Just because college is a Labyrinth doesn't mean you're gonna meet David Bowie.
TITLE: Collection
FANDOM: Katekyo Hitman Reborn!
RATED: K
PAIRINGS: Mukuro/Chrome
SUMMARY: He teaches her illusions like he teaches her Italian.
CHALLENGE: 30_romances
THEME: #8 - Analysis ; Collection
Turpentine waves lap the lake's shore, in and out, in and out. It breathes in motion and sound. She can see a bank on the other side spread with the pale white of exposed sand. Where the soil darkens, evergreen trees grow, and above these living towers so small in the distance, the calcium moon sits on its throne. If Chrome tilts her head to the side, she would see it. Two eyes. One is clear, mottled with gray and yellow like marble. The other is reflected and distorted on the still water where the trees point down, buried almost. Symmetrical or parallel? Sound and water.
"Chrome, we are alike."
She is collecting pebbles, squatting near old branches pushed aside. Chrome has a little glass and she drops her stones into it. They remind her of berries in the way they roll and bounce. Sometimes, she finds a special one of pink sandstone and she tilts it this way and that to see every rugged, rosy angle. Her eye squints.
"Everything is real if you think hard enough."
They are just rocks. They talk to each other. They agree. Chrome eavesdrops, but she doesn't quite know the language. She doesn't want to interrupt them, and so she is reluctant to drift when the wind starts blowing across the lake, knocking the trees together. She tucks her arms into her stomach, cupping her palms over her elbows. The glass keeps her fingers in the chilly air instead of tucked under her long sleeves. The trees are bending, so flexible, and she wonders if they are really alive or just husks.
"But I have never made these things easy."
Her bare feet step into the water. The pebbles are sharper. The wind blows and breathes but never listens. She makes little splashes as the water comes up to her knees, distorting it with her own physical movement. Still, the ripples on the lake look different at the spot where the wind blows. That is the spot where a boat would catch the breeze, but there are no boats. A lake is inland water. Hidden water. It smells of leaves.
"You need to be fluent, Chrome." His words are a collection of Italian and magic. "Is something the matter?"
Slowly, please, and her thoughts are jumbled into please, slowly. The lake freezes and she stands on it. A big fish swims underneath her, fins back and forth.
"So I see. All right," he says stretching out, making himself more comfortable and open. "Repeat after me." She is listening. The pebbles are strewn before her.