[secret‡letters)

Drowning | luceage

They sit together in the frosty night air, watching the ocean waves crash in and roll out. There is a lull in the conversation as they smoke, wisps of gray curling before they are whisked away by the salty breeze. It does not feel awkward or strange. Instead, it is like this is the way things should be, should have always been, as if they have known each other since the beginning of time.

Gackt turns to look at the man beside him, thinking absentmindedly that he is one of the most beautiful things that he has ever seen. He has always been fascinated with beauty. The strange thing is, he knows that Hyde isn't flawless, doesn't possess perfect looks. Yet his inner beauty seems to make up for all of that; it turns him into something perfect. Such a funny phrase, 'inner beauty'. So clinchéd and nonsensical. After all, people
are not beautiful on the inside. They are masses of sinew and muscle and blood
that somehow function. Hyde, though, has this indescribable quality that is labeled inner beauty. He shines with it, and sometimes, Gackt thinks he would like to drown in it.

"What are you looking at, Gackt?"

Hyde's amused voice brings him back to focus, and Gackt realizes that he has been staring at him.

"You."

"Obviously," Hyde says, smiling slightly. "I sometimes wonder what goes on in that strange head of yours...or perhaps I don't want to know, ne?" His smile widens, and Gackt wants to steal that smile to place in his heart so he can remember it when Hyde goes away, as everyone inevitably does. He is meant to be alone, anyway.

A tap on his forehead makes him realize that he has wandered off with his thoughts again, and Hyde is peering at Gackt curiously.

"What are you thinking so hard about that you can't pay attention?"

Gackt doesn't think before answering, "How much I would like to kiss you right now."

Hyde's eyes widen slightly before he laughs. He jokingly shoves Gackt with his shoulder, and Gackt laughs too. Their laughter fades into the black night, eaten up by the roaring ocean. Hyde, though, remains pressed against Gackt's side. Gackt has never felt so warm and safe in his life.

"Joking aside," Hyde begins, and Gackt wants to say that he's not joking, that he means what he says. But he is silent. "What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing...everything..."

Hyde flashes that brilliant smile again, and Gackt is on the verge of losing himself in it until he remembers that he would rather not provoke Hyde further.

"Cryptic answer, Gackt. Save that one for the talk shows," Hyde says. There is a pause. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

This isn't going the way it should be at all, and before Gackt can stop himself, he says, "I was thinking about how happy I am." He wonders how Hyde can make him lose his carefully honed control and say whatever comes to mind. This is dangerous, but he could care less. If Hyde asked for his life, his soul, he would give it. He would follow him to the end of the world without further thought.

"Really?"

"Yes." Gackt throws the remainder of his cigarette into the white sand. "Work brings me a kind of happiness, and winning. But this, being here...it is simple happiness." The unspoken "with you" hangs between them, suspended. Gackt looks up and their eyes meet. He is not wearing his contacts because before he left his hotel room he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. Those blue eyes were so cold, so impersonal. They were like a glass cage, so he took the contacts off. He felt naked without the protective barrier the blue contacts provided. But then he thought, it's Hyde, I can be myself around him...

A touch on his temple breaks his trance once again, and the warmth of Hyde's touch lances through his body.

"You should leave your contacts off more often," Hyde says gently before taking his hand away. Gackt wants to grab and hold it, lacing their fingers together, but he doesn't. He is momentarily proud of himself for restraining himself that much. It is usually hard to do so around Hyde.

"Perhaps," Gackt says. If only they could be the only two people in the world. If only he didn't have to worry about right or wrong, but simple be. If only everything consisted of this quiet stretch of sand and water and the night sky glittering with stars...

"I'm losing you again to your thoughts," Hyde says. "What are you thinking about now?"

"How much I would like to kiss you."

Hyde releases an exasperated sigh and is about to chide Gackt when Gackt reaches out and gently grasps his chin. His berating words stop short. He doesn't move away, nor does move into the touch. Gackt knows that he will regret this. He knows that he will wake up tomorrow and want to die, or turn back time, or crawl into a hole. He knows he will most likely be met with a shove, a real one this time, and that things will never be the same again.

He knows all of this, but leans towards Hyde as if drawn by a gossamer thread towards those depthless eyes. He kisses him softly, and it is like coming home. Hyde tastes like cinnamon and warmth and cigarette smoke. If Gackt believed in God, this would be heaven.

Hyde pulls away gently and Gackt waits for everything he predicted to happen, but it doesn't. Instead, he opens his eyes to the sight of Hyde smiling at him. And as he pulls Hyde down for another kiss, he thinks that he's never been so glad to be wrong in his life.

END.