Strawberry x Chocolate
Strawberry-Chocolate
He did not know why it was there. It was lying on the chair, he usually hung his jacket over at night, when he had come in.
It was not even Valentine's Day.
Orphen stared at this little package for a while.
It was heart-shaped, with a big red ribbon around it and a writing, that indicated the box came from the best and most expensive chocolatier on the continent.
Chocolate. Why in the world would somebody make Orphen a chocolate-gift?
Of course, it was clear for Orphen that it had to be a woman. A woman, who was obviously in love with him.
The sorceror picked the small package up and examined it solidly. No name, no seal, not the smallest hint of a sender. The heart was wrapped into plastic-foil, which was very expensive and difficult to do, and had no visible signs that it was opened or manipulated in another way.
So it did not seem as somebody wanted to poison him.
Orphen sighed and put the chocolate-box back on the chair.
As there was a knock on the door, Orphen was too deep in thoughts to hear it. He also did not notice when the door opened a few seconds later and a guest stepped in.
At first, he only put his head into the room, but as he had found Orphen sitting on the ground, in front of his chair, the rest of his body followed.
"Oh, so you are here.", he said, "I thought so."
Orphen still did not listen.
His visitor stepped behind him an detected the heart-box. "Well, well", he said, picking up the chocolate, "is it already Valentine's Day again?"
Now Orphen was interrupted in his thoughts and turned around immediately to face the one who stole his present.
"Hartia! How can you dare to enter this room without my permission?"
The redhead smiled at him. "Well, it's your own fault, if you don't answer my knocking..."
Orphen sighed. Hartia was not so wrong, after all. "Okay, and what do you want?"
"The usual. People have complained about you. Again. And of course, their first address is the Tower of Fang." He pointed on Orphen's necklace.
The brown-haired sorceror glared at him. "Is that my fault?"
"In a way yes, because..." Hartia stopped, then sighed. "Oh well... forget it..."
Discussing with Orphen when he obviously had other things on his mind was never a good thing to do. Hartia knew that well and he did not want to experience his old friend's shape of the day.
Orphen himself decided that the riddle about the mysterious chocolate was more interesting than Hartia's complaints, and roughly grapped it out of Hartia's hands.
"So, if this was everything, you can leave now.", he said while unwrapping the heart-box.
But instead of doing so, Hartia stayed. He was curious about that chocolate box.
Orphen did not notice that as he opened the box and faced several little chocolate-pieces, each heart-shaped again.
He looked at the box' cover. No letter again. This was going to become mysterious.
"How about tasting that chocolate?", Hartia suggested.
Orphen turned around and gave Hartia a more than slightly annoyed look. "And risking of falling down the next moment and die? No, thanks."
A few seconds later, his expression changed, into something that made the red haired sorceror know it was going to become troublesome.
"Hey Hartia", Orphen began, "You're looking so hungry. Want a piece?"
He held the chocolate under his nose.
"No, thanks", the freckled sorceror refused, "It's yours, so..."
"Oh, come on!" Without a warning, Orphen sticked the chocolate into Hartia's mouth.
The redheaded one muffled something Orphen could not understand, but in the end, he chewed and swallowed the sweet candy.
"And?", Orphen asked. He made a curious face, but Hartia easily detected that it was faked.
"Well, it tastes like..." Hartia took another piece from the box and broke it into two parts. The chocolate was just an outer frame, wich contained a white substance, probably yoghurt, with small red stains.
"...strawberry..."
"So it's Strawberry-chocolate?", Orphen asked and stole a piece from Hartia's hand. He looked at it, then at his guest.
He smirked.
"Say, Hartia...", he began, "...did anybody ever tell you that your hair looks like strawberry?"
"What...? No... I mean..." Hartia was visibly irritated by Orphen's question, searching for words. But he did not find any of which he thought they would fit the situation. In the end, he sighed. "But thanks for the compliment anyway."
He looked at Orphen and still found the same, mischievous look. "You're welcome, but..." Orphen looked at the chocolate again. "...I still don't know if it's dangerous or not. What if that is poison that only begins to work after eating more of it?"
The sorceror with the headband pressed Hartia's shoulder down so that in the end, he took seat on Orphen's bed. Orphen himself, took the chocolate box and sat beside him.
He held another piece of strawberry-chocolate up. "Say aaaah..."
"But-"
All protesting did not help; the little candy was quicker in Hartia's mouth than he could even speak a word. Then another piece followed and another and another.
Everyone entering the scene by accident would have most probably laughed over the sight of a grown man, almost twenty years old, feeding another man of the same age with chocolate. It was so strange.
With anybody else, Hartia would have protested and end this little game immediately, but now he could not. He had never been able to go against Orphen, and that did not change in years.
Even more, he began to like it.
He liked hearing Orphen's voice, rough and smooth, childish and manly at the same time, so very different from the way the brown haired sorceror casted his magic spells. Okay, another one? A beautiful sound.
He liked feeling Orphen's presence so close to himself. It felt like Orphen's free hand was coming nearer and nearer to his own with every piece he gave to him. His heart beat faster and faster.
After a while, Hartia decided to just close his eyes and open his mouth whenever he demanded another piece of chocolate. To his own surprise, Orphen followed these demands and handed him piece after piece.
But after a short time, the feeding stopped.
"Great", Orphen complained, "Now you've eaten it all up."
He looked at the box that now showed another heart and the printing I love you on the bottom. "I wanted something too..."
"It was your idea", Hartia protested, "Besides, I could have told you that they are not poisoned before." - "How would you know?" - "Because..."
Hartia turned away, blushing slightly.
"Because I sent the box to you."
For about half a minute, both remained silent.
Orphen looked at the heart-box, the printing and then at Hartia.
He began to laugh. "You're not serious, are you?"
"Of course I am!" - "Don't joke with me." - "I'm not joking."
Orphen sighed. "Okay, then thank you. But..."
He held the box up, showing the printing in Hartia's direction. The redhaired did not watch, just blushed harder.
"...you could have told me that in another way. Could have saved calories."
"It wasn't meant like that", Hartia replied, still not looking, "I got this from a girl, I didn't know this was written there."
Orphen smiled at the redhead. He had never been good at liing.
"But you did know this is a heart."
Orphen took Hartia's face with both hand and slowly turned it to his own.
"You know, I still want to taste that chocolate."
He came even closer to Hartia's freckled face, until their lips met. Orphen was sure to still find some taste of chocolate in Hartia's mouth. He tried to part the red haired's lips with his tounge, which needed some times, but worked in the end.
Even in such a situation, Hartia was not able to stand against his old friend's will.
And Orphen was right. It tasted of chocolate, strawberry and Hartia himself.
A wonderful taste.
The whole situation was even weirder than before, but it also felt much better than the other one. Hartia would have enevr imagined to kiss Orphen. It was against his own preferences, against the laws the Tower of Fang had laid down for their students, against every bit of sense...
...but if felt good.
Only a few seconds later, it was over.
"This chocolate is very tasteful", Orphen said, smiling at Hartia, whose freckled cheeks were still red like his hair.
"Yeah... that's... right...", Hartia stammered, still confused from Orphen's action.
Suddenly he jumped from the bed. "I... have to go now..."
Sighing, Orphen got up and went after him. "You know, you could come around more often."
"O...kay..."
Already with the doorhandle in his hand, something came into Hartia's mind. Something he already wanted to say since Orphen had compared his hair to strawberries.
He pointed at the other man's head. "Your hair looks almost like chocolate."
Orphen laughed. "Really? So if my hair is chocolate and yours is strawberry..."
He grinned at Hartia. "...Then you have eaten us both."
"Okay, and what"s the yoghurt then?", Hartia asked, still feeling uncomfortable about the happenings before.
Orphen's grin became bigger. "Well, what do you think? Don't tell me you're that prudish."
"Okay, okay, I think I know what you mean.", Hartia replied after a few seconds of thinking, "But that's far beyond reality, at least in my case."
He opened the door and left.
For a minute or two, Orphen just stood in the middle of his small room and stared at the door. He still ginned widely, sometimes looked at the writing in the box and then at the door again.
He sighed. "Well, Hartia... I don't really think you didn't know of this print...
But that's okay. Very okay..."
While leaving the tavern, Hartia thought he should buy another box. The same box with the same shape and the same print.
And he should send it to Orphen and then visit him again. Just because the print was true. And because this afternoon was wonderful.
He wanted to repeat it, but slightly changed.
He wanted to say it, to tell him.
He just had to say he loved him.
private paradise
große Inspiration für diese FF, die man als eine Art Fortsetzung zu 'Strawberry-Chocolate' ansehen kann:
Hyde - Shallow Sleep
----
rakuen ~ private paradise
Red hair flew around in the bedsheeds like water, as he restlessly turned and tossed in the soft sheeds, seeming like no position was able to hold him in place.
It was not that he was just unable to sleep, it was not even night. Daylight shone through the window, painting his room with a soft touch of orange. The sun was just about to set.
After a while, Hartia stopped turning around and stared up to the ceiling, sighing. He had not left his bed the whole day. All the time, he had been staying there, turning and tossing, always in a despreate try of mimicking the movements of the times he had shared his bed with somebody else.
He turned his head to the side, looking to the empty space beneath him.
It had been a while since he last time had seen him, been with him. He had disappeared so suddenly as he had come to him.
Hartia turned around. It smelled not only of himself, but also of the one who had been sharing this bed with him for several times. Silently, so silently as if the lightest sound of his voice could cause any damage, he whispered a name. His name.
"Kiriranshero..."
It made him remember.
His voice, his face, his touch.
He wanted him back.
Hartia remembered the day Orphen had come to the Tower of Fang, looking down and defeated. Like always, he had not talked about it, but Hartia had seen, known, felt his old friend needed some comfort.
Comfort had led into hugs, hugs into desperate embraces, soon joined by kisses, first shy and careless, then deep and passionate. After a while, Orphen had come back more and more often, repeating this actions over and over again.
Sometimes they had talked; mostly Orphen complained about certain people and events going on his nerves, sometimes about this and that.
But still, he did not open himself to his old friend, which hurt Hartia much as he had realized so. Wasn't he trustworthy enough? For Hartia, it showed how much Orphen had changed the last years from the one he had always known and remembered as 'Kiriranshero'.
And still, he was special.
Mostly, Orphen had stayed over the night and the two shared the big bed.
But always, when Hartia had woken up in the mornings, the other half of this bed had been empty and Orphen was gone.
Just like now.
Hartia held out a hand, but there was nothing else to touch than the bedsheeds.
Nobody was there.
A look through the window at the setting sun let him realize what a ridiculous thing he had been doing all day long. It was no use trying to imitate moments with somebody he would never be able to have for more than a few hours.
Orphen had not come around for several weeks now and from the newspapers, Hartia knew that a certain 'rude black sorceror' was involved into a lot of mysterious things lately.
He certainly would not come back in the next time.
If ever.
It was no use to wait for him.
♥~♥~♥
A few days later Hartia did it again.
He lay in his bed and did nothing else than thinking of the times he had been with Orphen. The wonderful feeling Orphen had created while holding, touching, kissing his old friend was still somewhere in Hartia’s memories, but it was not enough.
It was only a memory. It was not real.
Hartia was not sure if Orphen knew what kind of feelings about him had grown in the redhead’s heart, having become more and more intensive with the time.
But on the other hand, Orphen had to know. Already since the day Hartia had sent him the strawberry-chocolate flavoured candies.
He knew exactly and still he was handling this feelings so recklessly, like just playing around with them.
It was certainly not fair.
Sunddenly, there was a knock on the door. But Hartia felt too tired to open, or even to answer the knocking.
After a moment of silence, a voice came from the other side of the door.
"I know you’re there. It's me."
That voice. No doubt, it was his voice.
Hartia crawled out of his bed and moved his tired body to the door. As he stood in front of it, he hesistated.
Should he really let him in? It would certainly happen the same things as always, hurting him even more as he already was.
Maybe he should just...
"Hartia, please..."
He sounded crushed, no doubt about that.
As Hartia opened the door, he detected Orphen did not just sound broken, he also looked like that. Just like on the day everything had begun.
And just like on this day, he couldn't find any words.
But Orphen did not say a word either, he just walked in, slowly and tiredly, and headed to Hartia’s bed. As he arrived there, he let himself fall down into the soft sheeds.
Silently, he stared onto the ceiling.
Something serious had happened, Hartia could see that. But still, he did not know what to do or say.
As Hartia walked to his bed, Orphen suddenly began to speak.
"I lost...
...my only chance..."
Hartia climbed onto his bed, placing himself behind Orphen.
"What in the world are you talking about...?"
His voice sounded worried.
"There was this one and only chance I had for getting out of all this, but..."
Orphen stopped speaking, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. It did not seem easy to tell.
"But I was...-"
He stopped again, this time out of surprise.
Hartia had softly grabbed his head and placed it onto his own lap. He slowly began stroking Orphen’s hair, trying to comfort him.
"Shh...", he whispered, "It's okay, if you don't want to tell..."
Orphen opened his eyes and looked into Hartia’s face.
There was this smile, warm and caring, but forced. Hartia was obviously not in the mood to smile, but still, he did so. He tried the best he could to comfort Orphen.
He reached up until his hands touched Hartia’s cheeks. First only barely, then more firmly, imitating the stroking gestures Hartia was still using on Orphen's head.
"It's okay, if you don't want to smile..."
Maybe there were some feelings. Orphen was not sure.
Slowly, he forced Hartia to bow his head down, his own one reaching up until they met.
A relatively short kiss, but long enough for both to melt within it.
Without any further words, Orphen turned around and kissed Hartia again.
♥~♥~♥
They had found back their old rhythm quickly.
Turning around in Hartia's bed, which seemed slightly too small for their actions, they explored every inch of it, and almost every of each other.
They never went any further than kissing, mostly also enjoyed the feeling of their soft skin. Hartia’s shirt was to be unbuttoned easily.
So it was also this time when the redhead sat on Orphen's lab after a while, his shirt revealing the view onto his bare, pale skin.
Panting heavily from the previous actions, Hartia opened his mouth. Orphen took this as a sign for another kiss, but Hartia stopped him. He was not out for kissing, but for saying something.
"Kiriranshero, I..."
He hesistated; Orphen’s curious face irritated him. He could not detect if it was real or not. But Hartia was quite sure, his old friend was annoyed from being stopped from the last kiss. At least a bit.
Hartia swallowed, took a deep breath and began to speak again.
It just had to be said.
"Kiriranshero, I...
...I lo–"
This time it was Orphen to stop him in the middle of an action.
He gently put his finger onto the redhead’s lips, slightly nodding.
"I know", he whispered.
"I know..."
He reached out for kissing him again, which was easy, because Hartia was too surprised to move.
Orphen could not return this love, at least not fully. Also due to the last events, his head was too full of other things and his heart still belonged to Azalea. At least mostly.
But when he was with Hartia, he forgot about this things for a few hours. No strange and mysterious people, no worries about money, no fights. He did not need to care for anything. All that was there was Hartia's warmth, his comfort and friendliness. They acted as if no time had ever passed.
It was their own, little paradise.
In the beginning, it was odd for Orphen, sharing this kind of intimacy with his old friend, but with every time he had come here and spent the night with Hartia, his head became free, more and more. A great feeling he did not want to miss after a while.
It was like a drug.
Hartia was Orphen's drug.
A beautiful drug...
Orphen pulled the redhead close to him, until both lay on the bed, Hartia on top of him and their heads side by side.
For minutes, both remained silent.
Orphen sighed and began to stroke Hartia's red hair.
He took a few strands, looked at them and then turned his head around to dive into the bright red, while Hartia did not dare to move or even to make a sound. The situation was fraigle, the feeling just too wonderful to be destroyed.
Slowly, the room became dark. The sun was gone.
"Your hair smells wonderful...", Orphen whispered after another minute.
Hartia was puzzled. He had spent the whole day in his room and did not even make a single step in direction of the shower. It was impossible that his hair still smelled of the shampoo he had used the day before.
Hartia rose and looked at Orphen, irritated.
But instead of giving an explanation, Orphen began to laugh.
"You’re really cute like this."
Hartia blushed, which made Orphen laugh even more.
He really liked Hartia's blush. Also his hair and his smile and everything else that was so typically Hartia. His freckles, his strange likening for certain books.
He really loved it.
But he could not see him that often anymore.
Orphen’s smile faded, he sighed. He was about to say something serious, Hartia was sure. He knew him long enough to be able to read his face.
"I told you I’m still trapped in this big mess, right?"
Hartia nodded.
"I just noticed I’m dragging more and more people into this which I don't want to be envolved. I don’t want to see them suffering because of my inability for finishing all this. I'll have to work and fight hard to end it as quickly as possible and so I don't think I'll be able to visit you anymore.
Maybe I will even die..."
More minutes of silence passed, neither of them knew what to say.
There was no need for anything to be discussed further.
They both had to accept it.
Orphen pulled Hartia close, so close he could.
"Let’s forget about this now", he whispered.
Hartia nodded; this was the only thing he was able to.
Orphen’s embrace felt wonderful and he should be happy for the last few hours they could spend together.
♥~♥~♥
As Hartia awoke in the next morning, kissed by warm sunlight that shone through his window, the other half of his bed was empty.
This time he would not come back. He had said so himself the last night.
Hartia sighed and stared at the empty bed.
It was finally over.
But it hurt so much.
Slowly, Hartia held out a hand, to his other bed-half.
Somehow it felt as he was still there. The sheets were still warm.
But besides the bedsheets, Hartia felt there was something else. It took him a minute until he realized it was a small sheet of paper.
He looked at it and instantly recognized Orphen’s handwriting, somewhere between beautiful and crappy, ‘man-like’.
The note consisted of only a few words, but they let him hope.
"I’ll make it. And then I’ll be back."
I gently held out my hand
And in that perfect moment
You disappeared - I lost you over again
In a shallow sleep I dreamt I was seeing you
Just how I remembered
Brimming with tenderness
And somewhere in the calm
A feeling that nothing had ever changed
Your presence close beside me till I wake
(Hyde - Shallow Sleep)
