Date: Oct 12, 2001
Part: prologue/5
Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing.
Pairings: 1x2, 3x4,
Warnings: Future lemon, Angst, OOC, AU
Note: Kappas are Japanese water imps. Legend says that throwing them a cucumber with your name carved on it will buy their good will.
Yes, I'm still working on HTBD, but I've been working on this for a while too. I didn't want to start posting it until it was done,though.
On an early autumn morning, a weathered man pushed a small boat out onto a lake, and then climbed in himself, picking up an oar.
"Let me row, Papa. Please." His son, four that very day, begged. He looked tiny in the heavy orange life-vest.
"When you're bigger, Heero. I promise." The older man smiled. "Right now, you better leave it to me."
The child sulked for a minute, but the morning was too interesting to be sad for long. Birds circled and dived overhead, and if he looked over the sides of the wooden boat, he could see silver fish streaking along next to them. Best of all, it was his birthday, and he was with his father.
He leaned back against the wooden planks of the boat, soothed by the rowing motion as his father took them to the middle of the lake.
"Your mother called." Papa said suddenly. "She sends her love. She can't come to see you today, though."
"It's okay, Papa." Mama had left them last year. He loved her, because little boys were supposed to love their mother, but he didn't really miss her any longer. In honesty, he barely remembered her at all.
Papa stopped the boat in the dead center of the lake and lowered a small weight to keep them in place.
"Can we fish now, Papa? Please?"
"Just a minute. One more thing we have to do, first."
Papa opened up his knapsack and pulled out two long, green cucumbers.
"Yuck." Heero pronounced.
"Don't worry. We're not eating them." Papa laughed, and pulled a penknife from his pocket. "Watch."
He opened the knife and carefully began making cuts in the first cucumber, and then the second one. Heero watched, confused.
"See? This one has your name on it. It says 'Heero'" Papa handed the boy the vegetable, and Heero traced the letters of his name.
"This one is for me. It says 'Odin'"
"So what do we do with them?"
"Well, see, there's a special spirit in this lake. It's called a kappa. Lakes with kappas have a bunch of fish, but the kappa doesn't like people a whole lot. He likes cucumbers, though. So fisherman here carve their names on cucumbers and give them to the kappa. That way, he won't bother them."
"What happens if you don't?"
"Well, if he's in a good mood, he'll just scare away the fish. If he's in a bad mood, he might tip over your boat. It's better to make him happy."
"Have you seen him, Papa?"
"Nope. But that's because I always make sure I have lots of cucumbers. Now, watch me. You throw yours over the side of your boat and say your name loudly. So he'll know who you are." Papa leaned back, and lobbed the green vegetable into the water. "ODIN!" he yelled, as it arched through the air, and hit the water with a splash.
The child threw his own cucumber. "HEERO!" he cried out.
"Now what?"
"Now we can go fishing."
"Cool."
The morning melted into afternoon. Heero guessed the kappa must have liked their offering, because they caught tons of fish. He had even managed to bring in a few small ones all on his own, without his father's help at all.
Odin was nearly asleep, when he heard Heero speak. The boy was peering over the other side of the boat, and his voice was thoughtful. "Papa? What's a kappa supposed to look like?"
"Well... they're green." Odin offered. "And scaly. With a lot of sharp teeth."
"Oh." Heero nodded.
Just under the water, a boy his own age was staring up at him, a cucumber in his hand, and hair trailing all around him. He was a normal looking boy, so he couldn't be a kappa, but what was he doing under water like that?
Heero raised a hand and waved, and the water boy grinned and waved back. Heero stuck out his tongue and made a face, and the water boy giggled.
As he watched, a man appeared next to the water boy, and glared at Heero. As Heero watched in fascination, the man appeared to scold the other boy, although his words were lost in the water. The other child hung his head, and gave Heero a sideways, apologetic glance. The man put a hand on his shoulder firmly, and they swam away together. The water boy still had a cucumber in his hand.
Heero sat up and looked over at his own father, starting to tell him what he had seen, but something stopped him. He knew that Papa wouldn't believe him; grown-ups never believed in much of anything. He would, when he was grown up, he thought stubbornly. He would believe in everything.
"Ready to head for home?" Papa asked a few hours later.
"Ready. I'm starving!"
"Well, fresh fishing coming up, Mr. Starving." Papa laughed, and picked up the oar.
Heero looked back hopefully in the water, but there was no sign of the odd boy and his father.
"Having a good birthday so far?" Papa asked, ruffling Heero's dark brown hair playfully.
"Sure am." Heero agreed.
"Good. Because after we eat these fish, I bet I can find a cake and a whole bunch of presents with your name on them."
And the sun was warm, and the water was sparkling, and the air was sweet, and it was his birthday, and he had made friends, sort of, with a water boy, and all was right in the world.
End Prologue
"Because I've made other plans, that's why!" Heero snapped, pacing around the apartment, the cordless phone in his hand. "You told me you were busy, so I decided to do something else. No, I can't change my plans. Yes, Mother, I'm the most selfish person who ever lived. I'm terrible, evil, horrible, and deserve a wretched death. And I'm still busy Sunday. He opened the door to his apartment, and began ringing the bell. "Mother, I have to go. Someone's at my door. Yes, I'll talk to you later. I love you too. No, Mother, I'm not lying. GOODBYE, MOTHER." He came back inside and ended the call, setting the phone down hard in it's cradle.
From an easy chair, snickering emerged from behind a thick book. "Why don't you just change your number?" Heero's roommate Trowa suggested.
"Because she'd find a way to get it." Heero said mournfully, falling backward into an overstuffed grey couch. "She has minions of darkness everywhere."
Trowa snorted. "Might be less grief to change your plans and do what she wants, ya know?"
"Oh, no. Not this time. Three years in a row, she's had other plans on my birthday. Then I make other plans, and then SHE changes HER plans, and expects me to drop everything. It was the same way when I was growing up. Not this time."
Trowa put down his book and walked over to Heero, squeezing his shoulder. He knew these stories, backwards and forwards, but he also knew that Heero needed to vent or go mad. And Ruth Yuy was enough to warrant an awful lot of venting.
"It's not just my birthday." Heero said at last. "She doesn't understand."
Trowa sat down next to the couch. "It's your 24th birthday."
"And the 20th anniversary of my father's death." Heero said softly.
Trowa glanced at his friend in surprise
"He took me fishing for the first time on my forth birthday." Heero smiled at the memory. "We had a great time. My mom had been gone a while by then. It was just us. My dad was awesome. On the way back from the lake... the truck came out of nowhere..."
"Heero, I'm sorry." He had known that Heero's father had died when he was a boy, but not that it had been on his birthday.
"My mother flew into town, and picked me up from the hospital. I guess I should be grateful for that." Heero picked at the stitches on the couch. "But at the time, all I wanted my was dad. She refused to talk about him. She didn't even let me go to the funeral." His voice broke.
"Oh, Heero."
"So this Sunday, I'm finally going to get to say goodbye to him. I'm going back to the lake. I need to go back. I've booked a cabin up there for a week. Maybe..."
"Do you want me to come with you?"
Heero shook his head. "Not this time, but I appreciate the offer."
Trowa stood up, and patted his hand. "Well, since you're not going to be home on your birthday, let me take you out to dinner tonight." He grinned. "That new waiter at Shashi's is pretty cute."
"The blond?" Heero smirked.
"I like blonds." Trowa protested. "He's adorable." His one visible green eye sparkled.
"His hair is too short."
"You and long hair. I'm going to go gift-wrap you a nice Hell's Angel for your birthday."
Heero perked up. "Promise?"
"Sure. Just let me get my insurance paid up." He reached for his shoes. "So, where is this lake, anyway?"
"Near where I used to live, Warning."
"Warning?" Trowa glanced at his shoes. "Have they gone feral or something?"
"No. The TOWN I lived in is called Warning, stupid. The lake is about twenty miles to the north. Real boondocks."
He thought back. "The lake was neat, though. My father said it had a kappa in it."
Trowa handed Heero his own shoes. "Did you see one?"
"Nope." Heero said after a second. "Thought I saw something, but it was just my reflection in the water. For a while there, I was sure there was another little boy living in the lake."
Trowa cracked up. "You?"
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Come on, Heero. You wouldn't believe in a spirit if it started tapdancing in your sock drawer. A vampire could suck you dry, and you'd blame giant mosquitos."
He grabbed his jacket. "Speaking of sucking one dry, you think Blondie is working tonight?"
Heero smacked him lightly. "Probably. And I was different before my dad died..." his voice trailed off.
"Heero, I'm sorry. I was just kidding around."
"I know. Come on. Let's get there early enough to get a table in your blond guy's section."
The airport near Warning barely qualified to be called that. In the age of sleek, modern terminals, with myriad eateries, shops, and things to do, it was pathetic. Not that Heero cared much; the last time he had been here, it had been stumbling along behind his mother as she held tightly to his hand, determined not to miss their flight out of "this bassackwards town" as she called it. He noted idly that it hadn't changed much; even the woman running the lone food kiosk looked the same to him.
He waited impatiently for his battered black suitcase to make it's way down the conveyor belt; he never fully believed that his luggage had made it safely anywhere until he saw it with his own two eyes. He hoisted it off the belt, and passed by a man and a woman arguing loudly over who owned the suitcase with the red roses stitched on it. On another conveyor, a little girl watched in pride as her brother climbed on the belt and vanished through the hanging leather straps. "Billy went bye-bye." She informed her mother.
"BILLY!" the mother screamed.
Heero swallowed a chuckle. If he'd pulled something like that, Ruth might well have left him to his fate. No, he scolded himself, walking toward the exit. He was being too hard on her. Ruth wasn't cruel; she just wasn't all that great at the whole parenting thing. And to be fair, she'd realized this and tried to get out of it. It just hadn't worked out that way.
The woman at the rental car booth stared hard at Heero's ID and his face, looking for a reason, any reason, to deny him. He gave her his best smile. The one that always made Trowa die laughing.
"One moment, Mr. Yuy." She pronounced it rhyming with "soy".
"It's U-E." Heero corrected automatically.
The woman gave him a look that said clearly she could think of a few other things to call him, and then handed him a key. "It's the red Mazda, Mr. U-E."
"Have a nice day." Heero gave her a bright, fake smile. And I hope your head explodes, he thought to himself. He'd heard his father say that to a rude sales clerk once, and it brought a real smile to his lips.
The Mazda, as in apology for the woman responsible for allocating it, was in good shape and not bad looking. Heero stowed his suitcase and shoulder bag in the trunk and slid behind the wheel. It purred to life as he turned the key. Heero then cursed softly, and shut off the engine, popping the trunk. He retrieved his shoulder bag, rooted around inside, and pulled out a map. He knew the general location of the lake, but he had only been four years old, just barely four. Certainly not old enough to remember the directions by heart.
Finally, he pulled out of the airport's parking lot, and was on the highway a few minutes later. "Going to be all right, Papa." He said suddenly. "Just need to see it again, that's all. Just need to remember."
It wasn't very long after that he was pulling into the parking lot of strip mall near the lake. An old time general store would have probably been more fitting, he thought wryly, with elderly men playing checkers on the porch, and a snoozing hound or two, but he needed supplies for the week and wasn't going to be picky.
A half hour later, the Mazda was filled with blankets, tackle, bait, and various other assorted goodies he would be lucky to ever use. He hit the grocery store next, stocking up on canned food, Sterno, toilet paper, and matches. The cabin was supposed to have everything else. As he was finishing he pushed his cart passed the produce section. With a dry laugh, he picked up a cucumber and turned it over, his tongue between his teeth. He sat it back down in the pile and went to check out.
End Chapter 1
(:./lasha/kappa1)
