Title: undecided (1)
Author: Scarlet Kozi
Rating: PG-13
Band: La:Sadies
Contains: Violence, adult language, drama
Warning: This is fiction, okay? Don’t sue me.
Comments: This is sort of an unusual piece for me. It’s not too long, and on top of that, it has a less depressing ending than most of my work. And also, it’s less yaoi... but still, it’s important to me, and I think that maybe a lot of you out there might be able to understand too. It was interesting to try to write it from the other person's perspective. Please comment when you’re through with this... I really want to know what you think about it. Don’t ask about the title, I couldn’t think of anything else. [Damn this has taken me a long time to get up on ff.net.]
Other: This is dedicated to Xelyna. It’s the promise I wish I could make to you.
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"Ne, Kaoru-kun?"
As he carefully tuned the pegs on his black guitar, Kaoru paused and glanced up over his shoulder. Die was standing there, with his own guitar, also tuning it, but there was a slightly curious expression on his face which struck Kaoru as being more serious than usual. Mentally, Kaoru tried to predict what Die would say, but failed. "Hai?"
"Listen, I wanted to talk to you."
Kaoru nodded. "Okay. About what?" He continued to tune his guitar, but kept his attention on Die.
"Well, it’s kind of about Kyo."
Kaoru was taken a bit by surprise, but he nodded again. Meanwhile, his eyes shifted off of Die and traveled across the practice room. It was mostly empty at the moment. Kisaki was in the next room unpacking his bass, and Shinya was in the bathroom trying to wash off a soda stain in his shirt that Die had caused only a few minutes ago. And then, on the opposite wall, Kyo was rummaging through a bag, with no real expression on his face, simply searching for something. He was out of ear-shot, at least.
"What about Kyo?"
His eyes shifted back to Die, taking in the long red-tinted hair, pulled back over one shoulder, and that expression again. Die paused for a moment, and then shrugged. "I don’t know. I probably shouldn’t say anything."
For some reason, Kaoru felt slightly nervous, but tried not to let it show, as he adjusted the pitch of the A string. "No, go ahead."
"Well... I mean, it’s a little hard for me to understand him, but then, that’s probably the same for everyone else, right?" Die laughed a bit. "Kyo’s not easy to figure out. Not that I’ve known him for a really long time or anything."
"I know what you mean. It’s... hard to know what’s going through his mind."
"Hai." Die nodded, temporarily turning his attention back to his guitar. He didn’t seem too worried, Kaoru noticed. A moment passed, and then Die glanced up again. "I wasn’t sure what time practice was going to be today, so last night I called him up."
"And?"
"I don’t know, maybe I was just interrupting something. But it sounded like he was really upset."
"Upset?" Kaoru blinked. "About what?"
"I don’t know, I didn’t ask him." Die shrugged. A bit uncertainly, he added, "He might have been crying."
"Kyo? Crying?"
"Well, yeah, I think so."
"… Oh." Kaoru was silent for a moment. For a long moment, he thought hard, trying to understand why Kyo would have been crying. It wasn’t that big of a deal, he knew, but still, something about this made him feel uneasy. Sidelong, he watched Kyo, and the casual way the vocalist was plucking item after item out of the bag, and his concern started to grow. He didn’t quite understand Kyo, and had just assumed that the two of them lived on different levels. But, still...
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Ten minutes later, Shinya had given up on trying to get the stain out of his shirt, and was in a sullen, irritated mood. Therefore, to make it up to him, Die helpfully volunteered to take him out for a cup of coffee before practice actually started. Kisaki had seemed a bit annoyed, but Die had volunteered to buy HIM coffee too, and the three of them were gone.
"Ne, Kyo-kun, you wanna come too?" Die had asked on their way out.
"No. Thanks, though."
"Okay. You, Kaoru-kun?"
Kaoru had hesitated for a moment, not sure whether to give Kyo some time alone, or to stay behind and try to talk to him. Finally, he shook his head. "Coffee makes me too jittery. But thanks anyway."
"All right. We’ll be back soon."
"Ja." Kaoru had nodded and waved, carefully watching them leave.
A short period of silence had passed, and now Kyo was sitting down on the couch, alternating between flipping through a book and going through the notes and lyrics that he had brought. Kaoru felt his worry increasing as he watched him, but for no good reason.
At last he flipped off the switch on his amplifier and took off the guitar, leaning it against the wall. Brushing his hands off on his jeans, he wandered over to Kyo’s couch and stood there for a moment.
Kyo neither looked up nor said anything to really acknowledge his presence. But Kaoru had grown used to that by now. It wasn’t an arrogant or negative gesture, especially coming from someone like Kyo. It simply meant that the vocalist had nothing to really say, so was just making room for someone else to speak.
"Mind if I sit down?"
"No, go ahead." Kyo nodded to the space next to him, pushing strands of dark brown hair out of his eyes. His black roots were starting to show.
Feeling inwardly relieved, Kaoru turned and sat down on the couch next to Kyo, idly noticing to himself the way the cushions shifted slightly under his weight. It made Kyo, the much lighter of the two, be elevated slightly. Stifling a smile, Kaoru silently decided, ‘Better not risk my life today by saying anything I’ll regret,’ and pushed any possible jokes about Kyo’s size out of his mind.
Kaoru watched him for a moment, folding his hands in his lap and leaning forward, and asked, "Hey, have you been okay lately?"
Blinking, Kyo turned dark brown eyes onto him, blank and still without expression. "What do you mean?"
"I don’t know. A couple of us have been a little worried about you. You seem like you’re a little depressed."
Kyo let out a little humorous snort that was only half of a laugh, and turned his eyes back onto his sheets of lyrics, taking the top one off and shifting it to the back of the pile. "Well, everyone gets depressed sometimes, ne?"
"Yeah, but..." Kaoru paused, feeling a little worried still. "Are you SURE everything is okay?"
Kyo just rolled his eyes slightly.
Kaoru almost stopped there and let it go, but something told him that it would be the right choice. He wondered whether he was overreacting... As usual, could he be making too big of a deal out of something? But scooting over a bit closer, still with his eyes on Kyo, he said in a quiet and confidential voice, "Come on, Kyo-kun. Really, are you sure?"
At first Kaoru thought that Kyo was going to blow up at him, because the vocalist’s hands tensed as they held the papers for a moment, and he stopped moving. But then he just deflated, sighing, and said, "I’m fine, Kaoru-kun. Like I said, EVERYONE has unavoidable bouts of depression, sometimes. You worry too much." He laughed slightly, but it seemed as though he was forcing it for Kaoru’s benefit, to try and reassure him.
Kaoru just nodded, eyeing him. ‘Unavoidable bouts of depression?’ he thought. That disturbed him a bit.
A couple of minutes of silence passed, and then Kyo set his things down.
"I’m gonna go take a leak," he announced, and stood up.
"Un." Kaoru nodded yet again, not sure what else to say. He watched Kyo, without taking his eyes away, as the other stuck his hands in his pockets and meandered out of the room. When the door closed after him, Kaoru could finally look away again, and his eyes flicked around the room quickly before settling on the lyrics next to him.
Kyo’s lyrics were admirably poetic. Kaoru searched over a few of them briefly, the only sound in the room the crinkling of the paper as he moved them. But sometimes, he had to wonder. Occasionally Kyo’s lyrics would make him feel a bit unsettled, no matter how beautiful or poignant. The ones in front of him went to a rather sad-sounding song that Die had written, and the subject of the words was an insane mental patient who tried to find solace in slitting his wrists.
‘Why DOES he write things like that, anyway...?’
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Kaoru leaned his back against the elevator wall, watching the glowing display of the buttons and the floors being ascended. Brushing a few purple strands of hair out of his face idly, he glanced down at the floor. ‘Hope I won’t be interrupting anything.’
The previous night, he had come here, to Kyo’s place, and they had spent some time brainstorming over ideas for a song that Kaoru had brought. They were all rough sketches, with the notes and riffs and chords scrawled out on paper, but somehow, Kaoru could always communicate his ideas to Kyo. And once they got an idea of the melody, Kyo would always find some inspiration for the lyrics.
Kaoru was returning with hopes of making some alterations to a chord progression. But without the music sheets that he had left, he was pretty helpless. ‘Kyo probably won’t mind.’
The elevator stopped, and the doors opened. Following a familiar path, Kaoru leaned off of the wall and pulled his hands out of his pockets, stepping out of the elevator onto the floor. Kyo’s apartment was three doors down, he remembered mentally, and he paused just in front of the door in question.
Soft strains of exaggerated speech and guns shooting reached Kaoru’s ears through the door. He smirked a little bit. ‘Kyo’s rotting his mind with television again.’
Wondering whether he should interrupt at all, Kaoru knocked on the door.
"Hang on a second," Kyo’s voice absently called from inside. The vocalist sounded slightly irritated, as though he didn’t want to have his show interrupted, but finally there was the sound of him picking up the remote and putting the television on mute. Kaoru listened for all of the usual sounds of Kyo getting up and stepping across the floor towards him.
Then the door opened.
Kaoru smiled amiably, as his eyes unconsciously traveled over Kyo’s head and glanced around the apartment inside. It was slightly small, but had some clutter because Kyo wasn’t very compulsive about cleaning. There were some cigarette packs sitting here or there, some empty and some not, and there were places where clothing was sitting in unorganized piles, waiting to be sorted. As Kaoru had suspected, the television was on, and the glow from it flickered across the room and lent a neon light. Kyo tended to like it dark.
Then Kaoru glanced down, and noticed the expression on Kyo’s face. "Hey, Kaoru-kun," the vocalist only said, a touch of a usual welcoming smile playing at his lips, before he moved back and made way for Kaoru to enter.
Numbly, Kaoru walked in, his eyes still on the other.
Apparently Kyo had opened the door without thinking. With his attentions on the television, he hadn’t thought to throw something on before running to the door and pulling it open. He was only dressed in a pair of loose jeans and a white wife beater, his brown and now slightly black hair in general disarray, his face sans makeup, but his eyes inquisitively on Kaoru, apparently wondering at the guitarist’s surprise.
Kaoru looked at all of these things only passingly, at last focusing on Kyo’s arms. The pale skin had long, crisscrossing pink scars, raised slightly and in some places white, depending on the level of healing. Some were even a dark red.
At last, Kaoru brought his eyes up to Kyo’s face again. The large, dark brown eyes blinked, the head tilting to one side. "What’s wrong?" the vocalist asked, almost uneasy.
Kaoru just shook his head. "N-Nothing."
Kyo seemed to be wondering whether he had sprouted a second head, whether that could be the explanation for such an expression on Kaoru’s face. Quickly he glanced down, and stopped. His face paled, as his eyes reminded his brain that he had mindlessly opened the door without thinking first. Hastily he started backing up, a dark expression settling over his face as he looked up at Kaoru again.
"I’ll... I’ll be right back. You want the music, ne? Sit down."
"Ha... Hai." Kaoru nodded.
Without another word, Kyo turned and practically raced out of the room. He was actually walking, but at such a pace that it seemed as though he wanted to simply disappear. A moment later he disappeared behind the door to his bedroom, and Kaoru looked after him.
Finally he inspired himself to move, and slowly walked across the room to the couch where Kyo had been sitting and watching television. The show was still on, lights dancing across the screen, and Kaoru looked up at it. It was a show on the yakuza, one of the things that Kyo showed one of his usual peculiar interests in. Kaoru only watched it for a moment, not really able to think anything at the time.
A couple of seconds later, he heard footsteps and glanced over, seeing Kyo walking back into the room. In one hand he was holding the sheets of music that Kaoru had brought over yesterday. Now he was wearing a sweatshirt, the sleeves pulled down, fabric wrapped around his thumbs.
His face flushed slightly, his eyes avoiding Kaoru’s, he held out the papers. "Here."
"A-Arigato." Kaoru took them and set them in his lap, still looking at Kyo.
Apparently Kyo quickly grew uncomfortable under the scrutiny, and abruptly moved past Kaoru, sitting back in his own seat on the couch. Snatching up the remote control, he un-muted the show again, and sat back, almost sinking into the cushions. The sound of gunfire flooded back into the room, and intensely Kyo resorted back to watching the show, as though nothing had happened.
Kaoru watched Kyo for a second longer, until the vocalist’s eyes darted over to him, almost angry, as though to ask, "What are you looking at?"
So Kaoru started watching the show too, in silence.
‘Well,’ he thought. ‘This... This explains everything...’
---to be continued---
To the next part