#but then the s/o for Giotto was like NOPE

[mafiabosstsuna]

I love you guys so much. Gonna miss ya

((The admins will miss you too, dear anon! Also..... I might have taken some liberties with this ask. ^^;;; - admin nana))

Giotto:

You didn’t know why he was with you.

You were nothing special. Nothing particularly important. So easy to overlook you as you lingered at the edges of the crowd, tucking your hands behind your elbows, visibly tense despite the laughter, the cheer lightly brushing against your senses. Your smiles too strained and your attention too faked, practically sweetly false, and not that very well either.

Yet he looked to you with a warmth that almost burned, felt too good, too bright to understand. He looked at you as if you shined brighter than any star as if your very words left him breathless, something more than what you knew you were…

An ordinarily, painful person that was just – nothing without him.

And that hurt more than anything else because to think about being there without him… left you empty.

He breathed life into you, energy and excitement. You wanted him, you wanted to see as he did, with such rapture and feelings, so deep and consuming that it frightened you sometimes.

He was too much when you were too little.

You feared one day it would burn so completely and you’d never get back up again.

It isn’t healthy, you thought, to be so dependent on another as you were. To be unable to live freely without a piece of them there. It isn’t healthy, but knowing wasn’t the same as doing. Anyone could know as much as they wanted, but unless they wanted to do, to change, then nothing would.

It took you great courage to realize that, and even greater courage to act upon that.

You left, and the freedom of it had been both exhilarating and frightening.

Truth be told it had been very painful, the hardest first weeks you have ever had to work through. Everything had felt off balance, and you’d wake up with choked tears, shaking all over. It felt as if Giotto had become an addiction you needed to overcome.

It was only thanks to Alessio that you had been able to struggle past it all, a weighted, stable anchor that kept you from the sea of doubt and uncertainty. He was an odd fellow, resembling more of his mother than his father, soft-faced and as strong as the Rose she was named by. Alessio had helped you greatly, and he was, perhaps, one of your greatest friends.

It was why, when he had come to you, babbling about someone he had met, saying how he thought he was in love and he needed your help, that you decided to do just that. At first, you were confused. It didn’t seem as if Alessio was attracted to anyone. Yet here he was, looking back at you hopefully, and you just knew you had to help him. Why wouldn’t you? He was there for you in the days that felt so dark, so hard to see the light through, where you just wanted to run back and into Giotto’s arms and to the person you had been before, so small and insecure as if nothing had ever happened.

Giotto might have made you feel surreal, so loved entirely that you could have drowned in that feeling, but it was Alessio who made you strong.

“You were there for me when I had a bad day.” You laughed.

He gave you a sceptical look, “It must have been a long bad day then.”

…. It was meant to be like that.

It was… supposed to be like that.

You had hoped, even, to have called Giotto after being with Alessio for the last few months. That perhaps he could visit and see who you had become, and to perhaps come to know the dear friend you had learned to love dearly (just as strongly as Giotto who even now made your heart race). Yet that wasn’t how it had turned out. Instead, the light of the apartment was heavily shrouded, the silence so overbearing that you could almost believe the shadows were writhing and moving with life.

Giotto, a dark ember that burned too much, was standing in that darkness. He stood there and just the sight of him made you want to turn away in fear of the heat that flickered in his eyes, on his hands… in his heart. He burned so strongly that you could choke on the very air he breathed into you.

You sobbed, voice cracking, even as you could see, in the corner of your eye a slumped body just behind Giotto. “All I wanted was to be better.” You whispered, begging, pleading to any god that this was just a nightmare.

“But you were,” Giotto said, unable to understand why you flinched away from his touch, why you refused to look at him and see the dark splatters on his skin. “You were an ordinary person, the most important thing in existence… and he took it from me.”

Oh.

You remembered now.

The words he had said the very first time you had agreed to be his lover.

“Look at you. You’re not so bad, almost beautiful. So ordinary. It makes me feel happy.” His expression was almost peaceful if not for the faint furrow between his brows. His eyes looked to you, open and imploring, “Promise that won’t ever change. Even when you feel like you’re drowning, promise that this look in your eyes, that softness, living… promise me… promise me…”

He wanted you to love so much that you would drown in it.

You thought, that perhaps, he had drowned you a long time ago.

Reborn:

You knew very well that you were not someone worthy of him.

You knew very well that you were not anything beautiful, nor amazing. You were simply you, and that person was someone who held great insecurities. Such deep feelings of it that you just couldn’t sleep, listening to the whispers your own mind told you, such biting cruel words that twisted into your skin, into your heart, into your very mind.

But you had always been that way. It wasn’t hard to be that way.

It was hard though, to pretend.

With a laugh that was just too loud, too odd to even believe real, and an awkward little body that tried to mimic the behaviour of others only to fall short, a person playing pretend. You wanted to be better, needed to be more than you knew you were, to be the people he surrounded himself with – such wonderful people with strong shoulders and gleaming eyes.

But you were not, and each day you looked back at the fading smile in the mirror, wondering why it had to be so.

You had never had to try before.

You had never had to worry before about the softness of your voice, or the restless fidgeting of your hands. Never had to worry about a single thing about you. Yet standing next to him made you feel small, made you realize that this man dressed in his black suits, hair groomed back and fedora neatly turned at an incline… was a better person than you could ever be.

Perhaps you were jealous.

Yes.

You knew you were.

You were jealous of this man you cared for greatly, who didn’t feel shame in himself or in anything he said, no matter how ridiculous it truly was. Of this man who had no difficulties speaking, who seemed so relaxed, at ease in his own skin. Of this man whose heart didn’t race when feeling confronted, nor whose throat felt uncomfortably dry when realizing the shortcomings, the flaws in the choices he’s made.

Some days you did wish you believed him when he told you that you were important. And perhaps you did believe it some days, only to watch as it twisted, mangled itself apart in front of you into something less than it should have been, becoming wrong in ways that it should never be. A monster that clung to your skin, voice garbled and distorted, a demon of your own making.

You gave a shuddering breath as you leaned back with a grimace. Only to startle as two warm hands draped themselves on either side of you, pulling you closer, deeper into a familiar and comforting scent of brewed dark coffee and gunpowder, of groundwood and something like bottled sunlight.

Reborn’s hot breath tickled your ear, and your eyes closed, biting your lip to keep away the shiver building up at the base of your spine. It didn’t stop your toes from curling, nor from your breath hitching in surprise.

“I can hear you thinking.” He said, “What is it that is making you look so upset?”

You whispered back to him, voice carefully even, “I thought you could read minds.”

He hummed, the vibration rumbling against your back.

“I can. But I want to hear it from you. I want to hear those words you seem so determined to bottle up, to burn your hands with.” There was a pause and when you didn’t speak he continued on. His tone gentle and his touch just as sweet. “I can see it, you know, what you’re thinking of. I can see that you can’t even believe it for a moment that you’re special… It’s just so easy to see, to hear.”

Your body instinctively tensed up, colour pooling at your cheeks. Yet all you could do was listen, even as your stomach tightened uncomfortably with every word he spoke into your ear. Too damning, too close to your heart for your comfort; his arms a tight cage and his lips burning against your flesh.

“You think you’re not worth it. But I think that you are the most remarkable human in existence, and every day I wonder how did I meet you – you with your eyes, and your kindness, and you’re never giving up… giving up on no one but yourself.”

“I don’t –”

“But you do.” The retort was sharp, factual, leaving no room to say otherwise. “And I can’t stand it.”

You flinched, eyes dampening at his words.

“I can’t stand the way you degrade yourself so much, and look at me as if you just can’t understand why.” Reborn gave you a tight squeeze, muttering surely that he would make you see it, that he’d say it a thousand times if he must. He peppered small kisses at the curve of your shoulder. “And you know where we’re going to start?” He hummed, “With those words you heard last week, from that person. I know you were speaking to them again.”

“You have all the capabilities of seeing the truth. But you always refuse. But I know very well that you are –”

“I thought I said to ignore them,” He said, voice tinged with disappointment. “I don’t care how long they have been with you, people who care don’t say such things like that.”

“ – and unloved.”

“I know, but…”

Reborn hissed at you, and you quieted. There was a long moment of silence between you, and then Reborn spoke up again, telling you that there would be no more relapses. He had spoken to them, had made sure they would not bother you again. There was a burning anger that he had done so and yet a just as equal relief that you did not have to hear any more. No longer would their words sink into your mind, no longer would it poison it, twist it until your own mind was against you.

You understood Reborn was only waiting for you to see yourself positively, and for that you didn’t say anything more but a quiet thank you, never mentioning the odd stain on his left fingernail (of crumbling red that smelt faintly of iron), nor mentioned the broken vase that you had found in the trash (different than the new one sitting on the coffee table, more indigo than purple and not chipped at the bottom side). You never said a word, and for that Reborn held you tighter, reassuring words being buried into your heart.

Kawahira:

There used to be an odd man you knew when you were younger. You can’t quite recall what he looked like, but you do remember that he liked the snow, the new cold air of winter and the almost magical touch it brought to the earth.

You can’t quite recall what his voice sounded like, but you do remember that his words were never quite blunt, secrets tied up in other things, too much for a child of that age. Even more, you recalled the almost bitterness of his smile and the faraway glaze, the sadness and uncertainty of his gaze.

He was an odd, sad man. An odd, sad man that you had never understood, but who you had wanted to speak to underneath the biggest tree. Those were times you recalled being the happiest, a feeling so fleeting now but one very cherished.

“Tell me… am I a good man?”

Then one day he left, not a whisper of his departure, nothing but the remnants of the winter painting the ground and the newly budding leaves of the trees. He felt like a dream, an illusion that had been fabricated from the falling white mush of the skies, and the fading heat of your breathe visible in the air. He was a dream, you thought, but one you cherished no matter how frayed and forgotten the memory was.

Sometimes you thought you saw him, in the littlest things. In the oddest places, but nowadays you saw him in a person.

You knew it was silly, but sometimes you thought he had come back as –

“You’ll catch a cold sitting out here.”

You jerked in surprise, looking back over your shoulder to see Kawahira making his way down the steps, dressed in a warm scarf and in his plain green kimono. He seemed quite at ease despite the almost flimsy layers of warmth he had chosen for himself, even as the cold wind bit at his nose and brushed at his hair, he didn’t make a single suggestion that he was bothered.

A biting chill nipped at your red nose and you fixed him with a pointed glare, “Says the man who thinks he’ll keep warm in a flimsy kimono, sandals, and a scarf. Me on the other hand,” You trailed off, nuzzling into the warm jacket two sizes too big. Hands perfectly warm in the fuzzy coloured gloves and shawl-like scarf draped over your shoulders. “I’m warm and cosy!”

“…without boots on.”

You glanced down to your feet, covered snuggly with fuzzy socks that were slowly getting wet from sitting in the snow for so long. You hadn’t really noticed, the thick wool keeping most of the brunt of the ice away from your flesh. With an upturn of your nose, you retorted surely, “The warmest socks in the world.”

A soft smack at the back of your head made you yelp. He sat down with a disapproving glare, still looking as if the winter had no effect on him. “You’re just trying to get sick.” Kawahira hissed. Then he paused, scrutinized you shrewdly and then muttered, “Didn’t you sit out here when I met you? Out here in the cold…”

You hummed, thinking. “No, there was another time before, not here but somewhere else. In the little shop, remember?”

“And then I actually spoke to you out here –” He nodded before waving a hand dismissively at you, “the crazy person sitting on a cold wet bench in winter, for hours on end.”

“I do not!” You gasped, affronted by the accusation, even as your cheeks coloured with heat. You turned quickly away when he rose his brow, hoping he wouldn’t notice the redness of your cheeks, and if he did, would blame it on the whistling breeze.

Kawahira made a sound, one that just spoke of his lack of belief in your words, but did not say anything more on the subject. Instead, he quietly contemplated the grey skies and then downwards to the packed snow on the ground. There seemed to be something heavy on his mind.

“Most people don’t really meet me more than once, and yet I did meet you once, and then I met you again.” His words were soft, carrying so low that you had to almost strain your ears to hear him. “In the whole wide universe, I met you for another time.”

The way he said it seemed very special, made it seem as if the coincidence between you both hadn’t been just that. It left you strangely warm, and you laughed, brushing off his words with a simple, “Don’t be silly. You make it sound as if meeting me was something special.”

You thought that he was seeing too much in something that wasn’t really there.

“But it was. And you are,” He said with fierce certainty, “you’re special.”

You stared at him curiously, as if seeing something there, more than just the man sitting beside you right now. You shook your head and looked away, “He used to say that.” You muttered.

He looked curious, “Who did?”

“A man… ” You shrugged weakly, “can’t remember now.”

“…Is he gone?”

“No, but he used to… I don’t know. He used to just appear, and when I asked where he had gone, it was as if he never existed. I can’t remember him now, but I do remember the feeling he used to give me…”

There was a long drawn out silence between the two of you.

“… What was it?”

You stared at the ground, thinking about the man you had once known. A dream of a man that was slowly fading into obscurity. But not the feelings, never that, never the warmth he gave even at his saddest. It lingered even now, a tiny little flame you held onto even after so long, doubts and insecurities creeping in like monsters in the night.

It was silly but sometimes just the thought of that odd man from your youth gave you –

“Hope.” You said, “He gave hope.”

And sometimes when you looked at Kawahira, with his pale skin, white hair, and round glasses, you thought of that odd man whose eyes had been old and sad. Kawahira was nothing like that man, you knew. But sometimes the tiny blur between them was enough to make you wonder, to believe in the little magic that the world just didn’t have.

Without it, you would surely be nothing.

You did not want to contemplate that nothing.

Perhaps it was rude, perhaps it was selfish, but as long as Kawahira continued to give that feeling to you, then it did not matter what he was or wasn’t.

In the back of your mind, a voice whispered that perhaps you should. That there was more than what was shown, what was given, and what was received. Kawahira was more than just a memory, but the thought of letting go, of letting the long years of whispers you knew were buried deeply (shifting restlessly in the depths of your heart) out, you would not be able to live with it.

You were not a strong person, you knew.

And hope can do many things. If it helped you to hold on as tightly as you were, then that was fine, yes… that was good.

“Maybe you’ll see him again someday.”

“Time moves on for all of us. But I want you to remember this, no matter what occurs, you are brilliant and you are loved.”