A Moth to Flame | 1/1 | AoixRuki
Title: A Moth to Flame
Chapter: 1/1 (one-shot)
Author: akichuu
Fandom: the GazettE
Pairing: AoixRuki, RukixAoi, AoixOC
Rating: R
Genre: angst, drama
Warnings: Yaoi, slight manxman smex, cheating!Aoi.
Disclaimer: the GazettE belongs to themselves and, yes, the Almighty PSC. I, well I own this story. It's fiction, meaning IT'S NOT REAL and I'm making no profit from it (except my 15 minutes of fame). Yes, mind that.
Beta: None this time.
Summary: … He wouldn’t have been able to prevent himself from falling. It was inevitable; like a hole in the road that you just couldn’t swerve away from. It had always been there, deep inside of him, buried deep in denial. It had been waiting for its’ time to break through. And now it had made its’ appearance.
Comment: This one-shot is sort of a continuation of a couple of one-shots I’ve written, titled ‘Runaway’ and ‘Addiction: The Taste of Sin’. I do suggest you to read those two earlier one-shots before you read this (hahaha~), but I suppose it's also fine if you wish to jump to this story instead. For this one-shot, I'm using the same situation that I had created in the two earlier parts. It has the same ongoing conflict, the same confusion between the two men and everything, but here I decided to take Aoi’s point of view instead of Ruki’s. I’m not planning on writing another part after this; I just hope that, for now, this will set some things clear. I hope you enjoy :)
BGM: the GazettE - CALM ENVY (I suggest you listen to the live version, taken from Repeated Countless Error. I don’t know why but I think it was more touching than the recorded version…)
A Moth to Flame
Aoi wouldn’t lie, not to himself, not about how he felt. Yes it hurt. In fact, it hurt so fucking bad. It was as if the weight of the entire world was placed upon his chest, crushing him flat against the floor. Each new second he had to suffer through, the pain grew, expanding inside his chest until there seemed to be no space left for his heart to beat. Every breath felt like a thousand needles entering his lungs. He couldn’t breathe without having to endure the pain splitting him apart from the inside.
What sucked the most was the realization that it would not get any easier, not when he was the cause of his own misery. He had screwed up his own life, and he had no idea how to set things right. He had tried calculating his chances, analyzing the situation from every angle he could find. At the end of every trial, he had only found the same old, annoying dead end. It was like he was stuck in a stupid game show where he needed to guess which door would lead him to his victory, but every guess he made only led him to the sign that spelled “Sorry, wrong door.”
It took so much of him, so many futile attempts until he came to this point where giving up seemed like the most rational choice. Rational, quite unfortunately, didn’t always mean executable. He knew if he gave up then it was all over-everything he had so stubbornly hung on to, everything that had made up for all the reasons he ever needed to keep going. His hands were starting to bleed from clutching onto these shards of hope, but if he let go, then it would be the end of it… the end of his life.
Day four of self-condemning, day eight of the band’s pre-production stage, Aoi found himself sitting-or rather, sinking into the couch in Uruha’s living room, staring disinterestedly at the owner of the apartment and the bassist who were getting into a rather heated argument regarding the song they had been working on for the past ten hours or so. It was a silly technical issue; Uruha insisted that Reita should do some bass maneuver shit but Reita just didn’t get what kind of maneuver Uruha really wanted. Aoi honestly didn’t give a damn; he just wanted this meeting to be over soon so he could go home, home where bottles and bottles of blessed alcohol were there on his rescue. Fuck, God, he needed to be drunk tonight… again.
“Okay you two, stop it,” Kai’s tired voice broke up the two’s endless quarrel. “It’s 2 freaking a.m. for God’s sake. You can continue arguing about this minor detail tomorrow because I don’t think the rest of us still have enough patience to wait until your discussion is over.”
Aoi could have given Kai a big hug if he hadn’t been feeling so morose and so desperate to leave this place-leave the circle of people that was starting to make him suffocate. It wasn’t normal to be feeling like this around the people he had considered as family, more than just bandmates. But recently nothing had been normal. Nothing had gone like they used to after what had happened. And whose fault was that? Whose fault was it that his life had been so fucked up lately?
Gingerly he moved to sit upright on the sofa, trying to brush off the bitter resentment that he felt rising up in his stomach. He would never get used to this, he thought. There was no getting used to guilt, to self-hatred. He could spend days drowning himself in this flood of emotions but he knew it wouldn’t do him any good; he couldn’t just suddenly develop an ability to breathe underwater. There were only so many attempts to surface that he could try before he wore himself out, before his muscles gave up… before the surge won and swallowed him whole.
Don’t you think life has its’ very own special way to fuck you up, inside and out, thoroughly and completely?
Just when he began thinking about irony and its’ recent daily visits, he heard the voice-the very same voice that had been haunting his nights, clouding his days, and messing up his brain. Like a drop of acid on his already torn skin, the voice cut through him giving him the taste of pain he had never known existed in this world. And it was pathetic, really, to think it was nothing more than a short farewell greeting.
“See you all tomorrow.”
The words were simple; words you would say to your colleagues, friends, families when you were ending your conversation. To Aoi, the voice sounded different than it might have sounded in his bandmates’ ears. It sounded, disturbingly, almost in tune with the ripping noise that came from deep inside of him. It sounded like blood dripping to the floor. It sounded like heartache.
And then Aoi took his risk and looked up, eyes searching until he met the source of the voice. He soon found him, and the sight was more than he could bear.
Ruki’s eyes were like a pair of embers that were losing their flicker, dark and unfathomable. For a second the two of them looked at each other, eye to eye, sending invisible messages across the room, through the space and time that stretched between them. For a second, Aoi could see what real pain looked like. For a second, Aoi was drowning again, asphyxiating.
That one second did eventually pass by. Minutes later, Ruki was already on his way leaving the building. Aoi, in the mean time, was drowning even deeper in this pool of guilt.
===
Mornings with hangovers were never Aoi’s favorite. He loathed the headache, the pain that made him feel as if his skull would soon split into two. He hated the despicable taste of bile that was rising from the depth of his stomach, waiting to burst from his throat. But he supposed all this suffering was worth it; at least it was taking his mind off of the things he intended to forget. It was keeping him busy, distracting him from the ghost of his nightmare that was hanging close by. He knew that by the time this headache subsided, he would have to face reality again and, as he had learned the hard way, reality was a bitch-an even more infuriating bitch than the worst of all hangovers in the world.
Day six of self-blaming, he had drained his alcohol storage and now he felt completely fucked up.
He groaned when he rolled around in bed, the pain throbbing brutally inside his head. He closed his eyes only to see flares of lightning, red and menacing, ruining his otherwise dark and peaceful solitude. He needed aspirin, a whole fucking bottle of it. He needed to die.
Maybe that’s the quickest, less stressful way to end this whole mess. Die. To cease being alive. Being alive meant being aware of every single mistake he had done in the years that he had lived. There was no way to count just how many mistakes he had done so far, but the one he had committed recently overshadowed every other sins. The guilt it brought him was worse than anything else he had ever experienced; even if all his other mistakes were to be combined and dumped altogether over his head, he was certain he wouldn’t have felt this horrible.
He knew he sounded like a desperate man-he was a desperate man, at the moment, and it didn’t go well with his conscience. He wasn’t used to being a desperate man; no, he had always been able to see the positive side of every difficulty, but that was before he had violated his own virtues.
Guilt does that to you; change you into a whole different person. It happens all the time.
Was there any use in wishing he could turn back time and relive his past all over again? But even if it was possible, if some miracle was to happen and he could return that moment, would he do or say anything differently? Would he be able stop himself from ruining what was precious for him, for his life and his surroundings?
When he inhaled, sensing the faint remnants of a cologne that wasn’t his still clinging to his pillow cover, he thought no. No, he wouldn’t have been able to stop. He wouldn’t have withdrawn from that cursed kiss. He wouldn’t have ceased touching the person he shouldn’t have touched in the first place. He wouldn’t have been able to prevent himself from falling. It was inevitable; like a hole in the road that you just couldn’t swerve away from. It had always been there, deep inside of him, buried deep in denial. It had been waiting for its’ time to break through. And now it had made its’ appearance.
He clutched his pillow tight, the pillow that still smelled slightly of him.
“Oh God, how could I… Ruki, I…”
… Love you.
===
“Yuu, just tell me what’s wrong.”
Aoi wanted to laugh, and he would have already if he hadn’t remembered they were sitting in a restaurant where several other people were present. It wouldn’t be really nice if they started an argument-which would almost certainly end up with her making a scene-here. People were watching, listening. A soul or two might recognize him for being one of Japan’s most well known rock stars nowadays; it’s too big of a risk to take. Not that it would have been easier had they picked a more private place to talk.
And what an appropriate timing, he thought, for her to come up with this topic. He was already so close to the verge; it would only take one push to send him off to his doom, and now she had come forth with her worries and her concern, and she was looking at him with those eyes. She wished to know what was wrong, but was she prepared to know the truth? How would she react if he told her what she really wanted to know?
I fucked up. I had sex with my bandmate, and now I think I’m in love with him.
How was he supposed to say that in front of her? Did he have the heart to rip the heart that had been handed to him, crush it in his fist and throw the remaining to the ground? Was he able to wipe that smile off her face and replace it with tears instead?
“Nothing,” he finally said, forcing a smile to spread on his stiff lips. “I’m just tired. Too much work.”
Deep inside he was dying, his heart was retching, his soul was screaming.
I love you, I really do. But I love him more.
Day twelve of self-loathing, he could no longer look straight into her eyes. He had told her too many lies; it was getting difficult to let her see through him, for fear of her finding out the truth that he had been hiding.
===
The traces of her lipgloss hadn’t even faded from his lips when he crushed them against Ruki’s supple, seemingly always accepting ones. He didn’t know what Ruki thought of it-of how obvious his betrayal was, as if he was flaunting it out in the open; but the agony had already become too much for him to endure. Days and nights he had struggled to repress it, but there was no use. He had been aching for this, for just one touch, one kiss.
There is no restraining love. It will only consume you if you try.
He could taste anger, frustration, sadness, hope, love-all meshed up in Ruki’s harsh, fervent kisses. It was as if Ruki was desperately trying to convey all these emotions Aoi had evoked in him with this kiss. His hands were clutching onto Aoi’s shirt, the same shirt that she had put her hands on earlier tonight before he bid his momentary farewell-and yes, he had told her the same old alibi: he had to finish his work in the studio. He didn’t know if she had bought his lie, but right now it didn’t seem to matter-nothing else seemed to matter except the sensation he received from pressing his body hard against Ruki’s. He could immediately feel heat emanating from Ruki’s skin even through the clothes they wore, a heat so intense he felt like he was being burnt alive.
Her smile flashed across his mind as he tumbled onto the bed, bringing Ruki’s lithe body along with him. He remembered the look on her face when they parted ways just a few hours ago. It was heartbreaking how trusting she was after all the lies he laid out in front of her. She didn’t deserve this. It was unfair that she was hurt, when her only mistake was to love him with all her heart.
But what did that mean when all he really wanted was something else-someone else?
He opened his eyes, watching the look plastered on Ruki’s face while his lips latched onto Ruki’s, their tongues dancing together. He watched as Ruki’s eyelids fluttered, small drops of tears clinging to those soft lashes. He watched, unceasingly, as smooth, creamy skin began to appear, inch by inch as he peeled Ruki’s clothes off of the man’s body. He watched-couldn’t help but keep watching when he put his hands on that seemingly untainted skin and began mapping, memorizing, discovering. Something inside of him churned-an odd mixture of delight and despair-when Ruki moaned his name, his body arching into his touch.
I’m sorry, I’m so sorry for doing this to you over and over again. I never meant to hurt you, but even if I knew my existence brought you nothing but pain, I just had to come back to you. I’ve tried to survive without you, breathe without you, but it turned out to be impossible, because when you were not there with me, when I couldn’t see you or feel you… I was dying.
The words were reeling inside his head, but his tongue was tied, his voice was drowning in the tension that was breaking through his whole body. He wanted to tell Ruki all that, but with his speaking capability currently going into malfunction, he could only speak with his hands, his lips, tongue, breath, body. His wish was that Ruki could translate his touches into the words he intended to say but couldn’t.
It became somewhat like a conversation between two mutes. Aoi felt himself throb, acknowledging Ruki’s frantic movements, listening to Ruki’s silent speech. Skin on skin, everything became clearer-the language that only they could understand, the words that only they could interpret. There wasn’t any cryptic secret, no fancy mystery; there was just the truth. And it was such a grand thing, truth. It was something that neither he nor Ruki could predict. It came without warning, and it straightly stripped them off of every pretense, baring them open for each other to read and to comprehend. Tonight, they were no one else but themselves; no makeup to hide their true selves, and no words to spell another lie.
Aoi held Ruki’s smooth body tightly, burying himself as deep as he could go inside Ruki’s warmth. The sound of Ruki’s restrained cry, the whisper of his name slithering from those lush lips urged him on to take what he had come to take. He moved, slowly, not wanting to rush so that it would be easier to understand these soundless words that they were both saying to each other. It was like listening to Ruki whisper into his ear the answers to all his questions, unveiling all of his deepest secrets. Aoi couldn’t help but to be awed as one by one these revelations emerged and became known.
Understanding you is a breathtaking process. Tell me more. Tell me all about you, about your feelings, about why exactly I am continuously drawn to you although I know I shouldn’t… just like a moth to flame.
As time progressed, their rhythm gradually accelerated, their heat slowly intensified. Even if he was so caught in the moment, it was impossible for Aoi not to be aware of the sensation that grew inside of him. He couldn’t exactly put a name on it but he knew it was there. All those days worth of frustration suddenly became nothing more but pieces of memories at the back of his mind, and now he felt as if he hadn’t been suffering from near-insanity for the last twelve days. It wasn’t an illusion, no, however absurd it may sound. It was as real as every single thing that they had been sharing between them tonight. With every touch of Ruki’s hands on his body, he felt his distress melting away, his confusion and his foolish reasoning vanishing, leaving him this large space in his conscience that was filled with comprehension and awareness.
Tonight, for the first time in the many years of his life, he felt complete. Just one look into Ruki’s eyes-those eyes that were now once again flickering with fiercely bright sparks-he felt like his personal war was finally coming to an end. Now he knew everything he had always wanted to know, discovered everything he had been searching for. He felt… fulfilled, and he honestly thought it was one heck of a wonderful feeling.
===
It was 04.00 a.m.; Aoi looked at his phone, feeling irritated by the blinking numbers on the screen that seemed so persistent in reminding him about the time. He rose up from the bed, fighting against the heavy lump that settled in every nerve string in his body. He didn’t want to go, that much was obvious, but he knew he had to. Someone was waiting for him back in his apartment, someone who would begin thinking his ‘work in the studio’ alibi was too much of a cliché to be used repeatedly, again and again. Difficult though it may be, tonight he would have to come up with another alibi, another lie. Tonight he would make sure her smile and her trust didn’t fade away too soon.
He could tell that someday later the weight of lies would drag him down and bring him the end of everything he had been struggling for so far. It wasn’t about her, although of course Aoi cared a lot about her and her feelings for him, and he would hate to have to hurt her; after everything they had gone through, he did love her and wished she could be happy. He also hoped he could, maybe, if God permit, spend the rest of his life with her. What mattered the most for him, truthfully, was the future itself in which she happened to be a part of. He had had his plans carefully mapped out, a plot of his life and what he wanted to do once his youth had passed him by. When all these bright lights, fame and exposure were over, he wanted to live a peaceful life, share the remaining of his days with someone he loved, someone who loved him in return. He wanted to have children, watch them grow old-make sure that a little part of him would continue living in this world even after he was gone.
Was he, or would he ever be ready to let go of all of those for the sake of one person?
“You’re leaving.”
Aoi stopped dead in his tracks just when he was reaching down for his shirt. Ruki’s voice pierced through the air like a cold knife through his flesh, leaving behind a fresh wound that throbbed with pain.
It wasn’t a question, Aoi knew. It was the outcome of Ruki’s observation; it was Ruki wording out the truth. The voice, laced with grief and dejection which Ruki barely tried to hide, had just read out Aoi’s verdict. It was a harsh one, but he knew he deserved it. As a matter of fact, he deserved something much, much worse. He even deserved to suffer Ruki’s hatred and anger, although he hoped with all his heart that wasn’t a part of Ruki’s ideas.
“I am,” he confirmed, taking one deep breath before turning around and meeting Ruki’s gaze.
The silent disappointment that he found in those eyes hurt him more than anything else that Ruki might have told him or done to him, but he braced himself. If there was anyone hurting the most here, it was Ruki. What Aoi felt, no matter how horrible it was, could never compare to how Ruki felt at the moment. And it was all because of him; he was the cause of Ruki’s pain. How was he supposed to take it away, take that pain away from Ruki and give him what he actually needed?
Slowly, he approached the bed and laid down right next to Ruki’s nude figure. How could anyone look so tragically beautiful? It was as if he was a man of paradox; everything, every aspect that Ruki was made of contradicted one another. It was intoxicating, absorbing, staring at Ruki, because there was so much hidden underneath his skin. So much to understand, so much to uncover; Ruki was such a complicated being, but tonight Aoi learned one thing about him that was clear and unmistakable: Ruki loved him. Ruki loved him deeply and unconditionally. There was no paradox in that. It was plain truth, there was just no way Aoi could misinterpret it.
Pushing back his anxiety, gently he took Ruki into his hold, kissed his lips, and told him the words that would surely open the gate of his doom.
“I can’t stay, not tonight. But someday soon, if you’re still willing to spare me some space here…” he placed his palm on Ruki’s chest where he could feel Ruki’s heart beating evenly. “… I would like to stay, once and for all.”
===
Aoi gazed down at her sleeping figure, following the curves of her face with his eyes. Her innocence-her lack of knowledge of what was going on behind her back was tearing Aoi’s heart to pieces. With her, he could someday build a small but happy family, and live their lives in the house by the beach like they had planned. She brought along with her the dream of every man, and he had her in his palms. What was left for him to do was to decide whether he would grasp her and keep her secure in his life, or let her and all hopes of a peaceful future fly away from his hands.
In every man’s life, there will come a time when you feel like you’re standing in between two choices, and you feel like you can never choose. Every option seems important. You just don’t know which one you can let go. But when you look deep inside, you’ll find that you have actually made your choice from the very beginning. It’s what you’ve always needed, although you weren’t always aware of it. The only problem is: do you have the courage to take the choice you’ve already made, carry on with it, and face its’ consequences?
The clock on the bedside nightstand showed 05.10 a.m. It was nearing dawn, the beginning of day one: self-preparation. It would take quite a while to get ready for the day to come when he would no longer have to hurt her.
~ THE END ~
A/N: So... how was it...? *fiddles thumbs*
| Fanfic List | AoixRuki 50stories Project List |
| Drop in your questions & suggestions here |
Chapter: 1/1 (one-shot)
Author: akichuu
Fandom: the GazettE
Pairing: AoixRuki, RukixAoi, AoixOC
Rating: R
Genre: angst, drama
Warnings: Yaoi, slight manxman smex, cheating!Aoi.
Disclaimer: the GazettE belongs to themselves and, yes, the Almighty PSC. I, well I own this story. It's fiction, meaning IT'S NOT REAL and I'm making no profit from it (except my 15 minutes of fame). Yes, mind that.
Beta: None this time.
Summary: … He wouldn’t have been able to prevent himself from falling. It was inevitable; like a hole in the road that you just couldn’t swerve away from. It had always been there, deep inside of him, buried deep in denial. It had been waiting for its’ time to break through. And now it had made its’ appearance.
Comment: This one-shot is sort of a continuation of a couple of one-shots I’ve written, titled ‘Runaway’ and ‘Addiction: The Taste of Sin’. I do suggest you to read those two earlier one-shots before you read this (hahaha~), but I suppose it's also fine if you wish to jump to this story instead. For this one-shot, I'm using the same situation that I had created in the two earlier parts. It has the same ongoing conflict, the same confusion between the two men and everything, but here I decided to take Aoi’s point of view instead of Ruki’s. I’m not planning on writing another part after this; I just hope that, for now, this will set some things clear. I hope you enjoy :)
BGM: the GazettE - CALM ENVY (I suggest you listen to the live version, taken from Repeated Countless Error. I don’t know why but I think it was more touching than the recorded version…)
A Moth to Flame
Aoi wouldn’t lie, not to himself, not about how he felt. Yes it hurt. In fact, it hurt so fucking bad. It was as if the weight of the entire world was placed upon his chest, crushing him flat against the floor. Each new second he had to suffer through, the pain grew, expanding inside his chest until there seemed to be no space left for his heart to beat. Every breath felt like a thousand needles entering his lungs. He couldn’t breathe without having to endure the pain splitting him apart from the inside.
What sucked the most was the realization that it would not get any easier, not when he was the cause of his own misery. He had screwed up his own life, and he had no idea how to set things right. He had tried calculating his chances, analyzing the situation from every angle he could find. At the end of every trial, he had only found the same old, annoying dead end. It was like he was stuck in a stupid game show where he needed to guess which door would lead him to his victory, but every guess he made only led him to the sign that spelled “Sorry, wrong door.”
It took so much of him, so many futile attempts until he came to this point where giving up seemed like the most rational choice. Rational, quite unfortunately, didn’t always mean executable. He knew if he gave up then it was all over-everything he had so stubbornly hung on to, everything that had made up for all the reasons he ever needed to keep going. His hands were starting to bleed from clutching onto these shards of hope, but if he let go, then it would be the end of it… the end of his life.
Day four of self-condemning, day eight of the band’s pre-production stage, Aoi found himself sitting-or rather, sinking into the couch in Uruha’s living room, staring disinterestedly at the owner of the apartment and the bassist who were getting into a rather heated argument regarding the song they had been working on for the past ten hours or so. It was a silly technical issue; Uruha insisted that Reita should do some bass maneuver shit but Reita just didn’t get what kind of maneuver Uruha really wanted. Aoi honestly didn’t give a damn; he just wanted this meeting to be over soon so he could go home, home where bottles and bottles of blessed alcohol were there on his rescue. Fuck, God, he needed to be drunk tonight… again.
“Okay you two, stop it,” Kai’s tired voice broke up the two’s endless quarrel. “It’s 2 freaking a.m. for God’s sake. You can continue arguing about this minor detail tomorrow because I don’t think the rest of us still have enough patience to wait until your discussion is over.”
Aoi could have given Kai a big hug if he hadn’t been feeling so morose and so desperate to leave this place-leave the circle of people that was starting to make him suffocate. It wasn’t normal to be feeling like this around the people he had considered as family, more than just bandmates. But recently nothing had been normal. Nothing had gone like they used to after what had happened. And whose fault was that? Whose fault was it that his life had been so fucked up lately?
Gingerly he moved to sit upright on the sofa, trying to brush off the bitter resentment that he felt rising up in his stomach. He would never get used to this, he thought. There was no getting used to guilt, to self-hatred. He could spend days drowning himself in this flood of emotions but he knew it wouldn’t do him any good; he couldn’t just suddenly develop an ability to breathe underwater. There were only so many attempts to surface that he could try before he wore himself out, before his muscles gave up… before the surge won and swallowed him whole.
Don’t you think life has its’ very own special way to fuck you up, inside and out, thoroughly and completely?
Just when he began thinking about irony and its’ recent daily visits, he heard the voice-the very same voice that had been haunting his nights, clouding his days, and messing up his brain. Like a drop of acid on his already torn skin, the voice cut through him giving him the taste of pain he had never known existed in this world. And it was pathetic, really, to think it was nothing more than a short farewell greeting.
“See you all tomorrow.”
The words were simple; words you would say to your colleagues, friends, families when you were ending your conversation. To Aoi, the voice sounded different than it might have sounded in his bandmates’ ears. It sounded, disturbingly, almost in tune with the ripping noise that came from deep inside of him. It sounded like blood dripping to the floor. It sounded like heartache.
And then Aoi took his risk and looked up, eyes searching until he met the source of the voice. He soon found him, and the sight was more than he could bear.
Ruki’s eyes were like a pair of embers that were losing their flicker, dark and unfathomable. For a second the two of them looked at each other, eye to eye, sending invisible messages across the room, through the space and time that stretched between them. For a second, Aoi could see what real pain looked like. For a second, Aoi was drowning again, asphyxiating.
That one second did eventually pass by. Minutes later, Ruki was already on his way leaving the building. Aoi, in the mean time, was drowning even deeper in this pool of guilt.
===
Mornings with hangovers were never Aoi’s favorite. He loathed the headache, the pain that made him feel as if his skull would soon split into two. He hated the despicable taste of bile that was rising from the depth of his stomach, waiting to burst from his throat. But he supposed all this suffering was worth it; at least it was taking his mind off of the things he intended to forget. It was keeping him busy, distracting him from the ghost of his nightmare that was hanging close by. He knew that by the time this headache subsided, he would have to face reality again and, as he had learned the hard way, reality was a bitch-an even more infuriating bitch than the worst of all hangovers in the world.
Day six of self-blaming, he had drained his alcohol storage and now he felt completely fucked up.
He groaned when he rolled around in bed, the pain throbbing brutally inside his head. He closed his eyes only to see flares of lightning, red and menacing, ruining his otherwise dark and peaceful solitude. He needed aspirin, a whole fucking bottle of it. He needed to die.
Maybe that’s the quickest, less stressful way to end this whole mess. Die. To cease being alive. Being alive meant being aware of every single mistake he had done in the years that he had lived. There was no way to count just how many mistakes he had done so far, but the one he had committed recently overshadowed every other sins. The guilt it brought him was worse than anything else he had ever experienced; even if all his other mistakes were to be combined and dumped altogether over his head, he was certain he wouldn’t have felt this horrible.
He knew he sounded like a desperate man-he was a desperate man, at the moment, and it didn’t go well with his conscience. He wasn’t used to being a desperate man; no, he had always been able to see the positive side of every difficulty, but that was before he had violated his own virtues.
Guilt does that to you; change you into a whole different person. It happens all the time.
Was there any use in wishing he could turn back time and relive his past all over again? But even if it was possible, if some miracle was to happen and he could return that moment, would he do or say anything differently? Would he be able stop himself from ruining what was precious for him, for his life and his surroundings?
When he inhaled, sensing the faint remnants of a cologne that wasn’t his still clinging to his pillow cover, he thought no. No, he wouldn’t have been able to stop. He wouldn’t have withdrawn from that cursed kiss. He wouldn’t have ceased touching the person he shouldn’t have touched in the first place. He wouldn’t have been able to prevent himself from falling. It was inevitable; like a hole in the road that you just couldn’t swerve away from. It had always been there, deep inside of him, buried deep in denial. It had been waiting for its’ time to break through. And now it had made its’ appearance.
He clutched his pillow tight, the pillow that still smelled slightly of him.
“Oh God, how could I… Ruki, I…”
… Love you.
===
“Yuu, just tell me what’s wrong.”
Aoi wanted to laugh, and he would have already if he hadn’t remembered they were sitting in a restaurant where several other people were present. It wouldn’t be really nice if they started an argument-which would almost certainly end up with her making a scene-here. People were watching, listening. A soul or two might recognize him for being one of Japan’s most well known rock stars nowadays; it’s too big of a risk to take. Not that it would have been easier had they picked a more private place to talk.
And what an appropriate timing, he thought, for her to come up with this topic. He was already so close to the verge; it would only take one push to send him off to his doom, and now she had come forth with her worries and her concern, and she was looking at him with those eyes. She wished to know what was wrong, but was she prepared to know the truth? How would she react if he told her what she really wanted to know?
I fucked up. I had sex with my bandmate, and now I think I’m in love with him.
How was he supposed to say that in front of her? Did he have the heart to rip the heart that had been handed to him, crush it in his fist and throw the remaining to the ground? Was he able to wipe that smile off her face and replace it with tears instead?
“Nothing,” he finally said, forcing a smile to spread on his stiff lips. “I’m just tired. Too much work.”
Deep inside he was dying, his heart was retching, his soul was screaming.
I love you, I really do. But I love him more.
Day twelve of self-loathing, he could no longer look straight into her eyes. He had told her too many lies; it was getting difficult to let her see through him, for fear of her finding out the truth that he had been hiding.
===
The traces of her lipgloss hadn’t even faded from his lips when he crushed them against Ruki’s supple, seemingly always accepting ones. He didn’t know what Ruki thought of it-of how obvious his betrayal was, as if he was flaunting it out in the open; but the agony had already become too much for him to endure. Days and nights he had struggled to repress it, but there was no use. He had been aching for this, for just one touch, one kiss.
There is no restraining love. It will only consume you if you try.
He could taste anger, frustration, sadness, hope, love-all meshed up in Ruki’s harsh, fervent kisses. It was as if Ruki was desperately trying to convey all these emotions Aoi had evoked in him with this kiss. His hands were clutching onto Aoi’s shirt, the same shirt that she had put her hands on earlier tonight before he bid his momentary farewell-and yes, he had told her the same old alibi: he had to finish his work in the studio. He didn’t know if she had bought his lie, but right now it didn’t seem to matter-nothing else seemed to matter except the sensation he received from pressing his body hard against Ruki’s. He could immediately feel heat emanating from Ruki’s skin even through the clothes they wore, a heat so intense he felt like he was being burnt alive.
Her smile flashed across his mind as he tumbled onto the bed, bringing Ruki’s lithe body along with him. He remembered the look on her face when they parted ways just a few hours ago. It was heartbreaking how trusting she was after all the lies he laid out in front of her. She didn’t deserve this. It was unfair that she was hurt, when her only mistake was to love him with all her heart.
But what did that mean when all he really wanted was something else-someone else?
He opened his eyes, watching the look plastered on Ruki’s face while his lips latched onto Ruki’s, their tongues dancing together. He watched as Ruki’s eyelids fluttered, small drops of tears clinging to those soft lashes. He watched, unceasingly, as smooth, creamy skin began to appear, inch by inch as he peeled Ruki’s clothes off of the man’s body. He watched-couldn’t help but keep watching when he put his hands on that seemingly untainted skin and began mapping, memorizing, discovering. Something inside of him churned-an odd mixture of delight and despair-when Ruki moaned his name, his body arching into his touch.
I’m sorry, I’m so sorry for doing this to you over and over again. I never meant to hurt you, but even if I knew my existence brought you nothing but pain, I just had to come back to you. I’ve tried to survive without you, breathe without you, but it turned out to be impossible, because when you were not there with me, when I couldn’t see you or feel you… I was dying.
The words were reeling inside his head, but his tongue was tied, his voice was drowning in the tension that was breaking through his whole body. He wanted to tell Ruki all that, but with his speaking capability currently going into malfunction, he could only speak with his hands, his lips, tongue, breath, body. His wish was that Ruki could translate his touches into the words he intended to say but couldn’t.
It became somewhat like a conversation between two mutes. Aoi felt himself throb, acknowledging Ruki’s frantic movements, listening to Ruki’s silent speech. Skin on skin, everything became clearer-the language that only they could understand, the words that only they could interpret. There wasn’t any cryptic secret, no fancy mystery; there was just the truth. And it was such a grand thing, truth. It was something that neither he nor Ruki could predict. It came without warning, and it straightly stripped them off of every pretense, baring them open for each other to read and to comprehend. Tonight, they were no one else but themselves; no makeup to hide their true selves, and no words to spell another lie.
Aoi held Ruki’s smooth body tightly, burying himself as deep as he could go inside Ruki’s warmth. The sound of Ruki’s restrained cry, the whisper of his name slithering from those lush lips urged him on to take what he had come to take. He moved, slowly, not wanting to rush so that it would be easier to understand these soundless words that they were both saying to each other. It was like listening to Ruki whisper into his ear the answers to all his questions, unveiling all of his deepest secrets. Aoi couldn’t help but to be awed as one by one these revelations emerged and became known.
Understanding you is a breathtaking process. Tell me more. Tell me all about you, about your feelings, about why exactly I am continuously drawn to you although I know I shouldn’t… just like a moth to flame.
As time progressed, their rhythm gradually accelerated, their heat slowly intensified. Even if he was so caught in the moment, it was impossible for Aoi not to be aware of the sensation that grew inside of him. He couldn’t exactly put a name on it but he knew it was there. All those days worth of frustration suddenly became nothing more but pieces of memories at the back of his mind, and now he felt as if he hadn’t been suffering from near-insanity for the last twelve days. It wasn’t an illusion, no, however absurd it may sound. It was as real as every single thing that they had been sharing between them tonight. With every touch of Ruki’s hands on his body, he felt his distress melting away, his confusion and his foolish reasoning vanishing, leaving him this large space in his conscience that was filled with comprehension and awareness.
Tonight, for the first time in the many years of his life, he felt complete. Just one look into Ruki’s eyes-those eyes that were now once again flickering with fiercely bright sparks-he felt like his personal war was finally coming to an end. Now he knew everything he had always wanted to know, discovered everything he had been searching for. He felt… fulfilled, and he honestly thought it was one heck of a wonderful feeling.
===
It was 04.00 a.m.; Aoi looked at his phone, feeling irritated by the blinking numbers on the screen that seemed so persistent in reminding him about the time. He rose up from the bed, fighting against the heavy lump that settled in every nerve string in his body. He didn’t want to go, that much was obvious, but he knew he had to. Someone was waiting for him back in his apartment, someone who would begin thinking his ‘work in the studio’ alibi was too much of a cliché to be used repeatedly, again and again. Difficult though it may be, tonight he would have to come up with another alibi, another lie. Tonight he would make sure her smile and her trust didn’t fade away too soon.
He could tell that someday later the weight of lies would drag him down and bring him the end of everything he had been struggling for so far. It wasn’t about her, although of course Aoi cared a lot about her and her feelings for him, and he would hate to have to hurt her; after everything they had gone through, he did love her and wished she could be happy. He also hoped he could, maybe, if God permit, spend the rest of his life with her. What mattered the most for him, truthfully, was the future itself in which she happened to be a part of. He had had his plans carefully mapped out, a plot of his life and what he wanted to do once his youth had passed him by. When all these bright lights, fame and exposure were over, he wanted to live a peaceful life, share the remaining of his days with someone he loved, someone who loved him in return. He wanted to have children, watch them grow old-make sure that a little part of him would continue living in this world even after he was gone.
Was he, or would he ever be ready to let go of all of those for the sake of one person?
“You’re leaving.”
Aoi stopped dead in his tracks just when he was reaching down for his shirt. Ruki’s voice pierced through the air like a cold knife through his flesh, leaving behind a fresh wound that throbbed with pain.
It wasn’t a question, Aoi knew. It was the outcome of Ruki’s observation; it was Ruki wording out the truth. The voice, laced with grief and dejection which Ruki barely tried to hide, had just read out Aoi’s verdict. It was a harsh one, but he knew he deserved it. As a matter of fact, he deserved something much, much worse. He even deserved to suffer Ruki’s hatred and anger, although he hoped with all his heart that wasn’t a part of Ruki’s ideas.
“I am,” he confirmed, taking one deep breath before turning around and meeting Ruki’s gaze.
The silent disappointment that he found in those eyes hurt him more than anything else that Ruki might have told him or done to him, but he braced himself. If there was anyone hurting the most here, it was Ruki. What Aoi felt, no matter how horrible it was, could never compare to how Ruki felt at the moment. And it was all because of him; he was the cause of Ruki’s pain. How was he supposed to take it away, take that pain away from Ruki and give him what he actually needed?
Slowly, he approached the bed and laid down right next to Ruki’s nude figure. How could anyone look so tragically beautiful? It was as if he was a man of paradox; everything, every aspect that Ruki was made of contradicted one another. It was intoxicating, absorbing, staring at Ruki, because there was so much hidden underneath his skin. So much to understand, so much to uncover; Ruki was such a complicated being, but tonight Aoi learned one thing about him that was clear and unmistakable: Ruki loved him. Ruki loved him deeply and unconditionally. There was no paradox in that. It was plain truth, there was just no way Aoi could misinterpret it.
Pushing back his anxiety, gently he took Ruki into his hold, kissed his lips, and told him the words that would surely open the gate of his doom.
“I can’t stay, not tonight. But someday soon, if you’re still willing to spare me some space here…” he placed his palm on Ruki’s chest where he could feel Ruki’s heart beating evenly. “… I would like to stay, once and for all.”
===
Aoi gazed down at her sleeping figure, following the curves of her face with his eyes. Her innocence-her lack of knowledge of what was going on behind her back was tearing Aoi’s heart to pieces. With her, he could someday build a small but happy family, and live their lives in the house by the beach like they had planned. She brought along with her the dream of every man, and he had her in his palms. What was left for him to do was to decide whether he would grasp her and keep her secure in his life, or let her and all hopes of a peaceful future fly away from his hands.
In every man’s life, there will come a time when you feel like you’re standing in between two choices, and you feel like you can never choose. Every option seems important. You just don’t know which one you can let go. But when you look deep inside, you’ll find that you have actually made your choice from the very beginning. It’s what you’ve always needed, although you weren’t always aware of it. The only problem is: do you have the courage to take the choice you’ve already made, carry on with it, and face its’ consequences?
The clock on the bedside nightstand showed 05.10 a.m. It was nearing dawn, the beginning of day one: self-preparation. It would take quite a while to get ready for the day to come when he would no longer have to hurt her.
~ THE END ~
A/N: So... how was it...? *fiddles thumbs*
| Fanfic List | AoixRuki 50stories Project List |
| Drop in your questions & suggestions here |