second-to-last
31_days
ack
Title: Make Your Move
Day/Theme: September 21: I'm sick of waking up on your floor
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki,
Rating: PG, methinks.
Every time you wake up on the wooden floor, your first thought is that you’d rather he had a larger bed. Every previous night, he’d have taken the blanket on the floor, but you would refuse until he drops with exhaustion and you carry him the last metre because he is already asleep. And when you wake up, you wish you were in the same bed as he is.
It’s not simply because the floor is uncomfortable, although that is definitely a part. It’s not even because you harbour unchaste desires that you would be one step closer to fulfilling in that position, although you think it would be nice if someday there would be a way to traverse that particular road. But you can never be sure if he’s even there until you stand up and ease the bedroom door open. And if you could simply open your eyes to see him, or better yet wake up to him in your arms, life would be that much easier. The added benefits of such a position didn’t even require exploration just yet.
But every time, the idea is on the tip of your tongue when you swallow it down and fight for the placement you’re thoroughly sick of.
Not tonight, you vow. He’s already losing resistance fast, enough to let you support him without a fight. He fumbles with the key and you prepare the words in your head, already anticipating each and every response. There’s the customary argument that always results in your staying the night, and then the deviation that will land you in a softer and warmer place to sleep. He’s fuzzy with exhaustion and injury. He won’t argue convincingly enough to force you to win the floor.
“What are you doing?” you ask as he shuffles over to the shelves where he keeps the extra bedding. He glances back, surprised.
“Making an extra bed,” he replies without the tones of irritation he would normally have. You wonder if he’s more tired (or in more pain) than you had previously suspected.
“No need,” you say. “Yours is big enough.”
There is a pause big enough to span dimensions in seconds and you wonder if it wasn’t too soon, after all. But he stares for a moment and you realise he merely hasn’t comprehended quite what you’ve said. Before you can be overcome by the inevitable wave of fondness, you take action, pushing him towards the bed. “Lie down,” you say.
“I - what?” He understands better now. “What are you thinking?! If you think I’m going to let you go through my stuff to sort out a bed, you’re wrong!” Well, perhaps not.
You sigh. “Lie down and move over. As I said, your is big enough.”
He stares at you until the moment is broken by a gargantuan yawn. “You know what? Go ahead. But I had better not wake up on the floor or squished into the wall,” he finally says, giving up. “Good night.” He lies down on what he’s probably designated in his head “his side” and promptly falls asleep.
“Good night,” you tell him with all the fondness you had suppressed before, and crawl in next to him with complete disregard for all boundaries, which are only in his head anyway. He’ll wake up next morning in your arms and probably raise a fuss, as he’ll be awake and less receptive, but you don’t mind.
You know it’s possible, now. So this won’t be the last time.
Title: Morning After
Day/Theme: September 22: Your spectrum's a to z
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki
Rating: G
Analyzing the spectrum of his moods is like proving that no two snowflakes are alike, you think. Painstaking work that strains the vision and is more trouble than it’s worth, with an end result that is not only unsatisfactory but also far too uncertain. It’s difficult to tell what he’s feeling, let alone where that could lie on what he can feel.
You’ve experienced some extremes, it’s true. You’ve seen him angry, angrier than you’ve thought possible or really felt yourself. You’ve seen him bleak and resigned. You’ve seen his contented. And now…you’re not sure if it’s happiness you’ve seen on his face or a trick of the light, but you rather suspect it was the former. And not just him smirking, but genuine happiness, which is only a little too frightening a concept to contemplate at length.
You can’t help but think you’d like to see it again, though.
Title: Innocent Question
Day/Theme: September 23: If you find yourself caught in love
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki, Himawari
Rating: G
“What’s being in love like?” she asks one morning, and you are surprised to find it doesn’t hurt. Not even a twinge of residual pain. And then you realise you have no answer.
“I don’t remember,” you begin, but that is wrong. “I don’t know,” you amend, and she smiles at you.
“Don’t you?” she persists. “But what do you consider love?”
“Safety,” you say before thinking about it, and glance to the side a little to make sure unwanted ears were not listening. You hadn’t meant it like that. “Waking up knowing that nothing’s changed since the night before, because that person is there.” For once you can think clearly about her question because you’re not really tongue-tied around her anymore.
“A warm back to lean against?” she provides, and you agree after a moment of thought.
“Someone to hold you up.”
“Someone who’ll do anything for you,” she finishes, and bestows her best beaming smile upon you. “I think you’re wrong,” she continues. “I think you know exactly what it is to be in love.” And she turns to the side and waves. “Doumeki-kun!” she calls. “We were just talking about you!”
You aren’t sure whether you should be astounded by the lie or afraid of the truth.
Title: End of Denial
Day/Theme: September 24: The sudden wave of silver born in you
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki
Rating: G
You go home thinking that day, and while you hold your own in knowing yourself, logic puts up a convincing fight. For once he isn’t there to bother you - something to do with the class chairmen, as Himawari was mentioning a meeting earlier. You have all the silence you need to think in, and it’s driving your more than a little crazy.
Because what Himawari says isn’t impossible, not anymore. It’s not impossibility that’s the issue. Ever since the beginning of the month when she turned you down, you’ve been learning that in any aspect of life, nothing can be expected. At least, not for you. But while it’s not impossible, you don’t want it to be true. You don’t want to see everything in a new light, not when you were only just adjusting to night vision.
It is a slight comfort to know that at this point there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it, so you might as well make the most of the last vestiges of obliviousness before they too are ripped away.
Title: Memory
Day/Theme: September 26: Your hair was long when we first met
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki
Rating: G
A/N: Sorry to go out-of-order, but the next five are all in a direct sequence so I thought I'd post this one in this batch.
Your hair was long the first time you met Watanuki. Years later, you will look back and realise that the smiling boy with the blue eyes was the haunted spirit-seer that you devote your days to looking out for. You will think on it for a while, and decide that if you could see him smile so freely of your making, every single pain he’s inadvertently caused you would be worth it.
But when you met him, you were only concerned with how the initial difficulty of wearing a dress was wearing thin, and that the smiling blue-eyed boy was pointing and laughing at something that your grandfather could see but was merely air and dust to you.
In that moment you felt envy, envy you retain a small seed of when years later a woman tells you of the price Watanuki paid for his privilege, envy that pushes you to anger with the boy who would pay a high price to give up something so precious.
This envy will last you until the day you shoot an arrow to save him from a fate he’s embraced unwittingly and realise that all things have a price, and that the price he will pay to lose the ability is far less than the price to retain it. But you will wish (only to yourself) that you could somehow find the smiling boy in the struggling youth now, and that you could bear his burden until he finds a way to be free of it.
You will know that although you would have paid a high price for it once, it would burden you as it burdens him. The thought will be oddly comforting.
ack
Title: Make Your Move
Day/Theme: September 21: I'm sick of waking up on your floor
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki,
Rating: PG, methinks.
Every time you wake up on the wooden floor, your first thought is that you’d rather he had a larger bed. Every previous night, he’d have taken the blanket on the floor, but you would refuse until he drops with exhaustion and you carry him the last metre because he is already asleep. And when you wake up, you wish you were in the same bed as he is.
It’s not simply because the floor is uncomfortable, although that is definitely a part. It’s not even because you harbour unchaste desires that you would be one step closer to fulfilling in that position, although you think it would be nice if someday there would be a way to traverse that particular road. But you can never be sure if he’s even there until you stand up and ease the bedroom door open. And if you could simply open your eyes to see him, or better yet wake up to him in your arms, life would be that much easier. The added benefits of such a position didn’t even require exploration just yet.
But every time, the idea is on the tip of your tongue when you swallow it down and fight for the placement you’re thoroughly sick of.
Not tonight, you vow. He’s already losing resistance fast, enough to let you support him without a fight. He fumbles with the key and you prepare the words in your head, already anticipating each and every response. There’s the customary argument that always results in your staying the night, and then the deviation that will land you in a softer and warmer place to sleep. He’s fuzzy with exhaustion and injury. He won’t argue convincingly enough to force you to win the floor.
“What are you doing?” you ask as he shuffles over to the shelves where he keeps the extra bedding. He glances back, surprised.
“Making an extra bed,” he replies without the tones of irritation he would normally have. You wonder if he’s more tired (or in more pain) than you had previously suspected.
“No need,” you say. “Yours is big enough.”
There is a pause big enough to span dimensions in seconds and you wonder if it wasn’t too soon, after all. But he stares for a moment and you realise he merely hasn’t comprehended quite what you’ve said. Before you can be overcome by the inevitable wave of fondness, you take action, pushing him towards the bed. “Lie down,” you say.
“I - what?” He understands better now. “What are you thinking?! If you think I’m going to let you go through my stuff to sort out a bed, you’re wrong!” Well, perhaps not.
You sigh. “Lie down and move over. As I said, your is big enough.”
He stares at you until the moment is broken by a gargantuan yawn. “You know what? Go ahead. But I had better not wake up on the floor or squished into the wall,” he finally says, giving up. “Good night.” He lies down on what he’s probably designated in his head “his side” and promptly falls asleep.
“Good night,” you tell him with all the fondness you had suppressed before, and crawl in next to him with complete disregard for all boundaries, which are only in his head anyway. He’ll wake up next morning in your arms and probably raise a fuss, as he’ll be awake and less receptive, but you don’t mind.
You know it’s possible, now. So this won’t be the last time.
Title: Morning After
Day/Theme: September 22: Your spectrum's a to z
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki
Rating: G
Analyzing the spectrum of his moods is like proving that no two snowflakes are alike, you think. Painstaking work that strains the vision and is more trouble than it’s worth, with an end result that is not only unsatisfactory but also far too uncertain. It’s difficult to tell what he’s feeling, let alone where that could lie on what he can feel.
You’ve experienced some extremes, it’s true. You’ve seen him angry, angrier than you’ve thought possible or really felt yourself. You’ve seen him bleak and resigned. You’ve seen his contented. And now…you’re not sure if it’s happiness you’ve seen on his face or a trick of the light, but you rather suspect it was the former. And not just him smirking, but genuine happiness, which is only a little too frightening a concept to contemplate at length.
You can’t help but think you’d like to see it again, though.
Title: Innocent Question
Day/Theme: September 23: If you find yourself caught in love
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki, Himawari
Rating: G
“What’s being in love like?” she asks one morning, and you are surprised to find it doesn’t hurt. Not even a twinge of residual pain. And then you realise you have no answer.
“I don’t remember,” you begin, but that is wrong. “I don’t know,” you amend, and she smiles at you.
“Don’t you?” she persists. “But what do you consider love?”
“Safety,” you say before thinking about it, and glance to the side a little to make sure unwanted ears were not listening. You hadn’t meant it like that. “Waking up knowing that nothing’s changed since the night before, because that person is there.” For once you can think clearly about her question because you’re not really tongue-tied around her anymore.
“A warm back to lean against?” she provides, and you agree after a moment of thought.
“Someone to hold you up.”
“Someone who’ll do anything for you,” she finishes, and bestows her best beaming smile upon you. “I think you’re wrong,” she continues. “I think you know exactly what it is to be in love.” And she turns to the side and waves. “Doumeki-kun!” she calls. “We were just talking about you!”
You aren’t sure whether you should be astounded by the lie or afraid of the truth.
Title: End of Denial
Day/Theme: September 24: The sudden wave of silver born in you
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki
Rating: G
You go home thinking that day, and while you hold your own in knowing yourself, logic puts up a convincing fight. For once he isn’t there to bother you - something to do with the class chairmen, as Himawari was mentioning a meeting earlier. You have all the silence you need to think in, and it’s driving your more than a little crazy.
Because what Himawari says isn’t impossible, not anymore. It’s not impossibility that’s the issue. Ever since the beginning of the month when she turned you down, you’ve been learning that in any aspect of life, nothing can be expected. At least, not for you. But while it’s not impossible, you don’t want it to be true. You don’t want to see everything in a new light, not when you were only just adjusting to night vision.
It is a slight comfort to know that at this point there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it, so you might as well make the most of the last vestiges of obliviousness before they too are ripped away.
Title: Memory
Day/Theme: September 26: Your hair was long when we first met
Series: xxxHOLiC
Character/Pairing: Doumeki/Watanuki
Rating: G
A/N: Sorry to go out-of-order, but the next five are all in a direct sequence so I thought I'd post this one in this batch.
Your hair was long the first time you met Watanuki. Years later, you will look back and realise that the smiling boy with the blue eyes was the haunted spirit-seer that you devote your days to looking out for. You will think on it for a while, and decide that if you could see him smile so freely of your making, every single pain he’s inadvertently caused you would be worth it.
But when you met him, you were only concerned with how the initial difficulty of wearing a dress was wearing thin, and that the smiling blue-eyed boy was pointing and laughing at something that your grandfather could see but was merely air and dust to you.
In that moment you felt envy, envy you retain a small seed of when years later a woman tells you of the price Watanuki paid for his privilege, envy that pushes you to anger with the boy who would pay a high price to give up something so precious.
This envy will last you until the day you shoot an arrow to save him from a fate he’s embraced unwittingly and realise that all things have a price, and that the price he will pay to lose the ability is far less than the price to retain it. But you will wish (only to yourself) that you could somehow find the smiling boy in the struggling youth now, and that you could bear his burden until he finds a way to be free of it.
You will know that although you would have paid a high price for it once, it would burden you as it burdens him. The thought will be oddly comforting.