Gravitation Fan Fiction ❯ Inertia ❯ Chapter 8

Inertia part eight

Walking on Broken Glass

 

 

I whimper in Tohma's arms. He coos and nuzzles my sweat-drenched hair. I close my eyes and push my face into his chest. Is he rocking me?

 

He is...

 

“I will always love you, Eiri.”

 

I suckle his nipple and feel myself drift off on a cloud.

 

++

 

”Spread your legs so I can clean you up, Eiri,”

 

How long did he let me sleep? An hour? Ten minutes? Long enough to justify laying me out on the sofa. I wake up blanketed under his black silk shirt. Tohma is standing over me, with a washcloth.

 

He is a strange, startling mess.

 

Tohma must have washed his face; but his hair is sunshine spoking through a morning cloud. That tall, lithe body is still beautifully naked. Beautifully so. It radiates an odor- something I could never associate with Tohma before- a mixture of honey-funk and our sexual alchemy. I am branded with the same smell…

 

“What about you?” I ask. This is so bizarre.

 

“What about you?” I know Tohma goes to great pains to be clean.

 

“Cleanliness is next to godliness.” The towel touches my inner thigh. It feels so good, so soothing… “That's what they say, isn't it? But I wouldn't feel right if I didn't take care of you first.”

 

But I've been asleep. What would keep a self-avowed hypochondriac from cleaning himself?

 

The thought fades as he swabs me down with delicate strokes. I close my eyes. It feels so good to be cared for.

 

“I always loved you, Tohma. I always will.”

 

He sighs, and finishes me up. It's over, too fucking soon. I nearly object when he says, “No. No you won't, Eiri.”

 

The water leaves goose bumps as it evaporates. Molecules parachute away from my body heat, toward cooler heaven- somewhere between myself and the upper atmosphere. They collide and coagulate in a microscopic chaos I can't see, but I do feel as galaxies collide and worlds shatter with such simple words. I feel something- maybe it's my skin. Maybe it's sluicing away like a husk. It leaves me more than naked under his shirt. I feel… raw. Exposed.

 

“What… what did you say?”

 

I'm afraid. Because world's tilting- I can feel the topsy-turvy spin as its axis sputters. I put my arms on either side of the couch to keep from flying off like a cast away into space.

 

Please tell me I'm hearing things, Tohma. Please tell me there's nothing to be afraid of.

 

Call me your Eiri.

 

Somehow Tohma's managed to keep standing. He's acting like nothing's wrong, like it's so easy to find gravity in this madness. He's…

 

Dialing his cell phone?

 

“You should go home, Eiri. Go home to your Shuichi.” He can give it to me, but he can't look me in the eye. “Here.”

 

“Hello?” Shi's voice is on the other line. I blink, dumbstruck by voice from a lifetime ago. Tohma turns away, hand on one elbow and chin in hand.

 

“Shi?” I wish I had a cigarette. But my menthols are somewhere in the debris on the floor. It's a wonder the mess isn't swirling weightless in this chaos.

 

“You woke me up.”

 

“I was asleep, too.”

 

There's a pause, and Tohma looks over his shoulder at me. His naked body is like a willow, when he twists it like that. He's caught me looking. Oh fuck… he closes his eyes and turns away again. Fuck…

 

“Yuki…?” That name… The hesitation and catch in his voice when he draws it out that way…fuck it hurts so bad to hear it. “Did you call me from his cell phone just to tell me what it feels like in his bed?”

 

“Tell him you're going home,” says Tohma.

 

He can't wait to get rid of me, now. Amazing… how words can break your heart, how they can render your ego into nothing more than butchered parts. He let me believe I was his Eiri, but it was all…

 

“Bullshit,” I say.

 

Tohma turns away.

 

“Don't lie to me, Yuki,” Shi says. He doesn't whine, no. He's not even angry. “Please don't be a liar. I'm begging you. You hate liars.” He's… almost patient.

 

“That's right,” I say, narrowing my eyes at Tohma. “I hate liars.”

 

“So, are you staying there?”

 

“Obviously I'm not staying here.” I am shaking like a leaf, jonesing for some nicotine and a good, cold beer. No- fuck that. Some Tennessee Bourbon. “Wouldn't that be why I'm talking to you?” Maybe even a bottle of aspirin.

 

Gods, I hate the way my voice sounds: hard and angry.

 

“Oh.” Shi's cautious. “You really mean that? You're… really coming back?” I envy the sound of hope on the other end.

 

Go back to being a disgusting bastard, live that disgusting life, that disgusting lie? I can't! I want to be Eiri. I want to burn so bright, but one wants that from me.

 

“Yeah.” I cut the line and toss the cell phone to the sofa, then rub my hands over my face, desperate to wipe away stunned expression on my face.

 

“Eiri-“

 

“I'm leaving.” No. Don't speak Tohma. Please. Not another word.

 

“Let me explain.”

 

Explain?

 

I stand, and hold the shirt out to him. I hate the way he hesitates, the way he looks at this body of mine, as if it holds some sort of attraction beyond… an easy fuck.

 

Miserable lie. That must be what I am, after all. That's all anyone ever saw in me. A filthy experience. My touch is contaminating.

 

“Take it.”

 

He accepts with a polite nod. “I hung your clothes in the restroom. You should be able to wear them home.”

 

“Thoughtful of you,” I say, slinking away like the repellent fucktoy I am. I've served my purpose. Now I leave to serve another. At least I can stay there when I'm done.

 

I don't even realize I'm shaking, or rubbing my arms, or even crying, until I am in the restroom, staring at the ridiculous picture I make in the mirror.

 

What am I? A throwaway boy? Or bastard of a man? What's my name? Who am I, now?

 

My clothes are on a hanger, hooked behind me. Tohma even found and sewed the buttons in. Isn't that just like him? Patching up tattered things… no tolerance for imperfection of any sort. How… thoughtful. This kind of thoughtfulness kills me.

 

I pull on, and they stick on my skin. I shuffle into my shoes. They never did fit. The freak in the mirror keeps shaking. I have to stop, though. I can't open that door this way.

 

++

 

“I told you,” says Tohma. “I told you-you would hate me.”

 

This is what I hear the moment false courage turns the knob and forces me out. This is what waited for me on the other side. Waiting to torture me.

 

“What do you want from me, now?” When everything else fails me, I still have words to jab with, to defend the broken bits of myself. I lie with a question.

 

“You think I don't love you.”

 

“I have to go.”

 

I rush past Tohma, vaguely aware that he's sheathed himself in that protective black silk. I can smell the tang of his cologne masking our scent as I pass on by. Good. Mask any evidence of what we did.

 

Then I think about what he did to my balls.

 

Oh…

 

“Wait,” he says.

 

…Fuck.

 

I stop in the middle of his office like a car wreck.

 

“What, Tohma? What else could you possibly have to tell me?”

 

“Eiri, what I want is for you to be happy. That's all I ever wanted.” His voice sounds very far away. His hand, though. His hand is right there. On my shoulder. I wince at his touch.

 

I need something to do. Fitfully I riffle through my pockets until I find an abused package of cigarettes. “Spare me.” I pop one in my mouth and take a deep drag.

 

“You've got to understand,” he says.

 

“Why?” I spin around and grab his shoulders, shake him, will him to finally look me in the eye and tell me. “I know why. The same reasons you've had for years. It's wrong. I'm too fragile and fucked up to be anything other than something to regret. Some cheap, tragic fuck.” The language makes him flinch. “Good! That's good, Tohma. Act hurt when one of us is finally honest. Show me that brave face! Because it's so hard to deal with a demented fucktoy, isn't it? And you are so admirable, aren't you?”

 

“No I'm not.”

 

“I know that now!”

 

Oh…my…god…

 

I step back, blinking in horror. Tohma almost deflates when I let him go.

 

“You knew it would just be a fuck.”

 

A fuck. That's all I really am to anybody. That's all anyone's ever wanted; and he's no better than the rest…

 

“You bastard!” I shove him away and spin on my heel. “I should never have come here.”

 

“I told you at the door.”

 

I told you… I told you… I glare at the bandage on my hand. When I ball up my fist, I can feel the thin layer of coagulated blood crack. An open palm reveals the fresh permeation of blood through the banding.

 

I told you…

 

“I do want to know something…” My chest heaves in rage. He's just standing there, watching me with his remote beauty and silent voice. “Can you tell me why you did it? Can you tell me why you… fucked me?”

 

He has no response for that.

 

“Why?”

 

His wide eyes are suddenly narrow. His mouth is compressed. Like he refuses to speak, but the words are all there.

 

I'm a horrible child, aren't I? An unlovable, irritating brat.

 

“Tell me.” I deliberately drop the cigarette on his carpet and grind it out with my bare foot. The pain… it's nothing. It almost feels good. “Tell me why, you son of a bitch.”

 

He puts his fingers on the bridge of his nose and closes his eyes.

 

“You can't ignore me, Tohma!”

 

I reach for his shoulders again, but this time he blocks my hands. It's shocking- he's never defended himself against me, before. A sound, like a cry, comes out of my mouth.

 

I…

 

Don't deny me, Tohma. Don't deny my pain. Don't deny my right to throw myself against you and scream. Don't ignore me!

 

Don't… push me away.

 

I look at the skyline, hungry and desperate for escape through that window. I would fly like a zephyr. But I am no angel. Just an untouchable tragic sacrifice to this god. I am not even worth acknowledging, now.

 

I'm just a…

 

“Fu-u-u-ck!”

 

The curse is a battle cry; I rush at the window like a berserker. One foot jacked in the air, I push my shoe through the thick plate and the glass breaks into the outside.

 

I broke his window, like child desperate for attention. I can't stop staring at the break, like a crack in the sky. Air rushes out of the rarified atmosphere of Tohma's office. Wind whips papers and honey wrappers in small funnels all around us. The lights flicker and the darkness sucks them away. I nearly follow them through that hole.

 

“Eiri!”

 

I am being pulled away, too dumbstruck to move my own feet. I can see the chaos in my soul, now, all around me. It's horrible. So horrible.

 

“Why?”

 

“Are you alright, Eiri?” He looks so concerned, now. His face is a map of worry, and his hands are brushing the shards of glass away from my shirt and jacket. His palms seem to gather them. They fasten like jewels on his skin.

 

“You still won't tell me. Won't admit I am just some disgusting mistake to you, now.”

 

He stops. Wild, blonde bangs shield his eyes, but I can see him swallow back the words. Tohma must have a bellyful. I want to hit him in the gut and make them all spill out.

 

“You're not disgusting. It was just… not the right thing to do.”

 

It was wrong when he made me Eiri again? It was wrong?

 

“Think about our obligations, Eiri. How could you love a man who turns away from those?“

 

“You're too busy playing god to be a human being!”

 

I nearly shove him again, but stop myself, and step away from his horrible pose.

 

All hail Tohma, the noble, sacrificial being. In his sacrifice he becomes a messiah. Where does that leave me? Cold and uncared for, in the church of the cross and nail. I am only an offering.

 

No!

 

“But you're no god.“ I point at him accusingly, as he hangs his head. I almost expect him to raise his arms and imitate the cross. “Pose all you like. Act like you care, but I know the truth. You're a goddamn hypocrite, Tohma! Talking about doing what's right, when you were the one fucking me!”

 

He puts one hand up in surrender. “Enough.”

 

“I agree.”

 

I storm toward the door, fueled with indignation. I want to rip it from the hinges. I want to tear through the ceiling and rip through the black night like a hell demon.

 

“Eiri-“

 

I look over my shoulder. I can't help it, because somehow I know this is the last I will see of him.

 

I hate him for making me want to catch one last glimpse.

 

Tohma floated over the carpet, barefooted. Glass and city lights glimmer around him. His face is sad, so sad. As it tilts I want to cry. I want to know why…

 

“I'm begging you, Eiri…”

 

“For what?”

 

He motions behind him. His backlights flicker on and off again. I can make out the blood and glass that litter the floor. I look down at my hand and frown. I didn't think I bled that much.

 

Tohma shifts on his bare feet.

 

“Don't come back to me, because… I… I can't say no to you. I am begging you to be strong for both of us, and stay away.” He looks down, and a small sigh falls to the floor. “And… I love you. I'm sorry.”

 

Then he closes the door, and leaves me on the other side. I slam my hand against the barrier. When it slides down, not a bit of blood is left on the wood grain.

 

I left no trace.