Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ This is Not My Life ❯ I got to know you in a dream ( Chapter 13 )

A/N: In this chapter Aya makes a bunch of references to things he said in chapter 1. So if it's been a long time (like 2 years, heh,) since you read the beginning of the story, you might want to skim over the first chapter before reading this one.

 

 

“Long before I ever saw your face

I got to know you in a dream

So goodnight

I'm going to bed

I'm falling upstairs to meet you

I wake up with memories in my head

I'm someone else instead”

 

 

—AYA—

 

Why did I do that?

 

My hand is still frozen to the wheel, and I'm splayed across Yohji's lap from the force of swerving the car off the road.

 

A glance in his direction reveals the same wide-eyed, glazed over expression he'd worn when he lost control of the car.

 

I find myself smacking him in the head.

 

“You idiot.”

 

I'm not sure if I'm more pissed at him for almost killing us or at myself for stopping him.

 

I always thought that if I saw an easy way to die I'd take it.

 

Not on a mission of course. I'd never simply give up on a mission. But I've often found myself fantasizing about accidents that would give me a way out.

 

Like in the flower shop, for example. I'd never admit this out loud, but I made it a habit to never quite stack the pots on the upper shelves levelly. I really hoped one of these days they'd fall and brain me.

 

I never followed the directions when I sprayed the plants with pesticides, either. Protective face-gear is for people who want to live, ha.

 

You know, that probably attributed to why I'm having such a hard time catching my breath right now….

 

My assault on Yohji shakes him out of his stupor. He reacts in his usual manner of trying to turn everything into a joke.

 

“Aya! I didn't—ha—know you cared.”

 

“I don't, moron,” I mutter.

 

The fake cheerful expression plastered across his face drops away like quicksilver.

 

“Then why did you…?”

 

“I didn't have time to think about it,” I cut him off, “I just reacted.”

 

“Oh.” Yohji returns to staring off into space.

 

I try getting up, but Yohji's arm has fallen across me, and in his catatonic state it's pure dead weight. My awkward position makes it embarrassingly difficult to shove it off.

 

“Move.” I snarl.

 

Instead of complying I feel his muscles tighten. He's deliberately pinning me down, the bastard!

 

“Do you regret it?” I've never heard his voice sound so dead.

 

“What?”

 

“If you regret it, we can do it again,” he lets out a creepy, strained chuckle. “No swerving, second round, eh?”

 

The anger his words spark in me provides the strength to shove his arm off and straighten myself.

 

This time the smack is upgraded to a good old fashioned punch to the gut. I hit him hard enough that he should react, but he doesn't even blink.

 

“Have you finally lost your mind?” I scream at him, “Do you think I want to die in a goddamned car accident with an idiot like you?” That last sentence finished meaner than I intended it to….

 

A shrug. “Maybe.”

 

“Well I DON'T” I holler, “If that's the way you want to go, then count me the hell out. It'll have to be a one man mission—”

 

“Okay.”

 

“What?” He's not frickin' serious.

 

“Get out of the car,” he nods towards the passenger door.

 

“Yohji…” my voice lowers automatically, “please tell me you're joking.”

 

Instead of an answer I get another nod at my door.

 

“You're mad.”

 

“I'm tired,” his eyes slide shut, “I give up.”

 

“Like hell you do,” I take advantage of his eyes being shut to wrench the keys out of the ignition and toss them over the side. They arc gracefully before disappearing with a shimmer into the grass along the wayside.

 

This, I anticipate, to be an act of war. Seven is only Yohji's most treasured material possession; a deliberate destruction of any part of it being nothing short of suicide. I brace myself for his attack.

 

The lack of physical assault on my person causes me to look at him again. He's…not really doing anything.

 

“Yohji?” I poke him.

 

“What?” He sounds…almost…bored.

 

“Aren't you going to kill me for tossing your keys?”

 

“Nah,” he shrugs, “I can still just run into traffic.”

 

“Don't you dare.” I find myself on his lap again—though this time it's me who's pinning him.

 

“I thought you didn't care,” he asks, raising an eyebrow.

 

“I don't—I mean I…I….” Well, shit. He's got me there. What happened between my own suicidal thoughts of five minutes ago, and now? When did I start to give a damn about what happens to Yohji? I can't bring myself to spout out any of the emotional bullshit that I know he wants to hear. I trust him to be smart enough to interpret my lack of further denial for what it means.

 

A few awkward minutes elapse where I remain on top of him. While I trust him to interpret my silence correctly, I don't trust him not to still do something idiotic.

 

“Well,” he says, a smile slowly creeping across his face, “we can't very well drive the car without keys, so now I guess we have to go camping, don't we?”

 

“Arrgh, you idiot.” I mutter through gritted teeth; though this time the repeated insult is not directed at Yohji.

 

….

 

 

“We don't have any camping gear,” I point out, hoping to talk some sense into the raving lunatic who is now rummaging through the trunk of the car.

 

“Emergency car blanket,” he declares, and yanks out a dingy, ratty mess that looks more like a fire hazard than a blanket.

 

I shoot him a skeptical look but remain silent.

 

“Well, what are you waiting for?” Yohji says impatiently, slinging the blanket over his shoulder, “Come on, let's go.”

 

“Let's go?” I ask incredulously, “That's it? One cruddy blanket, and `let's go'? No cooking supplies, matches, not even a second blanket? Let's go?”

 

“It's too hot to sleep under a blanket, so all we really need is the one for a mattress,” he says, as if this was obvious and I'm the crazy one.

 

“Who the hell said I was willing to share a blanket with you ANYWAY?” I'm starting to lose my temper, I shouldn't have signed up for this mindless trip to begin with, I certainly never volunteered for this.

 

“You're welcome to sleep on leaves if you prefer it,” Yohji mutters irritably, “it is my blanket. I was trying to be nice.”

 

“Oh, don't get me wrong, you're a bloody philanthropist Kudoh.”

 

“Lighten up, it's not like I'm asking you to sleep under a blanket together.”

 

“LIGHTEN UP!” I scream, “I'm stranded next to the highway, hours from home, with no food or water, and nothing but a grimy blanket and an insane man for company! This IS `lightened up.' Normal Aya would be strangling you with the blanket right now, you goddamned freak!”

 

“To the casual passerby,” he says dryly, “you're the one who appears to be the insane man, you know.”

 

“The casual passerby is an idiot,” I mutter. But I'm left with nothing else to say, and it seems, nothing to do but resign myself and follow him.

 

….

 

Sometimes, it seems, that no matter where you go in the country, the mountains--or at least some hills anyway--are never far away. The outskirts of Nara are no exception. It doesn't take too long of a trek to find a nice elevated woodsy place to stop.

 

“Perfect!” Yohji beems.

 

“Yeah, perfect,” I mumble sarcastically. “Perfectly cold and dark and miserable. Though I suppose if you were an insect-eating aborigine it would have a nice homely feel to it.”

 

He ignores me in favor of making a pile of sticks and dried grass.

 

“Do you have any matches?” I ask. I have the suspicion he's run out because I haven't seen him smoke since our little fiasco began.

 

“Don't need matches,” he replies, without stopping whatever it is he's doing.

 

“I don't believe you,” I say crossing my hands over my chest, “you can't even survive a day without a hair dryer and a coffee machine, like hell you can start a fire without matches.”

 

“Oh yeah?” he says. The amusement on his face ought to warn me, but I genuinely can't comprehend this guy in front of me having those sort of skills. “Wanna Bet?”

 

“Yeah,” I say slowly, “I do wanna bet.”

 

“Okay,” he replies, “I win; you're sharing my blanket and not complaining about it.”

 

A snort involuntarily escapes me. I can't help it; Yohji just had the opportunity to demand all sorts of devious obligations of me, and all he asks is that I not complain about his crappy blanket? He could have made me work all his shifts for a month or hit on Manx or something equally humiliating. I'm almost disappointed in his lack of creativity. Almost. I don't actually want to be obligated to do any of those things. Not that I expect him to win, anyway.

 

“Alright,” I nod, “If I win we go back to the car and call a locksmith.” Ha. Looks like I just scored myself a real (and Yohji-free) bed tonight. I hope he gives up quickly and doesn't drag this out till after dark….

 

I've barely finished congratulating myself before Yohji has produced a rock and a stick or something along those lines, and within five minutes has somehow created a small, but steadily growing flame.

 

Well, damn. How'd he do that?

 

I'm standing, completely dumbstruck, as he tosses the car blanket at me.

 

“Why don't you make the bed up for us, eh?” he laughs, the jerk, “I'm going to find us some dinner. Venison okay?”

 

The ending question distracts me from the degrading gesture of the blanket. “Vension?” I ask, “Don't you dare. We're in Nara. The deer here are a docile, overfed tourist attraction. That'd be like eating Momoe san's cat.” I shiver involuntarily at the thought.

 

Yohji blanches slightly. I doubt he had looked at it from that perspective before. “Um,” he ponders, “rabbit then? I bet I could find a rabbit or something.”

 

I shake my head. It probably seems stupid, but my mind can't let go of my fixation on fairy tale quests. Forests are full of enchanted animals, Yohji could be killing some bespelled person; someone's sister even….

 

You know, maybe when we get home I should take Omi's advice and see a therapist.

 

Yohji rolls his eyes and sighs dramatically. “Okay, a feast fit for the squirrels it is, then. I'll see if I can find a wild turnip for you, oh fussy one.”

 

I'm left speechless as he stomps off into the trees. Not knowing what else to do, I neatly lay the blanket by the fire, and sit down to wait.

 

….

 

After about 45 minutes or so, Yohji returns, with pockets bulging.

 

From one he produces a handful of small knobbly apples, and from the other some dirty brown root-like things.

 

“What are those?” I ask with distaste, motioning toward the brown things.

 

“I have no idea,” he answers, and drops them on top of a rock which he's placed in the fire.

 

“What?” I ask, “How do you know we can eat them if you don't even know what they are?”

 

“I saw a rabbit eating them,” he says. “First rule of the wilderness is `eat what the animals eat.'”

 

I can't help giving him a strange look, “Since when did you become Robinson Crusoe, anyway?”

 

He returns my look with an utterly unreadable one, “The real question, I think,” he says, “is, `since when did you find me interesting enough to care?'”

 

Okay, I don't really have an answer for that. Time to awkwardly stare at our dinner. Yup, slowly cooking dirty brown things are sooo interesting….

 

“Apple?” he asks, amicably.

 

I sigh and hold out my hand. “How'd you learn to start a fire like that?” I hope to distract him from the awkwardness with a non-judgmental question.

 

“I taught myself when I was eleven,” he explains, “out of a book.”

 

A book? Yohji? Little Yohji reading? My mind can't seem to form a believable picture out of this information. Somehow I'd always just imagined younger Yohji as a slut-in-training or something….

 

“Um, your parents let you start fires at that age?” I ask.

 

“My parents didn't know about it,” he gives me a sly smile.

 

Okay, that's a little closer to my mental image of young Yohji. But still, kinda weird.

 

“If you're going to ask me these kind of questions,” he says, pulling the rooty things out of the fire and peeling them, “then I expect some information in return.”

 

“Anything I'd tell you would just make me sound crazy.”

 

“I already think you're a nut case,” he says cheerfully, “so you've nothing to lose.”

 

Uh oh. I can't go spilling my past to Yohji! My mission. Have I forgotten my mission? I made a vow of silence to Aya. Telling Yohji the sort of things I'm sure he wants to know would be like giving up on Aya. I'd be betraying her; sealing the enchantment. I'd…shit. I'm thinking like a crazy person again.

 

“I liked to read when I was a kid too,” I offer cautiously, “but I never read anything useful like you did.” With that my mouth is sealed. I shove a piece of the freshly cooked…thing…into it to prove my point. Ew, it's bitter.

 

Yohji has been watching me intently and looks disappointed when I stuff my face. Sorry pal, but that's all you're going to get.

 

He stares at the fire a minute, and then, as if it's nothing—nothing!—he casually begins to unbutton his shirt.

 

“What do you think you're doing!” I squeak.

 

“Getting ready for bed,” he gives me a questioning look. “What, you don't expect me to sleep in my clothes do you?”

 

“YES!” I cry. I'm trying to avert my eyes, but at the same time I'm paralyzed with horror watching to see what he'll do next.

 

What he does next is drop his shirt on the ground and start working on his pants.

 

I swear, he had better be wearing underwear under those, or by god I'm going to kill him. Yohji Kudoh will have an unmarked grave on the side of a hill with nothing but nasty tasting root things to keep him company. And he'll deserve every last bit of it.

 

My sanity, by luck, is spared, and my imagination left intact. Yohji is not only wearing underwear, but to my surprise he's wearing perfectly normal and non-threatening boxer shorts. Once again, I find Yohji surprising me. If I could actually admit to myself having pondered the scenario, I would have expected him to possess far more scandalous undergarments.

 

Did I say “normal”? Okay, they're not exactly normal. His shorts are covered with the predictably tasteful phrase `I heart Me.'

 

Upon reading their message, I nearly choke on my dinner.

 

“What?” he asks with a frown.

 

“Your…shorts….” I can barely get the words out, I can't stop laughing.

 

“What's wrong with them?” his frown deepens.

 

“Those are girls shorts!” I cry with glee, “Oh my god—ha ha—the great Yohji Kudoh wears girls underwear, ha ha ha!”

 

“How the HELL do you know that?” he asks with dismay, looking down at the item in question, “They're just boxer shorts!”

 

“Yeah,” I wheeze, “but they're the kind they sell to girls for pajamas. I saw that exact same pair at a trendy girly store.”

 

“In other words,” he says pointing at me, “you've been patronizing girl stores too. The pot's calling the kettle black, eh?”

 

The laughter dies in my throat. Crap. I can't very well tell him I used to take my little sister shopping on a regular basis, can I? He doesn't seem to know about Aya, and I'd like to keep it that way….

 

“I…um…” I stutter lamely, “I just saw them through the store front….”

 

“Like hell you did,” he's leaning in on me to a rather unsettling effect, “no store keeps the unmentionables in the front. This stuff is always at the back of the shop.”

 

He's got me there. I try again, knowing before I start that he won't believe me. “Sakura dragged me shopping one time, I must have seen them then….”

 

“Oh just quit while you're ahead,” he's leaning in closer—shit! “It's not like I mind or anything, I think it's rather sexy, actually….”

 

Why is he looking at me the way he's looking at me? What the hell does that look even mean? Why—

 

He cuts off my panic attack with an explanation; “Okay, you caught me, anyway. Guy's clothes don't fit me right, I'm too thin. If I want to wear tight clothes I have to get them from Girl's stores. It's not like the stuff I buy is actually girly, anyway, I certainly haven't been getting any complaints.”

 

I raise an eyebrow.

 

“Okay, congratulations, you're my first complaint.” He mutters dramatically.

 

I decide to keep giving him a hard time, he deserves it.

 

“Those aren't tight,” I say, pointing, “so what's your excuse there?”

 

“Hmm?” He looks down, “Who needs an excuse? I thought they were cute.”

 

“You would,” I mutter.

 

“Maybe if you had a pair you wouldn't be so grouchy,” he mutters back.

 

“Oh yes,” my answer's dripping with sarcasm, “the secret to happiness is underwear, why didn't you tell me sooner?”

 

“If I thought you'd listen, I would have,” he states, simply.

 

“What is that supposed to mean?”

 

“It means I'd love to see you in my underwear,” he says in a barely audible voice. His voice was so low, maybe I heard him wrong. Please oh please let me have heard him wrong….

 

I throw his pants at him, “For the love of all that's holy put your clothes back on!”

 

“No can do,” he says, and pulls a silver flask out of the pocket of his jeans. “But thanks, I was thirsty.”

 

I give up and plop backwards. If I'm staring at the sky then I don't have to look at barely dressed Yohji.

 

“Want some?” he asks, and holds out the flask. I grab it. I'm too exasperated to care about consequences right now. Besides, one little flask can't possibly hold enough liquor to mess me up…right?

 

Krack-a-boom!

 

I jump a little at the noise. “What was that?”

 

“Heat lightning, I think,” Yohji answers with a shrug. “Did you see the flash?”

 

“No,” I jump again, despite myself, at a second cracking noise. “Okay, I saw it that time.”

 

“That was weird,” Yohji says softly, and lays down next to me on the blanket—hey does he have to lie so close to me, it's a big blanket— “The lightening was behind us the first time; but that one was in front of us.”

 

“It seems far away though,” I say cautiously.

 

“I'm pretty sure it is, it looked like it was over the other mountains.”

 

The next flash comes from an entirely different direction. “It seems…” I say, “…to be everywhere except over us.”

 

“It does,” Yohji's voice is almost awestruck. He takes the flask back from me and takes a swig.

 

We watch in silence as the sky flashes shades of grey and green.

 

“It's kinda creepy,” I murmur, “I feel like we're in a ghost story.”

 

“Nah,” he says, and turns so that he's looking me in the face, “being in the middle of nowhere, no noise but cicadas and lightening, an almost supernatural light show that probably no one but us is noticing…feels more like a romance story to me.”

 

The word “What?” is barely out of my mouth before I find myself barely able to breathe and battling the not exactly invited intrusion of one very wet and slimy tongue in said mouth.

 

Oh. My. God. Yohji's. Tongue. Is. In. My. Mouth.

 

I freeze while my brain tries to process this somewhat disturbing information.

 

It's not doing so good a job processing, so it seems.

 

My brain, it turns out, is utterly unnecessary in this scenario, as the cloying taste of alcohol mixed with the foreign sensation of something so, well, foreign, sets off my gag reflex and my arms push him off of me, no thinking required.

 

Now, in my defense, had he warned me first, I might not have reacted so badly. True, that had he warned me, he would have received an elbow in the chest instead of compliance, but just rhetorically speaking, had he warned me, and had I expected to suddenly find a warm and slippery thing in my very personal space, I wouldn't have found myself gagging and freaking out. Alas.

 

“What was that about?” I shriek.

 

Yohji, to his credit, looks positively horrified as he realizes what he's just done.

 

“I—ah—shit—I—I'm…sorry.” ; He trails off rather pathetically.

 

“I didn't ask if you were sorry,” I cry hysterically, “I asked what was that about!”

 

“….” Yohji, apparently, has lost his ability to articulate. He also—for the first time I can remember, honest to god, including missions—looks terrified.

 

What business does he have being terrified! That's my right, he brought this upon himself!

 

“…ing you.” He mutters something I can't quite catch.

 

“WHAT?” I yell. I know I shouldn't be quite this upset. But that was my first kiss goddamnit, and it was horrible. What the hell, I thought Yohji was supposed to be good at that sort of thing! Christ what am I thinking, anyway, it's upsetting simply because it was Yohji doing it! Would it have even mattered if it was good?

 

“It's about,” Yohji speaks up, a pitiful hopeless expression on his face, “me…liking you.” He turns over on his side so he's no longer facing me and covers the side of his head with his arm.

 

My hysterical fit is stopped dead in its tracks.

 

Huh?

 

I expected his excuse to be something lame like “All that electricity was turning me on,” or “You looked sexy in the firelight;” something typically Yohji, something I could have been righteously pissed off about. I did not expect an earnest confession of genuine feelings. Damnit Yohji, stop throwing me for a loop like this!

 

“But,” I say stupidly, “you like girls.”

 

He turns to look at me again. “Ten minutes ago,” he says blandly, “you were all too happy to discover that I shop in Girl stores. Now do you really think that someone like that is terribly hung up over distinctions of gender?”

 

Shit, he has a point.

 

That doesn't mean his point makes sense though.

 

Yohji likes me? What the blazes does a guy like Yohji have any business liking a guy like me! I've—not that I'm proud of this—but I've never even been nice to him.

 

He was dropping hints all night though, I suppose. I just couldn't believe them….

 

“Can we just skip over the angst,” he says miserably, “and move on to pretending it never happened?”

 

“Oh great,” I mutter as I lay back down and stare up at the sky, “so if you just pretend it never happened, does that mean your first kiss doesn't count?”

 

“That was your first….Shit, I'm sorry Aya….”

 

Damn! Why did I tell him that! Am I some kind of masochist? Yes, apparently.

 

“Gah, I'm such a screw up.”

 

“If you're waiting for me to argue with that,” I say, “don't hold your breath.”

 

He laughs, in a nerve-wracked, broken kind of way.

 

We lie in silence for a while; both desperate for the bliss of unconsciousness, and both, for obvious reasons, very far from getting there.

 

“It's almost always better the second time, you know,” Yohji offers quietly.

 

Not sure how to respond, I settle for a nice, noncommittal “Mn.”

 

While waiting for sleep, I'm trying to focus on the predicament that faces us when we return to the car—we're still keyless and stranded on the side of the road. Not to mention, once we solve that problem, do we continue on our trip? It'd be terribly awkward now though, with this little turn of events behind us….

 

My practical thoughts however, keep getting nudged and poked around the edges by subtle, very unwelcome thoughts. Every now and then one of them manages to slip through, and I find myself wondering would the second time really be better? If Yohji had been a little more chaste, would the *first* time have been better? And most worryingly, had the first time BEEN better, would I have still pushed him off?

 

Yes. I tell myself. Of course I would have.

 

You're not really sure though, are you?

 

Shut up. I say in my head. Shut up shut up shut up.

 

And then, more unwelcome than any of these sneaky, but mostly harmless thoughts, is the crashing realization of something quite disturbing.

 

This whole, effed-up evening, including every awkward moment, courtesy of Yohji, makes complete and utter sense. It doesn't just make sense; it fits into my insane, deluded life-plan that I've thinly veiled as a “mission.”

 

Yohji is the goddamned King in the forest. And vow of silence or not, he's going to fucking get to me.