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speaksoftlylove2015-02-19 10:52 pm
dalicious) wrote in speaksoftlylove2015-02-19 10:52 pm
FIC - I'll Find What You've Become
tokyo ghoul: re; chie + tsukiyama
1255 words
for miffy
She still tries to see him, on days when she knows Kanae will be off the premises and likely won't be back until well after the streets of Tokyo have gone dark – days that are given to hunting or the auction block, days where the family requires him elsewhere, days where even Kanae has to acknowledge that he's spent too long wandering through quiet halls looking for busywork and kneeling in a dark room trying to prompt responses that won't come. He talks to himself a lot nowadays; it's probably something that should be worrying, and if she was the sort to worry about much she probably would, but as it stands she's not and whatever worry she has isn't going to be given to Kanae, and he wouldn't ask for something like that from a human, anyway.
So it's for the best that neither of them bother, and neither of them pretend, and she thinks that's probably one of the reasons he keeps working with her even if he doesn't like her – she's one of the few people he can just aggressively be himself around, and even if he doesn't like her for it in the same way that Tsukiyama likes her for it, she imagines that it's probably nice to not have to worry about offending his master's dignity or something.
Not that she thinks Tsukiyama had much dignity to start with, but that is neither here nor there.
But dignity or not, some days she tries to see him, and most of the time she's successful; there are windows with locks that are "broken," things that Tsukiyama surely knew about before the incident but never bothered to fix, and she isn't about to point them out to Kanae because with everybody's luck he'll get them actually fixed and then she'll be locked out and cold and nobody really wants that. As it is she just lets him think they're latched before he leaves for the day, and then it's just a matter of tripping one of them open and climbing in, and sometimes it involves the help of a nearby tree but she manages, because she's always been good at getting into places that she shouldn't be.
The first time she'd done it had been the worst, because he hadn't expected it but he hadn't moved to defend himself, either; by now she's accepted that he won't try. She can tell herself that it's easier that way anyway, that she won't have to worry about the possibility that he'll startle and she'll end up with a kagune through her stomach for her effort, and so that's what she does – even if some days she imagines the kagune would be better than the knots that form below her ribs as a result. Either way, he never protests when she enters and she doesn't ask for permission before sliding into bed with him, shoes off and covers up almost to chin-level because he's got the warmest bed in the 20th Ward and probably the softest, too. She doesn't try to touch him; she pulls her camera out and she waits.
On bad days she resigns herself to lying on her back while he lies next to her and doesn't move much; sometimes he just wants to sleep and that's all right. Other times he cries and she never knows what to say to him when he does that, and she doesn't know if he even wants her to say anything at all; either way, bad days are given to entertaining herself, because she isn't like Kanae and doesn't see the sense in talking to someone who won't answer her, and she flicks through the pictures she's taken and just stays with him.
She sort of figures that if he wants conversation he'll ask for it, like he always does (like he always used to), only today she won't tell him that he's boring. Sometimes he does, on bad days, and those days are usually the most difficult to handle just because she doesn't know how to answer things like "I don't know what I'm supposed to do, Hori" with something that isn't "Probably not this," as much as it's true and as much as she's tempted. So instead she doesn't say anything and she just lets him cry, and she moves or makes noises once in a while to let him know she's still there until he falls asleep; he's quiet once he's out, and she wonders sometimes what his dreams look like.
So the bad days are hard, but nothing Kanae had told her had prepared her for the good ones – on good days she doesn't have to worry about startling him when she slips into his room because he's already awake, propping himself up on one elbow to get a look at her and raking his free hand back through his hair as though he's just waking up and trying to untousle it a little (and not having much success); on good days he still looks tired and he doesn't have very much energy but his expression softens when they talk and he tells her to come lie down if she's going to, and before long her camera is out and she's showing him pictures of everything she's seen that week – sunrises and grass and stones and the view from the tallest tree in the park – and after a while his head is nuzzled up against hers and the gesture is weird and affectionate but for now she doesn't mind and she doesn't push him away.
The bad days are hard but the good days are worse, because on good days he's almost like himself; he's quieter and his voice cracks more than it used to and he's softer around the edges when he responds to her banter, but it still sounds and feels like him and just for a brief while, he's interesting again.
Sometimes she just stays under the covers with him when he's like that, and she tells him about the snails she found yesterday and Ikuma's guitar-playing and how hard it is to make Kanae pay for parfait; sometimes she'll tell him that he should come with her and they can go break into buildings together, they can steal a suite in the Hotel Okura for the sake of jumping off the roof, they can do whatever he wants, and if it's been a particularly good day she knows it because that's when he just offers a soft noise and lies back against the pillows again and he seems content when he tells her that maybe someday, they can.
And then there's not else much to do on days like that but let him sleep, though she takes pictures of him before she goes, as many as she thinks she can get away with without waking him up. The shots usually aren't any good, but she likes them better than the ones she's found herself taking a lot nowadays – even though she knows it's wasting time to keep taking pictures from the same spot, in the same way, every single time, more often than not she finds herself returning to that rooftop where she'd found him.
Once she's there she lies down, and she tilts her camera, and as the shutter clicks she wonders if he'd actually seen any of what her camera is capturing or if he'd been a bit too blinded by grief to notice any of it.
The view isn't all that great, anyway.
1255 words
for miffy
She still tries to see him, on days when she knows Kanae will be off the premises and likely won't be back until well after the streets of Tokyo have gone dark – days that are given to hunting or the auction block, days where the family requires him elsewhere, days where even Kanae has to acknowledge that he's spent too long wandering through quiet halls looking for busywork and kneeling in a dark room trying to prompt responses that won't come. He talks to himself a lot nowadays; it's probably something that should be worrying, and if she was the sort to worry about much she probably would, but as it stands she's not and whatever worry she has isn't going to be given to Kanae, and he wouldn't ask for something like that from a human, anyway.
So it's for the best that neither of them bother, and neither of them pretend, and she thinks that's probably one of the reasons he keeps working with her even if he doesn't like her – she's one of the few people he can just aggressively be himself around, and even if he doesn't like her for it in the same way that Tsukiyama likes her for it, she imagines that it's probably nice to not have to worry about offending his master's dignity or something.
Not that she thinks Tsukiyama had much dignity to start with, but that is neither here nor there.
But dignity or not, some days she tries to see him, and most of the time she's successful; there are windows with locks that are "broken," things that Tsukiyama surely knew about before the incident but never bothered to fix, and she isn't about to point them out to Kanae because with everybody's luck he'll get them actually fixed and then she'll be locked out and cold and nobody really wants that. As it is she just lets him think they're latched before he leaves for the day, and then it's just a matter of tripping one of them open and climbing in, and sometimes it involves the help of a nearby tree but she manages, because she's always been good at getting into places that she shouldn't be.
The first time she'd done it had been the worst, because he hadn't expected it but he hadn't moved to defend himself, either; by now she's accepted that he won't try. She can tell herself that it's easier that way anyway, that she won't have to worry about the possibility that he'll startle and she'll end up with a kagune through her stomach for her effort, and so that's what she does – even if some days she imagines the kagune would be better than the knots that form below her ribs as a result. Either way, he never protests when she enters and she doesn't ask for permission before sliding into bed with him, shoes off and covers up almost to chin-level because he's got the warmest bed in the 20th Ward and probably the softest, too. She doesn't try to touch him; she pulls her camera out and she waits.
On bad days she resigns herself to lying on her back while he lies next to her and doesn't move much; sometimes he just wants to sleep and that's all right. Other times he cries and she never knows what to say to him when he does that, and she doesn't know if he even wants her to say anything at all; either way, bad days are given to entertaining herself, because she isn't like Kanae and doesn't see the sense in talking to someone who won't answer her, and she flicks through the pictures she's taken and just stays with him.
She sort of figures that if he wants conversation he'll ask for it, like he always does (like he always used to), only today she won't tell him that he's boring. Sometimes he does, on bad days, and those days are usually the most difficult to handle just because she doesn't know how to answer things like "I don't know what I'm supposed to do, Hori" with something that isn't "Probably not this," as much as it's true and as much as she's tempted. So instead she doesn't say anything and she just lets him cry, and she moves or makes noises once in a while to let him know she's still there until he falls asleep; he's quiet once he's out, and she wonders sometimes what his dreams look like.
So the bad days are hard, but nothing Kanae had told her had prepared her for the good ones – on good days she doesn't have to worry about startling him when she slips into his room because he's already awake, propping himself up on one elbow to get a look at her and raking his free hand back through his hair as though he's just waking up and trying to untousle it a little (and not having much success); on good days he still looks tired and he doesn't have very much energy but his expression softens when they talk and he tells her to come lie down if she's going to, and before long her camera is out and she's showing him pictures of everything she's seen that week – sunrises and grass and stones and the view from the tallest tree in the park – and after a while his head is nuzzled up against hers and the gesture is weird and affectionate but for now she doesn't mind and she doesn't push him away.
The bad days are hard but the good days are worse, because on good days he's almost like himself; he's quieter and his voice cracks more than it used to and he's softer around the edges when he responds to her banter, but it still sounds and feels like him and just for a brief while, he's interesting again.
Sometimes she just stays under the covers with him when he's like that, and she tells him about the snails she found yesterday and Ikuma's guitar-playing and how hard it is to make Kanae pay for parfait; sometimes she'll tell him that he should come with her and they can go break into buildings together, they can steal a suite in the Hotel Okura for the sake of jumping off the roof, they can do whatever he wants, and if it's been a particularly good day she knows it because that's when he just offers a soft noise and lies back against the pillows again and he seems content when he tells her that maybe someday, they can.
And then there's not else much to do on days like that but let him sleep, though she takes pictures of him before she goes, as many as she thinks she can get away with without waking him up. The shots usually aren't any good, but she likes them better than the ones she's found herself taking a lot nowadays – even though she knows it's wasting time to keep taking pictures from the same spot, in the same way, every single time, more often than not she finds herself returning to that rooftop where she'd found him.
Once she's there she lies down, and she tilts her camera, and as the shutter clicks she wonders if he'd actually seen any of what her camera is capturing or if he'd been a bit too blinded by grief to notice any of it.
The view isn't all that great, anyway.