Gensomaden Saiyuki Fan Fiction ❯ Fateful Encounters ❯ Becoming Roommates ( Chapter 5 )

Title: Fateful Encounters [part 5/?]

Author: Enigma

Series: Saiyuki

Written: June - October, 2002

Rating: R

Pairings: (Gojyo + Hakkai)

Category: Shonen ai/yaoi, Angst, Romance, Action/Adventure, Blood, Language. AU-OOC.

Archive: fanfiction.net & mediaminer.org [author: "E-sama the Llama"]

Warnings: shonen ai/yaoi, angst, romance, action/adventure, anime-based bloodshed, crude language matching the characterization of the series, original characters to support the main characters from the anime and not detract from them, medical and other squick, additional warnings and pairings possible as fic comes into being over time. AU-OOC.

Spoilers: Since this is based on episodes 15 & 16 of the anime, there are definite spoilers for them, but there are also minor spoilers for other aspects of the series which I will try to keep to a minimum so readers both new and old can enjoy this tale.

Disclaimer: "Saiyuki" is the property of Kazuya Minekura, et al. All original characters featured herein (including but not limited to: Zan, Long, Kiko, etc.) are © Enigma, 2002, and are not to be used without permission. This unauthorized work of unpaid fanfiction is intended for entertainment only; kindly do not sue me.

Notes: What might have actually happened after Gojyo found and rescued a severely injured Gonou (a.k.a. Hakkai) three years prior to their journey to the west? How will these revelations change not only their own lives but also Sanzo's and Goku's as well?

*****

The actual journey to Gojyo's apartment was a slow one since Zan didn't want to jar her patient's wounds unnecessarily, but since the distance was actually fairly short, it wasn't long before they had successfully transferred Gonou into the one and only bed there.

In the kitchen, Kiko was less than pleased as he put away the food Long's wife had prepared and performed a perfunctory check on the older half-breed's all too empty pantry. When he joined his "aunt" and Gojyo as they rearranged the furniture to allow the nineteen year old to keep watch over the injured man, he growled, "Do you *ever* keep anything in that refrigerator of yours other than beer, baka?" Gazing at the woman who he respected and adored, the annoyed ten year old complained, "The only stuff he has in the kitchen is beer, coffee, sugar, and something with purply-green fuzz growing on it in a cabinet, Aunt Zan! Honestly, I can't imagine how *anyone* can live like that!" He glared at the elder half-breed as if daring him to try to defend himself.

Gojyo, however, didn't feel the least bit insulted about the simple truth. He merely grinned at the crimson-haired child and explained, "I'm hardly ever *here*! There's no need to keep a bunch of stuff around when most of my meals are usually the result of a quick poker hand against the cook at the bar or are gifts from pretty girls who want to impress me!"

Snorting in derision, Kiko placed tiny hands balled into fists onto his hips and remarked coolly, "No wonder you asked me to teach you to cook!" Then allowing a bit of forgiveness to enter his hardened ruby-hued gaze, he added, "But at least you've got some pots and pans. When Aunt Zan and I go shopping later in the week, we'll get you some stuff so you won't go hungry, all right?"

"Sounds cool to me, kiddo." Glancing at the patient to whom he had recently learned to administer the intravenous fluids that would keep him alive through the coma, he added sadly, "Too bad it's going to be awhile until I'm cooking for more than one, though."

Patting him on the arm reassuringly, Zan said, "Don't worry about it too much, Gojyo. Have faith and just take good care of him. He ought to be awake before you know it."

With a sigh as he ran a hand through flowing crimson hair, the nineteen year old commented, "I hope you're right, doc. It'll be weird having a roommate for the first time, but to have one that doesn't talk or eat will be even weirder."

"Try not to dwell on it too much, all right?" The kindly woman smiled then asked, "By the way, what did you decide to call him?"

Giving the young boy standing nearby a smirk before mussing Kiko's hair, Gojyo answered, "I decided to go with 'Nanashi', just like this little otaku recommended."

The boy mock-glared at him then smiled slightly, pleased to have helped with such an important decision, then he said as indifferently as he could, "Suit yourself, baka. It doesn't matter to me."

"Oh? Really?" The teasing quality of the older half-breed's voice was plain to hear and then he pretended to reconsider and remarked, "In that case, I might go back to 'green eyes' then. At least that way it's still true even after we know who he really is, right?"

Kiko pouted ever so slightly until he caught the wink that ended the playful remark. With a smirk and a shrug, the boy repeated, "Suit yourself. But if he hates you for it when he wakes up, don't blame me."

Chuckling slightly and deciding it was time to leave the two housemates on their own, Zan interjected, "I think 'Nanashi' will do just fine, Gojyo. Now, though, I think *we* need to see about going home and Kiko has to get back to his studies. He may not attend the regular school here in the village since his education was neglected while he and his mother lived in isolation, but we're trying to fix that with some fairly intensive tutoring, just the two of us." Her adoring gaze lay lightly on the small boy's head and the loving pride in her eyes was unmistakable.

"All right," Gojyo agreed easily. As they walked to the door, he added almost nervously, "Um, I'll see you whenever you get a chance to come check up on Nanashi, right, doc?"

"Certainly, Gojyo," the woman promised, then amended it saying, "I'll be over to check on you *both* tomorrow most likely. Make sure that *you* get some rest, too, all right? You're recovering well from the loss of blood due to the transfusion, but you shouldn't push yourself unnecessarily."

"Sure thing, doc!" The gambler smiled and waved as the pair got into the wagon and prepared to leave. Realizing he'd forgotten to mention something as he stuck his hands into the pockets of the jeans that had been almost ruined the night he'd rescued the stranger, he added quickly, "Oh, and thanks, too, for getting all the blood out of my clothes, doc! I'm a real klutz with laundry and would've never been able to do that."

Her laughter was light yet warm as she remarked, "That's all right, Gojyo. Doctors tend to become fairly expert at that since it's a foregone conclusion that sooner or later you're going to have to cope with it." She and her "nephew" waved good-bye and before he knew it, Gojyo was on his own once more.

Stepping back into the main room of his apartment, he pulled over a chair, turned it backwards, and straddled it, seating himself so that he could lay his arms across the back of the chair and rest his chin on them. Sitting comfortably, the scarlet-eyed man gazed for quite awhile at his new roommate and wondered where to begin with his assignment of talking to a person who couldn't respond.

With a small sigh and a shake of his head, Gojyo reached up to rub a fingertip across the twin scars on his left cheek as he looked at the thick bandage on the other man's face. Then he commented without really thinking it through, "I sure hope that doesn't leave a scar, Nanashi. If it does, you'll spend the rest of your life getting asked stupid questions about it by people who really ought to keep their big mouths shut. Then again…"

His words trailed off as he rose and walked over to stand behind the waist-high headboard of the bed. He bent over and gently brushed the soft waterfall of coffee-brown hair away from the patch over the silent man's injured right eye and added sadly, "But better to have a few scratches than to lose your eyesight, you know. Zan told me she wasn't sure how bad the damage was without being able to ask you if you could focus and shit like that, but it would be a damn shame to lose one of those nice-looking green eyes of yours."

Deciding he rather liked the view, Gojyo remained where he was and simply leaned on the bed resting his weight on hands placed on opposite sides of the silent man's shoulders while hanging above his companion with long crimson locks drifting down beside his face. If Gonou had been able to open his eyes, he would've received a preview of the first time the pair would share words, but this was beyond his capabilities right at the moment.

Simply standing there quietly wasn't in the outgoing teen's nature, however, and soon the silence seemed to encourage him to speak again. With a wide smirk that was utterly wasted on his audience, he remarked, "Want to know something, Nanashi? I don't recall ever letting a *guy* sleep in my bed before. You should feel honored, ya know?"

Thinking his own impromptu comments through even as he finger-combed the silken chocolate tresses he'd disturbed moments before, he added almost wistfully, "Or maybe it's *me* who should feel honored, ne? I still can't shake the feeling that this won't last, that someone's going to come looking for you and take you from here before I'm ready to let you go, so for now, I think maybe that I *am* the one who's getting the better deal out of this."

Gojyo chuckled slightly and made a pretense of adjusting the unmoving man's covers as if he'd shifted and disturbed them which he hadn't. Then he remarked, "After all, I've never had a roomie before and seeing as how I've got one that's not only drop-dead gorgeous in a masculine kinda way, I've got one that doesn't give me any back-talk either!"

The gambler's flippant words weren't what he truly felt, however.

He ached to hear the voice of this handsome stranger. To hear what his real name was and how he'd come to be so terribly injured were facts that at the time Sha Gojyo would've sacrificed a great deal to discover. Yet by the time such information was available he would not want to know them for fear it would mean that the intriguing man might leave his life forever just that much sooner.

After remaining where he was for quite some time, rambling on and off about random topics as they crossed his mind, Gojyo realized he was only making himself all the more lonely to hear another voice and he stopped himself from continuing the one-sided conversation.

With a soul-weary sigh, he commented rhetorically, "Well, Nanashi, old pal, I think I want some coffee." He lifted his palms from the bedclothes and straightened, groaning slightly as his back muscles complained about his earlier posture, then he said with another sigh, "I'd rather have some whisky over ice, mind you, but a promise is a promise. When Sha Gojyo tells someone he intends to keep them safe, he means it! Especially when they aren't even awake to hear the words."

As he walked past the bed, Gojyo didn't bother to suppress a desire to give the insensate man a pat on the shoulder for his own comfort if nothing else. Then he said very quietly, "Get well in a hurry so we can go drinking to celebrate, all right, dude?" He hesitated as that wish for a fairy-tale response washed over him again. There was, of course, no fantasy ending to the poignant moment, and he released a pent up breath in a rush of sadness and left the small room hoping a hot mug of whatever coffee was left in the cupboard might cheer him up.

*****

The day stretched on seemingly endlessly as Gojyo wandered about the small apartment like a tiger in a cage and yet he never seemed capable of staying away from the side of the man in the bed for very long.

It wasn't until his stomach growled angrily at him for being ignored that he even noticed that it was sunset on the other side of the thick blinds he'd lowered over the windows hoping to keep the room cool and comfortable for the man in his care. With a tiny shake of his head, he pondered aloud, "Hmm, I guess I oughta go see what Long's wife sent for me to eat. What do you think it might be, Nanashi? Maybe some fish stew or possibly some rice balls or something?" He glanced at the motionless figure and then smiled slightly as he added, "It doesn't really matter much to me, though. I'll go grab whatever Kiko left at the front of the fridge and eat that first."

The fact that a small smile crept onto his face without giving it any thought actually made Gojyo feel a little better as he commented to his silent friend, "I'm glad that he and Zan are dropping by tomorrow. I hadn't noticed that the kid and I had gotten to be so chummy. It'll be nice to hear him calling me 'baka' again and isn't *that* a strange thing to wish to hear?"

Laughing slightly at his own joke, Gojyo wandered off to discover a cold yet tasty Shanghai-style noodle, vegetable, and chicken concoction that the doctor's wife had made for him. Despite the fact that he was fairly certain it was supposed to be heated before serving, the crimson-haired man skipped that step, grabbed his first, last, and only Asahi of the day, and returned to Gonou's side almost immediately.

Placing his dinner on the table that held a deck of cards, an empty coffee mug, and cigarettes with an ashtray that he set on the floor as superfluous, Gojyo plopped unceremoniously into the chair that hadn't been relocated and then stared at the ceiling for a moment. Whether he was wordlessly expressing his thanks to some higher power for getting them where they were or if he was just reflecting on things as they were was unknown, but before long, he refocused his blood red eyes on the food in front of him.

Wishing he was sharing the meal with the motionless man in the bed as he hoped he would eventually, the gambler picked up his chopsticks and dug in, eating without thought and enjoying his drink in atypically tiny sips. Once he was done, the dishes sat ignored on the table as he picked up his half-full can of beer and went over to sit on the floor where he could lean against the bed, tired despite the lack of physical activity during most of the day.

Gojyo listened to the soft whisper of air moving in and out of the other man's lungs and found it to be reassuring, comforting in its ageless rhythm, an almost poetic yet wordless confirmation that where there was life there was indeed hope.

Long lashed eyelids drooped down to conceal ruby-colored orbs for several minutes, then they cracked open only enough to help guide a hand to the beer can sitting nearby. Taking a shallow swallow before resting the cool metal in his lap, Gojyo enjoyed the slide of barely cold fluid down the back of his throat and went back to enjoying the new melody that sang softly in his ears as he rested his back against the mattress. His lengthy ponytail had loosened during the course of the day and now long tendrils of deep red silk spilled across the dark blue bedspread to lay close to the motionless man's hand as if tempting it to move and discover it waiting there for him.

Occasionally his eyes would slip open and peer at the man whose gentle face lay upon the pillow only a short distance away, bathed in the soft glow of the lamp, pleased and displeased equally by the unchanging quality he found there.

From an optimistic perspective, the fact that the stranger's condition hadn't changed was quite reassuring in that the act of transferring him from Zan's home to his own had been an inherently risky procedure as evidenced by the need to travel slowly. From a pessimistic one, however, this also implied he wasn't getting better as quickly as Gojyo would've liked, but considering the level of physical trauma Gonou had experienced, this was terribly unrealistic. Ether way, though, the scarlet-eyed man was simply glad that he was able to be the one sitting there watching him and listening to the rhythm of his breathing.

The rest of the evening slipped away in near silence.

Eventually the empty Asahi can lay forgotten where it was last set down on the floor, next to it were a pair of boots discarded by their owner haphazardly when his feet got tired of being confined. The soft golden glow of the lamp near the bed cast soft shadows across the room caressing a pair of restful masculine faces.

The emerald-eyed man remained as unmoving as always yet he was no longer alone on the bed to a limited extent. [1]

After falling asleep while still sitting on the floor and leaning against the mattress, Gojyo had moved in slumber to turn towards the comatose man and then crossed his arms atop the bedspread and rested his head upon them. Crimson hair flooded loose of its tie eventually and spilled across Gonou's hand after all, entwining itself in slack fingers as if that was where it belonged in the first place.

The human body is adept at making itself comfortable while resting and this strange arrangement seemed to suit the previously devil-may-care gambler just fine as Gojyo enjoyed the best night's sleep he'd had in months if not years despite the slight backache he would awaken with in the morning.

The 500 year old ties that bound these two souls together were slowly reasserting themselves.

Given time, these two men would learn to overcome almost anything for the sake of the other as well as for the sake of two others they had yet to meet. Sadly, this new found strength would arrive too late to grant peace to one of them when he'd need it badly in only a few days' time.

*****

To be continued.

Author's Notes:

[1] I find it fascinating how often the anime includes scenes where Gojyo ends up asleep while leaning against a bed that Hakkai is sleeping in. This occurs in the OVAs as well as the regular series and these scenes inspired the sleeping patterns that develop here as Gojyo finds himself unable to stay away from Gonou. A similar scene for a different set of bishounen was chibi-Goku sleeping beside an injured Nataku during the Gaiden flashbacks in the second season. These two make an adorable pair, too, and I wish I had time to write them a nice friendship story.