Work Text:
Kurapika hadn’t slept in four days. He was constantly on the move, going from town to town, village to village, searching for something. He didn’t even know what he was looking for, at this point; he was spurred into movement by the restlessness in his chest, by the unmoving and unblinking red eyes suspended in liquid that flashed through his mind every time he closed his eyes. Every time he blinked, he was reminded that his were the only ones left.
So he kept moving. He kept going from town to town, never feeling safe enough to stop at any inn, to accept the hand of the kind old women that offered him a bed for the night. He hadn’t felt safe enough to sleep in years. Except, staring down at his phone, at the hundreds of missed calls from Gon and Leorio, when he was with his friends.
He clenched the phone in his fist, ignoring the way his chains pressed into the screen and the black dots that danced across the surface from the pressure of his hand. Leorio had called again.
He had called a lot, at first. When Kurapika first left, with a half-hearted promise to come back eventually, Leorio had called twice a day. Mostly, he just told Kurapika about how his day was going. He was filled in on his studies, on his adventures with Gon and Killua, on the things he ate for lunch, the things he saw as he walked through the park. It made Kurapika’s heartache to hear them, to hear the things he was missing out on. He never responded.
Eventually, the calls trickled down to once a day, once every few days, once a week. Now, they were sporadic. No longer used to the jingle Leorio had set as his ringtone, Kurapika jumped when his phone began to ring from inside his closed fist.
He stared at the screen for a moment, thumb poised over the answer button. It would be so easy, Leorio would make sure of that. They would pick up where they left off as if Kurapika had never left them in the first place, as if he had been gone a day instead of months. But still, he couldn’t do it. Even if Leorio could pretend he never left and would be happy to have him back, Kurapkia knew the damage he had caused by leaving. He knew that he didn’t deserve to be with his friends after abandoning them all those months ago.
He couldn’t stop the tears that gathered in the corners of his eyes. He blinked them away, flinching as one landed on his phone screen. He didn’t dare wipe it away until the missed call notification finally popped up. He wasn’t surprised when a voicemail followed soon after.
He stood, knees shaky from sitting on a random park bench for the past few hours, and walked further away from the crowd that was slowly gathering around him. Once he was sure he was out of earshot, he stopped in front of a tree and leaned against it, thumbing through his phone so that he could listen to Leorio’s newest voicemail.
He hadn’t expected Leorio to be crying.
“Hey Kurapika,” Leorio started, his voice tinny through the speaker of Kurapika’s phone. He sniffled a bit before he continued. “I’ve been having this recurring dream about you, you know?”
“I don’t know why I’m telling you this, I know you don’t listen to these.”
Kurapika’s chest tightened with guilt. He wanted to call Leorio back right then, to tell him he had listened to every single one, that he hadn’t deleted a single one of them. He had no space on his phone because every single inch of space was consumed by Leorio’s voice.
“But in my dream,” Leorio continued, “the sun is blinding. But I can see you.”
Kurapika closed his eyes. He could almost see it, could almost picture Leorio’s face as he squinted against the sun, smiling in that way that took Kurapika’s breath away.
“You’re laughing, and smiling so big…”
Kurapika held the phone to his chest as the message continued to play. He didn’t open his eyes, just let the tears slipping out from under his eyelashes pool on his cheeks and slowly slide down his face until they dropped off the curve of his chin.
“It drives me crazy! Because,” there was a choked sob before Leorio continued. “Because I know wherever you are right now, I can bet you’re not laughing very much.”
“Can you remember the last time you smiled?”
Kurapika bit down on his lip, hard enough to draw blood, trying to stifle a sob before it could fully exit his mouth. He wished he had an answer to Leorio’s question. Thinking about it, maybe he did. Maybe the last time he smiled was the last time he talked to Leorio.
“Well,” Leorio’s voice was thick with tears, “I wanted you to know that at least in my dream you’re laughing. At least in my memory you’re smiling.”
He didn’t try to stop himself as his knees buckled underneath him, as he fell to the grass underneath him, hunching over himself as his body wracked with sobs.
He didn’t want to do this anymore. He was tired. Gods, he was so tired.
When he could finally breathe again, and when his body had stopped shaking enough that he could stand, he unlocked his phone.
It felt foreign, clicking on Leorio’s contact information. He hadn’t called him in so long he was worried Leorio might not even pick up. He would deserve it for all the times he had ignored the others' calls.
Finally, before he could talk himself out of it, he clicked Leorio’s name and watched as the phone began to ring. He had barely brought it to his ear before Leorio picked up, screaming his name, still obviously crying.
“Leorio,” he started, surprised when it came out as more of a sob than anything else. He didn’t know what to say, so he listened as Leorio cried into the speaker, telling him how scared he had been, how he had almost convinced himself Kurapika was dead somewhere, that he had finally lost in a fight against the Spiders, had finally gotten in over his head.
“Leorio,” he said again, a little steadier this time. Leorio paused, waiting for Kurapika to finish.
“I want to come home.”