No additional warnings or spoilers for this part... just a lot of sulking.
Part Nine
“So did Yue bite your head off?” I ask as Sakura settles back with us. She has a mug of tea and an oddly pensive expression on her face. Sakura doesn’t usually look pensive. Not that I don’t love her dearly, but it’s just not a word that can often be applied to her.
“No,” she says, after a pause. “I just promised I wouldn’t replace him and that I loved him very much, and he said that I’m a better mistress than Clow was a master, because I tell him what’s going on and Clow never did.” She smiles cheerfully. Never let it be said that Sakura doesn’t bounce back from things. “Maybe I should figure out how to make a new guardian!”
Tomoyo, Kerberos, and I just blink at her.
“What?” I finally ask, sounding somewhat less than intelligent, I’m sure.
“Well,” Sakura says, about to launch into a long explanation. “The cards need to get passed on to someone else, and then converted, which means that I’ll probably get reincarnated like Eriol-kun did. And then I’ll need new guardians the way that Eriol-kun did, but I don’t want new guardians. I want to keep Kero-chan and Yue-san. But I can’t just leave the cards with nobody. So I’ll have to invent somebody else new to send with the cards.”
“We’re going to have a menagerie pretty soon,” I remark.
Kerberos puffs up indignantly. “Don’t refer to me like I’m some zoo animal!” he demands.
“Get a grip,” I say. “Even in your true form, you look like something that should be put in a cage for children to gawk at.”
Needless to say, I soon find myself pinned to the floor by five hundred pounds of extremely annoyed Guardian, where Sakura wraps herself around Kerberos’ neck and wails. “Get off him!” The sad thing about this is that it’s a fairly common experience.
We finally get back to the conversation at hand when Kerberos considers that he’s obtained victory and goes small again, settling on Sakura’s shoulder and looking triumphant. “Anyway,” he says, as if there was no interruption at all, “I don’t think it’s too hard, naa, if Eriol can do it. You can ask him about it once he feels better.”
Sakura nods, serious again. “Do you think I should go talk to Eriol-kun and try to cheer him up?”
“I’m not sure that’s such a good idea, Sakura-chan,” Tomoyo advises gently.
Sakura frowns. “But I need to tell him that Yue-san’s going to be okay with me . . . and someone should cheer him up! I mean, he’s all mopey, and that’s not like Eriol-kun! Do you think something’s really wrong?”
“No, he’s just dense,” Kerberos replies, mystifying me for one, and Sakura if the look on her face is any indication. Tomoyo, however, rolls her eyes. Again, she knows what’s going on and we don’t. Proof that Tomoyo knows way more about matters of the heart than either Sakura or I. Which is obvious to anyone who watched Sakura and I attempt, clumsily, to begin dating.
“Why is he dense?” Sakura asks.
“’Cause he’s just like Clow!” Kerberos says. “No matter how much he tries to deny it, he’s got all the same traits. Up to and including the cluelessness.”
Sakura blinks a few times. “Kero-chan, that didn’t explain anything!”
He shrugs. “You’ll figure it out eventually. You’re not as dense as he is.”
Now Sakura is pouting. Wonderful. “Why don’t we go out for a walk in the garden?” I suggest, trying to get her away from Tomoyo and Kerberos. I swear, the two of them can be a nightmare. Especially when they know something we don’t. “Alone,” I say meaningfully, giving Tomoyo a glance. She hides a smile.
So Sakura and I adjourn for the garden, and unfortunately bump into Kinomoto on the way out.
“Where are you two going?” he asks, eyes narrowed. “Where are you taking my sister, brat?”
“We’re just going out to the garden!” Sakura protests immediately, latching onto my arm. “We’ll be okay!”
Kinomoto looks from me to her several times. “All right. But don’t forget that we don’t know where that woman is. So be careful.”
“We will! I can take care of myself, Oniichan,” Sakura promises. “Is Eriol-kun okay?”
“I think so,” Kinomoto says. “I’m going to give him a few hours to sulk, then try to take him some food. Or at least some tea.”
“Good luck!” Sakura takes my hand, braving her brother’s wrath with courage I’m not sure I would possess, and we go outside.
****
I’ve got a secret, I’ve got a secret! I love secrets! They’re pretty. And also they let me torture people. Like Yue! Because Yue doesn’t know the secret. And I was tormenting him with it all evening! And then he got mad and stalked off. But that’s Yue. He’s always stalking somewhere. Well, okay, actually I had to leave, but only because he tried to strangle me! With my own hair, no less. That was mean. Yue sure is touchy sometimes.
But anyway, I have a secret! It’s about Yue, too, which is probably why it annoys him so much. About Yue and Eriol. Because Eriol won’t tell me how he feels about Yue, which means that he’s probably in lo --
Oh no.
Oh no!
This secret isn’t good at all!
“ERIOL!!!”
****
I should have locked the door. Ah, hindsight. Always twenty twenty. But I didn’t lock the door, because I figured after throwing a shoe at Yukito, no one else would dare come bother me. I mean, it was Yukito, of all people. If I was in a bad enough mood to throw a shoe at him, I would probably resort to violence for just about anyone else.
Unfortunately, common sense is not something that can be applied to Nakuru.
She’s wailing. I can’t understand a damn word she’s saying. She’s really wailing. In a few seconds every other person is going to be in here, trying to figure out what’s going on. Every few seconds I catch either my name or Yue’s, but everything other than that is really garbled. And something about a secret. Right. She was tormenting Yue with a secret. What secret?
“Nakuru! Stop wailing!”
She didn’t even hear me. She’s wailing too loud. What I wouldn’t give for the Silent Card right now . . .
The door opens again and Touya-san looks in with raised eyebrows. He apparently catches a) the fact that Nakuru is unharmed, b) the pained expression on my face, and c) the fact that I have a pillow over my ears -- when did that happen? -- so he gives me a half-hearted sympathetic smile, leaves, and closes the door. Hopefully he’ll explain to everyone else that Nakuru isn’t being murdered. She’s just trying to deafen me.
I throw the pillow at her. It’s about the only thing I can come up with.
She stops wailing. Silence is bliss.
“Now, take a few deep breaths and calm down,” I say firmly.
She obeys the first command, but it doesn’t look like she’s doing a very good job with the second bit.
“Can you tell me what on earth you’re wailing about?” I ask.
Oh God. I think she’s going to cry. She stares at me for a second, then exclaims, “Because you’re in love with Yue!”
And starts wailing again.
Kill me.
I hope no one outside was listening. Because I think Yukito has figured it out by now, and if he knows then Touya-san knows. But I’m trying to keep the entire world from learning about it. Besides . . .
Wait a minute.
There’s a very easy way to solve this.
“Nakuru!” I have to shout to be heard above her. “I am not in love with Yue!”
She stops.
Blinks.
“LIAR!”
And starts wailing again.
“Nakuru, why do you think I’m in love with Yue?” Please, let her be rational about this. I would love for her to be rational. I would love for her to stop wailing. It would make my day. And let me tell you, it’s been such a bad day that it would take a miracle to do that right now.
“Because! You are!”
I close my eyes. “Linear thought, please?”
“Because you refused to just say how you feel, and you’re always so worried about Yue. Yue this and Yue that and I want Yue to be happy and I wish Yue would understand I’m not Clow and you LOOK at him! You don’t look at ANYONE else like that! I know why you wish Yue would understand you’re not Clow! You want Yue to love you for you instead of for who you were!”
Okay, she’s got me there. I flop backwards and bury my face into the pillow. I wish she hadn’t figured it out. No, that’s not even true. I wish she hadn’t figured it out before I did.
Let’s analyze. I’m good at analyzing. The first thing she said is true. I wouldn’t tell her how I felt about him. But that was because I didn’t know, not out of any conscious desire to mislead her. Secondly, of course I’m always worried about Yue. Yue needs to be worried about. It’s the nature of his being. And I do want him to be happy, and I do want him to understand I’m not Clow, and . . .
I don’t really LOOK at him, do I?
This is not good.
“You really don’t love me at all!” Nakuru wails. Actually, she’s progressed more onto moaning. Which is good, because it hurts my ears less. And also makes it less likely that neighbors may call the police. Though I doubt anyone could hear us in here.
“Nakuru, that’s just a blatant untruth,” I say firmly. “Of course I love you. I care for you very much. I care for Spinel Sun very much. I care for Sakura-san very much. I also happen to care for Yue very much.”
She gives this due consideration. “You love Yue more than me!”
“Didn’t we have this conversation three hours ago?” I ask.
“But you weren’t in love with him then!” she moans. “Or at least I didn’t realize you were!”
“Nakuru, that has nothing to do with it! Everything I said is still true! I love both of you in two entirely different ways.”
“So you admit that you love him!” she shrieks. Great. Shrieking is just what I needed. I think my ears are going to start to bleed.
“Yes, but not romantically.” I have no plans on admitting to that. Not until I do some serious thinking and decide whether or not it’s true.
“Liar!” She’s still shrieking. God help me if Yue hears any of this himself. My life would just end.
“Nakuru, what on earth makes you think I feel romantically about him at all?”
“Because! I said! You LOOK at him! And you have that LOOK when you’re talking about him! You didn’t used to have it! It’s just since we started visiting again! Because before you had Kaho-sensei and now you don’t have anyone! And you didn’t even LOOK at her that way! It’s just Yue! Yue is more special than anyone else to you, and don’t you try to deny it!” She stamps her foot. Welcome to the world of a five-year old.
Though, as much as I hate to admit it, she has a point.
I hate her.
I hate everyone.
“Nakuru, is there anything I can say to you that will make you less hysterical?”
“No!” And she stamps her foot again, turns on her heel, and flounces out of the room.
Great.
Spinel Sun flutters out from where he was sitting on a chair, watching the entire mess.
“Well?” I snap. “Do you think she’s right?”
“I think you ought to lock the door,” Spinel says, settling on the pillow beside my head.
“FINE! OUT!” I’m not sure I can even remember the last time I was this upset. Maybe when Kaho broke up with me. But maybe not. Because, as Nakuru so loudly pointed out, Yue is . . . special.
Spinel shrugs and flies upwards, then says over his shoulder, “And by the way, yes, I think she’s right.”
Fortunately for him, he’s out the door before I can lob my remaining pillow at him. I make a sharp gesture which closes the door and locks it firmly. At least I have enough magic left for that.
I bury my head in the pillow and try to sleep.
****
Yuki and I decided to let Eriol mope for the rest of the night. Approaching him seemed suicidal. Of course, the fact that he had locked his door -- which didn’t previously have a door lock -- added to our decision. We waited until morning. Yue, oddly enough, seems to be in a fairly good mood. For him, anyway. He’s not scowling any more than usual. He keeps looking up in the direction of Eriol’s room, though.
I decide it’s high time I have another little talk with Eriol -- not that the last one went well -- and then leave the two of them alone together for the rest of the afternoon.
Which is why I’ve been standing outside this door, knocking, for the past five minutes. “Eriol, please let me in.”
“No.” His voice is muffled. I think he’s talking into his pillow. Or he might just be tired. He doesn’t have all his magic back yet, and he’s still pretty weak. Adding emotional stress probably didn’t help.
“You need to eat something. End of story.”
“No I don’t.”
“Don’t make me go get Sakura to open the door for me,” I threaten.
Silence.
Eriol opens the door. “Give me the food and go away,” he says flatly. He looks awful. I’m not sure he slept very much. He’s pale, but then again, Eriol is always pale. And he’s been paler than usual lately because of all the magic loss. It’s something about the way he’s carrying himself that makes him look worse.
So I push my way into the room. Not exactly the way to make myself popular, but what the hell. Sooner or later he’ll probably notice I don’t have any food for him anyway.
“What do you want?” he asks, annoyance radiating from him. “I thought you wanted me to eat.”
“I do. And I want you to come downstairs and get it.”
“No. Now get out of my room.”
He really is intent on moping. So I fold my arms and glare. “Make me.”
He stares at me for a minute. He knows he’s not strong enough physically, and strong displays of magic aren’t a good idea with that crazy lady stalking us. After a long second, he flops back onto his bed. “Why do you want to sit in my room, Touya-san?”
“I just want to talk to you.”
He waves vaguely. “So talk.”
“For starters, why are you insisting on staying up here and sulking?”
He lifts his hand so it’s visible above the blankets. “One: I don’t feel like facing Nakuru. Two: I don’t feel like facing Sakura-san. Three: I don’t feel like facing Yue. Reasons enough for you?”
I ponder. “Akizuki will wail, Sakura will try to cheer you up. But why Yue? He’ll just look at you. He’s not even in a terrible mood, like you.”
“If I have to hear Nakuru wail anymore, I’ll go deaf,” he says.
“You just totally avoided my question. And anyway, we’re taking Akizuki out with us when we go sight-seeing today. Everyone’s going but Yue. So you can’t avoid him forever. Isn’t that convenient?”
“I hate you,” Eriol says. “You have far too much in common with me.”
“You locked my sister in an elevator with the Brat. Call this my revenge.”
He sighs. “What do you hope to accomplish by leaving Yue and I alone in the house together?”
“I thought maybe you two will work this out.”
“There’s nothing to work out,” Eriol says in that utterly calm voice that used to infuriate the Brat so much.
Now, naturally, it’s starting to infuriate me. Fortunately, I don’t have that quick a temper. At least, not if it doesn’t involve Sakura. “So, you’re sulking up here for absolutely no reason at all? Brilliant, Eriol.”
“I hate you.”
“Yeah, yeah. So why can’t you talk to Yue?”
“Because I don’t know what to say to him.”
“So you’ll try to avoid him for eternity?” I look at him skeptically.
“If at all possible,” he replies.
“Great idea. Because then you can both be miserable. I thought you were smarter than this.”
“I’ll be fine,” Eriol says sharply.
“But he won’t,” I reply. “And I thought you cared oh-so-much for Yue, right? Ever since Sakura suggested trying to ‘fix’ him, you’ve been all over him. So to speak.”
Eriol’s glaring at me. He obviously thinks it’s some sort of evil, intimidating glare. It’s not working. At all.
“Because you know what I think?” I don’t wait for him to reply, because he probably doesn’t want to know what I think. “I think that you were determined to not be in love with Yue.” There, I said it. Fortunately, he doesn’t flinch. Or even hit me. “Because you were trying to separate yourself from Clow. Okay, I can understand that. And Yue was sharing a body with Yuki, and Yuki was in love with me, which further complicated matters. So you hooked up with Kaho -- and I can guess what happened there.”
“No you can’t.”
“Oh, yes I can. But for fun, what do you say happened?”
Eriol replies rather stiffly. “We broke it off like any two mature, civilized people. She realized that while I’m very old mentally, I still had the body of a child. She was interested in someone else, so I let it go.”
“Right. She dropped you just like she dropped me.”
“Oh, shut up.”
Now he’s sulking again. “The point is that you never loved her anyway. You were just using her as an excuse to not love Yue. Except now Yue’s not sharing a body with Yuki anymore, and his happiness now depends on finding someone else to love. And you, unfortunately, are the only likely candidate around. And somewhere in there you realized that loving Yue didn’t make you just like Clow, because Clow only loved him as a son, and you love him as more than that.”
Man. If looks could kill.
“Am I right?”
“Yes. You’re very perceptive, congratulations. Now will you leave me alone to starve myself to death?”
“No,” I reply. “You know better than that. We’re going to go sight-seeing, and then you’re going to talk to Yue, and tell him everything I just told you, and when we get back -- ”
“You’ll have to hogtie Nakuru and stick her in a closet,” Eriol interrupts me.
“Yeah, but you forget that I wouldn’t mind that a bit,” I say. “Now get down to breakfast before Sakura decides to bring it up here to you, all concerned and everything. Probably dragging Yue with her. At least if you come down now you can face him in a crowd first.”
He apparently sees I have a point there, because he stands up and wraps a blanket around himself. “Fine,” he says. “But only about breakfast. I need to think about the rest of it.”
I’ll let it go. All day alone with Yue? He doesn’t have a chance anyway.
****
Everyone is acting very oddly. Well, more oddly than usual. Sakura is normal as always, except for the fact that she’s being more affectionate than she usually is, but I can’t say that I dislike it. And Syaoran is glaring as always. Tomoyo seems to think something is very funny, because she keeps looking at me and giving me this little smile. What disturbs me most about this is that it’s the same smile she used to give Syaoran when he was in love with Sakura but wouldn’t tell her.
I’m worried.
Kerberos isn’t helping by flying around the table, arguing with Spinel, and making as many suggestive comments as he possibly can. Unfortunately, I have no idea what he’s trying to suggest. Spinel -- also flying around, and occasionally dodging the sugary things that Kerberos is pelting at him -- is responding to these comments in a most cryptic manner. I think they’re talking about Eriol, except they won’t come right out and say his name.
Yukito has a rather similar smile to Tomoyo. Which makes me incredibly nervous, because that kind of smile on Yukito is never a good thing. I’m not used to Yukito having secrets from me, and it unnerves me. He was the last person to talk to Eriol last night before Akizuki went in there and started wailing.
She, naturally, is in a foul mood. She’s demonstrating this by even more exuberance than usual, but it’s definitely exuberance with a nasty edge. She’s joined Kerberos in throwing sugar at Spinel. She also occasionally plucks one of them out of the air and spins them around.
I’m staying far away from her.
Touya went to get Eriol, which is making me nervous. But I don’t know why it’s making me nervous. There’s absolutely no reason I should be nervous about seeing Eriol. All right, we hardly parted on congenial terms last night. Coming to the conclusion that he really doesn’t care for me hurt, but I suppose it’s better in the long run. It’s always better to realize these things early.
I wonder if he was just saying all that to make me feel better? Or maybe to make himself feel better?
And here he is. He looks awful.
Akizuki immediately gets up and tries to start fussing. Eriol waves her off. “All right, I’m down here,” he says. “Can I go back upstairs now?”
“Sit down, Eriol.” Touya all but shoves him into a chair. And oddly enough, Eriol allows it. He definitely looks sullen, but he allows it. Something funny is going on here.
Akizuki dishes him up some food and puts the plate in front of him. He looks at it for a minute, then starts eating. It’s very strange to see normally-cheerful Eriol in such a bad mood. Everyone keeps glancing at him, then looking away nervously.
“Well,” Touya says. “Now that we’ve made sure Eriol will eat, is everyone ready to go?”
What?
“Let me just go grab my backpack, Oniichan!” Sakura skips out of the room. Syaoran and Tomoyo both follow her. Kerberos has managed to stuff a cookie down Spinel’s throat. The two of them are flying around the room at manic speed. Akizuki somehow manages to catch them both at once and fling them out of the room.
Then she glares at me. “I’m doing this against my better judgment,” she informs me in a tone that makes me think she’s about to spit fire. “And you’d better appreciate it!”
Doing what? She flounces out of her room before I can ask.
Touya and Yukito both grin at me. “We decided that you two need time to talk,” Yukito says.
Eriol scowls. I think I must have a completely horrified look on my face.
“So we’re going sight-seeing. We’ll be back around three, probably,” Touya says. “Kero and Spinel are going with us, so they won’t bother you.”
“But . . .” I protest. “Haven’t you seen all the sights yet?”
“We’ll find some more,” Yukito says with a nod. “See you later!”
The two of them leave the room. Holding hands. How cute. I try to suppress the wave of panic I feel. Why am I panicked? There’s no reason to be panicked. I don’t know what they expect us to work out when he doesn’t even like me. I resisted the urge to run after them and ask them to take me along. I’d look childish, and they wouldn’t agree anyway.
Seconds of silence tick by. Most likely the most awkward seconds of my entire life. Well, except when Clow told me he was dying. That was probably the loudest silence I’ve ever heard.
Sometimes it’s hard to remember that Clow is dead.
“Uhm,” I say, and force myself to shut up. I hear the voices of the others fade, then the front door closes. We’re completely alone. Must not panic. No reason to panic. No reason except those huge violet eyes that are giving me a very pensive look. Probably trying to decide how to best tell me that he really doesn’t feel anything for me. That must be it.
“Yue,” he finally says, sounding as if the words are being dragged out of him, “I think I owe you the truth.”
More silence.
“I’m not sure I want to hear the truth,” I finally reply.
I can hear the grandfather clock in the hall.
“Yue -- ” Eriol begins again.
And that’s when she shows up.
****
Part Ten
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