Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Chains ❯ Grasp Me ( Chapter 63 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Notes: A long chapter this time!


Chapter Sixty-Three: Grasp Me


“Get up! Yohji, get the hell up!”

Shaken roughly from his sleep, Yohji felt his head and stomach protest loudly and wondered if throwing up all over Ken would be a suitable revenge for the disturbance.

“Yohji! Get your clothes on and come help us—it’s Aya!”

The shaking hadn’t stopped, but Yohji’s thoughts did a one-eighty. There was something wrong with Aya.

Getting his head off the mattress, he looked at Ken. The brunette withdrew his hand and turned away, but it was only to grab Yohji’s sweatpants from the floor and fling them at his face.

Sitting up, he held the pants in his lap as he asked, “What’s the matter?”

“Just come on,” Ken pleaded, apparently looking around for a shirt. He grabbed the one Yohji had been wearing the night before, but after a second look, he tossed it aside and turned back to the blonde who was still sitting a little stupidly on the bed.

Yohji was finding it difficult to get up, more difficult than it had been in the last few weeks, anyway. His head ached and his stomach was still debating whether or not to force him to rush to the toilet. His mouth was dry with an awful taste that told him clearly he had been drinking. A lot. Still, he drug himself from the bed, sparing a thought for the odd condition of the thing, bare of all sheets and even the mattress cover. And he was naked.

Dropping his hand onto Ken’s shoulder, he steadied himself enough to get the navy pants, working the elastic top over his hips with one hand. That finished and a bit of his balance restored, he used both hands to push the tangled mess of his hair back from his face before scrubbing it roughly.

Ken seemed anxious, and Yohji asked again, “What’s going on?”

Instead of answering, the other went to the door, silently telling Yohji to get a move on as he looked back nervously. It wasn’t like Ken to get worked up over nothing, and the initial concern Yohji had felt returned tenfold when he noticed the uneasy shifting of the brunette’s feet.

“Ken,” he tried again, “What’s happening?”

“Just get downstairs.”

Brushing by the younger man, Yohji took the stairs two at time without regard for his miserable condition. When he hit the ground floor, he looked around almost frantically, trying to figure out where to go. There was some sound from the living room, but by then Ken was behind him, a hand latched onto his arm as the other towed him quickly into the room.

At first he couldn’t place what was amiss. The TV’s blank face reflected his own, and the only light was the dim sun of the rainy morning that filtered between the open curtains. The couch was empty, normal, but the large chair had been pushed aside, sitting too close to the low coffee table at an odd angle. When Ken pulled him another step forward, he saw Omi kneeled beside it, a tense look on his face, one that Yohji was used to seeing in dark alleys and empty roofs, not the security of their home.

Omi looked up at him, relief visibly coloring his expression.

“Yohji-kun,” he sighed. His blue eyes flicked nervously to something behind the chair, then back to Yohji.

Yohji shook off Ken’s hold and rounded the coffee table to stand behind Omi. The smaller blonde scrambled out of his way so he could get closer to Aya.

The boy was huddled in the corner, shadowed by the chair as he sat pressed against the wall in a fetal position, hands tangled in his hair as he pulled hard at it. He was wearing one of the outfits they stored in the basement closet, the things he wore when he chose to train in the mornings, kept apart so he wouldn’t have to wake Yohji up by moving too much around their room. Had something happened while he practiced with the sword? Had he hurt himself?

“Aya?” Yohji questioned. The boy jerked at the sound of his voice, curling more tightly around himself. “What’s the matter?”

Inching closer, Yohji sat down cross-legged and reached out a hand, but Aya jerked away, making a small, piteous sound like the whine of an injured animal.

“Aya,” Yohji said again, worried, “Look at me.”

Aya didn’t move, keeping his head resolutely tucked against his knees.

Yohji looked up at Omi for an explanation.

“He was here when I came down,” Omi whispered, “He wouldn’t let me get near him. Ken either. He won’t tell us what’s wrong.”

Looking back to the boy, Yohji tried to reach out again; this time he brushed Aya’s bare forearm. The reaction was instantly more violent. Aya screamed.

Yohji jerked back, eyes wide.

“Aya!”

“No,” the boy said in a trembling voice muffled by his position, “No, no. I’m sorry. No. I can’t. I—no! No!”

“Aya!” Yohji tried again, his own voice rising in volume in his worry. Reaching out, he caught hold of Aya’s shoulder, trying to help. Maybe the boy was having a flashback or something. “It’s me. It’s Yohji.”

“I’m sorry, Yohji. I’m sorry. No. No, no, no. I can’t. I can’t—No, Master. No, Yohji. I—I’m sorry.”

“Can’t what? What’s wrong?” Yohji tried, edging closer. Aya tried to pull away, but he was trapped in the corner.

“Don’t! Don’t,” he pleaded, hands so tight Yohji was sure he was pulling part of his hair out. Yohji tried to open the fingers, but the stuck resolutely. Aya shook under his touch. “I can’t, Yohji.”

“Can’t what?” he questioned, hands worried running over Aya’s back. His breathing was erratic. “You don’t have to do anything, Aya.”

“Liar,” Aya accused in a broken voice. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“Damnit, Aya, look at me!” he demanded, grabbing both of Aya’s shoulders and shaking him.

He was surprised when purple eyes came up to meet his own. They were dark with emotion, with pain.

“I knew…I thought,” the boy pulled air in with difficulty, mouth open as he tried to breath between words, “I thought I could, but I can’t. I can’t! Don’t you understand?! I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I can’t fucking do that!”

“Aya, who wants you to do something?” he asked, hearing the rough emotion in his own voice. The look he received was one of disbelief and fear.

“You,” Aya whispered. His eyes drifted, and when Yohji followed the gaze, he found himself looking at his own bare arm. There, over his shoulder and down his bicep were layers of deep red scratches, many of them scabbed over with dried blood. A look to the opposite shoulder revealed much of the same, and he released Aya in his shock. What had happened? Had he been with someone last night? Had he come home looking like that and scared Aya? He had been naked this morning. Did the boy think he had forced himself on that girl—

No, she had left. She had left, and Yohji had come home.

He looked to Omi, hoping for explanation, maybe for denial to the sick theory trying to form in his head.

The younger blonde looked at him with barely disguised disgust.

“Oh, fuck,” Ken said. Yohji jerked his head in Ken’s direction, finding Omi’s half-sick expression mirrored there.

“I didn’t,” he defended lamely, shaking his head.

“You were naked, Yohji. You haven’t been…you know…since,” Ken looked away. He was right, though. Yohji hadn’t been sleeping that way, not since Aya had been in his bed. And where were his sheets?”

By the door, his memory suddenly supplied. He had taken them off…

Oh God. No.

“No,” he repeated out loud.

“Yohji-kun,” Omi said, forcing Yohji to look back in his direction. “Did something happen?”

“I was drunk. I didn’t. Aya,” he looked back to the frightened boy, “I didn’t.”

Again he reached out, and again Aya balked.

“No!” the boy screamed again. “I told you I can’t!”

Curling up again, Aya’s words degraded into apologies and nonsense. He was hysterical. His breath was getting shallower and he didn’t stop talking long enough to get enough air. Yohji was too shocked to move, watching in horror as Aya fell apart in front of him, remembering fragments of the night before: staggering home, standing in the doorway of their bedroom, the feel of Aya’s thin hips beneath his own, the hard look in Aya’s eyes as he told Yohji he hated him.

Then, he saw it. Aya’s hands finally came down from his hair, the right going for the left to scratch along the wrist in the perpetual gesture of self-punishment. Now, though, the nails met not a cleanly bandaged wrist, nor even scratched skin. No. What Yohji saw was a bloody mess of once-white cloth, clinging loosely around Aya’s thin wrist. The bandages were soaked, the skin around them smeared with dried blood. There was more on the chest of Aya’s white t-shirt, and though he couldn’t see behind Aya’s drawn-up legs, Yohji would bet there was more there.

Without thinking, he grabbed the injured arm and yanked it towards him.

“No! Let go of me!” Aya cried, eyes back to Yohji. “I’m sorry, Yohji! I’m sorry!”

Figuring it couldn’t get much worse, he made a quick move and tugged Aya into his lap. The boy was startled, landing in a loose sprawl. Yohji steadied him at the waist, sitting Aya over his lap so that the boy faced him. His arms were tucked protectively against his chest, eyes down, and feet under his legs so that he mostly kneeled over Yohji, sitting gingerly on the blonde’s lap as he shivered. Apparently shocked out of his panic, he started to breathe, not deeply, but with a more regular rhythm.

“Aya,” Yohji tried again. He ran his fingers through crimson hair, trying to smooth the abused strands before reaching again for Aya’s injured arm. The boy let him unfold it, just a little, to look at the soaked bandages. Looking up, he found Aya looking directly at him.

“See,” Aya said quietly, “I can’t…I can’t even…”

“I’m—” Yohji cut off his own words as Aya went on, mesmerized by the dark eyes.

“Yohji…I want…”

“What?” he asked, quietly. It took effort not to jump when Aya wrapped his arms loosely around Yohji’s neck, leaning close and resting his head on Yohji’s right shoulder. He lay like his was tired, head tipped so he could speak, very quietly, in Yohji’s ear. The blonde couldn’t move, didn’t dare.

“I can’t do what you want. I…”

The pause was so long he didn’t think Aya would go on. He was on the verge of speaking when the boy continued.

“I can’t do this anymore. Kill me, Yohji.”

“What?” he hissed. Taking hold of Aya’s shoulders again, he pushed the boy away enough to look at him. Aya met his eyes.

“Kill me. I don’t want to be slave.”

“Fuck, Aya, you’re not.” He looked hard at the boy, then clasp him suddenly back against his own chest, holding on fiercely as if Aya might slip through his arms.  The redhead felt small and fragile. “I’m sorry. I’m so damn sorry. Don’t…don’t you dare try to kill yourself because of something I did.”

Aya sat limply in his arms.

“You’re not a slave, Aya, not anymore. I was an idiot, okay? I was stupid, drunk idiot, and I’m not going to do that anymore, okay? I won’t fucking touch you if that’s what you want; I’ll stay down here and sleep on the damn couch. I’ll stay in the other room or stop talking to you or just stay the hell away, but don’t do this. Please,” he begged.

Yohji felt warm tears slip beneath the closed lids of his eyes. He pressed his face in against Aya’s hair and resolved that he wasn’t going to lose another one.

~*~

Omi stood in the doorway of the living room, mug of tea held in front of him, staring sadly at the scene. It hadn’t changed much in the last four hours. Yohji sat on the couch looking tired and half sick. The blonde had been motivated, eventually, to go upstairs to shower and change, but his clothes were anything but the normal flashy attire. He wore loose, torn jeans and a gray sweatshirt, his hair pulled back halfheartedly into a ponytail and his sunglasses discarded on the coffee table beside a cup of coffee, Omi’s last delivery to the room.

The tea was for Aya. The boy had confided to Yohji not too many days before that he didn’t like coffee, and the older man had been quick to procure several kinds of tea for the house. Omi had made up some of it in hopes of getting Aya to drink something, or at least talk to him a little.

Since the scene this morning, Aya hadn’t done anything besides sit in the large chair. Ken had dragged it back to its regular place, and Yohji had lifted Aya to put him there. Instantly the boy had curled up around himself, taking on the same position he had folded himself into on the floor. There was a fresh change of his clothes laying over the arm of the couch, but he still wore the bloody practice outfit he had found during the night. Omi had cleaned up his arm, acting alongside Yohji who held the thin appendage while he placed sterri strips over the three deep cuts.

That was one reason Omi was concerned with getting something into the redhead. He had lost a lot of blood. Early that morning Omi had gone to the bathroom only to find a disturbing scene. There was blood in the sink and on the vanity, more on the floor; the weapon was obviously Ken’s broken razor, still lying near the edge of the sink. When he had found Aya’s blue pajamas, the front soaked in red, he had leapt into action. If he hadn’t dealt with so many injuries before, he might have panicked.

He had checked Yohji’s room first, disturbed by the naked man sleeping there but with no real time to put it together. After a brief attempt to wake the man, Omi decided he definitely did not have time for that and went to get Ken instead, all the time replaying his own part in the incident. He had heard Yohji come in, but it wasn’t anything unusual for the man to stumble up the stairs and wake them all up. Still, he should have gotten up at the slamming of the door and when Yohji yelled the redhead’s name. But he had thought— no, it didn’t matter what he had thought, he ought to have gotten up.

Together, he and Ken had made a search of the house, locating Aya in a very few minutes The boy had been sprawled loosely against the wall, but once they tried to get close to him he had, in Ken’s words, completely freaked out. Thinking Yohji could fix the situation, Omi had sent Ken to get him, only to discover the blonde was the cause in the first place.

He still wasn’t sure exactly what had happened, but it was clear enough that Yohji had done something stupid while he was drunk off his ass. It infuriated Omi, and he had a hard time not giving the older man a piece of his mind. He had watched Aya over the last weeks, impressed by the progress he was trying so hard to make; the boy obviously trusted the man, more so than anyone else, and Yohji had betrayed that trust. The only thing that kept Omi’s mouth shut was that he felt complicit in the betrayal. He should have gotten up.

Now he came forward, handing the mug to Yohji and gesturing to Aya. The blonde scooted forward on the couch, holding the tea in his hands.

“Hey, Aya,” he said gently, “You want something to drink?”

Aya’s head moved, just a little, no.

“Omi made some tea,” he paused to sniff it, “It’s the one with oranges. You like that one.”

This time he got nothing, and Omi felt his heart react to the look of dejection that sprang anew to Yohji’s face. Carefully he took the mug from the blonde’s hands and went to stand next to Aya. Slowly, he reached to touch one pale arm, a motion that usually got Aya to look at him.

“Try a little, Aya?”

Nothing again.

“You need to eat something,” he tried quietly. “I could make you some soup, or send Ken out to get noodles. There’s ice cream in the freezer, do you want some of that?”

No, the head motioned again.

“Do you want to change your clothes? Yohji brought you some clean ones. I know you’re cold.”

There were goosebumps along the arm he had touched. Rarely was Aya seen in less than a sweater, and he favored heavy things with long sleeves. Now, having lost a good deal of blood, it was probably worse. But he motioned no, he didn’t or wasn’t or just didn’t care.

“Want to read for a while? Yohji brought your book downstairs, the one you were reading.”

No, he didn’t.

“Are you sure? You got really far in it last night. Is it a good story?”

There was no response, Aya apparently only feeling it necessary to answer direct questions about what he wanted to do.

Omi wracked his brain for anything that would get a response. Yohji was useless, staring at the boy and looking like he might cry if he weren’t so tired.

“Should I bring you a blanket?”

No.

“Do you want to go for a walk? We could go get some coffee or tea or something at the place down the street. Or we could go to the park.”

No.

“Want to go work in the greenhouse for a while?”

Expecting another no, Omi almost missed the nod. He stopped immediately, putting the tea on the table and kneeling down next to the boy, eager to get him moving. Hesitantly, Aya looked up at him. His eyes were dark and shadowed, his hair tangled as it fell over his face.

Omi smiled as gently as he could.

“Want to change your clothes, then go out there for a while? I’m sure the plants will be glad to be watered.”

Again Aya nodded, and after a minute, stiffly began to unfold himself. Yohji went to move, but Omi held up a hand to prevent him. Instead, he reached to help Aya, but the boy jerked away from his hands. Omi relented, lowering them and letting the redhead do it on his own. Getting up, he took his clothes silently, head lowered the whole time, and walked away to change.

~tbc~

Notes: Review to make the boys feel better; they like cookies and each other.  
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