fic for bellemelody (3/3)
Part 2
“JIN!”
The soft voice of a woman cries out the name in the middle of a crowded street, halting Kazuya’s steps.
The boy looks frantically around, his heart racing with the mere hope of simply catching a glimpse of the man filling his dreams every night.
The search stops as abruptly as it has started, though, when a hand tinted by the passing of time taps his shoulder and startles him, as he is unaware of the presence of the lady that has approached him.
“Jin?” she repeats the name, only this time her voice denotes confusion and insecurity.
Kazuya struggles for a couple of long minutes to find his own voice. He gives up and settles to shake his head when tears prickle his eyes. The woman is the living portray of the man that has been haunting his dreams for so, so long, the same kindness radiating for her as it used to from him and even the breathtaking beauty Kazuya can only recognize now.
But it’s when she calls Jin’s name for the third time, voice still filled with uncertainty and yet hopeful, that Kazuya can’t fight his tears anymore. He notices only then the clouded eyes of the blind lady.
“I’m- I’m not-” his voice wavers with the weight of the tears pressing on his throat. “I’m not Jin.”
The lady -Jin’s mom, Kazuya is sure by now- detaches the soft grip of her hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“I see,” she offers an apologetic smile that still manages to take away some years of her still youthful face. “I’m sorry for the confusion…”
“Kazuya. My name is Kazuya.”
“I see” the woman replies, this time with a more honest smile that somehow makes Kazuya feels as if she has approved of him. “Excuse me if I just…” she reaches out and holds one side of Kazuya’s face with one hand, her thumb barely grazing on the beauty mark under his right eye.
Kazuya remains both speechless and motionless, as if a spell has been casted on him.
“You two share the same fate in more than one way…” she whispers softly enough for only Kazuya to hear it among all of the street noises.
“Excuse me?”
“My son. He has a beauty mark on the same spot you do, and yet he has decided to carry with the fate of it.”
“How do you…?”
“I told you, Kazuya-kun. I see…”
“Where is he?” Kazuya can’t help but ask in the midst of his fogged state, the words slipping effortlessly out of his mouth as the honest cry of his heart.
“Waiting for you, Kazuya-kun. He has been all this time.” Kazuya is struck into a shocking state by those words. “When you find him, please, tell him I say thank you for giving me my love back. Please, I’d love him to know just how happy he has made me…”
She slightly bows as a way of saying goodbye and leaves a speechless Kame nodding to nobody in the middle of the street.
He can’t help but feel like Alice chasing after the elusive white rabbit without a chance to get a glimpse of its tail.
Kazuya has been trying to get a hold of Koki for over two months now, going back and forth from that street when he has first met him to the park in his neighborhood, but the guy is nowhere to be found. Kazuya feels like kicking himself for not having asked a way to contact him, but he’s almost certain wizards don’t use cellphone.
One late afternoon, Kazuya greets everybody goodbye in the café and takes his leave, his mind already wandering to the very same topic. Ever since he has accepted the fact that he needs, that he wants, Jin back in his life, he can’t help but have the man in his mind and soul every hour, every day.
That day is not an exception, and so Kame almost trips on a beautiful dog lying before the coffee shop’s front door.
In any other time, Kazuya would have probably ignored it. But after that long talk he had over a few months ago with the animals’ enchanter, Kazuya can’t simply ignore any living creature. He squats down to pat and scratch the pretty dog but, before he even reaches out to it, the animal gets on its four legs and starts running slowly.
Kazuya observes the odd behavior, noticing the dog hasn’t run out of fear. It’s then that the animal stops his jogging and looks back at Kazuya, as if asking him to follow its direction. The man doesn’t understand where that weird though has come from and yet, for once in his life, he decides to follow his intuition even if it goes against any logic.
After all, he is almost searching for a ghost of his past locked in a magical place far, far away. It’s been long ago since he has decided logic isn’t really going to help him this time.
He follows the dog’s pace and soon, before his very eyes, Koki is waiting for him.
They talk at great length, Kazuya trying his best to avoid any direct question about Jin’s whereabouts. Until he reaches his own limits.
“Do I have to learn magic to reach Jin, wherever he is?” he still can’t muster enough courage to pronounce the Capital of Stars.
The man takes his eyes away from his little entourage of dogs, cats, rabbits, foxes, turtles and more animals than Kame could count and places them on the man for a long time, before going back to pet his little zoo.
“You can reach Jin right now, Kame-chan, you two are connected after all. Didn’t I say that before?”
“Koki!”
“Do you want to know if you need to learn magic to get inside the Capital of Stars?” the wizard asks straightforwardly, his attention drifting once again from his four-legged friends to Kazuya. “But, truth is, to learn magic you’d need to believe in it first.”
“I already do!” Kazuya protests.
“You don’t.”
“I do!”
They start bickering like little kids, repeating over and over again the same words. You don’t. I do. You don’t. I do. Until finally Kazuya seems to have understood something out of it that worries him deep inside.
“Does that mean I need to?”
“Kame-chan, you could get there already if you wanted to…” Koki lets out tiredly.
“How?”
“I’m pretty sure Jin already taught you the way.”
Kazuya already knows that’s his cue to stop asking questions as Koki would never answer them anyway. Still, as stubborn as he has always been, Kazuya can’t just let go of the subject.
“He is the one who left me,” he mumbles, crossing his arms over his chest and looking down. “So I don’t understand why I’m the one who has to move heaven and earth to find him.”
“That might be true…” Kazuya wants to protest that it is true, but the short pause isn’t enough for him to butt in. “But he has already sacrificed a lot for you and for your sake, even if you can’t realize it. And haven’t you thought, Kame-chan, that maybe he is the one who needs to be saved now?”
The quizzical look Koki throws at Kazuya is enough for the younger to understand there is more to it than what he has just heard. The fact that Koki leaves earlier without uttering any other word about Jin is enough confirmation.
Kazuya’s search intensifies when the fear of losing Jin for good reaches its peak.
Deep inside, in a place Jin has been able to reach with his magic, Kazuya understand part of Koki’s words that day and he is more than determined to rescue Jin, no matter where he is. No matter what Kazuya has to sacrifice for it.
Every night Kazuya goes to bed feeling exhausted and night after night, the realm of dreams grants him his wish to meet with Jin again.
He keeps on chanting the same name still and with the same desperation. Only this time, there is a smile on his lips every day when he wakes up.
Jin has lifted up a light of hope again inside of him and Kazuya decides to cling to it and never let it go until he sees his dream turn into a reality.
“One has to be willing to, Kazu-chan,” Jin has said one lazy Sunday when they have gone to the close by park with jars in his hand to search for some dragonflies.
Kazuya has been really excited at first, but after a couple of failed attempts he has started to do it everything half-heartedly and so Jin has scolded him for it.
“Attitude matters as much as actions,” the man has said wisely and that has proven to be right when, later that same day and after Kazuya has regained all his excitement, they have come back home with two beautiful dragonflies for Kazuya to take care of.
The rustle of fallen leaves under his feet as his steps slow down with the weight of his sudden realization joins in harmony to the chill breeze and they fill together that otherwise quiet night of autumn. Who would have thought that, after all these past months and all these past years, the answer have been inside of him, really inside of him?
Koki has been right, after all, and Jin has given Kazuya everything he needed to know to reach out for him.
And Kazuya will not make Jin wait any longer.
Kazuya closes the door of his room and lays down on his bed, feeling eager to meet Jin after all these years apart. He closes his eyes slowly, mentally saying goodbye to everyone and everything in this world, his heart content with his decision.
After all, he has promised to sacrifice whatever it takes to be with the one he loves.
As his body starts fading into the air and his eyes welcome the bright light of an enchanted place filled with magic and peace, Kazuya feels grateful to be given the chance to fulfill his promise.
Kazuya is in awe, as countless fragments of stars writhe under a bright sky painted in the most beautiful shades of purple, orange and blue he has ever seen in his life. The place, Kazuya can feel it from the tips of his fingers to the very beating of his heart, quivers mildly with the powerful energy of magic.
But his journey hasn’t reached to its end, and he learns it when a group of weird creatures have gathered around him and have started questioning him about his whereabouts in this place.
“The pretty human wants to take the Star-maker away from us!” one of the creatures has shouted loudly when Kazuya has talked about Jin and soon the news has spread among other creatures that stop Kazuya from giving one more step.
“He gave me this as a symbol of his love and eternal promise,” Kazuya says out of fear and despair, as he shows the pendant hanging from his neck to the crowd around him, a confidence in his voice he hasn’t been aware existed. “You can’t take that away from me… from us!”
“Foolish human…” one scary creature says, his glare paralyzing Kazuya from any attempt to break out. “That Wizard’s descendants’ aspiration to a normal life is impossible!”
“You have no business taking the Star-maker with you!”
“I just want to see him!” he cries in despair. “I just want to see him! How can you tell me not to look after him when you are living in this place? Isn’t it called the Lovers’ Refuge? How can you deny the key to happiness to a person who has devoted himself to you?”
His words hurt the creatures around him with the conceit and pride they have mistaken his desire with, and now Kazuya feels defeated in a place he has thought he’d reach his true happiness at. Kazuya doesn’t know what to do or say anymore, scared he would cause a bigger fury in them instead of making them understand.
He doesn’t have the time to say anything else. Nobody has, as a blinding force of bright light obliges all the creatures to let go of Kazuya and run away from that place.
Kazuya wants to ask who or why or even what, but by the time he recovers his ability to speak, the light has dissipated and the figure standing in front of him has taken both his breath and voice away.
Jin hasn’t aged one bit since Kazuya has last seen him. Instead, he is even more gorgeous that he can recall from his childhood memories.
Jin stays right in front of Kazuya once he has moved the two of them to a more private corner of the Capital of Stars. Kazuya still feels in awe, but not so much of the beautiful place. It’s Jin who has left a stronger impression in his soul.
“I’m sorry!” he startles Kazuya out of his reverie, his stern face twisted in an expression of pain and guilt. “I’m sorry I left you like that, Kazuya. I was scared, so I ran away.”
“Scared? Of what?”
“I was growing so attached to you, Kazuya. So attached. I was scared you’d end up tempting me to use my powers.” Jin looks at him in such a heartbroken way, his sad eyes reflecting the guilt that has been eating him up inside for the past decade. “I was so weak back then, so I chose the cowards’ way. I’m sorry, I was so afraid you’d hate me by now.”
Kazuya caresses Jin’s lowered face with his right hand, the soft touch being both a gesture of forgiveness and an attempt to reassure the other. He doesn’t know what else to do or say, so he pours all his feelings into that simple action and hopes it reaches Jin.
Soon Jin’s quiet sobs subsides until they finally stop. But even then, Kazuya’s hand remains in its spot, gently stroking the other’s cheek. The touch gets more intimate as time passes by and their bodies seek naturally for each other’s warmth.
“Did you cast a spell on me?” Kazuya feels the need to ask. Once he has fully accepted Jin’s place in his life, he has felt almost guided by a strong force coming from inside of him and after giving it a bit of thought, he has come up with that explanation.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I had faith you’d realize we are meant for each other all by yourself,” Jin answers sheepishly, placing one hand in Kazuya’s cheek. “It feels like real magic that way, doesn’t it?”
“It is real magic, Jin.”
“You sound like my parents,” Jin says with a bright smile, the words he have heard from both his Mother and his Father ever since he was a baby finally take fully sense in his life. It’s only now when he can understand the true meaning of the word happiness.
“Your mother…”
Kazuya finally remembers what he has been asked to do once he has found Jin. He delivers the message Jin’s mom has trusted him with and his heart shrinks a bit at the beautiful smile adorning the full lips. The lady hasn’t said a word about her condition, but Kazuya doesn’t feel like he can keep it from Jin.
“She’s blind, Jin, she can’t see.”
Jin gulps and stays silent for a bit, not trace of his big smile anymore. He doesn’t look sad, but rather pensive.
“I know that. But you’re wrong, Kazuya,” he corrects the younger boy. “She still can see.”
“She thought I was you, she said your name. I-”
“Of course she thought you were me. After all, she wasn’t looking at your face, but at your soul. And the star shining inside of you, Kazuya, it’s just exactly the same as mine.”
“I don’t understand.”
“We were doomed to be star-fated lovers since we were born, Kazuya. We belong together.”
Kazuya’s cheeks tinge with a light shade of pink when Jin pronounces those words with such an earnest, but sweet tone of voice, his heart rising uncontrolled inside his chest.
Jin doesn’t ignore the way Kazuya’s body reacts to his voice, his words and their closeness at long last. He likes to know that, after all this time apart from each other, he can arouse in Kazuya all the emotions Kazuya has been arousing in him since he has first lied his eyes on him.
And now that he sees Kazuya all grown-up, there are even stronger emotions overflowing him. Emotions he can’t control or understand well, but he has no problem voicing out for Kazuya to know.
“I want to kiss you, Kazu-chan. So bad.” Their foreheads are touching at this point and Jin feels afraid to open his eyes given the closeness they are sharing, Kazuya’s presence making him feel weak in the knees. “Can I kiss you?”
“You better… I’ve been waiting almost all my life for this” Kazuya confesses with burning cheeks.
“Do you mean… you’ve never been kissed?”
The blush intensifies with the teasing tone Jin uses.
“Baka” I meant you… I’ve been waiting over ten years to be kissed by you!”
Kazuya’s face is bright red the moment he finishes shouting such an embarrassing truth.
But Jin feels happy and benevolently puts an end to Kazuya’s trepidation by gently grabbing the sides of his face and leaning in the barely few inches separating them with his eyes fixed on Kazuya’s, that soon fall closed.
Unlike the younger, Jin has absolutely no experience in love affairs and yet, like everything he does in life, his actions are guided by his pure instinct. He shyly kisses Kazuya, dwelling in the feeling of his soft lips brushing against his own, and engraving in his memory the sweet taste of his kisses. He plans to keep on kissing for the rest of eternity, but sill he wants to guard every detail from this and all the kisses that are yet to come.
Kazuya’s responses, the little noises of appreciation he can’t hold back, make Jin feels a bit bolder and so he darts out his tongue and lets its tip run over Kazuya’s bottom lip, causing it to shiver and part open. Their tongues then come in contact inside the warm humidity of their mouths and entangle in a dance as harmonious as every move they have shared in this place.
Jin decides he could spend the rest of his life devoting himself to Kazuya and his lips.
When not even the magic can keep them kissing each other, the intensity almost burning their lungs and veins with the lack of oxygen, they part just a breath away from each other, keeping their bodies still connected.
They feel blessed and happy, all the hardships they both have gone through lying forgotten with every second they get to be together.
Still, Kazuya can’t hold back from saying, “Don’t ever go and entrust kids with something that important!”
“Sorry,” Jin smiles sadly and pats Kazuya’s head. “Did you get hurt, Kazuya?”
Kazuya nods, unable to say anything else as some tears choke his voice for a moment.
“I’ve been missing you my whole life… Feeling incomplete and not even knowing what was missing…!”
“Sorry you got entangled with me and my selfishness,” he says honestly, hugging Kazuya dearly in his arms. “For what is worthy, nothing will tear us apart ever again.”
“Nothing? Ever?”
Jin nods.
“All thanks to you, Kazuya.”
~Fin~
“JIN!”
The soft voice of a woman cries out the name in the middle of a crowded street, halting Kazuya’s steps.
The boy looks frantically around, his heart racing with the mere hope of simply catching a glimpse of the man filling his dreams every night.
The search stops as abruptly as it has started, though, when a hand tinted by the passing of time taps his shoulder and startles him, as he is unaware of the presence of the lady that has approached him.
“Jin?” she repeats the name, only this time her voice denotes confusion and insecurity.
Kazuya struggles for a couple of long minutes to find his own voice. He gives up and settles to shake his head when tears prickle his eyes. The woman is the living portray of the man that has been haunting his dreams for so, so long, the same kindness radiating for her as it used to from him and even the breathtaking beauty Kazuya can only recognize now.
But it’s when she calls Jin’s name for the third time, voice still filled with uncertainty and yet hopeful, that Kazuya can’t fight his tears anymore. He notices only then the clouded eyes of the blind lady.
“I’m- I’m not-” his voice wavers with the weight of the tears pressing on his throat. “I’m not Jin.”
The lady -Jin’s mom, Kazuya is sure by now- detaches the soft grip of her hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“I see,” she offers an apologetic smile that still manages to take away some years of her still youthful face. “I’m sorry for the confusion…”
“Kazuya. My name is Kazuya.”
“I see” the woman replies, this time with a more honest smile that somehow makes Kazuya feels as if she has approved of him. “Excuse me if I just…” she reaches out and holds one side of Kazuya’s face with one hand, her thumb barely grazing on the beauty mark under his right eye.
Kazuya remains both speechless and motionless, as if a spell has been casted on him.
“You two share the same fate in more than one way…” she whispers softly enough for only Kazuya to hear it among all of the street noises.
“Excuse me?”
“My son. He has a beauty mark on the same spot you do, and yet he has decided to carry with the fate of it.”
“How do you…?”
“I told you, Kazuya-kun. I see…”
“Where is he?” Kazuya can’t help but ask in the midst of his fogged state, the words slipping effortlessly out of his mouth as the honest cry of his heart.
“Waiting for you, Kazuya-kun. He has been all this time.” Kazuya is struck into a shocking state by those words. “When you find him, please, tell him I say thank you for giving me my love back. Please, I’d love him to know just how happy he has made me…”
She slightly bows as a way of saying goodbye and leaves a speechless Kame nodding to nobody in the middle of the street.
He can’t help but feel like Alice chasing after the elusive white rabbit without a chance to get a glimpse of its tail.
Kazuya has been trying to get a hold of Koki for over two months now, going back and forth from that street when he has first met him to the park in his neighborhood, but the guy is nowhere to be found. Kazuya feels like kicking himself for not having asked a way to contact him, but he’s almost certain wizards don’t use cellphone.
One late afternoon, Kazuya greets everybody goodbye in the café and takes his leave, his mind already wandering to the very same topic. Ever since he has accepted the fact that he needs, that he wants, Jin back in his life, he can’t help but have the man in his mind and soul every hour, every day.
That day is not an exception, and so Kame almost trips on a beautiful dog lying before the coffee shop’s front door.
In any other time, Kazuya would have probably ignored it. But after that long talk he had over a few months ago with the animals’ enchanter, Kazuya can’t simply ignore any living creature. He squats down to pat and scratch the pretty dog but, before he even reaches out to it, the animal gets on its four legs and starts running slowly.
Kazuya observes the odd behavior, noticing the dog hasn’t run out of fear. It’s then that the animal stops his jogging and looks back at Kazuya, as if asking him to follow its direction. The man doesn’t understand where that weird though has come from and yet, for once in his life, he decides to follow his intuition even if it goes against any logic.
After all, he is almost searching for a ghost of his past locked in a magical place far, far away. It’s been long ago since he has decided logic isn’t really going to help him this time.
He follows the dog’s pace and soon, before his very eyes, Koki is waiting for him.
They talk at great length, Kazuya trying his best to avoid any direct question about Jin’s whereabouts. Until he reaches his own limits.
“Do I have to learn magic to reach Jin, wherever he is?” he still can’t muster enough courage to pronounce the Capital of Stars.
The man takes his eyes away from his little entourage of dogs, cats, rabbits, foxes, turtles and more animals than Kame could count and places them on the man for a long time, before going back to pet his little zoo.
“You can reach Jin right now, Kame-chan, you two are connected after all. Didn’t I say that before?”
“Koki!”
“Do you want to know if you need to learn magic to get inside the Capital of Stars?” the wizard asks straightforwardly, his attention drifting once again from his four-legged friends to Kazuya. “But, truth is, to learn magic you’d need to believe in it first.”
“I already do!” Kazuya protests.
“You don’t.”
“I do!”
They start bickering like little kids, repeating over and over again the same words. You don’t. I do. You don’t. I do. Until finally Kazuya seems to have understood something out of it that worries him deep inside.
“Does that mean I need to?”
“Kame-chan, you could get there already if you wanted to…” Koki lets out tiredly.
“How?”
“I’m pretty sure Jin already taught you the way.”
Kazuya already knows that’s his cue to stop asking questions as Koki would never answer them anyway. Still, as stubborn as he has always been, Kazuya can’t just let go of the subject.
“He is the one who left me,” he mumbles, crossing his arms over his chest and looking down. “So I don’t understand why I’m the one who has to move heaven and earth to find him.”
“That might be true…” Kazuya wants to protest that it is true, but the short pause isn’t enough for him to butt in. “But he has already sacrificed a lot for you and for your sake, even if you can’t realize it. And haven’t you thought, Kame-chan, that maybe he is the one who needs to be saved now?”
The quizzical look Koki throws at Kazuya is enough for the younger to understand there is more to it than what he has just heard. The fact that Koki leaves earlier without uttering any other word about Jin is enough confirmation.
Kazuya’s search intensifies when the fear of losing Jin for good reaches its peak.
Deep inside, in a place Jin has been able to reach with his magic, Kazuya understand part of Koki’s words that day and he is more than determined to rescue Jin, no matter where he is. No matter what Kazuya has to sacrifice for it.
Every night Kazuya goes to bed feeling exhausted and night after night, the realm of dreams grants him his wish to meet with Jin again.
He keeps on chanting the same name still and with the same desperation. Only this time, there is a smile on his lips every day when he wakes up.
Jin has lifted up a light of hope again inside of him and Kazuya decides to cling to it and never let it go until he sees his dream turn into a reality.
“One has to be willing to, Kazu-chan,” Jin has said one lazy Sunday when they have gone to the close by park with jars in his hand to search for some dragonflies.
Kazuya has been really excited at first, but after a couple of failed attempts he has started to do it everything half-heartedly and so Jin has scolded him for it.
“Attitude matters as much as actions,” the man has said wisely and that has proven to be right when, later that same day and after Kazuya has regained all his excitement, they have come back home with two beautiful dragonflies for Kazuya to take care of.
The rustle of fallen leaves under his feet as his steps slow down with the weight of his sudden realization joins in harmony to the chill breeze and they fill together that otherwise quiet night of autumn. Who would have thought that, after all these past months and all these past years, the answer have been inside of him, really inside of him?
Koki has been right, after all, and Jin has given Kazuya everything he needed to know to reach out for him.
And Kazuya will not make Jin wait any longer.
Kazuya closes the door of his room and lays down on his bed, feeling eager to meet Jin after all these years apart. He closes his eyes slowly, mentally saying goodbye to everyone and everything in this world, his heart content with his decision.
After all, he has promised to sacrifice whatever it takes to be with the one he loves.
As his body starts fading into the air and his eyes welcome the bright light of an enchanted place filled with magic and peace, Kazuya feels grateful to be given the chance to fulfill his promise.
Kazuya is in awe, as countless fragments of stars writhe under a bright sky painted in the most beautiful shades of purple, orange and blue he has ever seen in his life. The place, Kazuya can feel it from the tips of his fingers to the very beating of his heart, quivers mildly with the powerful energy of magic.
But his journey hasn’t reached to its end, and he learns it when a group of weird creatures have gathered around him and have started questioning him about his whereabouts in this place.
“The pretty human wants to take the Star-maker away from us!” one of the creatures has shouted loudly when Kazuya has talked about Jin and soon the news has spread among other creatures that stop Kazuya from giving one more step.
“He gave me this as a symbol of his love and eternal promise,” Kazuya says out of fear and despair, as he shows the pendant hanging from his neck to the crowd around him, a confidence in his voice he hasn’t been aware existed. “You can’t take that away from me… from us!”
“Foolish human…” one scary creature says, his glare paralyzing Kazuya from any attempt to break out. “That Wizard’s descendants’ aspiration to a normal life is impossible!”
“You have no business taking the Star-maker with you!”
“I just want to see him!” he cries in despair. “I just want to see him! How can you tell me not to look after him when you are living in this place? Isn’t it called the Lovers’ Refuge? How can you deny the key to happiness to a person who has devoted himself to you?”
His words hurt the creatures around him with the conceit and pride they have mistaken his desire with, and now Kazuya feels defeated in a place he has thought he’d reach his true happiness at. Kazuya doesn’t know what to do or say anymore, scared he would cause a bigger fury in them instead of making them understand.
He doesn’t have the time to say anything else. Nobody has, as a blinding force of bright light obliges all the creatures to let go of Kazuya and run away from that place.
Kazuya wants to ask who or why or even what, but by the time he recovers his ability to speak, the light has dissipated and the figure standing in front of him has taken both his breath and voice away.
Jin hasn’t aged one bit since Kazuya has last seen him. Instead, he is even more gorgeous that he can recall from his childhood memories.
Jin stays right in front of Kazuya once he has moved the two of them to a more private corner of the Capital of Stars. Kazuya still feels in awe, but not so much of the beautiful place. It’s Jin who has left a stronger impression in his soul.
“I’m sorry!” he startles Kazuya out of his reverie, his stern face twisted in an expression of pain and guilt. “I’m sorry I left you like that, Kazuya. I was scared, so I ran away.”
“Scared? Of what?”
“I was growing so attached to you, Kazuya. So attached. I was scared you’d end up tempting me to use my powers.” Jin looks at him in such a heartbroken way, his sad eyes reflecting the guilt that has been eating him up inside for the past decade. “I was so weak back then, so I chose the cowards’ way. I’m sorry, I was so afraid you’d hate me by now.”
Kazuya caresses Jin’s lowered face with his right hand, the soft touch being both a gesture of forgiveness and an attempt to reassure the other. He doesn’t know what else to do or say, so he pours all his feelings into that simple action and hopes it reaches Jin.
Soon Jin’s quiet sobs subsides until they finally stop. But even then, Kazuya’s hand remains in its spot, gently stroking the other’s cheek. The touch gets more intimate as time passes by and their bodies seek naturally for each other’s warmth.
“Did you cast a spell on me?” Kazuya feels the need to ask. Once he has fully accepted Jin’s place in his life, he has felt almost guided by a strong force coming from inside of him and after giving it a bit of thought, he has come up with that explanation.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I had faith you’d realize we are meant for each other all by yourself,” Jin answers sheepishly, placing one hand in Kazuya’s cheek. “It feels like real magic that way, doesn’t it?”
“It is real magic, Jin.”
“You sound like my parents,” Jin says with a bright smile, the words he have heard from both his Mother and his Father ever since he was a baby finally take fully sense in his life. It’s only now when he can understand the true meaning of the word happiness.
“Your mother…”
Kazuya finally remembers what he has been asked to do once he has found Jin. He delivers the message Jin’s mom has trusted him with and his heart shrinks a bit at the beautiful smile adorning the full lips. The lady hasn’t said a word about her condition, but Kazuya doesn’t feel like he can keep it from Jin.
“She’s blind, Jin, she can’t see.”
Jin gulps and stays silent for a bit, not trace of his big smile anymore. He doesn’t look sad, but rather pensive.
“I know that. But you’re wrong, Kazuya,” he corrects the younger boy. “She still can see.”
“She thought I was you, she said your name. I-”
“Of course she thought you were me. After all, she wasn’t looking at your face, but at your soul. And the star shining inside of you, Kazuya, it’s just exactly the same as mine.”
“I don’t understand.”
“We were doomed to be star-fated lovers since we were born, Kazuya. We belong together.”
Kazuya’s cheeks tinge with a light shade of pink when Jin pronounces those words with such an earnest, but sweet tone of voice, his heart rising uncontrolled inside his chest.
Jin doesn’t ignore the way Kazuya’s body reacts to his voice, his words and their closeness at long last. He likes to know that, after all this time apart from each other, he can arouse in Kazuya all the emotions Kazuya has been arousing in him since he has first lied his eyes on him.
And now that he sees Kazuya all grown-up, there are even stronger emotions overflowing him. Emotions he can’t control or understand well, but he has no problem voicing out for Kazuya to know.
“I want to kiss you, Kazu-chan. So bad.” Their foreheads are touching at this point and Jin feels afraid to open his eyes given the closeness they are sharing, Kazuya’s presence making him feel weak in the knees. “Can I kiss you?”
“You better… I’ve been waiting almost all my life for this” Kazuya confesses with burning cheeks.
“Do you mean… you’ve never been kissed?”
The blush intensifies with the teasing tone Jin uses.
“Baka” I meant you… I’ve been waiting over ten years to be kissed by you!”
Kazuya’s face is bright red the moment he finishes shouting such an embarrassing truth.
But Jin feels happy and benevolently puts an end to Kazuya’s trepidation by gently grabbing the sides of his face and leaning in the barely few inches separating them with his eyes fixed on Kazuya’s, that soon fall closed.
Unlike the younger, Jin has absolutely no experience in love affairs and yet, like everything he does in life, his actions are guided by his pure instinct. He shyly kisses Kazuya, dwelling in the feeling of his soft lips brushing against his own, and engraving in his memory the sweet taste of his kisses. He plans to keep on kissing for the rest of eternity, but sill he wants to guard every detail from this and all the kisses that are yet to come.
Kazuya’s responses, the little noises of appreciation he can’t hold back, make Jin feels a bit bolder and so he darts out his tongue and lets its tip run over Kazuya’s bottom lip, causing it to shiver and part open. Their tongues then come in contact inside the warm humidity of their mouths and entangle in a dance as harmonious as every move they have shared in this place.
Jin decides he could spend the rest of his life devoting himself to Kazuya and his lips.
When not even the magic can keep them kissing each other, the intensity almost burning their lungs and veins with the lack of oxygen, they part just a breath away from each other, keeping their bodies still connected.
They feel blessed and happy, all the hardships they both have gone through lying forgotten with every second they get to be together.
Still, Kazuya can’t hold back from saying, “Don’t ever go and entrust kids with something that important!”
“Sorry,” Jin smiles sadly and pats Kazuya’s head. “Did you get hurt, Kazuya?”
Kazuya nods, unable to say anything else as some tears choke his voice for a moment.
“I’ve been missing you my whole life… Feeling incomplete and not even knowing what was missing…!”
“Sorry you got entangled with me and my selfishness,” he says honestly, hugging Kazuya dearly in his arms. “For what is worthy, nothing will tear us apart ever again.”
“Nothing? Ever?”
Jin nods.
“All thanks to you, Kazuya.”
~Fin~