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Skip Beat! (Kyoko/Ren)
Skip Beat! (Kyoko/Ren)
Title: Between Us
Author/Artist: tdei
Rating: PG
Warnings: n/a
Word count: 1223
Prompt: Skip Beat! Kyoko/Ren - UST - tension on set.
A/N: Question: How dead am I? Sorry this is so late. ._. Still working on my other prompts. Ouran ficlet up soon! And sorry, I kind of failed.;; T_T Super sub-text! It's there, really.
---
I can't get out of my head, the sound of your tears, or the touch of your fingertips against my hand.
"Tsuruga-san?"
Your voice freezes me with dread despite the faint happiness that warms my heart. I straighten from leaning against the wall and slow my harsh breaths, trying to control the expression on my face.
The last take has stricken me in a way I can't explain. Supine in your arms, I admitted everlasting love through scripted words of deepest suspicion.
The feeling I imagined at that moment to convey my role is not one I'd ever think would have anything to do with you, but it connected with me on the basest level. It felt like when I wipe out and act on pure instinct. I can't acknowledge what that connection means.
So, I left the first chance I got after the cut. Luck smiled on me when you had to leave to do something when the director released the scene, rather than rehash the scene with me, but now here you are. Still wearing the ornate robes of the warrior sorceress that is your role, smeared in crimson that matches the scarlet stains on my costume.
I turn toward you from the shadowed hall, knowing I have to answer before the silence sets too long and there is a misunderstanding.
I'm afraid of catching your eyes because you read me best, but I look at you, because if I don't you still will read me. At least like this, I can try to control the way you learn.
"Yes?" I say neutrally, praying my control over my face is complete. You look beautiful. Even more so than the angel you portrayed in Fuwa's PV, a smug thought in my mind thinks with satisfaction.
You bow with a jerk, skirts sweeping forward in a whisper. "I'm very sorry I had to step away from our post act discussion!"
"Please," I say, smiling politely to cover up the gentle smile that wants to creep up at your flustered politeness. I add some brightness to it reflexively because of the mixed feelings I can't identify much less straighten out. "Don't take it to heart."
Inwardly I curse as you blanch and edge back at the sight of my gentlemanly face. I mean to dispel any worries but forget you have long since known the lie of this smile. So, when you pause and lean forward, a fortified stare hard in your expressive eyes, I have a mental start.
"As I thought," you say, hands loosely fisted. "I shouldn't have left." Not even the threat of ill humor in me intimidates you when you decide there is something you have to do. Or the words you must say.
The dangerous glitter in your eyes, so closely mirroring the desperation in your role's, stops the question in my throat dead. I want to understand what you mean, but not if the answer can make your eyes glint like this.
"It really is alright..." I murmur quietly, words trailing unfinished as you smile at the opening honesty on my face.
You are so different. Fearless. It makes your smile so charismatic a blind man can't fail to see it. No one needs to see to hear the brightness in your voice.
"Tsuruga-san...?" Your voice is bright but you look down, eyes troubled.
I look at you patiently, but you say nothing more. "...? Is there something?" I finally ask hesitantly, at the gradual moroseness darkening your face.
There is a hitch in your breathing, as if for a sudden inward breath for heavy words. "No," you answer. "It's nothing." You sigh.
The times I understand your actions are few, but I know them unmistakably. Your passion for acting. Your intensity towards Fuwa. I know your look is not 'nothing.'
Unthinkingly, I almost ask what is wrong before I stop myself, earlier scripted scenes flashing before my eyes. The characters are not like us, but the similarities in themes are close enough they remind me of what caring too much makes us stand to lose.
"Oh. Then, thank you for your hard work..." I say inanely, stepping back, preparing to say goodbye.
I can't acknowledge the connection between this film's role and myself, but I can't deny it either when it is all too clear. This role is a peephole to my real self under "Ren Tsuruga," despite everything I've constructed to hide it...
The look that it gives you if you see through it, that it will tell you if you listen through it, is damning.
You’ll learn that if you don't stay away from me, if you don't bolt hellbent from me, I'll never let you free.
You can't escape from my closed fist.
I've destroyed everything I've grasped. And if I keep you, I'd ruin you.
Ruin you.
...I'd rather die first.
I, Kyoko thinks, am probably doing something really embarrassing again. The knowledge is not enough to move her from standing nervously next to Ren in search of assurance. Of her own or his she is not sure. The weight of the current scene she and Ren just filmed is irrationally heavy.
This movie is everything she could ever want-- an epic futuristic fairytale of monsters and heroes, filled with magic and battle. She is unbelievably happy to have gotten such a brilliant role, even if it entails enacting a tragic love.
She didn't mind, since doomed romances are something she thinks she understands well enough to let truly affect her.
Yet the strength of her reaction during the scene, in response to its weight, still shocks her. Each time she thinks about it, the severity of her feelings deepens.
‘Ren’ had 'died' in her arms. The treasured person that 'she' had loved with all of her heart, but could not protect.
But it doesn’t really count. That was make-believe, Kyoko thinks. It's not real. It didn't happen.
But, whispers her subconsciousness, from which her reaction had stemmed to convey the depth of her role's desperate feelings. What if it did?
Kyoko stares at the blood soaked royal robes Ren wears. “No,” she says disconnectedly. “It’s nothing.” She sighs heavily, tension thickening in a confused maelstrom.
If Ren--
If Ren died--
Kyoko knows the bitter taste of despair but nothing before had ever felt like this. This feeling, fathomless and dark, crushes her heart. Extinguishes her breath. As if a long-denied curse she has felt hovering over her head has finally overtaken her.
Kyoko doesn't understand why she feels like this. She hated Ren before she even met him. If he'd died then, his death would've meant nothing to her except as good fortune for Shou. Now is different. There is something between them. It's not love. It can't be love. She doesn't know what it is, but if he died now, it would mean something that hurts.
If Ren died--
The thought expands until it eclipses everything else. Hands clammy and suddenly struck with a kind of fear she has never known before, Kyoko is overtaken by the urge to see Ren even though he is before her eyes. To find him and keep him with her. Protect him.
If Ren died--
No.
Never.
Her hand grasps tight on Ren's escaping sleeve before he can leave.
Never.
It is unthinkable.
Title: Between Us
Author/Artist: tdei
Rating: PG
Warnings: n/a
Word count: 1223
Prompt: Skip Beat! Kyoko/Ren - UST - tension on set.
A/N: Question: How dead am I? Sorry this is so late. ._. Still working on my other prompts. Ouran ficlet up soon! And sorry, I kind of failed.;; T_T Super sub-text! It's there, really.
---
I can't get out of my head, the sound of your tears, or the touch of your fingertips against my hand.
"Tsuruga-san?"
Your voice freezes me with dread despite the faint happiness that warms my heart. I straighten from leaning against the wall and slow my harsh breaths, trying to control the expression on my face.
The last take has stricken me in a way I can't explain. Supine in your arms, I admitted everlasting love through scripted words of deepest suspicion.
The feeling I imagined at that moment to convey my role is not one I'd ever think would have anything to do with you, but it connected with me on the basest level. It felt like when I wipe out and act on pure instinct. I can't acknowledge what that connection means.
So, I left the first chance I got after the cut. Luck smiled on me when you had to leave to do something when the director released the scene, rather than rehash the scene with me, but now here you are. Still wearing the ornate robes of the warrior sorceress that is your role, smeared in crimson that matches the scarlet stains on my costume.
I turn toward you from the shadowed hall, knowing I have to answer before the silence sets too long and there is a misunderstanding.
I'm afraid of catching your eyes because you read me best, but I look at you, because if I don't you still will read me. At least like this, I can try to control the way you learn.
"Yes?" I say neutrally, praying my control over my face is complete. You look beautiful. Even more so than the angel you portrayed in Fuwa's PV, a smug thought in my mind thinks with satisfaction.
You bow with a jerk, skirts sweeping forward in a whisper. "I'm very sorry I had to step away from our post act discussion!"
"Please," I say, smiling politely to cover up the gentle smile that wants to creep up at your flustered politeness. I add some brightness to it reflexively because of the mixed feelings I can't identify much less straighten out. "Don't take it to heart."
Inwardly I curse as you blanch and edge back at the sight of my gentlemanly face. I mean to dispel any worries but forget you have long since known the lie of this smile. So, when you pause and lean forward, a fortified stare hard in your expressive eyes, I have a mental start.
"As I thought," you say, hands loosely fisted. "I shouldn't have left." Not even the threat of ill humor in me intimidates you when you decide there is something you have to do. Or the words you must say.
The dangerous glitter in your eyes, so closely mirroring the desperation in your role's, stops the question in my throat dead. I want to understand what you mean, but not if the answer can make your eyes glint like this.
"It really is alright..." I murmur quietly, words trailing unfinished as you smile at the opening honesty on my face.
You are so different. Fearless. It makes your smile so charismatic a blind man can't fail to see it. No one needs to see to hear the brightness in your voice.
"Tsuruga-san...?" Your voice is bright but you look down, eyes troubled.
I look at you patiently, but you say nothing more. "...? Is there something?" I finally ask hesitantly, at the gradual moroseness darkening your face.
There is a hitch in your breathing, as if for a sudden inward breath for heavy words. "No," you answer. "It's nothing." You sigh.
The times I understand your actions are few, but I know them unmistakably. Your passion for acting. Your intensity towards Fuwa. I know your look is not 'nothing.'
Unthinkingly, I almost ask what is wrong before I stop myself, earlier scripted scenes flashing before my eyes. The characters are not like us, but the similarities in themes are close enough they remind me of what caring too much makes us stand to lose.
"Oh. Then, thank you for your hard work..." I say inanely, stepping back, preparing to say goodbye.
I can't acknowledge the connection between this film's role and myself, but I can't deny it either when it is all too clear. This role is a peephole to my real self under "Ren Tsuruga," despite everything I've constructed to hide it...
The look that it gives you if you see through it, that it will tell you if you listen through it, is damning.
You’ll learn that if you don't stay away from me, if you don't bolt hellbent from me, I'll never let you free.
You can't escape from my closed fist.
I've destroyed everything I've grasped. And if I keep you, I'd ruin you.
Ruin you.
...I'd rather die first.
I, Kyoko thinks, am probably doing something really embarrassing again. The knowledge is not enough to move her from standing nervously next to Ren in search of assurance. Of her own or his she is not sure. The weight of the current scene she and Ren just filmed is irrationally heavy.
This movie is everything she could ever want-- an epic futuristic fairytale of monsters and heroes, filled with magic and battle. She is unbelievably happy to have gotten such a brilliant role, even if it entails enacting a tragic love.
She didn't mind, since doomed romances are something she thinks she understands well enough to let truly affect her.
Yet the strength of her reaction during the scene, in response to its weight, still shocks her. Each time she thinks about it, the severity of her feelings deepens.
‘Ren’ had 'died' in her arms. The treasured person that 'she' had loved with all of her heart, but could not protect.
But it doesn’t really count. That was make-believe, Kyoko thinks. It's not real. It didn't happen.
But, whispers her subconsciousness, from which her reaction had stemmed to convey the depth of her role's desperate feelings. What if it did?
Kyoko stares at the blood soaked royal robes Ren wears. “No,” she says disconnectedly. “It’s nothing.” She sighs heavily, tension thickening in a confused maelstrom.
If Ren--
If Ren died--
Kyoko knows the bitter taste of despair but nothing before had ever felt like this. This feeling, fathomless and dark, crushes her heart. Extinguishes her breath. As if a long-denied curse she has felt hovering over her head has finally overtaken her.
Kyoko doesn't understand why she feels like this. She hated Ren before she even met him. If he'd died then, his death would've meant nothing to her except as good fortune for Shou. Now is different. There is something between them. It's not love. It can't be love. She doesn't know what it is, but if he died now, it would mean something that hurts.
If Ren died--
The thought expands until it eclipses everything else. Hands clammy and suddenly struck with a kind of fear she has never known before, Kyoko is overtaken by the urge to see Ren even though he is before her eyes. To find him and keep him with her. Protect him.
If Ren died--
No.
Never.
Her hand grasps tight on Ren's escaping sleeve before he can leave.
Never.
It is unthinkable.