[Lamento] Vicissitudes of Life
Title: Vicissitudes of Life
Fandom: Lamento - Beyond the Void
Pairing: Rai/Konoe
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Vicissitudes of Life
By mid-morning, the heat has managed to creep all the way down to the forest floor. It remains trapped here, beneath the leafy canopy, turning earth to dust and needles to tinder, a myriad of gnats dancing in the air.
The sweat is rolling down your neck, collecting between your shoulder blades and under your arms until everything is a sticky mess, clothes indistinguishable from skin. It's something that comes with the job more than the season, but that still doesn't quell the urge to sit down and return yourself to a more presentable state, futile as it may be.
It's not as though you have anyone to impress. Your partner's no better off than you, though he's a lot less dignified about it; tugging at his soaked shirt and swatting at the insects trying to touch to his arms and ears. They plague him a lot more than they plague you, and there's a joke to be made here in the voice of an annoying old guy with a habit of commenting on anything he sees, about a sweet kitten and a sourpuss. He whips up something in that vein whenever you make the mistake of stopping by, nearly insufferable now that he's found out the best way to rile you is to make your partner blush and squawk. You shouldn't be so easy, really, not when it's your partner who insists on these visits and thus deserves every bit of humiliation he gets, but there's a small part of yourself that you can't erase, the part that wants to insist it's something meant for you alone.
Pretty stupid to think that way, of course, but what else can you do when he has a hundred ways to catch you off guard, and you only have the one?
It's not his fault for being so inexplicably vibrant, like someone took a clear, bright morning and stuffed it inside a person, and it just shines through, sometimes. He has the gift of stopping people in their tracks and turning their heads without even trying, people like the idiot and the old man, and even people in the streets, when he's waiting around and humming a tune of no particular finesse. It's people who are looking for something, the idiot once said in one of his uncanny outbursts of perceptiveness, and you snorted in response, but lately, you've been looking closer. There's a difference between the idiot and your partner's little merchant friend, like leaves in a pond, one that's drifting across the surface and stirring ripples in the water, and one that's just bobbing aimlessly, never quite moving anywhere.
You're not sure what that makes you, but then again, you're no longer sure about anything. You never thought of stepping beyond yourself, beyond what you are and know, beyond what is, killing and fighting aside, clear-cut and comfortably safe. Only you and your skills against everything else, with no room between the sword strokes to do anything but breathe. Certainly nothing like living your life alongside someone else's.
He'd smile if he knew, probably, and ask you what else you thought having a sanga would entail, if not that.
Truth is, you didn't think much at all, so used to keeping to yourself that it seemed only natural others would want to do the same, and he seemed just the right kind, wide-eyed and too fresh to realize he could be the one calling the shots. It seems like so long ago now, even though it isn't, it's only your world that's been upended like the contents of a musty trunk, ideas and principles spilling out on the floor. But you didn't notice just how much until your mind seized upon the soft crunch-rustle of your footsteps on the forest floor, their echo in near-perfect synch, and you realized with a start that your stride has started to match your partner's. It's only one of the things that have been happening without your express consent; your ears pricking for his voice even when you're not particularly interested in listening, your tail curling across his lap whenever he stretches out beside you, no questions asked.
The light is starting to slant through the leaves when you call a stop, but it does nothing for the temperature. Even the rocks against your back are warmed by the stuffy air, an irritable itch forming from your refusal to peel off your clothes. Fastidiousness is demanding its due, your tail in a sorry state, but all you manage to do is make it stick up in tufts, hairs clinging to your fingers when you dig them through.
He chuckles. "Your face is all red."
"So's yours," you say, a touch of irritability stealing into your tone at the teasing.
"Yeah, I guess so. Come here for a moment?" He's kneeling next to an overhang, feeling for something.
"What for?"
"Just come," he says, and it's that odd mix of gentle insistence and secrecy that gets you to move, never knowing why.
Squeezing the moss with both hands, he leans over before you can ask what he's doing, his hands wet on your skin and shockingly cool. He smiles, moving damp palms to your cheeks, your temples, the nape of your neck, fingers dipping into your collar and spreading the water in small circles. If he's noticed you twitch in surprise, he doesn't show it, so you're allowed to pretend.
"That's better, isn't it," he says, pulling back to spread what's left on his own arms, before reaching out to draw more water from the moss.
You don't answer, preoccupied with the feeling of rough fingertips and smooth liquid. It wouldn't have been nearly as nice to do it for yourself.
The thought lingers like the cooling water, refusing to be examined for its hows and whys.
What would it entail, if not that?
Stepping up, you bat his hands away.
"Stop that. Let me…"
- Fin -
----
A/N: Ah, the dreaded you-style, but the experiment was fun. XD C&C is appreciated.
<< Return to Lamento Index | Return to Fanfiction Index >>
Fandom: Lamento - Beyond the Void
Pairing: Rai/Konoe
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Vicissitudes of Life
By mid-morning, the heat has managed to creep all the way down to the forest floor. It remains trapped here, beneath the leafy canopy, turning earth to dust and needles to tinder, a myriad of gnats dancing in the air.
The sweat is rolling down your neck, collecting between your shoulder blades and under your arms until everything is a sticky mess, clothes indistinguishable from skin. It's something that comes with the job more than the season, but that still doesn't quell the urge to sit down and return yourself to a more presentable state, futile as it may be.
It's not as though you have anyone to impress. Your partner's no better off than you, though he's a lot less dignified about it; tugging at his soaked shirt and swatting at the insects trying to touch to his arms and ears. They plague him a lot more than they plague you, and there's a joke to be made here in the voice of an annoying old guy with a habit of commenting on anything he sees, about a sweet kitten and a sourpuss. He whips up something in that vein whenever you make the mistake of stopping by, nearly insufferable now that he's found out the best way to rile you is to make your partner blush and squawk. You shouldn't be so easy, really, not when it's your partner who insists on these visits and thus deserves every bit of humiliation he gets, but there's a small part of yourself that you can't erase, the part that wants to insist it's something meant for you alone.
Pretty stupid to think that way, of course, but what else can you do when he has a hundred ways to catch you off guard, and you only have the one?
It's not his fault for being so inexplicably vibrant, like someone took a clear, bright morning and stuffed it inside a person, and it just shines through, sometimes. He has the gift of stopping people in their tracks and turning their heads without even trying, people like the idiot and the old man, and even people in the streets, when he's waiting around and humming a tune of no particular finesse. It's people who are looking for something, the idiot once said in one of his uncanny outbursts of perceptiveness, and you snorted in response, but lately, you've been looking closer. There's a difference between the idiot and your partner's little merchant friend, like leaves in a pond, one that's drifting across the surface and stirring ripples in the water, and one that's just bobbing aimlessly, never quite moving anywhere.
You're not sure what that makes you, but then again, you're no longer sure about anything. You never thought of stepping beyond yourself, beyond what you are and know, beyond what is, killing and fighting aside, clear-cut and comfortably safe. Only you and your skills against everything else, with no room between the sword strokes to do anything but breathe. Certainly nothing like living your life alongside someone else's.
He'd smile if he knew, probably, and ask you what else you thought having a sanga would entail, if not that.
Truth is, you didn't think much at all, so used to keeping to yourself that it seemed only natural others would want to do the same, and he seemed just the right kind, wide-eyed and too fresh to realize he could be the one calling the shots. It seems like so long ago now, even though it isn't, it's only your world that's been upended like the contents of a musty trunk, ideas and principles spilling out on the floor. But you didn't notice just how much until your mind seized upon the soft crunch-rustle of your footsteps on the forest floor, their echo in near-perfect synch, and you realized with a start that your stride has started to match your partner's. It's only one of the things that have been happening without your express consent; your ears pricking for his voice even when you're not particularly interested in listening, your tail curling across his lap whenever he stretches out beside you, no questions asked.
The light is starting to slant through the leaves when you call a stop, but it does nothing for the temperature. Even the rocks against your back are warmed by the stuffy air, an irritable itch forming from your refusal to peel off your clothes. Fastidiousness is demanding its due, your tail in a sorry state, but all you manage to do is make it stick up in tufts, hairs clinging to your fingers when you dig them through.
He chuckles. "Your face is all red."
"So's yours," you say, a touch of irritability stealing into your tone at the teasing.
"Yeah, I guess so. Come here for a moment?" He's kneeling next to an overhang, feeling for something.
"What for?"
"Just come," he says, and it's that odd mix of gentle insistence and secrecy that gets you to move, never knowing why.
Squeezing the moss with both hands, he leans over before you can ask what he's doing, his hands wet on your skin and shockingly cool. He smiles, moving damp palms to your cheeks, your temples, the nape of your neck, fingers dipping into your collar and spreading the water in small circles. If he's noticed you twitch in surprise, he doesn't show it, so you're allowed to pretend.
"That's better, isn't it," he says, pulling back to spread what's left on his own arms, before reaching out to draw more water from the moss.
You don't answer, preoccupied with the feeling of rough fingertips and smooth liquid. It wouldn't have been nearly as nice to do it for yourself.
The thought lingers like the cooling water, refusing to be examined for its hows and whys.
What would it entail, if not that?
Stepping up, you bat his hands away.
"Stop that. Let me…"
- Fin -
----
A/N: Ah, the dreaded you-style, but the experiment was fun. XD C&C is appreciated.
<< Return to Lamento Index | Return to Fanfiction Index >>