Let Go (Yue/Eriol)

[storypaint]

Comm: 10hugs (repost)
Title: Let Go
Series: Cardcaptor Sakura
Character/Pairing: Yue/Hiiragizawa Eriol (onesided)
Set: #2
Theme: #6, wings
Rating:G, strong mentions of shonen-ai warning
Word Count: 1405
Disclaimer: Cardcaptor Sakura belongs to CLAMP.

Summary: Eriol has to make Yue understand that Clow was gone, and he couldn't replace him. Yue has to learn the hardest lesson--how to let go.

Eriol had done the best that he could to explain things to Yue, but he didn't want to understand. All the moon angel saw was that his beloved master had died and now he'd returned, and he didn't want Yue anymore. Clow knew that would be the lesson that would be hardest for the guardian to learn, even harder than learning to love Sakura. After all, Yukito loved Sakura, and there was less difference between the true form and the false form than either of them thought. Clow remembered when Yue used to smile like Yukito did, a long easy smile that came rarely, like a gift. He spent too much time trying to get Yue to smile...

A week passed after Eriol returned to England and settled back into a life that resembled Clow's but was his own, with his beloved, a woman not often privy to strange mood swings and alcohol like Clow's girlfriend (for one night after a particularly terrible hangover, Clow had vowed to teach his reincarnates to hate alcohol, by tweaking their taste buds, and it had held, and Kaho found no need to drink alone). After the week he got the first set of letters, smiling to see each carefully crafted address. Sakura's English looked like a kindergartener's, large, loopy, and uncertain, but full of sheer Japanese sunshine. Tomoyo had typed her address label, writing on hyacinth-scented paper about trivialities in Sakura's life and Yamazaki's sorrow that he'd left him to craft lies alone. And his cute little descendant had written, his emotions written in aura just as clearly as his address was--irritation mixed with duty and a small bit of affection, for how could he hate Eriol when Sakura treasured him? And of course there was jealousy, but there would always be. Eriol smiled until he saw the fourth letter, a small white envelope with no return address, as if the writer was afraid the note would be sent back unopened.

The letter was from Yue, emotional at turns, written in two different hands--Yue's, as well as Clow remembered, and Yukito's more open, messy script. The moon guardian pleaded, repeating all the same arguments on paper as though seeing the stark black kanji on the cream paper would make his points official. Eriol hated to see the guardian in pain, but he could do nothing. He would have to learn to be satisfied with his life. For had he not two people who loved him very much, instead of one as Clow had presumed? Hadn't Eriol responsiblities beyond Clow's?

The letters came, all four of them every week. They came to his wedding, two years after he came back to England, when finally he was tall enough and seemed old enough for the relationship to be plausible to the English. They all came-- Sakura, Syaoran, Tomoyo, Kero, even Yamazaki--except for Yue, who ignored the invitation entirely and had sent his usual letter. Three of them piled up while they were gone on their honeymoon, each more desperate than the last. The letters stopped for a month, and Eriol dared to hope. Syaoran's letters began to come from Japan instead of China, and Tomoyo's letters were littered with accusations of Sakura and Syaoran cuteness and all of the hugs and kisses she taped. Sakura mentioned quietly that Touya had proposed to Yukito, but no wedding was being planned. Eriol knew why, and it twisted his heart. He went back to Japan.

~

"Yue, you have to stop this," he said, outwardly calm as always, but bothered by the fact that he had to grab Yue's hand to bring him to his feet, and that the moon guardian was now cradling the hand in his other like a treasure. It was honestly creeping him out a little.

"But Clow--" Yue said, his eyes intense with devotion.

"CLOW IS DEAD!" Eriol shouted. Yue started and Eriol recovered, repeating quietly, "Clow is dead. He's gone forever. I am Hiiragizawa Eriol. I am not your master, nor is Fugitaka. That man you knew and loved--he's gone. I'm sorry."

To Eriol's intense discomfort, he saw the winged creature begin to cry, tears like pearls cascading one by one down his cheeks. His eyes were dark and his eyelashes fluttered. Even in agony, Yue was beautiful, and Eriol understood how Clow had loved him, but he couldn't be Clow for Yue, no matter how much Yue needed him.

Eriol watched Yue cry, and when finally the guardian stopped, he said, "Write a good-bye letter to the man you loved, and if you'd like, you can send it to me, but I want it to be a good-bye. If you can't let him go, you can't live in this life, and your false form is trying desperately to be real. He needs you more than anyone right now, more than a man long dead."

Yue nodded and Eriol left, resisting that part of him that wanted to take each tear from the porcelain skin and brush the pain away, because there was a lot of Clow left in him, most of the memories. But he was too tired of the old magician's ghost to indulge.

~

Yue wrote the letter and Eriol received it one month later, addressed to Clow Reed, care of Hiiragizawa Eriol. He brought it outside and read it underneath the maple tree in his backyard, far away from the others, and Kaho, whom he had kept well informed, not that she needed words to know what was going on, distracted the guardians with a trip to the mall that would surely put a large dent in the monthly budget, but it was worth it.

Dear Clow-sama,

The day you left I thought I would die before my heart could heal. Strange thing was that was when I truly began to live, the day that she unsealed me and things began again. I remember too much and too strongly to think that your reincarnate does not feel anything for me, but also I feel guilty. I must admit that my obsession with your rebirth was not only born out of love, but jealousy. For my false form, as irritating and strange as you in your wisdom have created him, had someone who loved him in this life more than anyone in the world, even knowing of his duality, and I did not. I would not allow someone to take your place in my heart. You were the only one to earn it. Still, I was jealous of Yukito and his simple happiness, because I thought you would never be back.

It hurt me when your youthful reincarnate took away the dream that surfaced wildly when I saw him. For he is truly your likeness, the form that you wore when you created us, so young. Surely, I thought, you hadn't abandoned me and gone into death forever. Surely, you have answered my desperate prayers.

I was wrong, Clow-sama, to disturb your reincarnate's life in the way that I have, with my letters full of bittersweet memories and begging for things that weren't even remotely possible. You created me as a selfish, childish being, I know. Is it wrong that I am trying to go past that to be someone new? Someone that could be loved by Yukito's dearest, even a little, and the new mistress?

I wish you had not sent him to us. But perhaps it was a lesson I needed to learn. You always made sure I kept up with my education, and it was sorely neglected those years I dreamed nightmares in the Book. Sakura has been trying to teach me that when one has a big heart one can love many people. You will always be my number one, Clow. But I think it's time that I see other people.

Thank you, Hiiragizawa-sama, for your infinite patience. Know that I will always respect you as a reflection of my master, and a brilliant mind. Thank you for helping me let go.

Respectfully,

Yue

"Did you get all that?" Eriol whispered aloud to a half-seen form sitting in his chair. The man with smiling eyes nodded and disappeared without a word. It wasn't often he took a visible form, perhaps best under the circumstances, but some things one had to experience in person.

Eriol read the letter again. Then reverently he folded the paper in on itself until it became something it had not been, and he let a white feather be blown away into the wind.

Comments

[claire-chan.livejournal.com]

Wow.

I heart this fic in so many different ways.

But I also have a student coming and have got to split, so I'll say more later!

[storypaint.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you liked it. It was one of the ones I cut my teeth on while returning to fandom. ^_^

My favorite part is the ending, personally. It makes a great image in my head. /self-centeredness

Thanks for the comment, made me smile!

[claire-chan.livejournal.com]

Awww, I see. ^__^ Yay for smiles!

The ending is pretty, yes. ^^ I really liked reading Yue's letter myself. I was expecting it to be depressing and cold but I think it was really warm, and not uncharacteristically so.