[KHR] The Healing Well
Title: The Healing Well
Characters/Pairing Nana/Iemetsu, Ryohei/Hana, implied Tsuna/Kyoko
Rating: T
Warnings: None
A/N: Written for Round III of khr_fest
The Healing Well
He leaves her first at the end of spring, so she will spend her summer alone.
It is sudden, but not unpleasant, the weather will not allow it: the chirping cicadas with husks emblazoned by noonday, the sky a perfect gradient from pale aquamarine, to blinding cerulean, then rich lapis lazuli. Blue was always her favorite color--so many different shades, like a fan of various emotions: turquoise happiness, azure melancholy. He'd brought her back a blue scarf from Italy, once, it's pattern so detailed it had the illusory effect of crawling beneath her fingers. He showed her how to tie it around her neck, before he kissed it, the scratch of his beard comforting and coarse.
By the time she remembers all of this he is already halfway out the door, his bags packed, clean-smelling, soles of his shoes on the threshold and arms outstretched. She flies into them like a sunbird, but not for remembrance or even sorrow, but simply because they looked so inviting. To her he is irresistible, every bit of him, incendiary, magnetic. She could never be one of those wives who knew what was best. Instead, she trusted him completely, that for the sake of his life, and hers, and their life together, (and the life turning inside her, unbeknownst to both of them)he would make the right choice, and not come to harm.
I'll be back before you know it.
She does not ask him to promise. She does not have to.
Nobody told her it was so hard, living the unexpected life.
In retrospect it should have been obvious, frightening in its clarity like the reflection of a black mirror. The mafia man, with his crown of steel and dark heart. The gangster movies--tall Americans and swarthy Italians bantering in strange tongues she struggled to understand--a cacophony of words and sounds and bad intent. It was Tsuna she wanted, Tsuna she decided on, Tsuna big-eyed and clumsy and trying his best, not this shadow creature with his rings and sharp suits.
She tries to quell such thoughts. Busies herself with trivialities and minor pursuits: extensions for her hair, a new pair of shoes, a drive in this strange country hastily aborted, she had frightened herself into thinking someone was following her. It's superficial, and she feels it, feels shallow, feels cowardly, drifting and plain. She is a figure, trussed and displayed, loved and worshipped and mistreated, always by accident. She feels selfish. She feels stupid. She feels desperately alone. At night she turns toward his breath to make sure he's still there, as if he could be the anchor point she wants to hang all her lovely hopes upon. A child to fix everything, a new house of possibilities, a life without rebirth.
He sleeps, beside her and far away. She does not dare to wake him.
He is allowed to be quiet, around her.
Battles are meant to be loud, and his especially, his position on the front lines of chaos. Into the fray he delves, deeper and deeper into the swarm of bodies and of death. He demands closeness, he demands an absolute, and that comes with noise: the sound of fist on flesh, pound, pound, pound. War does not cease, merely ebbs, and when it starts up again it floods, and leaves women and men drowning, crashing together like bones. Yet somehow, inside their house seems like another realm to him, where his wife presides--the quiet warrior.
The difference between peace and tranquility is tangible there. Peace is blinding, but tranquility is soft and malleable. She can wind it between her hands like string. She wraps it around his fist. It is perfect because she makes it so. He pours his wounds onto her like oil, what he has done and what he has seen. At times it is hard for her to understand--the scope has limits, even for her, but she is intelligent and astute, draws suitable conclusions like a needle through water. It was wondrous, at first, her knowing and her seeing. His want to protect tenderly overruled by her strength. (It's not quite as unfailing as he thinks. She will fall before he does, a weary creature, the fire in her burnt out too fast. He will not expect it, and she will regret that. One of many.)
They fight back to back, looking at opposite sides of the sky, but it is a holding, and that's what matters.
Characters/Pairing Nana/Iemetsu, Ryohei/Hana, implied Tsuna/Kyoko
Rating: T
Warnings: None
A/N: Written for Round III of khr_fest
The Healing Well
He leaves her first at the end of spring, so she will spend her summer alone.
It is sudden, but not unpleasant, the weather will not allow it: the chirping cicadas with husks emblazoned by noonday, the sky a perfect gradient from pale aquamarine, to blinding cerulean, then rich lapis lazuli. Blue was always her favorite color--so many different shades, like a fan of various emotions: turquoise happiness, azure melancholy. He'd brought her back a blue scarf from Italy, once, it's pattern so detailed it had the illusory effect of crawling beneath her fingers. He showed her how to tie it around her neck, before he kissed it, the scratch of his beard comforting and coarse.
By the time she remembers all of this he is already halfway out the door, his bags packed, clean-smelling, soles of his shoes on the threshold and arms outstretched. She flies into them like a sunbird, but not for remembrance or even sorrow, but simply because they looked so inviting. To her he is irresistible, every bit of him, incendiary, magnetic. She could never be one of those wives who knew what was best. Instead, she trusted him completely, that for the sake of his life, and hers, and their life together, (and the life turning inside her, unbeknownst to both of them)he would make the right choice, and not come to harm.
I'll be back before you know it.
She does not ask him to promise. She does not have to.
Nobody told her it was so hard, living the unexpected life.
In retrospect it should have been obvious, frightening in its clarity like the reflection of a black mirror. The mafia man, with his crown of steel and dark heart. The gangster movies--tall Americans and swarthy Italians bantering in strange tongues she struggled to understand--a cacophony of words and sounds and bad intent. It was Tsuna she wanted, Tsuna she decided on, Tsuna big-eyed and clumsy and trying his best, not this shadow creature with his rings and sharp suits.
She tries to quell such thoughts. Busies herself with trivialities and minor pursuits: extensions for her hair, a new pair of shoes, a drive in this strange country hastily aborted, she had frightened herself into thinking someone was following her. It's superficial, and she feels it, feels shallow, feels cowardly, drifting and plain. She is a figure, trussed and displayed, loved and worshipped and mistreated, always by accident. She feels selfish. She feels stupid. She feels desperately alone. At night she turns toward his breath to make sure he's still there, as if he could be the anchor point she wants to hang all her lovely hopes upon. A child to fix everything, a new house of possibilities, a life without rebirth.
He sleeps, beside her and far away. She does not dare to wake him.
He is allowed to be quiet, around her.
Battles are meant to be loud, and his especially, his position on the front lines of chaos. Into the fray he delves, deeper and deeper into the swarm of bodies and of death. He demands closeness, he demands an absolute, and that comes with noise: the sound of fist on flesh, pound, pound, pound. War does not cease, merely ebbs, and when it starts up again it floods, and leaves women and men drowning, crashing together like bones. Yet somehow, inside their house seems like another realm to him, where his wife presides--the quiet warrior.
The difference between peace and tranquility is tangible there. Peace is blinding, but tranquility is soft and malleable. She can wind it between her hands like string. She wraps it around his fist. It is perfect because she makes it so. He pours his wounds onto her like oil, what he has done and what he has seen. At times it is hard for her to understand--the scope has limits, even for her, but she is intelligent and astute, draws suitable conclusions like a needle through water. It was wondrous, at first, her knowing and her seeing. His want to protect tenderly overruled by her strength. (It's not quite as unfailing as he thinks. She will fall before he does, a weary creature, the fire in her burnt out too fast. He will not expect it, and she will regret that. One of many.)
They fight back to back, looking at opposite sides of the sky, but it is a holding, and that's what matters.