森へのパスポート
Title: So Bury Your Head in the Sand and Hope for the Best
Rating: G
Fandom/Pairing: Football RPS, Víctor Valdés/Bojan Krkić
Summary/Notes: AU & shameless Totoro crossover (doesn't follow the movie rules at all tho). For the prompt 'bus stop'. Wherein Bojan is hopeful and stubborn and Victor comes along for the ride.
☆ I write fairytales, not the truth. Every word is a lie.
★ Beta'ed by my fantabulous partner in crime sunnyshinee who shed her infinite wisdom on my humble words! Any remaining mistakes you find are fully, and only, mine. Feedback is always welcome!
♥ for my dearest afrostedlemon who wanted Vic/Bo ♥
There's a sign, a blue one with weird characters and symbols which Victor can't even begin to understand and he starts to question if this really is where they're supposed to be. The timetable is empty. But Bojan sits down on the wooden bench, intending to take this one.
The bench is warm when Victor sits down next to the younger man; the strong rays of the sun have probably warmed the wood all day. The rays still reach their faces even though it's sunset, but they're not that strong; they're on the verge of dying out.
"When I was young, maybe seven or so, I was out in these woods with my dad. We were here all day, we fished and swam in the lake down that road." Bojan points to somewhere far away but Victor can still see, between large oak trees, the water glittering in the evening sun, "and by sunset, like now, we passed this exact spot. I had an acorn in my pocket that I had found earlier that day and my dad told me to plant it in the ground so an oak tree would grow. You know what the funny thing was though?" Bojan doesn't seek Victor's eyes for contact, opting to look away if the man would choose to laugh at what he would say right after. But Victor still shakes his head even if Bojan can't see him.
"This sign and bench appeared instead of my oak tree. It was the weirdest thing ever. I used to come here every day that summer and one day there was a sprout growing from the ground and the next, there was this bus stop. Except that I didn't know what it was back then. So, I would just sit on this bench and wait. Sometimes I had a coloring book or something with me to keep me from being bored," his hands stroke the wood of the bench with the memory, "and one day, when I had sat here longer than any other day, there was this sound from deep within the forest, it sounded like a cross between a lion and a house cat. And out from the forest, at racing speed, comes this huge, catlike bus running down this road. And it stops right here in front of me. The odd thing was though, I was never scared. It looked at me, made that loud sound again, even stretched some of its legs - it had like sixteen of them. But I was never scared. I somehow knew that it was nice, it even let me pet it."
Victor has a fleeting look of worry on his face for a second when he turns to face him. "Bojan, you do know that there aren't buses shaped like cats, right? You probably just imagined it. If you were seven and had sat out in the sun all day then it wouldn't be all that surprising if you did make it up."
"But it wasn't a figment of my imagination. There really was a Catbus." The smaller man - boy, really - looks so sincerely into his eyes that Victor almost believes him for a second. Until his logic kicks in.
"Then why didn't anyone see it when it brought you home?" He wonders, no trace of mocking anywhere near the tone of his voice.
"'Cause the Catbus is magical, silly! No one sees it; they think it's the wind blowing when in fact it's the Catbus running past them." He looks sentimentally up towards the sky as if he could see it, running in mid-air.
Victor just shakes his head, not really sure of what to believe. But he doesn't push it. Just sits beside Bojan and soaks in the last sun rays. It was, after all, nice to spend quiet time with the other. Even if he's doing something as stupid as waiting for an absurd thing like a Catbus, or whatever it was Bojan called it.
Bojan leans his head on Victor's shoulder, thankful for the lack of teasing he normally put up with from the other man.
****
They start to take this trip every day. The bus stop's not far from town but it takes a while to get there. On most days it's sunny and warm so Victor doesn't complain; it's actually kind of relaxing. Bojan is determined to get there on time no matter what so he keeps a fast pace. And Victor follows him just as quickly. Others would probably think of him as a puppy in the way he mindlessly followed the boy. But it was more out of curiosity than mindlessness.
One day, Bojan brings a small package consisting of a large leaf tied with a piece of string.
"What's that for?" Victor asks as they go along the country road. It's not even paved: just dirt and dust.
"You'll see," Bojan cryptically says, doesn't take his eyes off the forest that lies ahead of them. Victor is starting to grow worried, doesn't think it's healthy to be this obsessed about anything really. But when they sit down on the bench, as many other days, Bojan puts the tiny leaf-package beside him and gets rid of the glazed look in his eyes, is back to being his giddy self.
Somewhere around five o'clock, when the sun is the hottest, Bojan picks up his leaf package and rises from the bench. Victor silently observes him as he crosses the road and doesn't stop until he reaches the ditch on the other side. He wants to ask what Bojan is going to do, what is in that little green package. But as the boy squats down and digs a little hole with his right hand, Victor has a good guess as to what's going on.
Bojan pulls the string on the green bundle until it falls open, revealing a small, albeit shiny, acorn. He buries it in the pit he's dug, which he then fills up with the soil. And then he goes back, to sit beside the older man, as if nothing had happened. Victor just shakes his head in amusement.
When they've been sitting on the bench all day, the sun eventually goes down and the stars slowly show up, one by one. Soon they're there later than ever before and the darkness is kind of suffocating, thank luck they have a street lamp almost right beside them. Victor is unnerved by the lack of people passing through the forest, hasn't seen even one person all day, never really does. Just once, three days ago, there had been an old lady on a bicycle. Victor had only seen her go into the forest in the middle of the day.
"Bojan, it's time to go; we've been sitting here for hours now. C'mon," Victor kind of whines, makes his voice nagging on purpose. He never whines usually, but he thinks it'll work. He wants to go.
"No, you go ahead, I'll wait some more. It'll come soon. It has to." It doesn't work.
"You'll catch a cold if you sit here all night," Victor tries to reason with him but Bojan's being too stubborn to be reasoned with.
"No, it'll come before that," he says, never taking his eyes off the road, his mind once again not really in the present world. Victor sighs and decides not to leave Bojan alone, even if he is tired and hungry and all he wants is that last beer in the fridge. He can even feel the cold droplets that are going to run down on his fingers when he's sitting on his living room couch, the bottle in his hand.
So he resumes his place beside the boy, sitting just a tad bit closer than before, arm on the backrest for Bojan to rest his head on when he becomes too tired to sit up straight. Which he does when the crescent moon comes in sight and the sky is pitch black.
****
They've been at the bus stop every day for about three weeks now. Nothing has happened with the buried, or planted if you may, acorn. Victor is kind of disappointed.
But, he can swear that the symbols on the light blue sign have changed since the last time he saw them.
"Bo, do you know what the sign says?" He even points to it but Bojan's been zoning out again.
"Hmm, what?" he starts and then sees where Victor is pointing to, "oh, it's nothing important, doesn't matter," Bojan nonchalantly waves with his hand, as to shrug it off.
It's not like Bojan to shrug things off. Victor is not convinced.
****
It's raining tonight. They can't sit on the bench and they've only got one, slightly larger umbrella since it was sunny earlier that day. Victor doesn't know why he keeps waiting with Bojan, it's not as if what he's waiting for is real or anything.
Bojan, as always, stares into the dark forest, waiting quietly. Patiently.
"It'll come," he murmurs, never taking his eyes off the darkness.
Victor almost feels bad for the younger man. It's so unbelievable he wants to tell him, but at the same time, he doesn't want to ruin the childlike hope Bojan has. So he, as always, puts his arm around Bojan's shoulders so he can lean into Victor while Victor supports some of his weight on Bojan as they wait.
Out of nowhere, a sound erupts from the forest. It sounds suspiciously like a cat's miaow, but much, much louder. And feistier.
The wind picks up. It starts out with a breeze but it gets harder and harder and soon they can't keep their eyes open any longer. Victor tries to keep the umbrella in a firm grip but a particularly strong wind gust knocks it out of his hand.
Just as quickly as it came, it stops. But now, when they open their eyes, they're met with the largest cat Victor has ever seen.
"I told you it would come, didn't I?!" Bojan shouts happily as he untangles himself from Victor and rushes towards the huge Catbus, ignoring the rain. He's got a wide grin on his face: it matches the cat's.
It looks bizarre, really. Six pairs of legs and its body is shaped like a real bus but the head is normally shaped and sits on the front. It's got glowing eyes, like head lights, blinkers made out of mice and a sign with similar symbols as those on the bus stop sign right between the front blinkers.
"What the-" Victor murmurs, not quite believing his eyes. The bus-shaped cat turns its glowing eyes on him, along with a grin that makes him not so comfortable; so he follows Bojan quickly, just to make it stop looking at him.
It transforms an opening for them to get into and when they do, it’s impossibly soft and cosily warm, it kind of makes Victor forget that he's inside a cat - if it's a real cat he doesn't even know. Every surface is covered by the cat's fur though, and when they sit down on the seats, Victor hears a 'ping!' sound and they're off. The Catbus closes the transformed door hole and gets prepared to jump, leaps right off the ground and immediately uses all legs in unison to run like the wind.
Across tree tops, fields impossibly big and suburb households they go until they reach the larger building tops of the city. It's not a bumpy ride, but he can feel the legs moving, fast-paced and strong, making the floor wobble.
Victor sees Bojan's once-again sparkling eyes and wide smile and starts to laugh like a madman. This whole happening is so bizarre but oh-so-wonderful. And so, Bojan laughs with him.
fin