Hands… his hands… all over me. I moan and gasp as his lips find the places on me only he knows… warmth spreading through me, I smile, the laugh, at the joy of the pleasure as he murmurs my name, soft and low –
And suddenly I’m awake, alone in this empty, cold bed.
He’s not alone in bed.
After checking in on my peacefully sleeping Ai-chan, I go to the washroom. Not turning on the light, I can’t see my face in the small mirror, but I wouldn’t like what I see. My sister restored my health and took away the of the signs of fatigue of the last few months, but I still -feel- battered and worn-out.
I can hear, outside in this still night, the sound of feet, making their way from one side of the street to another. Someone here to kill me, or just my bodyguards? But the feet stop, and go still, so I know who it is.
I splash myself with cold water. One by one, our connections are snipped. Once he kills Mama-sama and her well-placed ally, the guards go away. Yukiko-san will leave for her kin. Tsutomu-kun will leave for his kin. And then it will just be the girls and I, until they grow up and fly away. And what of him? He’s handed headship of the Fujita house to his son, still a -boy-.
He wanted to wrap this up. Be done with this untidy mess, this broken dream. Does he mean to die, or re-form into another Saitou Hajime, to a new place with a proper sort of lover who acts in a way where he knows that he’s loved… Trapped in this house, with Glass and Steel gone, the other places empty… but I’m the one who wanted to be -safe-, so there are the guards, keeping me from the last place I have left.
These remnants… I have to put away. This longing that gets me nowhere. The dreams of love and passion and connection taunt me, -hurt- me in a way my nightmares don’t. Nightmares are just nightmares. Those dreams show me something I lost, someone I lost. It hurts more, and knowing that he’s utterly moved on… after all, I was the one who pushed him away. I only have myself to hate.
I go back to bed, curling up. Knowing sleep won’t come for another night. I’ve not heard from my brothers, perhaps my request yielded nothing or they feel no need to help either of us. My hand betrays me as it reaches out to the empty side. My heart, that traitor, hurts as it realizes it. The night is long.