storypaint | Coming Home (Soshi/Riiko)

Title: Coming Home
Author: rhap_chan
Fandom: Absolute Boyfriend
Rating: G
Length: 543 words
Warnings/Spoilers: ending of AB
Disclaimer: Absolute Boyfriend belongs to Yuu Watase. This fanfic is a derivative of canon material that is not my property. I do not profit from these writings. The opinions and actions expressed in these stories are not necessarily the views and beliefs of the original author or me.

Excerpt: He sees a man with a strange tattoo on his face in the plaza one day and uses his rudimentary Spanish to ask about Kronos Heaven. The man nods.

Soshi Asamoto leaves because he can't stand this anymore. He wants to move to somewhere in Japan first, and he thinks about it, but he knows that he would be seeing her everywhere-- he'd see her in crowds or he'd hear her voice or there would be the smell of her perfume.

A month after he arrives in Spain he is still seeing her, ridiculously, among a sea of black braids and white-haired widows. He sees a man with a strange tattoo on his face in the plaza one day and uses his rudimentary Spanish to ask about Kronos Heaven. The man nods.

She arrives the next day, as perfect as he specified, down to the last detail, and he owes them millions of yen but he doesn't care. He looks at her in her box and thinks he won't see her on the street anymore, because she's here.

He only keeps the doll for two days. He doesn't wake her up. He can't play with dolls. It's not the same.

So Soshi keeps moving, keeps working. He learns enough Spanish to shop in the markets and he's the quietest boy in school (that's nothing new). He makes too much food and one tired night he finds himself knocking on the neighbor's door.

Her name is Lita and she's beautiful, he recognizes that. He has dinner with her and the Spanish sticks in his throat and he listens to her talk instead. She is kind and articulate, and interested in Japan. And interested in him.

The next week she visits his apartment and tells him that it doesn't look lived in, that Spain is about bright colors and pursuing happiness and he sleeps in a nest of blankets on the floor. She brushes his hand and offers to help him paint. He considers it.

They paint the living room gold and the kitchen ruby and she gets paint on her nose and just laughs. "I'm clumsy," she says, and he laughs too. He starts to teach her Japanese.

The day after she kisses him on the stoop he gets the letter and feels the strange hardness in the corner. He opens the letter and the ring falls out and he is in Japan again, his blood boiling like a Spaniard, but he reads the letter anyway.

So he books a flight and he kisses Lita on the cheek and he tells her about Riiko.

"She better for you," Lita said in broken Japanese, and her heart is broken, he knows, but he doesn't tell her about Kronos Heaven.

"Avoid that strange guy hanging out in the plaza. The one with the tattoos," he says instead, and she thinks it's strange advice, but she sees him off at the airport.

And when Riiko rests in his arms, he sighs and realizes he is home, and Spain becomes like the most distant of memories; a blurred tanned face, ruby-colored walls. She tells him what happened and she hesitates, wondering if he still wants her.

"I love you," he says to Riiko in Spanish, watching her eyes grow wide. He presses her to his chest and a small part of him hopes Night will never, ever wake up again.

And that's okay, because he's only human.

Coming Home (Soshi/Riiko)

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