BREAK THE LIMITS: 6a/33

[andrew_in_drag]

Title: Break the Limits
Author: andrew_in_drag 
Pairing: Yoshiki x hide
Rating: mature
Warnings: foul language, yaoi, rock 'n roll excess
Genre: AU to bandfic
Note: I first wrote this fic about three (?) years ago, when I was still hallelujah_hide. Oddly enough, I still like it, so I thought I would move it here to my new journal. 
Synopsis: May 1998: Yoshiki Hayashi breaks down in a temple as he tries to take in the news that has changed his life forever - Hideto Matsumoto, the man he has been in love with for seventeen years, is dead. As the other mourners try to comfort him, Yoshiki finds himself falling back through history - to the day when it all began; the day when he met a boy who would, truly, break the limits...

CHAPTER SIX [a]:

“And if the cloud bursts, thunder in your ear,

You shout, but no one seems to hear.”

– ‘Brain Damage’, Pink Floyd

From the ashes of sadness sprung a phoenix of happiness. Life, I suppose, comes in several cycles, several seasons: a time to mourn, and a time to celebrate. A time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to keep, and a time to lose. I had lost my father and gained a brother – or so it felt. I still couldn’t quite come to terms with the way I felt about Hide; the way he made me feel. He became my direct source of everything, from love to pain, because my whole world became focussed around him. There was nothing I wouldn’t have done for him: if he’d asked me to fetch the moon for him, I would have gone mad trying to get it.

That said, there was a strange kind of numbness to my love. Nobody else could hurt me, because nobody else mattered, but entrusting your whole spectrum of human emotion to just one person…it’s a risk, a gamble, always. In those months of our friendship, I felt as if I’d been frozen in time: just waiting for him to fall in love with me. I could be patient; could wait forever. I belonged to him.

It was difficult to deny how…well, sad I was being, for want of a better word. I lived my life waiting for him to get drunk or high enough to touch me and kiss me.

Logically, we shouldn’t have been friends. Rich and poor weren’t supposed to mix, not in our world or the next, but when we were alone together all the little details like money and class faded into nothing. We could have been the only two people in the world.

We had to be careful, though. We never, ever went shopping in ‘my’ part of town; not after the first time, when Hide was first asked to leave a shop and then, when he so much as bought a drink, he had to endure the implications as the shop assistant raised each of his folded, dog-eared yen notes to the light to check for authenticity. 

“My money’s as good as anyone else’s!” he fumed, outraged, twisting the bottle top of his coke with such force that it flew out from his grip and bounced into the street.

“Didn’t you hear?” I asked, feigning nonchalance as I slid my arm through his, “It was published in New Scientist. If you have pink hair then you’re twice as likely to be using forged notes.”

He turned to me, his mouth twitching with an unsure smile. “That woman,” I nodded to the shop, “She was obviously a scholar.”

He gave in to a grin and took a swig of his drink, leaning against me gratefully.

“I don’t get it,” he stated bluntly, “Wouldn’t I be rich if I had loads of counterfeit money?” He dug his bony fingers into my ribs, making me squirm with delight. “Wouldn’t I?”

I smiled but didn’t reply: Jumbo’s owner had moved to the country, and Hide was shorter on cash than ever.

“Anyway,” he bustled, pushing a lock of hair behind his ear in a businesslike fashion (recently, he had dyed the whole lot a pinkish-red, even the black bits around the bottom. My mother found it hard to look at him). “She was horrible. I hope she goes bald.”

With that sweeping statement, he grabbed my hand, and together we disappeared into the crowds.

Even imperfect days like that, though, were to be treasured. We had precious little of them left.

For several months later, at the end of that summer with Hide, our time ran out. And everything changed.

I suppose it was no secret that my mother disliked Hide – hated him, really. She hated him because his family found it difficult to make ends meet; she hated him because he was, at any given time, the most colourful thing in our home; she hated him because he was friends with me and went to my school – polluting, through association, her perfect world.

But she was my mother, and I loved her – and pitied her, because I knew she would never have understood the way I felt about Hide; no, feelings like that could only be understood by those who had felt them too. Somehow, I knew that wasn’t her: her marriage had been practically arranged. My grandparents would have married her off to a pile of money if they could, and really, that wasn’t too far removed from what did happen. In many ways, I supposed her life must have been a disappointment. I wondered if she envied Hide, just a little.

He said he didn’t care. And I loved him too much to push it.

“Yoshiki.”

She still wore her widow’s black. She was still so young and so pretty.

“Your father was your first piano teacher…” she placed the pads of her manicured fingers under my chin and gently tugged my head up, “Wasn’t he?”

I nodded stiffly.

“And since then, you’ve had many more. You’re good,” she complimented, “You’re talented. Talent is a rare thing in this world, but to make money from your talent, you have to be the very best. In fact, very few people can support themselves upon their talent alone. They need other skills; general, life skills. They need the benefit of a full education. They need to try their best to excel at everything; to make the most of every opportunity that comes their way.”

I’m sure I looked confused. I hope I looked confused.

“You remember the Deyama family, Yoshiki?”

I did. The Deyama family was a model of how ours used to be – father, mother, son, money – and Mr Deyama had been employed by my father; some kind of executive. I still vaguely remembered playing with their son, Toshimitsu, when I was little – little fragments of memories, wispy and insubstantial, like cirrus clouds.

“Well…their son, Toshimitsu – they call him Toshi, he’s a darling boy –, has been attending a private boarding school. His parents are on the board of governors. It’s been my understanding that your school has slid a little…downhill, recently. Something about improper monitoring of scholarships and a breakdown of teaching method. Tell me, have you noticed the standards slipping?” She paused and licked her lips, and had the grace to avoid my eyes. “I mean, the educational standards…of course.”

I looked her in the eyes brazenly yet, when I spoke, my voice was soft and desperate.

“Nothing’s changed,” I told her, pleading with my eyes.

She winced. “Yoshiki, darling—”

“Nothing’s changed, mother.”

“The school has sent your report home.” She pressed her lips together briefly, “And there have been…changes. Disappointments, Yoshiki, do you understand me?”

I stared her in the eyes, but wasn’t seeing her. Since Hide and I became friends, I had hardly picked up a book: instead of reading about life, I was living it. It was true that he slept over often, and how could I sleep when he looked so angelic when he slumbered? Maybe my concentration in lessons had waned a little; maybe I had fallen asleep once or twice.

Didn’t she understand there were more important things?

“The only positive comments made about you came from your music tutor, Yoshiki. He’s complimented you for your new…” she took a stiff piece of white card from the desk in front of her – my father’s old desk, in his old study, still smelling sweetly of whisky and smoke. With her charcoal coloured dress and vigorously upright posture, she seemed to cut a more imposing figure in his chair than he ever could have done.

“Your new vigour. Passion.”

She kept her face carefully impassive. “He’s complimented you on the way you play alongside your…pink-haired friend. He says you show a promising talent on the drums.”

She locked her hands on the desk in front of her. “Rock music, Yoshiki?”

“Everyone’s listening to it, mother—”

“No,” she flared, “Not everyone is listening to it! The only people who seem to be listening to it are you and your…friend!”

She enunciated the word ‘friend’ as one might hiss the name of a direst enemy. I looked at her; looked at the spiteful, malicious woman before me and felt faint. I had to fix my gaze on the diamond and pearl choker around her neck to keep calm. I was scaring myself, because if I’d looked her in the eye...

If I had looked her in the eye, I might have hit her.

My hands were tensed against the desk, shaking with the effort I was putting into suppressing my anger.

“Mother,” I began calmly, “What are you saying to me?”

“I’m telling you that you’re going to Toshimitsu Deyama’s boarding school, Yoshiki.”

“No,” I said, my voice hollow but firm; an empty structure of steel. My single word seemed to thud down against the desk, between us, a crowbar separation that was to remain in place for the rest of our lives.

She took a slight breath.

“You’re going, Yoshiki.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Toshimitsu’s school, Yoshiki. It’s a wonderful place. It’s in Tottori.”

My head snapped up at that.

“Miles away!”

“Yoshiki…” she bowed her head, rubbing at her temples gently, “Don’t be difficult. Haven’t I given you everything? Didn’t your father and I provide everything for you? Tell me, have you ever wanted for anything?!”

“Friends,” I hissed, getting to my feet, “Friends, mother! And that’s something I’ve found all by myself!”

She laughed, the way women of money know how to laugh – husky and low.

“And a fine job you’ve made of that.”

I jerked backwards, stung.

“Because he’s not as rich as us?”

“The hair, Yoshiki! The clothes! The music! His father is in prison, his mother lives in…oh, some apartment in God-knows-where…” she ran a hand through her perfectly coiffed hair. “He’s just not good enough for you.” She smiled at me fondly, “My little prince. He’s a bad influence.”

I looked at her then. I took a good, long look at her. I looked at her black dress; the study of grief. I looked at her eyes. Emotionless eyes. The person my mother might have been, I realized, was gone. 

“When the summer is over in a week,” she said, perfectly poised, “You will start at Toshimitsu Deyama’s school in Tottori.”

I ran.

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