply, Hayato frowns, slits his eyes. “Why would I be?”
“I don’t know. Why are you?”
When Hayato only continues frowning, the hint of a smile spreads across Ryu’s face. Seeing this, Hayato’s frown deepens, and he elbows the other lightly, indignant. “Stop smirking like that. Why am I not allowed to be nervous?”
The smile on Ryu’s face dissolves, and Hayato curses himself a little on the inside (he should have let it stayed longer, that rare curve of lips, if only for a second). The question hangs between them for a few meters, accompanied by occasional scuffs of Hayato’s feet against the ground and the early-morning bustle of passerby. In fact, it stays silent for so long that Hayato is about to pretend he never asked when Ryu’s voice startles him from his thoughts, a hoarse whisper.
“You shouldn’t be. You’re a natural.”
Hayato isn’t given any time to linger upon the topic, because the figure of their school is already towering over them, Yankumi’s bright face at the gate.
---
Beside him, Ryu is shaking. Hayato can feel it through the fabric of his shirt, the clean, pressed folds of his school uniform. Yankumi’s voice is loud and direct in the gymnasium, a shrill sound filling the silence.
The applause comes all too soon, a splatter of loud concreteness that jostles them to their feet in a unified mob. Just as he feels Ryu drawing away, perhaps to leave out of nervousness, Hayato reaches out, grabbing the other’s wrist and holding tight.
He can feel Ryu’s surprised, swift look, but doesn’t dare return it. The microphone is rigidly cold in his spare hand, his breathing amplified as he carefully raises it to his mouth. The words are tangled inside of him, and he tries his best to sort them out, opening his mouth to a slur of gratitude. Yankumi’s eyes are trained on him, blurry at the edges, and he garners all of his strength, Ryu’s pulse throbbing under his two forefingers as he tucks their linked hands behind his back.
A heated, warm feeling rises up in him as he continues his speech, a tickling sensation in his throat that he hasn’t felt for years, not since he fought with his father as a child. The tears are hot at the corners of his eyes, clogging at the base of his throat, emotions weaving cracks into his heart as he closes his eyes in a desperate attempt to prevent them.
“You did great,” comes the whisper in his ear when the applause sounds again, and he feels Ryu’s arm pressed up against his, shoulder-to-shoulder. Barely managing to choke back a sob, Hayato yells out thank you with all of his might, his fingers interlaced tightly around Ryu’s.
The tears stream down his cheeks as an inevitable shape forms inside his heart, a thread that tugs tighter and binds him closer to the presence beside him, this thing, this person he never wants to let go.
“Thank you,” he breathes out of the corner of his lips, and can see Ryu’s slight smile out of his peripheral vision (they both know whom it’s for).
---
Blades of grass press against his palm, etching prints into his skin. The sky is a blinding pastel blue, far too bright to be comforting. Squinting, Hayato lies back, crossing his arms over his chest and sucking in a deep, desperate breath, like he wants to hold the moment inside of him forever.
There’s a hand on his; fingers filling the spaces between his own. Exhaling slowly (bit by bit, piece by piece, like how his heart is falling apart), he lets his eyelids flutter closed, bites his lip against the rays of sunshine beating down on his back.
I love you, Ryu doesn’t say, will not say, does not want to say.
Canada is a faraway place.
I love you too.
---
They exchange emails. How are you, Ryu writes, perfect, concise grammar (just like everything else about him).
I’m good, Hayato writes back, even though it isn’t true. He ducks his head into the confines of his hood, baring his teeth against the harsh bite of wind. He’s only been to Kurogin once since the graduation - everything there reminds him of Ryu, every little detail, every scar on tree bark. He can’t say it doesn’t hurt.
That’s splendid, Ryu tells him, in obsolete, pixilated characters. Splendid indeed, Hayato thinks, and he remembers Ryu’s chocolate eyes, stringy orange hair, hoarse voice - he remembers fingers clasped around his, pinky rings clashing unconsciously in the bridge they used to create with their hands.
And then one day, Ryu calls him out of the blue. He sounds tired, weary, but Hayato wasn’t expecting any less. “I miss,” says tired Ryu, older Ryu (Hayato purses his lips in thought around a cigarette, and wonders what color his hair is now). "Japan."
It’s been five years since they last saw each other.
(It’s been five years, Hayato thinks, since I love you.)
---
The call comes the next day, a clear, sharp sound at precisely five o’clock in the evening. (Hayato will remember it for the rest of his life.)
“Yabuki-kun?” It is Ryu’s mother, her voice monotonous. At first, Hayato almost wants to hang up, but he freezes when he hears her plead. “It’s about Ryu.”
The details pour from the other end like hail - hard, unrelenting balls of ice, brash, freezing pain against his skin, trickling into his chest and clenching. Car crash, she tells him, a drone of words and words and more words and more words (you’re a natural).
Finally, her voice stops. Shutting his eyes tightly, Hayato works his tongue around the words, forces them like bitter cough drops into his mouth. “Is he okay?”
There’s a hitch of breath, something resembling a sob, and Hayato feels his muscles tighten, tense enough to snap.
“No, he’s not.”
The phone clatters to the floor, the sound ricocheting off the whitewashed walls. Dark brown hair falls around the curve of Hayato’s arms, face buried into the rough crease of his palms. The blood drains from his features as he tries to curb the onslaught of tears, knees pulling up to tuck under his chin. Ryu’s life flashes like a slideshow in his mind, grainy images of childhood playgrounds and soft smiles and watching the sunrise every morning, drawing dreams along the horizon.
You did great, he whispers in between the tears, words lost somewhere in the cracks. He imagines Ryu in a business suit, hair all tidied and shoes shined, sitting primly in a swivel chair, clacking down tiled-floor hallways to his wide, windowed office.
You did great.
---
Blades of grass tickle the bare skin of his fingers, soft and breezy beneath the dim morning sunlight. Streaks of colors stretch across the expanse of the sky, so close and tangible that he feels like he could touch them if he wanted to, wants to brush his finger along the horizon and draw out the plot line of his life. The air is melancholy, smeared with nostalgia and memories of laughter. Hayato breathes it in, leaning back on his elbows as he weighs a cell phone in the palm of his hand.
There are visible scratches on the black surface, one scrape down the silver lining. The screen is cracked down the middle, and he presses down a creaky button to light it up. His fingers skim across the padded numbers, locating the menu and scrolling down to saved drafts of unfinished text messages.
The cursor blinks back at him, a remnant following the characters that have already been typed out. It is addressed to his own number (Hayato, it says in the to: line). I still love.
The time of creation of the message reads two fifty-nine AM, one minute before the car crash.
A sad smile adorns Hayato’s face. Gently, he runs his finger underneath the characters one last time before swinging his arm back, and flings it out, his hand releasing the phone from its grasp. The device soars into the air, a blackbird against the grayish beginning of dawn in the sky.
It lands with a plop into the water, but Hayato doesn’t hear it. He is already halfway down the dirt path, rocks crunching beneath his feet and clouds of dust gathering around his sneakers. The wind whistles past his ears, the faint echo of early-morning city life.
“I love you too,” he murmurs beneath his breath, seemingly to himself from the perspective of any passerby. His arm swings out in front, fingers curling together as if he can see the hand he is grasping, the pulse of somebody beneath his fingertips.
Author: fingeredheart
Pairing: HayaRyu [Gokusen 2]
Genre: Romance, major angst (major. That is your warning!)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer(s): Nothing's mine.
Summary: I love you, the wind whispers (or maybe it is Hayato, who knows).
A/N: This is, basically, all this song's fault. My HayaRyu is unbearably rusty ): so please bear with me! Also, THERE IS ANGST. Really. I'm not kidding. The ending is pretty much open for interpretation (though I do think it leans a bit towards...what I originally had in mind). And this whole thing is pretty vague, but I was sort of experimenting or something of the like, haha. So, enjoy! Or try to. Comments are, as always, very much appreciated :)♥
Blades of grass tickle the bare skin of his fingers, soft and breezy beneath the dim morning sunlight. Streaks of colors stretch across the expanse of the sky, so close and tangible that he feels like he could touch them if he wanted to, wants to brush his finger along the horizon and draw out the plot line of his life. The air is crisp, clear and full of something new, something exciting - something just around the corner. Hayato breathes it in, folding his hands into a makeshift pillow behind his head.
There’s a pad of footsteps, a rustle of grass. Cracking open one eye, he is met with the sight of a familiar back; a lanky figure leaned back on two palms, red-orange hair splayed out against the wind. With a smile, Hayato reaches over to finger a few stray strands of hair, curling them around his thumb and smoothing the pad of his fingertip over the silky texture.
Ryu is quiet, glancing only briefly at him before tilting his head upwards, chin thrown towards the sky. His jaw line protrudes against a background of dusky, slowly coloring sky, elongated facial structure prominent in comparison to the softness of dawn.
I love you, the wind whispers (or maybe it is Hayato, who knows). It is the day of graduation, and they are going to be free, going to be brand-new and starting off with a clean slate. It is the day of graduation, and they are in love, and it’s hard to deny.
Hayato rolls over, sitting up and sweeping his lips over Ryu’s, a brush of chapped lips and oncoming sunshine. Warmth seeps through him, an overflowing kind of warmth that brims so full it aches. Ryu’s smile is subtle against his lips, hidden by the consistent press of lips on lips, the tumble of limbs and quiet, low laughter that echoes in the empty dawn atmosphere.
I love you too.
---
“Are you nervous?” Hayato’s hands are shoved deep into his pockets, stance casual as he peers through the fringe of his bangs at Ryu. After a silent moment, he turns back towards the path, spontaneously kicking up a few clouds of dirt with the toe of his shoe.
“No,” is Ryu’s curt answer, “You?”
“Of course not,” quick to reply, Hayato frowns, slits his eyes. “Why would I be?”
“I don’t know. Why are you?”
When Hayato only continues frowning, the hint of a smile spreads across Ryu’s face. Seeing this, Hayato’s frown deepens, and he elbows the other lightly, indignant. “Stop smirking like that. Why am I not allowed to be nervous?”
The smile on Ryu’s face dissolves, and Hayato curses himself a little on the inside (he should have let it stayed longer, that rare curve of lips, if only for a second). The question hangs between them for a few meters, accompanied by occasional scuffs of Hayato’s feet against the ground and the early-morning bustle of passerby. In fact, it stays silent for so long that Hayato is about to pretend he never asked when Ryu’s voice startles him from his thoughts, a hoarse whisper.
“You shouldn’t be. You’re a natural.”
Hayato isn’t given any time to linger upon the topic, because the figure of their school is already towering over them, Yankumi’s bright face at the gate.
---
Beside him, Ryu is shaking. Hayato can feel it through the fabric of his shirt, the clean, pressed folds of his school uniform. Yankumi’s voice is loud and direct in the gymnasium, a shrill sound filling the silence.
The applause comes all too soon, a splatter of loud concreteness that jostles them to their feet in a unified mob. Just as he feels Ryu drawing away, perhaps to leave out of nervousness, Hayato reaches out, grabbing the other’s wrist and holding tight.
He can feel Ryu’s surprised, swift look, but doesn’t dare return it. The microphone is rigidly cold in his spare hand, his breathing amplified as he carefully raises it to his mouth. The words are tangled inside of him, and he tries his best to sort them out, opening his mouth to a slur of gratitude. Yankumi’s eyes are trained on him, blurry at the edges, and he garners all of his strength, Ryu’s pulse throbbing under his two forefingers as he tucks their linked hands behind his back.
A heated, warm feeling rises up in him as he continues his speech, a tickling sensation in his throat that he hasn’t felt for years, not since he fought with his father as a child. The tears are hot at the corners of his eyes, clogging at the base of his throat, emotions weaving cracks into his heart as he closes his eyes in a desperate attempt to prevent them.
“You did great,” comes the whisper in his ear when the applause sounds again, and he feels Ryu’s arm pressed up against his, shoulder-to-shoulder. Barely managing to choke back a sob, Hayato yells out thank you with all of his might, his fingers interlaced tightly around Ryu’s.
The tears stream down his cheeks as an inevitable shape forms inside his heart, a thread that tugs tighter and binds him closer to the presence beside him, this thing, this person he never wants to let go.
“Thank you,” he breathes out of the corner of his lips, and can see Ryu’s slight smile out of his peripheral vision (they both know whom it’s for).
---
Blades of grass press against his palm, etching prints into his skin. The sky is a blinding pastel blue, far too bright to be comforting. Squinting, Hayato lies back, crossing his arms over his chest and sucking in a deep, desperate breath, like he wants to hold the moment inside of him forever.
There’s a hand on his; fingers filling the spaces between his own. Exhaling slowly (bit by bit, piece by piece, like how his heart is falling apart), he lets his eyelids flutter closed, bites his lip against the rays of sunshine beating down on his back.
I love you, Ryu doesn’t say, will not say, does not want to say.
Canada is a faraway place.
I love you too.
---
They exchange emails. How are you, Ryu writes, perfect, concise grammar (just like everything else about him).
I’m good, Hayato writes back, even though it isn’t true. He ducks his head into the confines of his hood, baring his teeth against the harsh bite of wind. He’s only been to Kurogin once since the graduation - everything there reminds him of Ryu, every little detail, every scar on tree bark. He can’t say it doesn’t hurt.
That’s splendid, Ryu tells him, in obsolete, pixilated characters. Splendid indeed, Hayato thinks, and he remembers Ryu’s chocolate eyes, stringy orange hair, hoarse voice - he remembers fingers clasped around his, pinky rings clashing unconsciously in the bridge they used to create with their hands.
And then one day, Ryu calls him out of the blue. He sounds tired, weary, but Hayato wasn’t expecting any less. “I miss,” says tired Ryu, older Ryu (Hayato purses his lips in thought around a cigarette, and wonders what color his hair is now). "Japan."
It’s been five years since they last saw each other.
(It’s been five years, Hayato thinks, since I love you.)
---
The call comes the next day, a clear, sharp sound at precisely five o’clock in the evening. (Hayato will remember it for the rest of his life.)
“Yabuki-kun?” It is Ryu’s mother, her voice monotonous. At first, Hayato almost wants to hang up, but he freezes when he hears her plead. “It’s about Ryu.”
The details pour from the other end like hail - hard, unrelenting balls of ice, brash, freezing pain against his skin, trickling into his chest and clenching. Car crash, she tells him, a drone of words and words and more words and more words (you’re a natural).
Finally, her voice stops. Shutting his eyes tightly, Hayato works his tongue around the words, forces them like bitter cough drops into his mouth. “Is he okay?”
There’s a hitch of breath, something resembling a sob, and Hayato feels his muscles tighten, tense enough to snap.
“No, he’s not.”
The phone clatters to the floor, the sound ricocheting off the whitewashed walls. Dark brown hair falls around the curve of Hayato’s arms, face buried into the rough crease of his palms. The blood drains from his features as he tries to curb the onslaught of tears, knees pulling up to tuck under his chin. Ryu’s life flashes like a slideshow in his mind, grainy images of childhood playgrounds and soft smiles and watching the sunrise every morning, drawing dreams along the horizon.
You did great, he whispers in between the tears, words lost somewhere in the cracks. He imagines Ryu in a business suit, hair all tidied and shoes shined, sitting primly in a swivel chair, clacking down tiled-floor hallways to his wide, windowed office.
You did great.
---
Blades of grass tickle the bare skin of his fingers, soft and breezy beneath the dim morning sunlight. Streaks of colors stretch across the expanse of the sky, so close and tangible that he feels like he could touch them if he wanted to, wants to brush his finger along the horizon and draw out the plot line of his life. The air is melancholy, smeared with nostalgia and memories of laughter. Hayato breathes it in, leaning back on his elbows as he weighs a cell phone in the palm of his hand.
There are visible scratches on the black surface, one scrape down the silver lining. The screen is cracked down the middle, and he presses down a creaky button to light it up. His fingers skim across the padded numbers, locating the menu and scrolling down to saved drafts of unfinished text messages.
The cursor blinks back at him, a remnant following the characters that have already been typed out. It is addressed to his own number (Hayato, it says in the to: line). I still love.
The time of creation of the message reads two fifty-nine AM, one minute before the car crash.
A sad smile adorns Hayato’s face. Gently, he runs his finger underneath the characters one last time before swinging his arm back, and flings it out, his hand releasing the phone from its grasp. The device soars into the air, a blackbird against the grayish beginning of dawn in the sky.
It lands with a plop into the water, but Hayato doesn’t hear it. He is already halfway down the dirt path, rocks crunching beneath his feet and clouds of dust gathering around his sneakers. The wind whistles past his ears, the faint echo of early-morning city life.
“I love you too,” he murmurs beneath his breath, seemingly to himself from the perspective of any passerby. His arm swings out in front, fingers curling together as if he can see the hand he is grasping, the pulse of somebody beneath his fingertips.