Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Warmth ❯ Part Three ( Chapter 3 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Author's Notes: Some notes on the last chapter -- I know absolutely nothing about paintball. ^^ Some people have noted some things for me, and I'll go through and revise someday. Someday being the key word there.

Sorry about the cliffhanger type ending. ^_^ Don't worry, it's all in the next chapter.

Part Three
Soccer

There was no better feeling than waking up in the morning with fresh bruises. Standing before the mirror in the bathroom, Aya touched the small of his back, gently probing the area with the tips of his fingers. He sucked in a sharp breath of air as he applied too much pressure and a fresh wave of pain swept over him. He had not played paintball in so long, he had nearly forgotten how badly the paint pellets bruised him. His only comfort was knowing that Ken would be hurting as much as he was.

Another fresh bruise stood out on his knee, but that was easy for him to disregard. There was a better chance that he would do something to make the other hurt more throughout the day than the one on his knee. Even something as simple as a casual touch was going to hurt. But it was the price that came with playing paintball. He had learned that when he was a kid and his dad had taken him for his first game. He had come home without an inch of his body not covered with a bruise. His mother had thought for certain he was going to die.

He stepped out of the bathroom into the hall. Ken was not on schedule for the day and was using it as an opportunity to sleep the morning away. Aya did not make an effort to keep from disturbing his rest as he walked down the hall to his own room. Ken had woken him up more times than he could remember in such hideous hours of the morning as ten and eleven, kicking his soccer ball down the hall, yelling at Omi for something or another, or arguing with Youji. Aya took it as a personal insult and never made an effort to show him any more kindness than the younger man gave him.

It was tempting to do something obnoxious as he passed the closed door. Maybe pound against the wall yelling, 'Fire!' Then again, maybe that was too juvenile. He was supposed to be the older one, after all. But it was tempting all the same.

He closed the door behind him as he walked into his room. The door slammed, but it was an honest mistake. Anyone could have slammed it without meaning to.

It was too early in the morning for Youji and Omi to be awake yet. He would have to open the store alone. Ordinarily, he did not mind opening and closing the shop by himself. But lately the girls that came were becoming far more persistent. Almost half of the time, when he went downstairs, they were already there waiting for them, dressed in their freshly pressed school uniforms. Just a trip to the flower shop before a day at school. What they did with the flowers, he had no idea. Probably pitched them into the garbage as they walked down the street. They weren't really there for the merchandise, after all. Not that kind of merchandise, anyway.

He dressed in black jeans and an equally dark t-shirt. No one had ever said he was the picture of happiness and light. Besides, he liked black. Youji said wearing it made him look like he was a corpse, but then Youji's opinion had never meant anything to him.

He slammed the door again as he left the room. Glancing down the hall, he saw that Ken had abandoned one of his many soccer balls there again. He always left his things lying around, as though the entire floor was his to litter. He seemed to forget that he had to share it with another person.

Aya kicked the ball back down the hall as hard as he could. It struck the closed bedroom door leading to Ken's inner sanctum with what sounded more like a nuclear bomb being detonated than a ball hitting the wall. Aya waited a moment, counting under his breath. On three, the bedroom door was flung open by a disgruntled Ken, his hair sticking up in all directions. He looked like he had stuck his finger in an electric socket.

"Don't leave your stuff lying around."

Ken stared at him. He tried to work his mouth to fumble out words. "Y... you just woke me up for that?"

Aya folded his arms. "I've told you a million times not to leave your crap out here."

"And I've told you a million times not to wake me up on my day off! We don't always get what we want." Ken slammed the door. Aya could hear him cursing even from where he stood at the end of the hall and smiled. Retribution always was a painful thing.

He took the steps downstairs two at a time. Unlike Ken, he gave Youji and Omi the common courtesy of being quiet as he trooped along to the shop on the first floor. He did it more for Omi than he did for Youji. Youji had kept him from sleep almost as often as Ken did, but in far more obnoxious ways.

The shop smelled of what made him think of stale perfume, as it always did, when he stepped inside. It was not a potent scent, but it was still there, lingering in the air. He had never enjoyed the smell. Youji had dozens of romantic ways to describe how lovely was the smell of a flower, but he honestly thought it was all a load of bull. Flowers smelled like plants, nothing else. They were just there.

He turned on the lights. The girls had yet to show up. Good. It gave him time to prepare for the onslaught.

He was opening the metal sliding security door when Omi appeared. His hair was sleep tousled and his clothing rumpled, but he looked far more alert and in tune with the world than Ken or Youji ever did when they woke up in the morning. Those two were only alert in a lack of sleep induced stupor if it were a life or death situation. And that happened so rarely, they had likely forgotten what it meant to wake up before the sun was shining.

"'morning," Omi said, running a hand through his hair and yawning the words.

"'morning," Aya replied. He pushed up the door the rest of the way. The sun was just barely coming up. By the time it was full in the sky, the shop would be swarming with high school and middle school girls alike.

"Youji-kun and Ken-kun are still asleep?" Omi asked.

"Ken might not be," Aya answered. He tried not to smile. It really was juvenile to take pleasure in knowing he had robbed the younger man of sleep, but still. Ken had done the same to him. Revenge felt good.

Omi sat down at the counter, folding his arms on its top and resting his head on them. "I didn't ever think you'd be the paintball type of person," he said.

Aya glanced at him over his shoulder from where he stood, sweeping up discarded stems and flower petals that littered the floor. "There are a lot of things you don't know about me," he replied, simply.

"You don't want us to know?"

Aya shrugged.

Omi sat up, putting his elbows to the counter and resting his chin in his hands. "You don't trust anyone, do you, Aya-kun?"

It was a strange question for him to ask. Aya looked at him for a moment, puzzled. Omi rarely came out and said things as blatantly as he was. He was too polite of a person to do that. Even if he wanted to know, he would always stay away from the subject unless he knew it was safe to talk about it. He was always careful, never wanting to step on anyone's toes, never wanting to hurt anyone somehow.

"I try not to," Aya answered slowly.

"I trust you," Omi said. "And Ken-kun and Youji-kun too." He yawned, mouth opening wide and eyes closing. "Because we're all friends, right?"

Aya glanced down at the broom in his hands. "Sure." Maybe.

Youji joined them then, looking far worse than Omi did. He collapsed at the counter beside the younger man and promptly began to snore.

The morning rush of teenage girls was the only thing that woke him. Omi tried a few times to shake him awake to no avail. Youji could sleep through a hurricane, tsunami, and earthquake all at the same time if he wanted to. He did not intend to wake up until he was damn well and ready.

He did sneak away when Aya and Omi were not paying attention to him, distracted by cleaning up the shop and preparing for customers. When he returned, he looked far better, dressed in fresh clothes and looking as though he had splashed his face with cold water. His hair was still a mass of tangles and kinks, but nothing a brush through with his fingers wouldn't clear up.

Aya let he and Omi deal with the customers. He could not tolerate high school girls even on a good day. In the dead of morning, when he would have much rather been asleep, it was worse.

High school girls were like the spawn of Satan, he had decided. Individually, they were tolerable. He had even had somewhat of intelligent conversations with Sakura. But the moment they were in groups of more than two, it was as though they were possessed by some squealing, dramatic, fan-girling beast that he hoped to never meet. He doubted that death would be quick and painless when faced with such a creature.

"Hey, Aya, are you with us?" He blinked up from his daze and saw Youji looking at him, a hand pressed to his hip. Thinking about the fan-girl beast, he had tuned out the rest of the world. It wasn't like anything Youji had to say was more interesting than his newfound bedtime monster.

"Sure."

"Then maybe you can do the register like you're supposed to."

He blinked. Looking down the counter, he found the line to the register had built up almost ten people deep. Well, so much for day-dreaming the day away.

He was relieved when the morning rush finally began to break up and disappear. He was more tired than he thought. His mind kept drifting elsewhere, to the most absurd of things. It was not even noon when he began to wonder why in the hell it was a flower shop that had been chosen to be their cover. They could have done anything else. He would have even been happy in a candy shop. But no, it had to be flowers.

"Aya-kun?"

He glanced up. "Yeah?"

Omi was slinging a back-pack over his shoulder. He had almost forgotten he had school to go to as well. He just always made a point of being up in the morning to help them with the rush of girls that always came. Then he went his own way. Aya almost sighed. That meant he would have to spend all day alone with Youji.

"Are you okay? You seem really out of it."

"I think I am," Aya agreed.

"If you don't feel good, you should go lie down for awhile. Youji-kun will be all right on his own for a few hours."

"I'll think about it."

Omi smiled. "Okay. See you."

Aya lifted a hand and waved slightly to him. It was easy for him to forget that Omi was still only a kid. The innocence of youth when it came to Omi had blurred for him a long time ago. It was hard to look at someone that he had seen kill with his own eyes and be able to see him as anything like an innocent teenager, going to school, hanging out with friends, doing anything a person his age ordinarily would do. It was too easy to forget.

The older customers came in during the school day to avoid the throngs of high school girls the shop was all too often overrun with. Aya was grateful for them. For one, they were not hordes of squealing girls. And for another, they made his day pass more quickly, offering meaningless distraction as the hours wore on.

It was not until two in the afternoon that Ken made his first appearance since Aya had abruptly awoken him that morning. Aya glanced up at him, briefly. He was dressed in a pair of jeans that looked as though they had seen better days. Two holes in the knees showed skin, and another at the hip revealed the color of his boxers, something he had either overlooked or didn't seem to be feeling modest about. The t-shirt was white, and thankfully, in better shape than the jeans. He had a netted bag slung over his shoulder, in it a few spare soccer balls.

He glared. Aya ignored him.

"What, you two suddenly hate each other again?" Youji was leaning back in a chair, opposite of the counter where Aya sat. He had his legs kicked up and a newspaper spread open in his lap. Whether or not he was actually reading it for the news factor or the funnies page Aya had yet to see.

"Someone thinks it's funny to wake me up at the crack of dawn," Ken said. He folded his arms.

"Someone else is always waking me up before the crack of dawn," Aya returned.

Youji rolled his eyes.

"I've got to get to practice," Ken announced.

Aya said nothing. He did not have to. Youji said it for him, whether or not he wanted him to say it at all.

"Take Aya with you."

"What?" Ken stared at him.

Youji did not even look up from his newspaper. "He's been grumpy today. Take him with you. Maybe the kiddies will cheer him up."

"He can hear you," Aya interjected dryly.

"I doubt he even wants to go," Ken replied. Aya sighed. Fine. He would just sit and listen to them argue about him.

"Have you asked him?" Youji said peaceably.

Ken opened his mouth to argue, but apparently lacking a decent rebuttal, he turned to face Aya. Aya folded his arms and waited.

"Do you want to go to practice with me?" Ken asked. His voice said quite clearly that one, he did not expect that Aya would say yes, and for another, he was only asking because Youji had nettled him. Aya smiled faintly, in such a way it seemed more a smirk than a smile.

"Sure."

Ken stared at him. "What? Sure? What do you mean, 'sure'?"

"I mean sure, I'll go."

"Now, see?" Youji interjected. He smiled. "That wasn't so hard."

"But..." Ken opened his mouth again to argue, and again coming up with nothing, promptly shut up.

Aya stood. "Let's go."

He waited to see whether or not Ken would try to argue his going along. Instead the younger man sighed faintly, and adjusting the weight of the bag slung over his shoulder, started forward. Aya followed at a safe distance. He had a feeling that if Ken decided to hit him with those soccer balls, it would not tickle very little.

Ken kept a few paces ahead of him as they walked along. Aya did not mind. He knew that the younger man was not angry that he had decided to join him. Just bewildered. Honestly, he had only wanted to see what Ken's reaction would be if he said yes. Now he had it and though he knew it was rude and juvenile to be amused, he could not keep from smiling.

He hoped the small amusement was worth it. He hated soccer. And being around little kids tended to make him nervous.

Well, if the amusement did not last, the fact that school was just then letting out for the afternoon and he would not have to deal with the hordes of teenage girls would.

The team that Ken coached for, from what Aya understood of the way he babbled about it occasionally, was not school-sponsored, and Ken volunteered to coach. He was never paid for his efforts. Aya supposed with what he made as Weiss and at the flower shop, it was unnecessary to have anything else.

The team met for practices at a park a few blocks from the flower shop. Aya followed Ken, hands in his pockets. He glanced ahead. It looked like most of the kids were already there waiting for either him or the other kids to show up. A few scattered groups of parents spoke together as their children played amongst themselves or kicked around a battered old soccer ball.

A pig-tailed girl spotted Ken. She tugged on the arm of another boy her age. Word seemed to spread quickly. Before they had even reached the field, Ken was swarmed down by the kids. He laughed.

"Hey, hey, careful, you're gonna bowl me over." He put his hands to his hips. "Were you guys practicing those drills I taught you last time?"

There was a scattered response, some chorus of no and one high and indignant yes. Ken tried to look stern, but Aya could see his expression softening.

"You know if you want to beat those guys this weekend you've got to work harder," he said.

"We will," a boy piped up.

"Really, we will," another added. "We're sorry."

Ken grinned. "It's all right."

A girl tugged on his jeans. "Ken-ni, who's this?" She pointed up to Aya. Aya looked at Ken.

"This?" Ken repeated. He chewed his lower lip. "This is Aya," he said finally. "He's a friend of mine. He came to watch." He straightened up, all at once becoming the stern coach once again. "Go do those drills I told you about. I'll be over in a sec."

The kids dispersed, running off to do as he told them. Aya slipped his hands from his pockets.

"You have little things attached to you."

Ken glanced at him. "Yeah, they're called kids," he said, grinning. "They're smaller versions of adults."

Aya rolled his eyes. "Yeah. I got that."

"I've gotta get to them."

"Go ahead."

He watched Ken run out to the field to join the kids. Returning his hands to his pockets, he turned and walked toward a nearby tree. He dropped down and leaned his back against the trunk. It was not the most comfortable of places and did not provide much in the way of relaxation, but he could see the entire field and still hear the distant voices of the kids and Ken calling orders to them.

He had never been very good with kids. Even his own sister had made him uncomfortable when she was just a child. But Ken seemed to be completely at ease with them. He had a natural way with them that some were possessed with and others not. It was not a virtue Aya had been given, and not one he regretted not having at all.

Pulling up his legs, he folded his arms over his knees and rested his chin on them, watching. Ken stood in the center of the field, calling out directions or reprimands when the kids got too rough in their playing. He kept his tone light-hearted. Aya had a feeling, being the person he was, Ken would have done anything to prevent even slightly hurting the feelings of any of the kids. He was equal with all of them, never too harsh on one or too easy on another. Kids were able to see such qualities in a person better than an adult would. It was only natural they were as attracted to Ken as they were.

He frowned slightly. He could remember a time when Ken would leave the shop on his off days not to go train kids in soccer, but to play. There was never a team he could find to be on, but he was happy enough if he was able to find two or three people at the park that were willing to play a game with him. Sometimes he became so swept up in the game it would be the middle of the night before he would return, and he would always have to be reprimanded for missing a mission order.

That had all ended when Kase had died. He had stopped going to play then. It had taken the death of Persia and the brief dismantling of Weiss for him to go back to the sport.

Aya unfolded his arms and let them fall uselessly to his sides. Ken would have been happy if he could have kept playing soccer even after Kase had died and killed his love for the sport. He would have been happier if he could have continued to play professionally. But sometimes things were not meant to be.

Without Weiss, he had nothing. But Ken and Youji and Omi, they all had lives of their own they could live. Sometimes he wondered how things would be if Weiss had never regrouped.

He closed his eyes. No use dwelling on things that could never change.

For nearly two hours the kids ran their drills and had mock matches. Aya watched them, but it was not the kids that he focused on. He watched Ken and how he interacted with them and around them, listened to his words and watched his expressions change. A laugh when a kid made a simple mistake, smiling when they were able to work together to pull of something he had explained to them. Aya watched the kids and how they affected Ken and Ken alone, nothing else.

It was dusk before the kids began to break up and go their own ways. Aya stood up and walked over to stand at the edge of the field. Ken was talking with a group of parents while their children, restless, ran around them in circles. Finally, their parents took the hint that they were ready to go home, and with smiles and words of parting to Ken, left with their children tugging on their arms and forcing them along. It was probably past dinnertime and their empty stomachs were aching.

Aya glanced down. A forgotten soccer ball lay at his feet. He nudged it with the toe of his shoe, and as Ken turned to face him, pulled back his leg and kicked. Ken easily blocked, using the inside of his foot to stop the ball, and then flipping it up. He bounced it on his knee for a moment before picking it up with both hands.

"Are you bored out of your mind?"

Aya shrugged. "Not really."

"Liar."

"No," Aya said. "It was... interesting."

Ken inclined his head, balancing the soccer ball against his hip. "Interesting?"

"Better than hordes of teenage girls at the store."

"So it's the lesser of two evils."

"Something like that."

Ken smiled slightly, rolling the ball back and forth in his hands. He dropped it to the ground after a moment and kicked it from one foot to the other.

"Can you goalie for me?"

Aya blinked, surprised. "I'm not any good at sports."

"It's not that hard." Ken flipped the ball into the air and bounced it off the top of his head. He caught it as it came back down. "Think of it more like a mission. You're good at fighting. You should be able to dodge a ball."

Aya wanted to argue that there was something quiet different between bullets whizzing at your head than a soccer ball, but he doubted that Ken would have listened to him. Shrugging, he trotted across the field to stand before the goal. He could see Ken grinning even from his distance away from him.

He saw the ball coming toward him and knew that he could stop it. It wasn't that hard. But right as the ball came close enough for him to bat out of the way, it past him in a blur. He felt his fingertips brush along its surface, but it was not enough to stop its momentum. It barreled into the net behind him.

Ken laughed. "Yeah, okay. Maybe you do just suck."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." Aya picked up the ball and pitched it back to him. Ken settled it against his hip again.

"Hey, if I can't beat you at paintball, at least let me have this." He picked up the netted bag from where he had discarded it and slipped the ball inside. "C'mon, let's go. We can probably get back in time to help Omi and Youji close up."

The street lights were coming on as they walked down the paved pathways through the park. The sun was just beginning to set in the sky, casting everything in shades of gold and pale blue. Aya pressed his hands into his pockets, head bowed, watching the pavement as it passed beneath his feet.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he realized it was rude to ask. It would be stepping beyond an unseen boundary. But the words were leaving his mouth before he could stop them.

"Why don't you play anymore?"

Ken looked up at him, startled. "What?" His expression relaxed after a moment, softening. "You mean soccer?"

Aya nodded.

Ken was silent for a moment. Finally, he shrugged. "I have more fun with the kids," he replied. "Teaching them is more fun than playing."

It was a lie. Aya knew only because when he was lying, Ken could not look a person in the eye. He would look at anything else, the floor, the ceiling, the walls, anything to keep from making eye contact. His voice was the only thing that made it seem real. His voice never betrayed his words.

"Really," Aya murmured.

"Yeah, really," Ken said. Irritation sparked in his voice. "Why do you care so much anyway?"

"You shouldn't stop doing something that's important to you just because of one person."

He had said it. He had not said a name, but Ken did not need a name. His words said it clearly enough.

"It's not because of Kase," Ken said softly, but anger still sparked in his voice. "It's not." He looked up suddenly. "And what about you? You said you used to play paintball and surf and all of that, and you just quit. Why? Because of your sister?"

Aya lifted his head and stared at him. Ken could only look back for a moment. The anger fled from his face, instant regret filling him for his words. Aya had never said it, but the other members in Weiss knew not to ever mention his sister to him. Ken had not forgotten. He had said it purposefully to get a rise out of him.

"Let's go," Aya said quietly.

He started forward, not bothering to wait and see if Ken was following.

"Hey, Aya, come on... I didn't mean to say it like that."

"Are you coming or not?"

He heard Ken sigh. The younger man hastened his steps to catch up to him. He said nothing to him. There was nothing to be said.

The store was already closed up for the night when they arrived. Aya walked around the side of the building to come in through the back entrance, Ken following at his heels.

He knew it was not worth it to be angry or upset with Ken. But at the same time he could not help but feeling that way. What Ken said, he said out of anger. Unfortunately, when Ken was angry, he tended to be tactless. He would always say the truth, whether or not it was wanted or needed to be said. Aya had never enjoyed the feeling of having the truth thrown into his face.

Yes, it was because of his sister. A lot of things had changed in his life after she had fallen into a coma. Too many things. But hearing it said aloud, how jaded and cynical he had become, that hurt.

"Aya?"

He glanced back, his hand on the door knob. Ken shifted uncomfortably.

"Don't bother apologizing," Aya said before he could speak. "I started it."

Ken sighed. "You're just really good at pissing me off, do you know that?"

"I know."

He opened the door into the basement. He paused, hand hovering over the knob. It seemed they had company.

Youji sat on the couch, arms sprawled out across its back. Omi was perched on a chair across from him. Birman, a manila folder tucked beneath her arm, stood before the screen that Persia appeared on.

Youji tossed him a grin.

"Hey guys. Mission order."

Aya sighed. Great. What a lovely way to end the day.