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—i dreamt to the lull of your eyes; i drowned in the replica of your voice.
"Tomioka-san," is whispered into the cold breeze huffed by a bright giggle as ruby eyes shine with the threads of delight and fondness; the eyes glisten underneath the moon like a shard of sunlight that rivals the heavenly body of darkness. There is a quiet awe that has aged yet never grows old, and soaking through the drenched fabric is a sincerity that wishes to be bold.
"Giyuu-san!" is then heaved with more resonance of a laughter that bests even the wind's voiceless singing; the voice is delicate and tender with depth and passion, and Tomioka Giyuu would've thought the one who beheld his heart before him is no human for such a heavenly bearing to contour his very being.
Kamado Tanjirou finds his palms – his hands are calloused, telling the stories of the nightmares that he had walked through, but the smile he adorns in the face of Giyuu, and the gentle squeeze he gives, tell the stories of sweet dreams.
Too bright, or perhaps, Giyuu is simply too dull.
"Giyuu, why—why are you still staring at me?" comes Tanjirou's bewildered inquiry as his laughter lessens to the beginning of shyness tainting his cheeks redder than his burgundy hair and the intricate scar on his forehead.
Giyuu reaches out to grasp Tanjirou's cheek, breathing a shaky sigh when Tanjirou leans in to his touch without a word. The edges of Giyuu's lips are pulled up as he utters: "You've called me plenty names."
Tanjirou blinks at him, as though in wonder for how such an act could've warranted Giyuu's constant staring, but with Giyuu's hold over him, he simply melts and smiles softly. "Calling your name makes me happy."
It didn't make sense, but—
"Hearing you makes me happy."
Giyuu stares into Tanjirou's eyes, watching as Tanjirou's pretty orbs glimmer with realization.
The kiss they share is a reminiscence of the sun's reflection laying upon the surface of an ocean.
(The ripples echo along the softened whimpers of pleasure elicited from a careful touch; intrusions that are welcomed thrived in the night when only they who loved are the listeners to the sounds they make.
Giyuu gives; Tanjirou takes.
Tanjirou gives; Giyuu takes.
It is a moment where only they are willing thieves, willing victims to the trance of pining.)
But the sun sets, does it not?
And when it does, it sinks down into the horizon, and its reflection on the ocean – gone.
—i was entwined with the strings of your being; your blood woven into my tears.
Giyuu has come to adore red – its vibrant warmth that urges him to pull his love close, simply because it reminds him of Tanjirou. The redness has never been one that Giyuu spared any thought, for its color serves a memory ridden with the horrors the world eagerly pushes him into, and yet with Tanjirou, red is a color that Giyuu would not mind sighting.
From Tanjirou's burgundy strands that form a beautiful mess with its undetermined length, from Tanjirou's ruby eyes that hold more meaning than any poems can recite, from Tanjirou's scar that bristles with the power his veins conceal, from Tanjirou's lips and cheeks that flush whenever Giyuu initiates a touch or whispers words meant for Tanjirou – Giyuu adores them all; he sees red as Tanjirou's life.
It is foolish then, that he did not foresee red as Tanjirou's death.
(Red. Red. Red.
The vast blanket of snow is drenched with red, soaked terribly that the peaks of the ice show as it absorbs the blood that flows ceaselessly like the water they breathe to fight, like the tears that have sprung out of Giyuu's – for once – frightened eyes.
"Kamado—" He remembers quivering, and it is not of the harsh bite of the cold winter. "Kamado Tanjirou..." He remembers the sound of porcelain shattering, his voice unwilling to mend itself into a clear plea. "Tanjirou!" He remembers sobbing, his fingers digging into the checkered haori of his love that is painted red from the open wounds that are drawn upon his body.
He remembers a weak smile, remembers tearful ruby eyes that glisten like a broken shard of sunlight.
"Y-You've—" Tanjirou murmurs dazedly, with a wistful smile on his face, "—called me... plenty names."
Giyuu holds him tight, swallowing down the fear. He mutters back in the midst of the pain thrumming in his bones, in the anguish threatening to tear his heart, in the overwhelming mix of emotions over the memory and the present: "Calling your name makes me happy."
And the silence responds.
When Giyuu looks at the eyes that have lost its light, it comes like an ocean breaking through the dam.
Giyuu screams, screams, and he screams.)
Red is blood. Red is the color of demons' eyes. Red reminds Giyuu of the one who has taken Tanjirou's life.
Giyuu hates red.
—i wear your memory that i might still have you, but the pain has never left the shore.
The Water Hashira stands alone beside the line of his fellow Hashiras, his face a pale color, his blue eyes an empty dark sea that promises a fruitless swim. He stares hollowly at the rocks beneath his feet, with fists dutifully resting on either side of his body. His raven hair, nearly unkempt and arrayed in a frenzy, sways along the wind that delivers the unhurried whispers shared amongst the divided crowd.
They say the lone Water Hashira loved somebody once, and that he loved so much he couldn't let go. The tales are told, seen through the hanafuda earrings that Tomioka Giyuu's ears seemed to hold.
"How pitiful of Tomioka-san..."
"No wonder he does not talk too much."
"What was his lover like, that they made Tomioka-san so crestfallen with their death?"
"The earrings have never looked one with Tomioka-san. I have always felt like they belonged to someone else."
"Whoever they were, it seemed he truly loved them."
Giyuu has long since lost the fiery anger that would've bursted from the unending chatters that awaken his nightmares, his body too filled with the nothingness gained from his loss. All he wants is to turn away and to isolate himself from the wound that refuses to close. All he wishes now is to be buried beside the love he could never leave behind.
But then he hears: "Who could it have been?"
And Tomioka Giyuu does not think twice, barely able to withhold himself as he spares them a look for the first time, blind to their surprise, as he says solemnly: "Kamado Tanjirou."
The hanafuda earrings dangle over his ears.
Hearing you makes me happy.
"His name is Kamado Tanjirou."
(i dreamt to the lull of your eyes; i drowned in the replica of your voice. i was entwined with the strings of your being; your blood woven into my tears.)
Giyuu puts his hand on his chest, where his bleeding heart should be. "My love."
(i wear your memory that i might still have you, but the pain has never left the shore, and if oceans could grieve – i wouldn't cry at all.)