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Title: you and me against the mountain
Characters: izuko kataro, boriji watanabe
Summary: boriji gets into an accident and is rendered unconscious. izuko struggles with her feelings while waiting for him to wake up. on the other hand, boriji goes face-to-face with the river goddess, a spiritual manifestation of the girl he loves, and comes to terms with his relationship with the girl with the grey eyes and the burden on her shoulder.
Rating: PG-13 ; blood, injuries, angst
2 - you are everything to me and nothing at all
Blood is soaking Boriji’s jacket and his hair is dirty, but Izuko thinks that he’s never been more beautiful than in that moment. His blood doesn’t bother her anymore, even though Izuko thought she would faint at the sight of him. Seeing him so vulnerable, sprawled across the concrete with that helpless expression, Izuko thinks that she’s fallen in love.
“We got hit by a car. It’s kind of our fault though, since we were fighting,” Satoshi comes up behind her, face bandaged and arm slung in a makeshift cast - that’s Reiko’s jacket, so she must be here already. “The couple inside the car - damn, I feel so bad, they had a baby with them so I didn’t stop them - they offered to help but I turned them down.”
“What were you fighting about?” Izuko asks, lips numb from the cold.
“Our families, mostly. Girls too, I guess,” Satoshi remarks, “You know, he really does love you. It’s crazy. We’re not even eighteen yet. I told him was crazy but he won’t accept it.” Izuko opens her mouth to respond but Reiko’s voice pierces the night air, somewhat of a nuisance but more of a comfort.
“Izu-!” Reiko shouts, “Izu, I’m so glad you’re here.” She’s shivering, her t-shirt drenched with a cold sweat, her jacket in Satoshi’s possession, “We need to get Boriji to the hospital, now.”
“If we check him in, all our families will know and his rank will be knocked down by the time the inheritance ceremony comes around,” Satoshi mutters. “We have to do this some other way.”
“Doesn’t Daichi-kun’s mother run the night shift at the hospital?” Izuko asks, unable to take her eyes off Boriji’s mangled figure.
“Ah,” Reiko replies, flipping open her battered Motorola and fumbling through her contacts, “Amaya-kun’s mom, that’s right. She helped us when Akira was possessed back then too, right? She won’t ask any questions, I hope.”
Daichi takes a while to pick up, but sounds as alert and studious as he always does when he does answer. He also seems unfazed at the situation, stonily replying that he’ll be right there. The medical van appears five minutes later, sirens turned off - Daichi always holds true to his words, at least. Perhaps that’s why Akira’s so infatuated with him, because his seriousness never seemed to play off well with her fiery personality.
“I told my mom not to ask any questions,” he said, “Sorry if it took too long, I just got my license a week ago so I’m not used to driving this thing.”
“You are a godsend, Amaya,” Satoshi breathes, picking up Boriji and placing him in the back of the van. The rest of them pile in the front, and the bicycles that the boys were riding are strapped to the roof. Daichi’s driving is smooth and speedy - what an overachiever, Izuko thinks, saying that this kind of driving is subpar.
In the night, everything is warped and Izuko feels overwhelmed by a wave of sentimentality. When she looks over at Boriji, still bleeding, and she reaches for his hand, intertwining his fingers with her own. It feels good - almost right, like two pieces of shattered glass that should fit together but are missing an edge. Reiko catches sight of this, making eye contact with Izuko, smiling wryly but saying nothing, and Izuko is infinitely grateful.
“But why am I here? I was –” Boriji starts, but his head hurts intensely the moment he tries to recall what happened to him. Something about a bike, something about a car, something about Satoshi.
“Don’t overthink it,” Mizugami remarks, shoving a bundle of robes at Boriji, “put this on, you look unsightly in those mortal clothes.” He’s sitting in a giant bamboo cottage, the kind that Satoshi lives in during the summer, sharing tea with a river goddess. The absurdity of the situation is still slowly coming to him, but he’s too caught up in that image of Izuko, floating like a ghost down the river, to care.
When Boriji comes out of the dressing room, he feels somewhat better, as if the robes had soothed his aching body somewhat, and sits back down across Mizugami. She regards him warily, but it never fails to make Boriji uncomfortable because all he can see in her is Izuko.
“Is this a dream?” He asks, taking a sip of the tea in front of him. It’s purple - which is weird enough, but it also tastes purple, whatever purple can taste like. It’s fragrant and flowery and makes him want to sleep, but he struggles and stays awake because it just doesn’t feel safe to sleep right now.
“Kind of,” Mizugami replies, looking off into the distance, “but if you’re hurt here, you’re hurt for real. If you die here, you die for good.” She takes a knife from the edge of the table, grabs Boriji’s hand, and makes a cut up his arm with it. The boy yelps in pain and tries to pull away, but Mizugami doesn’t budge. Instead, she licks up the blood, her tongue healing his cut instantly, the pain ebbing away as if it didn’t happen in the first place.
“If you do get hurt, however, I’m here to help,” she grins, licking her lips, “Your blood tastes differently than I expected, though. It almost tastes like mine.”
“I assume you don’t know what happened last spring,” Boriji replies, feeling the skin that had bled earlier. He feels woozy, as if the relief from all that initial pain is a little too much for him.
“I do,” the goddess replied, eyes glinting, “but I just never expected it to run as deep as blood. It really bothers me that you would look up how to do something like soul-sucking, though. She always feels like something is missing from her, you know?”
“I know,” Boriji replies, too ashamed to look at Mizugami, “it hurts for me too. It feels like...something heavy, you know?”
“Does it feel lighter now?”
“It kind of does, actually,” Boriji admits. He pauses for a moment, taking in the idea, “Wait a second - that girl, I mean, Izuko - the one floating down the river. Is that it? Was that the weight on my shoulders?”
“Exactly,” Mizugami replies, lips quirking up in appreciation, “and you’ll have to reach her if you want out. You can’t exist in the mortal dimension without that part of you, since your soul’s so closely intertwined with hers.”
“But she can without me?”
“I suppose. It might be bad for her to stay away from that part of her existence for so long - especially forever, but she doesn’t exactly need you.” Those words pain Boriji somewhat - he had always figured that Izuko never really needed him as much as he did with her, but hearing it spoken made his skin crawl.
“But to return, I just need to rescue that girl in the river, right?” It didn’t feel right for him to call the girl - ‘his Ophelia,’ Mizugami had said - as Izuko.
“That’s correct, but I’d rather you not do that.” Mizugami’s eyes shift from grey to blue.
“Why not?”
“Because I love you. Like I said, I am your beloved, the same as this girl you call Izuko, and I want you to stay. That girl might not need you, but I do.”
Characters: izuko kataro, boriji watanabe
Summary: boriji gets into an accident and is rendered unconscious. izuko struggles with her feelings while waiting for him to wake up. on the other hand, boriji goes face-to-face with the river goddess, a spiritual manifestation of the girl he loves, and comes to terms with his relationship with the girl with the grey eyes and the burden on her shoulder.
Rating: PG-13 ; blood, injuries, angst
2 - you are everything to me and nothing at all
Blood is soaking Boriji’s jacket and his hair is dirty, but Izuko thinks that he’s never been more beautiful than in that moment. His blood doesn’t bother her anymore, even though Izuko thought she would faint at the sight of him. Seeing him so vulnerable, sprawled across the concrete with that helpless expression, Izuko thinks that she’s fallen in love.
“We got hit by a car. It’s kind of our fault though, since we were fighting,” Satoshi comes up behind her, face bandaged and arm slung in a makeshift cast - that’s Reiko’s jacket, so she must be here already. “The couple inside the car - damn, I feel so bad, they had a baby with them so I didn’t stop them - they offered to help but I turned them down.”
“What were you fighting about?” Izuko asks, lips numb from the cold.
“Our families, mostly. Girls too, I guess,” Satoshi remarks, “You know, he really does love you. It’s crazy. We’re not even eighteen yet. I told him was crazy but he won’t accept it.” Izuko opens her mouth to respond but Reiko’s voice pierces the night air, somewhat of a nuisance but more of a comfort.
“Izu-!” Reiko shouts, “Izu, I’m so glad you’re here.” She’s shivering, her t-shirt drenched with a cold sweat, her jacket in Satoshi’s possession, “We need to get Boriji to the hospital, now.”
“If we check him in, all our families will know and his rank will be knocked down by the time the inheritance ceremony comes around,” Satoshi mutters. “We have to do this some other way.”
“Doesn’t Daichi-kun’s mother run the night shift at the hospital?” Izuko asks, unable to take her eyes off Boriji’s mangled figure.
“Ah,” Reiko replies, flipping open her battered Motorola and fumbling through her contacts, “Amaya-kun’s mom, that’s right. She helped us when Akira was possessed back then too, right? She won’t ask any questions, I hope.”
Daichi takes a while to pick up, but sounds as alert and studious as he always does when he does answer. He also seems unfazed at the situation, stonily replying that he’ll be right there. The medical van appears five minutes later, sirens turned off - Daichi always holds true to his words, at least. Perhaps that’s why Akira’s so infatuated with him, because his seriousness never seemed to play off well with her fiery personality.
“I told my mom not to ask any questions,” he said, “Sorry if it took too long, I just got my license a week ago so I’m not used to driving this thing.”
“You are a godsend, Amaya,” Satoshi breathes, picking up Boriji and placing him in the back of the van. The rest of them pile in the front, and the bicycles that the boys were riding are strapped to the roof. Daichi’s driving is smooth and speedy - what an overachiever, Izuko thinks, saying that this kind of driving is subpar.
In the night, everything is warped and Izuko feels overwhelmed by a wave of sentimentality. When she looks over at Boriji, still bleeding, and she reaches for his hand, intertwining his fingers with her own. It feels good - almost right, like two pieces of shattered glass that should fit together but are missing an edge. Reiko catches sight of this, making eye contact with Izuko, smiling wryly but saying nothing, and Izuko is infinitely grateful.
“But why am I here? I was –” Boriji starts, but his head hurts intensely the moment he tries to recall what happened to him. Something about a bike, something about a car, something about Satoshi.
“Don’t overthink it,” Mizugami remarks, shoving a bundle of robes at Boriji, “put this on, you look unsightly in those mortal clothes.” He’s sitting in a giant bamboo cottage, the kind that Satoshi lives in during the summer, sharing tea with a river goddess. The absurdity of the situation is still slowly coming to him, but he’s too caught up in that image of Izuko, floating like a ghost down the river, to care.
When Boriji comes out of the dressing room, he feels somewhat better, as if the robes had soothed his aching body somewhat, and sits back down across Mizugami. She regards him warily, but it never fails to make Boriji uncomfortable because all he can see in her is Izuko.
“Is this a dream?” He asks, taking a sip of the tea in front of him. It’s purple - which is weird enough, but it also tastes purple, whatever purple can taste like. It’s fragrant and flowery and makes him want to sleep, but he struggles and stays awake because it just doesn’t feel safe to sleep right now.
“Kind of,” Mizugami replies, looking off into the distance, “but if you’re hurt here, you’re hurt for real. If you die here, you die for good.” She takes a knife from the edge of the table, grabs Boriji’s hand, and makes a cut up his arm with it. The boy yelps in pain and tries to pull away, but Mizugami doesn’t budge. Instead, she licks up the blood, her tongue healing his cut instantly, the pain ebbing away as if it didn’t happen in the first place.
“If you do get hurt, however, I’m here to help,” she grins, licking her lips, “Your blood tastes differently than I expected, though. It almost tastes like mine.”
“I assume you don’t know what happened last spring,” Boriji replies, feeling the skin that had bled earlier. He feels woozy, as if the relief from all that initial pain is a little too much for him.
“I do,” the goddess replied, eyes glinting, “but I just never expected it to run as deep as blood. It really bothers me that you would look up how to do something like soul-sucking, though. She always feels like something is missing from her, you know?”
“I know,” Boriji replies, too ashamed to look at Mizugami, “it hurts for me too. It feels like...something heavy, you know?”
“Does it feel lighter now?”
“It kind of does, actually,” Boriji admits. He pauses for a moment, taking in the idea, “Wait a second - that girl, I mean, Izuko - the one floating down the river. Is that it? Was that the weight on my shoulders?”
“Exactly,” Mizugami replies, lips quirking up in appreciation, “and you’ll have to reach her if you want out. You can’t exist in the mortal dimension without that part of you, since your soul’s so closely intertwined with hers.”
“But she can without me?”
“I suppose. It might be bad for her to stay away from that part of her existence for so long - especially forever, but she doesn’t exactly need you.” Those words pain Boriji somewhat - he had always figured that Izuko never really needed him as much as he did with her, but hearing it spoken made his skin crawl.
“But to return, I just need to rescue that girl in the river, right?” It didn’t feel right for him to call the girl - ‘his Ophelia,’ Mizugami had said - as Izuko.
“That’s correct, but I’d rather you not do that.” Mizugami’s eyes shift from grey to blue.
“Why not?”
“Because I love you. Like I said, I am your beloved, the same as this girl you call Izuko, and I want you to stay. That girl might not need you, but I do.”
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