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[FIC] Drinking Water Like Holy Wine: Intermezzo 1, Ao no Exorcist
A drabble in the Holy Wine fic instead of Chapter 5 proper. Title from Kate Bush's "Under Ice." I've still got the flu uugghhh.
Title: Drinking Water Like Holy Wine
Fandom: Ao no Exorcist
Rating/Warnings: M overall, no warnings for this chapter besides unbeta'd first draft.
Intermezzo 1: Little Lines In The Ice
Summary: The end of the world as they know it and nobody's fine. This drabble: Rin wants to go home, but the only thing he has left is the open road. Written for Challenge #131: Travel.
I. Four-Leaf Clover
This February is nothing but sleet, mud, and gray skies. Two months ago Rin's birthday passed without ceremony, save the daffodils and omamori Shiemi gave him. He doesn't feel eighteen, just tired and restless simultaneously. It's times like this Rin really misses having a home. He wants to be in middle school again, coming back to the monastery with bruised knuckles and snow in his boots. Yukio will be wearing Rin's favorite hoodie and when Rin protests they'll squabble over it because a stupid blue hoodie is the one thing Yukio will fight anyone over, even Rin. Their old man will grab them both by their collars and go, "If you two don't behave I'm taking it and you're cleaning baseboards all night." They'll stop fighting but they still have to clean baseboards.
Nobody's left to steal Rin's clothes; sometimes he unzips his jacket so he can put it over Shiemi's shoulders, and when she smiles at him he needs to loosen his scarf.
They're walking down a foreign street, trying to outpace evening before it turns to night and they have nowhere to sleep. She holds on to his arm and he holds the umbrella they share when the sleet picks up.
"Ugh, it's so goddamn cold," he says, and she squeezes his arm.
"You're keeping me warm."
"Well that's good for you..." Shiemi is so weird lately, saying things like that; yet she hasn't said anything about how she tried to kiss him on his birthday and he flinched and held the daffodils in front of his face.
"I'm glad." Her voice is soft as the falling ice and snow. "When you're warm it means you're still yourself. I want you to keep being Rin."
He can't respond to that, so they walk in silence until they find a home with Coal Tars swarming by the front door and offer to exorcise if the family inside will let them sleep on their floor. When all's done and they're lying in the corner under musty blankets, Shiemi falls asleep fast. Rin watches her and thinks unbidden, Let's hurry up and find a new home together.
Then he hides his face in his fists because he'd rather disappear than say that out loud.
Title: Drinking Water Like Holy Wine
Fandom: Ao no Exorcist
Rating/Warnings: M overall, no warnings for this chapter besides unbeta'd first draft.
Intermezzo 1: Little Lines In The Ice
Summary: The end of the world as they know it and nobody's fine. This drabble: Rin wants to go home, but the only thing he has left is the open road. Written for Challenge #131: Travel.
I. Four-Leaf Clover
This February is nothing but sleet, mud, and gray skies. Two months ago Rin's birthday passed without ceremony, save the daffodils and omamori Shiemi gave him. He doesn't feel eighteen, just tired and restless simultaneously. It's times like this Rin really misses having a home. He wants to be in middle school again, coming back to the monastery with bruised knuckles and snow in his boots. Yukio will be wearing Rin's favorite hoodie and when Rin protests they'll squabble over it because a stupid blue hoodie is the one thing Yukio will fight anyone over, even Rin. Their old man will grab them both by their collars and go, "If you two don't behave I'm taking it and you're cleaning baseboards all night." They'll stop fighting but they still have to clean baseboards.
Nobody's left to steal Rin's clothes; sometimes he unzips his jacket so he can put it over Shiemi's shoulders, and when she smiles at him he needs to loosen his scarf.
They're walking down a foreign street, trying to outpace evening before it turns to night and they have nowhere to sleep. She holds on to his arm and he holds the umbrella they share when the sleet picks up.
"Ugh, it's so goddamn cold," he says, and she squeezes his arm.
"You're keeping me warm."
"Well that's good for you..." Shiemi is so weird lately, saying things like that; yet she hasn't said anything about how she tried to kiss him on his birthday and he flinched and held the daffodils in front of his face.
"I'm glad." Her voice is soft as the falling ice and snow. "When you're warm it means you're still yourself. I want you to keep being Rin."
He can't respond to that, so they walk in silence until they find a home with Coal Tars swarming by the front door and offer to exorcise if the family inside will let them sleep on their floor. When all's done and they're lying in the corner under musty blankets, Shiemi falls asleep fast. Rin watches her and thinks unbidden, Let's hurry up and find a new home together.
Then he hides his face in his fists because he'd rather disappear than say that out loud.