[OKHC] Keep on Dreaming - part 3, R, Romance/Angst, Yuzuru/Yoshio, Kyouya/Tamaki
Keep on Dreaming - part 3
Ouran Koko Host Club, Yuzuru/Yoshio & Kyouya/Tamaki, R, 3000 words
Things change as time passes. Kyouya and Tamaki will never be their fathers and it is something Yoshio and Yuzuru are grateful for.
Part 1 ☆ Part 2
I AM DONE. DONE WITH THIS FUCKER. YEAH. The total is 6664 words long and 15 freaking pages. I AM DONE. ::pumps fist::
For the_dw, still. ♥
Keep on Dreaming - part 3/3
by meitachi
Two years after Yuzuru’s wedding, Yoshio found himself carrying through with his own arranged marriage, smile patently false as he held the delicate hand of Takahashi Chika, a girl he’d known since childhood when they’d darted away from the endless rounds of high class parties to amuse themselves in the gardens. Their fathers were business partners and he had seen her often, though she had gone to St. Lobelia’s. Yoshio had even kissed her twice, because they had been dating and it had been expected, and he hadn’t yet begun having dreams about Yuzuru making him scream and come.
She had been a friend in college, one of the few close enough to know of his relationship with Yuzuru. Yoshio had never said anything and she had been too well-mannered to ever broach the subject, but he’d suspected her knowing smiles. She had never judged him, he thought, and even though his smile was false and his regrets were bitter, even though this wedding was for duty and show only - he thought he could probably come to care deeply for her. Not the way he had loved Yuzuru, full of passion and abandon, reckless with emotion - but he could earn to respect and admire her.
So when he kissed her, he tried to tell her with his gentle touch that he would be good to her, even if he would never love her.
His cousin stood as his best man during the ceremony. Yoshio did his best not to look out across the dozens of pampered and privileged guests as he took Chika down the aisle on his arm. Yuzuru was lost somewhere among the countless faces, his wife at his side, and Yoshio might have forgiven him for his marriage, for fulfilling his filial duty, but he could never forget.
He wished he couldn’t see the painful longing in Yuzuru’s eyes whenever they met, now. He would’ve done anything to erase it, to replace it with the laughter and whimsy that he’d fallen in love with…but it was too late. They were both bound by greater things - by family and fortune and fate - and it was selfish to want more, even if he wanted it with every fiber of his being. Yoshio tightened his hold on Chika’s waist and she looked up at him, her face pretty and flushed under the flowers and lace of her veil. He gave her a quick smile, a little too forced, and her gaze darted out into the crowd of well-wishers he was struggling to ignore, and returned to him, sad and knowing.
She shouldn’t have to suffer his regrets on her wedding day, Yoshio thought, and pulled her close for a kiss. Cheers and clapping surrounded them tinged with laughter and good-natured shouts of encouragement.
She whispered in his ear before he drew away, “I’m sorry.”
She too knew the sacrifices for duty.
--
They are going home in two days because Tamaki is loath to leave his mother and Kyouya is hard-pressed to deny the blond the unadulterated joy he has found in seeing his mother again, even in the face of his father’s commands. He can’t deny his own contentedness, here in France, here with Tamaki full of energy and brighter than the sun, here with Tamaki in his arms, kissing him and pinning him to the bed. Here, Kyouya has heard Tamaki play the piano with fairy-light fingers, beautiful and joyful, spinning a melody accompanied by the look in his mother’s eyes and the sweet soprano of her voice. Here, he has felt the sun on Tamaki’s skin as they lay bare under the branches of willow tree in the Tonnerre’s garden, moving as slow as honey over each other on top of the velvet grass. Here, he can let his fingers tangle in Tamaki’s hair and stay there, stroking, as he writes in his notebook with his other hand, feeling the other boy’s breath ghost over his neck, warm and steady. Here, he can be surprised by kisses in front of an amused Eclair; sleep late entangled in rich sheets and Tamaki; and watch the sun set with breathtaking golden-red fires reflected on mother and son’s hair and skin. Here, when Tamaki kisses him, it is fully without the regret and loss that has plagued him for two years, for eight months.
It has only been two weeks and Kyouya thinks that if he would give his heart to a place, it would be to France.
--
“Everything looks different when you’re in love,” Yuzuru told Yoshio and his voice was humming with barely contained happiness. Yoshio had been married for two months and Yuzuru had been married for twenty-six, but he had been in love for one. Graduation took him to abroad to France for new cultural experiences, for a deeper understanding of global enterprise, for experience with the lifestyles of the men he’d be doing business with.
Those were his excuses to his mother because he’d wanted to see the world before he was burdened with responsibilities that took the joy out of travel. She’d let him go and Yuzuru had toured Britain, Germany, Spain, and France.
France, the country of food and wine and romance… Yuzuru had fallen in love with the country, with its lights and art and passion, and Yoshio had thought it inevitable after Yuzuru had finally found a culture of people as passionate as he.
“The sky is bluer and birdsong is sweet and you just want to smile at everyone and tell them how beautiful they are, how beautiful the world is!” Yuzuru was in raptures and Yoshio could only smile because it had been eight years since they’d first found each other, and so much had changed: their relationship, their responsibilities, their worlds - but Yuzuru was still Yuzuru.
Yoshio made a noncommittal sound, encouraging Yuzuru to continue, as he tapped his pen on the ledger before him, reviewing a report the Ootori police force had submitted to him. Yuzuru went on about the most brilliant wine he’d had the other night at dinner, rich and full and “like a long full-body massage at the most expensive onsen in all of Japan - only for your mouth.” Yoshio drank in his voice, letting it warm the cold corners that had never been filled after the Suoh-Hanogi marriage, corners that his wife could never even reach with her quiet words and painful compassion and understanding.
He owed Chika better, he knew, but he could never help himself when it came to Yuzuru. He could do his duty and he could become the head of the Ootori family, have heirs, and never again touch the boy now man who had first taught him to surrender to his emotions - but he could never stop his eyes from lingering a fraction of a second too long, or keep his memories at bay, or suffocate the longing that sometimes made the dark nights fumbling in Chika’s bed too long, sharp with the razor-edge of bitterness.
He had resigned himself to a life of duty and of watching Yuzuru from Chika’s side.
And then Yuzuru ended his rhapsody on the beauty of love with a flourish. “Her name is Eloise Laurent,” he sighed happily.
Twice in Ootori’s Yoshio life had his expectations and beliefs been thrown into upheaval, overturned with reckless abandon that left him short of breath, heartbeat wild with the rearrangement of his world: When he was sixteen and he’d fallen in love with Suoh Yuzuru, and when he was twenty-two and Suoh Yuzuru fell in love with Eloise Laurent.
--
Kyouya has extracted his hand from his pants by the time Tamaki cheerfully passes him a handkerchief. He wipes the sticky semen from his hand and tries to regain his breath. “Tamaki,” is all he can say, voice husky, and the other boy is still on top of him, heavy and warm. Kyouya traces the lidded, satisfied expression on Tamaki’s face with his eyes and blinks. His vision is blurry. He swallows and tries again. “Get off,” he says and rolls away to reach for his glasses on the end table.
“I wish we didn’t have to go home,” Tamaki muses wistfully, sliding off Kyouya to recline against the sofa. The floor beneath them gives a little jar of turbulence against the air currents and Kyouya catches himself on the sofa arm. He puts his glasses on and zips up his pants.
“Father’s orders,” he murmurs and his eyes are on Tamaki again, who is sprawled out with his legs obscenely spread, his pants still undone and covered in streaks of viscous white fluid. His shirt is undone and hanging open, the skin of his chest flushed and slick with sweat. Kyouya thinks of mouthing one of those pink nipples flirting with his vision under the edge of Tamaki’s shirt, and is distracted.
“Whose father?” Tamaki asks petulantly as he shifts - rather deliberately, if the look in his eyes is any indication. His shirt falls open further and his nipples are inviting and still hard. Tamaki reaches out a hand. “Kyouya,” he whines breathily.
They still have nine more hours in the air, at the very least. Kyouya wishes that they had been able to spend more time in France, as well. He licks his lips and says, “Both of ours.” Then he is leaning over Tamaki, hungry, and Tamaki tugs him close and bares his throat for Kyouya’s mouth. Kyouya smiles.
A day later they stand before their fathers in the Suoh mansion. They are not touching but they are only a hairsbreadth apart, next to each other and offering support as they face Ootori Yoshio and Suoh Yuzuru, whose faces are somber.
“What’s going on?”
Tamaki knows something is wrong when their fathers won’t look them in the eye, instead gazing uneasily at each other. “Father,” he starts, and stops when Yuzuru looks down at his teacup and crosses his legs instead of immediately snapping, “That’s ‘Superintendent’ to you!” He exchanges a look of concern with Kyouya and Tamaki can barely restrain himself from bursting forth with questions - fretful and concerned and unhappy for having been recalled from France and his mother’s side.
Kyouya’s presence reminds him to be calm and so Tamaki takes a deep breath and Kyouya takes over.
“You had something to tell us?” he asks politely.
“Yes,” said Yoshio gravely just as Yuzuru gestured widely at the sofa across from where he was seated.
“Sit down, sit down,” he encouraged, his cheer clearly forced.
Once Kyouya and Tamaki are seated - there is at least an inch between them but their knees are touching and Yuzuru’s gaze darts to Yoshio and Kyouya doesn’t miss this silent exchange - Yuzuru clears his throat. “Boys,” he says, and his voice is not filled with the customary confidence that is at ease with giving orders, “you should know that Yosh - that is, Ootori-san and I are aware of, ah, your…” A pause, desperate and fumbling: “…relationship.”
Kyouya tenses.
“What-” he says.
“Kyouya.” His father interrupts, voice heavy. He is sitting upright, back flush against the sofa, but his shoulders are slumped as if bearing a large burden. His eyes are dark behind his glasses. “Do not lie to me.” He does not add that it would be a futile effort because if anyone knows better than Kyouya the efficiency of the Ootori investigative team, it is Yoshio. Kyouya swallows and falls silent.
Yuzuru has a pinched expression on his face. “There’s something we need to tell you.” He glances again at Yoshio, who does not return the look but instead stiffens further.
The tea set on the table clatters. “You can’t stop us! We’re in love and nothing you do will change that!” Tamaki suddenly flings himself to his feet and throws his arms out dramatically. He stares at the two men across the table, his chin tilted defiantly and eyes flashing violet fire. “I don’t care what you say!”
Kyouya’s hands curled into fists. He knows how much it cost Tamaki to say that. Despite appearances to the contrary, Tamaki is not whimsically carefree or a rebel by nature - he desperately seeks approval from his family, from the father and grandmother he has only truly known for two years. He is struggling to make a place for himself in the Suoh family and to make this kind of defiant declaration - it means things Kyouya has only recently come to admit to himself. There is something that underlies Tamaki’s words...they are not mere words but truth, and somewhere along the line “love” became more than just enthusiastic courtship and kissing and friendship…
“Tamaki, wait,” says Yuzuru. He holds up a hand and his son’s arms fall to his sides, eyes turned to his father. “We are not here to separate you,” Yuzuru tells them and the words are low and full of a weight that Kyouya thinks they might never be privy to understand. He tugs Tamaki back onto the sofa beside him and now they are pressed all along the side, hands clasped.
Yoshio watches them as Yuzuru continues, haltingly, “We…understand,” he says finally. He smiles wryly at the blank expressions he receives in response. “Yoshio and I…were in love, once.” His voice is soft. “We were sixteen and in love and we thought nothing would change that.” He doesn’t look at Yoshio now because “once” was a long, long time ago. Instead, he lifts his eyes to the new generation of Suoh and Ootori, flummoxed, flabbergasted, and wearing poleaxed espressions.
He is almost induced to smiling.
“You - Ootori-san - back in high school-” Tamaki can’t seem to form a coherent sentence. His eyes are wide. “F-father,” he stammers and he has a horrible expression on his face, a combination of bewilderment and disbelief and pain.
Kyouya, on the other hand, after the initial shock wears off, looks only as if he is suffering a migraine.
“Father,” he asks quietly, “is this true?”
Yoshio minces no words. “Yes. Then Yuzuru married Hanogi-san and I married your mother.” No one misses the bitterness that flavors his next words, as clipped and flat as he can make them: “Then Yuzuru went to France and fell in love with Eloise Laurent, Tamaki’s mother.” Yuzuru opens his mouth and makes as if to touch his arm, but pauses and subsides. He looks subdued as he settles back into his seat.
Neither man is looking at each other and Kyouya glances up at Tamaki, who is still blinking. “Tamaki,” he says and squeezes his hand.
Tamaki looks from him to their fathers. “What does this mean?” he wants to know.
“We know the pressures of familial duty,” Yuzuru says, looking down at his hands. “We will not force them upon you.”
Kyouya gives him a sharp look at this statement. His eyes dart to his father for confirmation and Yoshio gives a stiff nod. Kyouya’s eyes spark. “You will not force us to marry,” he clarifies. “You will not arrange fiancées for us.”
Both men nod.
“You will not interfere with our relationship.”
Another nod.
He is probably too numb to feel joy but he thinks he will surrender to it when the shock wears off. Kyouya takes in what his and Tamaki’s father is telling them, processes it, and then looks at the boy at his side, whose violet eyes flare as they hold his gaze. He knows Tamaki hasn’t fully absorbed their father’s relationship and its consequences - and to be truthful, neither has he - but he knows all he needs to at the moment.
“Kyouya,” Tamaki breathes, voice intense with happiness and disbelief and an endless future of hopes and drama and kissing and spontaneity and friendship and them, together. He throws his arm around Kyouya and their mouths meet, perfect and beautiful.
Because they are sixteen, they have a future together full of possibilities, and they are in love.
--
Their sons have left after spending the better part of an hour questioning them about their history. They are left alone now in this opulent Suoh parlor, their tea half-drunk and cooling in the cups. They sit beside each other silently, heavy with their memories and regrets and present. They have heard the joy professed by the ever-eloquent Suoh heir and seen the quiet, possessive touches by the Ootori heir. They are both necessary to each other and they will be able to have each other in the way that Yuzuru and Yoshio never could.
The sun has drifted closer to the horizon and the shadows have stretched lazily across the floor. Their breaths are the only sound in the room because the gentle swish of tea and clink of china ceased after Tamaki and Kyouya left.
Yuzuru can’t find the words. “I’m sorry” doesn’t seem sufficient. It doesn’t encompass their history. “I hope you’re happy” is too cruel, because to wish happiness to Yoshio after taking it away from him is heartless. “I miss you” will only make things worse. They both know their positions and their obligations. It is far too late.
“So this is the new generation.” It is Yoshio who finally breaks the silence. He still doesn’t look at the man seated beside him and his voice strong, unwavering.
Yuzuru takes a deep breath and releases it slowly. He straightens his shoulders and places his hands on top of his knee, legs crossed. “The best of luck to them,” he says and even manages a wry chuckle. Their path will not be easy and he can imagine all their hardships, but he is sure that with their redoubtable personalities, they will somehow make it through.
Yoshio nods, unsmiling. “I should be going,” he says and rises to his feet.
Uncrossing his legs, Yuzuru stands as well and bows in response to Yoshio’s parting. He watches the other man cross the room to the doors. I loved you, he doesn’t say to Yoshio’s back.
The door closes between them.
--
Started: 09.30.06
Finished: 10.09.06
« part 1 | « part 2
Ouran Koko Host Club, Yuzuru/Yoshio & Kyouya/Tamaki, R, 3000 words
Things change as time passes. Kyouya and Tamaki will never be their fathers and it is something Yoshio and Yuzuru are grateful for.
Part 1 ☆ Part 2
I AM DONE. DONE WITH THIS FUCKER. YEAH. The total is 6664 words long and 15 freaking pages. I AM DONE. ::pumps fist::
For the_dw, still. ♥
Keep on Dreaming - part 3/3
by meitachi
Two years after Yuzuru’s wedding, Yoshio found himself carrying through with his own arranged marriage, smile patently false as he held the delicate hand of Takahashi Chika, a girl he’d known since childhood when they’d darted away from the endless rounds of high class parties to amuse themselves in the gardens. Their fathers were business partners and he had seen her often, though she had gone to St. Lobelia’s. Yoshio had even kissed her twice, because they had been dating and it had been expected, and he hadn’t yet begun having dreams about Yuzuru making him scream and come.
She had been a friend in college, one of the few close enough to know of his relationship with Yuzuru. Yoshio had never said anything and she had been too well-mannered to ever broach the subject, but he’d suspected her knowing smiles. She had never judged him, he thought, and even though his smile was false and his regrets were bitter, even though this wedding was for duty and show only - he thought he could probably come to care deeply for her. Not the way he had loved Yuzuru, full of passion and abandon, reckless with emotion - but he could earn to respect and admire her.
So when he kissed her, he tried to tell her with his gentle touch that he would be good to her, even if he would never love her.
His cousin stood as his best man during the ceremony. Yoshio did his best not to look out across the dozens of pampered and privileged guests as he took Chika down the aisle on his arm. Yuzuru was lost somewhere among the countless faces, his wife at his side, and Yoshio might have forgiven him for his marriage, for fulfilling his filial duty, but he could never forget.
He wished he couldn’t see the painful longing in Yuzuru’s eyes whenever they met, now. He would’ve done anything to erase it, to replace it with the laughter and whimsy that he’d fallen in love with…but it was too late. They were both bound by greater things - by family and fortune and fate - and it was selfish to want more, even if he wanted it with every fiber of his being. Yoshio tightened his hold on Chika’s waist and she looked up at him, her face pretty and flushed under the flowers and lace of her veil. He gave her a quick smile, a little too forced, and her gaze darted out into the crowd of well-wishers he was struggling to ignore, and returned to him, sad and knowing.
She shouldn’t have to suffer his regrets on her wedding day, Yoshio thought, and pulled her close for a kiss. Cheers and clapping surrounded them tinged with laughter and good-natured shouts of encouragement.
She whispered in his ear before he drew away, “I’m sorry.”
She too knew the sacrifices for duty.
--
They are going home in two days because Tamaki is loath to leave his mother and Kyouya is hard-pressed to deny the blond the unadulterated joy he has found in seeing his mother again, even in the face of his father’s commands. He can’t deny his own contentedness, here in France, here with Tamaki full of energy and brighter than the sun, here with Tamaki in his arms, kissing him and pinning him to the bed. Here, Kyouya has heard Tamaki play the piano with fairy-light fingers, beautiful and joyful, spinning a melody accompanied by the look in his mother’s eyes and the sweet soprano of her voice. Here, he has felt the sun on Tamaki’s skin as they lay bare under the branches of willow tree in the Tonnerre’s garden, moving as slow as honey over each other on top of the velvet grass. Here, he can let his fingers tangle in Tamaki’s hair and stay there, stroking, as he writes in his notebook with his other hand, feeling the other boy’s breath ghost over his neck, warm and steady. Here, he can be surprised by kisses in front of an amused Eclair; sleep late entangled in rich sheets and Tamaki; and watch the sun set with breathtaking golden-red fires reflected on mother and son’s hair and skin. Here, when Tamaki kisses him, it is fully without the regret and loss that has plagued him for two years, for eight months.
It has only been two weeks and Kyouya thinks that if he would give his heart to a place, it would be to France.
--
“Everything looks different when you’re in love,” Yuzuru told Yoshio and his voice was humming with barely contained happiness. Yoshio had been married for two months and Yuzuru had been married for twenty-six, but he had been in love for one. Graduation took him to abroad to France for new cultural experiences, for a deeper understanding of global enterprise, for experience with the lifestyles of the men he’d be doing business with.
Those were his excuses to his mother because he’d wanted to see the world before he was burdened with responsibilities that took the joy out of travel. She’d let him go and Yuzuru had toured Britain, Germany, Spain, and France.
France, the country of food and wine and romance… Yuzuru had fallen in love with the country, with its lights and art and passion, and Yoshio had thought it inevitable after Yuzuru had finally found a culture of people as passionate as he.
“The sky is bluer and birdsong is sweet and you just want to smile at everyone and tell them how beautiful they are, how beautiful the world is!” Yuzuru was in raptures and Yoshio could only smile because it had been eight years since they’d first found each other, and so much had changed: their relationship, their responsibilities, their worlds - but Yuzuru was still Yuzuru.
Yoshio made a noncommittal sound, encouraging Yuzuru to continue, as he tapped his pen on the ledger before him, reviewing a report the Ootori police force had submitted to him. Yuzuru went on about the most brilliant wine he’d had the other night at dinner, rich and full and “like a long full-body massage at the most expensive onsen in all of Japan - only for your mouth.” Yoshio drank in his voice, letting it warm the cold corners that had never been filled after the Suoh-Hanogi marriage, corners that his wife could never even reach with her quiet words and painful compassion and understanding.
He owed Chika better, he knew, but he could never help himself when it came to Yuzuru. He could do his duty and he could become the head of the Ootori family, have heirs, and never again touch the boy now man who had first taught him to surrender to his emotions - but he could never stop his eyes from lingering a fraction of a second too long, or keep his memories at bay, or suffocate the longing that sometimes made the dark nights fumbling in Chika’s bed too long, sharp with the razor-edge of bitterness.
He had resigned himself to a life of duty and of watching Yuzuru from Chika’s side.
And then Yuzuru ended his rhapsody on the beauty of love with a flourish. “Her name is Eloise Laurent,” he sighed happily.
Twice in Ootori’s Yoshio life had his expectations and beliefs been thrown into upheaval, overturned with reckless abandon that left him short of breath, heartbeat wild with the rearrangement of his world: When he was sixteen and he’d fallen in love with Suoh Yuzuru, and when he was twenty-two and Suoh Yuzuru fell in love with Eloise Laurent.
--
Kyouya has extracted his hand from his pants by the time Tamaki cheerfully passes him a handkerchief. He wipes the sticky semen from his hand and tries to regain his breath. “Tamaki,” is all he can say, voice husky, and the other boy is still on top of him, heavy and warm. Kyouya traces the lidded, satisfied expression on Tamaki’s face with his eyes and blinks. His vision is blurry. He swallows and tries again. “Get off,” he says and rolls away to reach for his glasses on the end table.
“I wish we didn’t have to go home,” Tamaki muses wistfully, sliding off Kyouya to recline against the sofa. The floor beneath them gives a little jar of turbulence against the air currents and Kyouya catches himself on the sofa arm. He puts his glasses on and zips up his pants.
“Father’s orders,” he murmurs and his eyes are on Tamaki again, who is sprawled out with his legs obscenely spread, his pants still undone and covered in streaks of viscous white fluid. His shirt is undone and hanging open, the skin of his chest flushed and slick with sweat. Kyouya thinks of mouthing one of those pink nipples flirting with his vision under the edge of Tamaki’s shirt, and is distracted.
“Whose father?” Tamaki asks petulantly as he shifts - rather deliberately, if the look in his eyes is any indication. His shirt falls open further and his nipples are inviting and still hard. Tamaki reaches out a hand. “Kyouya,” he whines breathily.
They still have nine more hours in the air, at the very least. Kyouya wishes that they had been able to spend more time in France, as well. He licks his lips and says, “Both of ours.” Then he is leaning over Tamaki, hungry, and Tamaki tugs him close and bares his throat for Kyouya’s mouth. Kyouya smiles.
A day later they stand before their fathers in the Suoh mansion. They are not touching but they are only a hairsbreadth apart, next to each other and offering support as they face Ootori Yoshio and Suoh Yuzuru, whose faces are somber.
“What’s going on?”
Tamaki knows something is wrong when their fathers won’t look them in the eye, instead gazing uneasily at each other. “Father,” he starts, and stops when Yuzuru looks down at his teacup and crosses his legs instead of immediately snapping, “That’s ‘Superintendent’ to you!” He exchanges a look of concern with Kyouya and Tamaki can barely restrain himself from bursting forth with questions - fretful and concerned and unhappy for having been recalled from France and his mother’s side.
Kyouya’s presence reminds him to be calm and so Tamaki takes a deep breath and Kyouya takes over.
“You had something to tell us?” he asks politely.
“Yes,” said Yoshio gravely just as Yuzuru gestured widely at the sofa across from where he was seated.
“Sit down, sit down,” he encouraged, his cheer clearly forced.
Once Kyouya and Tamaki are seated - there is at least an inch between them but their knees are touching and Yuzuru’s gaze darts to Yoshio and Kyouya doesn’t miss this silent exchange - Yuzuru clears his throat. “Boys,” he says, and his voice is not filled with the customary confidence that is at ease with giving orders, “you should know that Yosh - that is, Ootori-san and I are aware of, ah, your…” A pause, desperate and fumbling: “…relationship.”
Kyouya tenses.
“What-” he says.
“Kyouya.” His father interrupts, voice heavy. He is sitting upright, back flush against the sofa, but his shoulders are slumped as if bearing a large burden. His eyes are dark behind his glasses. “Do not lie to me.” He does not add that it would be a futile effort because if anyone knows better than Kyouya the efficiency of the Ootori investigative team, it is Yoshio. Kyouya swallows and falls silent.
Yuzuru has a pinched expression on his face. “There’s something we need to tell you.” He glances again at Yoshio, who does not return the look but instead stiffens further.
The tea set on the table clatters. “You can’t stop us! We’re in love and nothing you do will change that!” Tamaki suddenly flings himself to his feet and throws his arms out dramatically. He stares at the two men across the table, his chin tilted defiantly and eyes flashing violet fire. “I don’t care what you say!”
Kyouya’s hands curled into fists. He knows how much it cost Tamaki to say that. Despite appearances to the contrary, Tamaki is not whimsically carefree or a rebel by nature - he desperately seeks approval from his family, from the father and grandmother he has only truly known for two years. He is struggling to make a place for himself in the Suoh family and to make this kind of defiant declaration - it means things Kyouya has only recently come to admit to himself. There is something that underlies Tamaki’s words...they are not mere words but truth, and somewhere along the line “love” became more than just enthusiastic courtship and kissing and friendship…
“Tamaki, wait,” says Yuzuru. He holds up a hand and his son’s arms fall to his sides, eyes turned to his father. “We are not here to separate you,” Yuzuru tells them and the words are low and full of a weight that Kyouya thinks they might never be privy to understand. He tugs Tamaki back onto the sofa beside him and now they are pressed all along the side, hands clasped.
Yoshio watches them as Yuzuru continues, haltingly, “We…understand,” he says finally. He smiles wryly at the blank expressions he receives in response. “Yoshio and I…were in love, once.” His voice is soft. “We were sixteen and in love and we thought nothing would change that.” He doesn’t look at Yoshio now because “once” was a long, long time ago. Instead, he lifts his eyes to the new generation of Suoh and Ootori, flummoxed, flabbergasted, and wearing poleaxed espressions.
He is almost induced to smiling.
“You - Ootori-san - back in high school-” Tamaki can’t seem to form a coherent sentence. His eyes are wide. “F-father,” he stammers and he has a horrible expression on his face, a combination of bewilderment and disbelief and pain.
Kyouya, on the other hand, after the initial shock wears off, looks only as if he is suffering a migraine.
“Father,” he asks quietly, “is this true?”
Yoshio minces no words. “Yes. Then Yuzuru married Hanogi-san and I married your mother.” No one misses the bitterness that flavors his next words, as clipped and flat as he can make them: “Then Yuzuru went to France and fell in love with Eloise Laurent, Tamaki’s mother.” Yuzuru opens his mouth and makes as if to touch his arm, but pauses and subsides. He looks subdued as he settles back into his seat.
Neither man is looking at each other and Kyouya glances up at Tamaki, who is still blinking. “Tamaki,” he says and squeezes his hand.
Tamaki looks from him to their fathers. “What does this mean?” he wants to know.
“We know the pressures of familial duty,” Yuzuru says, looking down at his hands. “We will not force them upon you.”
Kyouya gives him a sharp look at this statement. His eyes dart to his father for confirmation and Yoshio gives a stiff nod. Kyouya’s eyes spark. “You will not force us to marry,” he clarifies. “You will not arrange fiancées for us.”
Both men nod.
“You will not interfere with our relationship.”
Another nod.
He is probably too numb to feel joy but he thinks he will surrender to it when the shock wears off. Kyouya takes in what his and Tamaki’s father is telling them, processes it, and then looks at the boy at his side, whose violet eyes flare as they hold his gaze. He knows Tamaki hasn’t fully absorbed their father’s relationship and its consequences - and to be truthful, neither has he - but he knows all he needs to at the moment.
“Kyouya,” Tamaki breathes, voice intense with happiness and disbelief and an endless future of hopes and drama and kissing and spontaneity and friendship and them, together. He throws his arm around Kyouya and their mouths meet, perfect and beautiful.
Because they are sixteen, they have a future together full of possibilities, and they are in love.
--
Their sons have left after spending the better part of an hour questioning them about their history. They are left alone now in this opulent Suoh parlor, their tea half-drunk and cooling in the cups. They sit beside each other silently, heavy with their memories and regrets and present. They have heard the joy professed by the ever-eloquent Suoh heir and seen the quiet, possessive touches by the Ootori heir. They are both necessary to each other and they will be able to have each other in the way that Yuzuru and Yoshio never could.
The sun has drifted closer to the horizon and the shadows have stretched lazily across the floor. Their breaths are the only sound in the room because the gentle swish of tea and clink of china ceased after Tamaki and Kyouya left.
Yuzuru can’t find the words. “I’m sorry” doesn’t seem sufficient. It doesn’t encompass their history. “I hope you’re happy” is too cruel, because to wish happiness to Yoshio after taking it away from him is heartless. “I miss you” will only make things worse. They both know their positions and their obligations. It is far too late.
“So this is the new generation.” It is Yoshio who finally breaks the silence. He still doesn’t look at the man seated beside him and his voice strong, unwavering.
Yuzuru takes a deep breath and releases it slowly. He straightens his shoulders and places his hands on top of his knee, legs crossed. “The best of luck to them,” he says and even manages a wry chuckle. Their path will not be easy and he can imagine all their hardships, but he is sure that with their redoubtable personalities, they will somehow make it through.
Yoshio nods, unsmiling. “I should be going,” he says and rises to his feet.
Uncrossing his legs, Yuzuru stands as well and bows in response to Yoshio’s parting. He watches the other man cross the room to the doors. I loved you, he doesn’t say to Yoshio’s back.
The door closes between them.
--
Started: 09.30.06
Finished: 10.09.06
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