Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ This is Not My Life ❯ Our Misunderstanding ( Chapter 16 )

A/N: Okay, so I have to admit what most of you have probably already noticed, I've kinda written myself into a bit of a plot hole with this story. It doesn't really make sense that Ken knew about Aya chan and Yohji seems completely oblivious about her. I didn't really realize I'd done that until that detail was too entrenched in the story for me to go back and fix it. Sooooo…. *cough* I was initially thinking that everyone knew about her and Yohji just forgot at first…but I no longer think that would work, as Yohji is getting increasingly focused on Aya, I just don't think he'd continue to make that kind of oversight. For lack of a better explanation, I'm going to say that Aya hasn't told anyone, but Ken knew because Omi is crafty and figures those sorts of details out, and since Ken is a little bit closer to Omi than Yohji is, Omi told him. Lame? Yes. Do I suck? Absolutely ;___; (I think it should be obvious by now, that while I'm following both the anime and manga loosely, my story doesn't match either of their timelines all that well.)

I'm sorry. All I can do is plow ahead and try to make up for the lameness….

 

 

“Our misunderstanding”

 

 

--Yohji—

 

Just for the record, it's now been 468 minutes since Aya should have killed me.

 

I wonder what's taking him so long?

 

Well, the fact that he's asleep probably factors into it, but still. I wouldn't expect something so trivial to stop a guy like Aya. More likely, he's stalling to psych me out. I imagine my righteously inflicted gruesome death will be a lot more satisfying to him if he properly hunts me down first. He'll probably come for me two weeks from now while I'm doing something complacent, like taking a shower.

 

Hm. Aya and a shower. Now there's a very interesting thought.

 

I'd smack myself if I weren't afraid of waking Aya up. My inability to suppress those kinds of interesting thoughts is exactly what got me into my current predicament. I promised myself I'd be guarded, and never ever let him on to me. That resolution lasted all of what? Two hours? Gah.

 

How did Aya manage to fall asleep after that, anyway? I suppose that imagining me impaled on his katana was a nice comforting sentiment; very sleep-inducing. He's probably having a whole slew of dreams that involve various ways of extracting his revenge.

 

Just for the record, I deserve it.

 

It's not helping that Aya has been steadily encroaching on my space while he sleeps. Pretty soon I'm going to have to get up if I want to avoid spooning the guy. Another interesting thought I have to squash in favor of self-preservation.

 

Damnit Kudoh. Things were *almost* going well.

 

Who am I kidding? By `almost going well' what I really mean is `we were still on speaking terms and no one has died yet.' Being an assassin teaches you to set your standards really low.

 

I think our period of speaking to each other has come to a rather abrupt end, no thanks to me.

 

But still, no one's died.

 

Yet.

 

Aya shifts a little in his sleep and I sit up. He's definitely getting too close for comfort, and that would be the case before one takes into consideration my state of undress. It's a state I intend to remedy. Just after I spend the next ten minutes staring at him, I mean.

 

Watching him sleep, it's hard to remember that I am actually gazing at the form of a revenge-crazed killer. He looks, well, normal. I highly doubt that any amount of sleep could ever visually reduce me to that unburdened state…. That unburdened state which is currently relapsing into consciously burdened.

 

Shit! He wasn't supposed to wake up until after I got dressed!

 

I feel myself reel backwards, without intending to. Self-preservation, my mind reiterates. Since when did I start making that my priority?

 

Aya, although awake, hasn't moved. He's lying there, still as a lump of granite. Staring at me.

 

Not one to be intimidated, I go on staring back. It's not like I can make things better just by refraining, anyway. I'm already royally screwed, so I might as well get an eyeful.

 

His eyes narrow into a borderline glare. “I suppose I don't want to know why, despite the obvious overnight drop in temperature, you're still practically naked.”

 

Now that he points it out, it has gotten noticeably colder. That's…rather unfortunate, despite being the absolute least of my problems.

 

He joins me in sitting up and reaches dangerously close to my personal space, rendering my ability to breathe all but useless. Until, for the second time in twenty four hours, he throws my pants at me.

 

Never let it be said that Yohji Kudoh can't take a hint.

 

I waste no time in restoring my clothes. Really, I half expect to get skewered in my moment of vulnerability. It doesn't matter that Aya came unarmed. I have absolute faith in his ability to materialize a weapon out of thin air were the situation to demand it. Possibly multiple weapons--he's just that kind of guy.

 

And yet Aya has let another opportunity for inflicting bodily harm pass by unrealized.

 

Once dressed, I resume staring at him. I'm afraid to speak. Once the floor has been opened, everything will be over. I'm not going to fool myself into pretending that things will just keep going on like before. Not after last night. Aya's let a lot of things slide with me over the past few days, but last night was too much to ask. I crossed the uncross-able line.

 

I can't believe I did that.

 

Who am I kidding? Of course I did that. Why ruin a life-long streak of screwing myself over? I'm surprised I didn't do something worse.

 

My mind is all too happy to supply images of what something worse might have been. Now I feel dirty even looking at him. I suppose that solves my staring problem….

 

I sigh. Time to get this over with. If we find the keys to my car quickly, we can be home by nightfall. Then I can enlist Ken or Omi's help at talking some sense back into my head…not that I think that will do a whole lot of good. Maybe I should just skip to calling Manx and having myself re-assigned.

 

My stomach twists at the thought.

 

Didn't think about the consequences, did you Kudoh?

 

I start folding up the blanket. “We should get back to the car.”

 

Although his face stays unreadable, Aya makes the predictable response. “Hn.”

 

“We should call Ken and Omi to let them know we're coming back.”

 

“We should call Ken and Omi to let them know we're not.”

 

I freeze in my tracks. What? He didn't…he couldn't have said…. Aya's face is stone. He's not giving me a thing to help decipher what he meant.

 

“Come again?”

 

“We should have called them sooner,” he says flatly.

 

“You don't want to stay with me.” I'm not asking. I know he doesn't.

 

“No, I don't.”

 

See?

 

“So why did you….”

 

“Do you,” he cuts me off, “really want to go back to the shop, with that,” a flinch cracks through his stony facade, “behind us, and have to be around Ken and Omi, acting like nothing happened?”

 

Now I'm the one flinching.

 

“They'll be able to tell. It's their job to tell when something is wrong with any of us. And they'll pretend everything is fine. But it won't be fine and the pretense is distracting. Someday,” now anger is sliding onto his features, “someday, one of us is going to die. And it won't be because of bad planning or being unprepared. It'll be because one of us was distracted by this kind of avoidable shit.”

 

The word avoidable stings appropriately.

 

“We have issues to work out. Then we go back.”

 

Issues. Now there's an understatement. Together, Aya and I probably have more issues than half of Tokyo. And I don't like the way he phrased it `to work out.' It makes me feel like a math problem he intends to solve and dispose of. Yohji Kudoh: textbook equation. It's not like I can fool myself into thinking that resolving anything will fall in my favor, anyway. Maybe going back to the Koneko is the best idea after all….

 

“I suppose apologizing again isn't going to cut it.”

 

No answer. I guess not.

 

I pick up the blanket and kick some dirt over the burned out fire. “Well I am. I'm sorry. Even if you don't want to hear it.”

 

Aya turns and gives me his iciest glance yet. “I think the root of our problems lies in your recent habit of making assumptions about what I want.”

 

My jaw goes slack. I want to defend myself, but I have nothing to say.

 

He walks over and leans towards me, jabbing me hard with his finger. “You do not know me, got it? Whatever interest you think you have in me is superficial. You have no right to tell me that you have feelings for me, because we are strangers.”

 

My moment of speechlessness is brought to a swift end, as I feel something within me snap. Before I can stop myself, I'm jabbing him back. If his words were chosen to piss me off, he did an excellent job.

 

“Who's making assumptions now!” He steps backward to avoid getting shoved, “Do you think someone's feelings can fit into a neat little formula? Is that how you do it? Throw away everything that doesn't add up?” Another step back. “You, have no right to tell me what to feel. Do you think I want my sanity tied up by someone like you? If I had any control over this I would have chosen someone less likely to kill me in my sleep!”

 

I've pinned him against a tree, but his face is still unreadable.

 

“If anyone kills you in your sleep, I have faith that it will be a justifiable matter of self defense.”

 

“You would say that,” I growl.

 

“Maybe I only said it because I knew you were expecting me to,” he replies, unruffled.

 

“Well if that's the case, you're doing a hell of a lousy job convincing me we're strangers.”

 

Aya leans back against the tree as if he doesn't expect to be going anywhere very soon, and can't be bothered by the inconvenience. “You don't even know my favorite color.”

 

I can't help smirking at that. Apparently he's failed to check up on my pre-Weiβ resume. Instead of immediately dispelling his illusion that I've spent the past two years in a blind self-absorbed stupor, I decide to test him back a little. “I bet you know mine.”

 

“You've never told me, and likewise.”

 

“But I bet you know.”

 

His eyes narrow. “A good assassin knows everything about their team.”

 

“So not only are we strangers, but I'm a bad assassin?” I pry.

 

The question obviously has no right answer, and Aya frowns, but remains silent.

 

“Well, much as you'd like to think that, the fact of the matter is that even if I hadn't been a detective,” Aya's eyebrow raises at that, as I suspected he hadn't known, “I would have had to be blind not to notice how much you favor the orange half of your wardrobe, all other things, aside.”

 

Another silent frown; had Aya really thought I didn't notice stuff like that? I'm sure Ken and Omi could have told him the same thing. Aya must think I'm the least competent member of the team.

 

“Well. That hardly means anything at all.”

 

“It means that I look up and notice you when you walk into a room. I think that's a pretty decent start for something.”

 

Aya has the nerve to roll his eyes at me. “You're going to have to give me something more important than that. Tell me something that matters.”

 

I have to stop and think a little. He's right, what I do know about him is pretty scant—although, that's not for a lack of effort on my part. “I know that Aya isn't your real name.”

 

His face pales, which I admit is a feat considering his pallid complexion to begin with, but his expression doesn't change. “I would imagine that to be obvious.”

 

“It's obvious because it's my fault anyone calls you that in the first place.”

 

He visibly bristles at that. I'm sure that the fact that I'm in any way responsible for shaping a piece of his identity bothers him deeply. He doesn't want to admit that I've affected him that much.

 

“If you don't know why I let you get away with calling me that, then it's meaningless.”

 

“I don't know because you don't want me to know. Would you prefer that I disrespect your privacy? I'm pretty sure I could work things out if I really tried.”

 

“Do what you want.” His eyes are fixed on some imaginary point behind me, denying me contact.

 

Damnit, he's completely shutting down. This is the most distant I've seen him since we left Tokyo.

 

“I don't want to do anything! I just want….” I pause and take a breath to calm myself down, it's all I can do to keep from shaking him, “I mean, I don't expect you to ever return my feelings. And I get that it's unrealistic for me to even hope you'd consider me a `friend.' I just want you to trust me enough to let me get to know you a little. Okay? You don't have to start by telling me anything important. Just cut the `we are strangers' crap, because that's worse than you flat out telling me you hate my guts.” Another breath. I back off and sit down on a fallen limb, never taking my eyes off Aya. I'm waiting for him to take the opening I left him and announce that yes, he does hate my guts. End of story.

 

But instead of proclaiming that I am the bane of his very existence, and now that that issue has been addressed, yes, it is okay to go home to Ken and Omi, Aya remains silent as ever. I take that as my cue to keep talking.

 

“There was a reason that I brought you to my room, and not the empty one, that first day in the Koneko,” I say. “You elicited something…I dunno. I got a vibe. Same thing when I decided to take off the other day. It never even occurred to me to take Ken or Omi. At least, not until after we'd already left. It had to be you. I don't know what it is, but something's there.”

 

And here I've given him another opportunity to object--to say, no, the only thing there is your lousy imagination. But Aya keeps staring and the only answer I get is the buzz of cicadas.

 

“And anyway, you know lots about me,” I continue, this is turning into a right monologue. “You know that I like to read stupid romance novels and that I won't hesitate to wear girls clothes if I think they look good on me. Which they usually do. And that I like camping. And just to add to that, my favorite song is Knocking on Heaven's Door, and I don't understand why curry is so popular these days.”

 

Aya twitches slightly. I can tell that if this were a normal conversation, he might have almost smiled at the randomness of the things I'm telling him. But since instead of a normal conversation it's a frantic attempt by me to convince him that our time together hasn't been completely meaningless, well, he obviously represses it. But then he surprises me and walks over to sit next to me on the branch. At first I expect this to mean that he's going to say something, but I'm disappointed. Oh well, it's still a good sign.

 

“And what do I know about you….” I say slowly, allowing myself to really think about this as I talk, “I know that you don't like camping. And that you've never seen any famous cowboy movies. And that you're extremely particular about how you eat a bowl of udon.” Weird how much my list of things I know about Aya has grown in the last two days. “And your favorite color is orange.”

 

“It's not.”

 

It's a good thing he moved closer to me, or his response would have been lost, his voice was so quiet. But…wait. What does he mean that's not his favorite color?

 

“I don't even like orange,” his voice is halting, like he isn't sure if he should tell me this. “It was someone else's favorite color.” He falls silent again and I know better than to press him to elaborate.

 

The “was” of his statement hangs like a heavy weight. It's important. Aya just told me something far more intimate than I ever could have expected of him. My mind flashes back to when he was drunk. I promised her. He's talking about the real Aya, whoever that is. Only the “was” keeps me from going numb with jealousy.

 

I feel like I have to say something or the significance of his reaching out will be lost, and I'll never get another chance like this. “Cattleyas were Asuka's flower,” I say. I've never mentioned Asuka to him before. I don't know how much he knows, but I'm confident he'll understand the gravity.

 

Silence falls but it's not so tense as before. Aya's frowning again, but this time it has an introspective air to it, and doesn't seem to be directed at me.

 

The minutes stretch on and again I feel compelled to speak. I just don't handle awkward silences very well.

 

“I might not know you, but I don't think we're all that different. And all I can say is that I want to know you, Aya, I really do.”

 

He stands up and brushes himself off without looking at me. “We should go to the book store,” is his cryptic reply.