ES21 MusaHiru:Body Control III

III.

He just didn't seem to be the same person as before. Hiruma's bad mood didn't change for days. Musashi observed him secretly and very intensely but it came up to him as a bad idea as he sometimes couldn't find anything left of the man he used to know for so many years. And one single moment was enough to give him the creeps.
He had woken up one morning and at first it had resembled every morning in the past years: He woke up, Hiruma's bedside empty and the smell of coffee around the whole house. So he got up, showered, dressed up and went downstairs finding Hiruma sitting on the couch. That hadn't been anything but unusual but instead of typing things on his laptop or doing researches or making phone calls, he just had sat there. He had sat there staring somewhere, his face looking almost expressionless. Musashi had not dared to make a single move as he saw Hiruma starting to nibble his under lip, looking all of a sudden doubtful and somehow clueless, which had been a very rare thing. That sight totally had destroyed the image of someone who always had tried to make a mysterious secret out of himself and the image of someone, one had used to know since middle school. Musashi had felt like wanting to give him a hug. But if he had done it, it wouldn't have been anything but an absolute egoistic action. He had felt that he only wanted to calm himself down with that and he had been afraid of Hiruma not reacting normally.
Hiruma used to actually start giving him stupid names for wanting to do normal 'couple things' to him, for hugging and kissing and caring (although he seemed to appreciate it in some very few moments or accepted it when he noticed that Musashi needed it badly).
But back then it hadn't seemed right to Musashi to ask for it. Especially because Hiruma had seemed to be so absent, not even thinking about something, just sitting there, staring, nibbling his lip and blinking every third second. And Musashi already had gotten desperate when Hiruma suddenly lifted himself up, passing him by without a single word and started preparing to get off to work.
Musashi had been confused. He simply couldn't make a suggestion about Hiruma's reasons to behave so strangely. Blaming the dog's death just had seemed too simple and too out of character. The new season would start soon and Hiruma Youichi wasn't at his best. That was something to worry about, although the teammates didn't notice, yet. But they might do it soon. And Musashi was sure about Hiruma not wanting anyone to notice, that something wasn't right.

''''''''''''''''''''

Like every day, Anezaki Mamori followed her usual routine.   She got up early, took a shower, put make-up on, did her hair, dressed herself up in something nice and respectable. She had to admit that she did all this not only for her sake. She did all her actions in the morning to get ready for work for her boss. Especially preparing today's appointments and organizing some things BEFORE getting to the company was something she did to please him, like she had always done.
Her private life was a mess as her professional life was perfectly well organized.
She didn't marry.
She didn't have children.
She didn't even have a boyfriend.
No, she did not even have a lover – to say nothing of one night stands.
Anezaki Mamori lived for her job.
Friends made her life being filled with joy and happiness, but when she got home in the evening, sadness reached her heart and she pushed it away by starting to prepare the next day. And disappointments like dating with absolute horrible and inacceptable men even made her returning to her office in the 49th floor until 2 am sometimes.
Sometimes this routine she had built up reminded her of someone whom she always had told 'you work too much!'. And she would have loved to change it, she would have loved to skip this pattern, but she just couldn't. She didn't have anything in her life that was worth giving up her job for. There was nothing more worthy to her than being helpful to her boss. Her faithful allegiance hadn't changed since high school. And even if she wouldn't get such a great salary which enabled her to possess all the material things she wished for, she would stand by his side – like she had always done.
Anezaki Mamori was a person who always had been aware of her feelings and not afraid to face her emotions. And she knew very well, that it was all HIS fault. Because she still loved him. And she felt like being stuck on him, like being a small doll glued into his life. That's why she still kept her loyalty unquestionably, although he had hurt her so much and although it meant for her that she could never be anything but a helpful hand to him. That was her destiny, being the personal assistant of the love of her life.
On her way through the streets she became quite melancholic and nostalgic. Sometimes she wished to turn back times so much, that she felt a big and heavy stone in her throat. Back then in high school she would have never imagined her life being like this. She had imagined to become a loving woman, a kind mother and a perfect housewife. But the only thing she became was a sad and small figure lost in space. She felt as if she wasn't living now, she was living in her past. She knew she was thinking a little bit too often about the 'ifs' and 'whens' and 'woulds' in her life.
What if Hiruma Youichi wouldn't have left her?
What if she still was more than a good friend, more than a manager, more than an assistant, what if she had become what Musashi seemed to have been for him even before she knew him?
While arriving at the premises she shoved her thoughts away. The 'ifs' and 'whens' and 'woulds' were stupid, they wouldn't help anything anyway. She put on her lovely face as every day. She didn't want to give him the feeling to have done something wrong back then. That is why she had accepted his job offer. She could imagine really well that no one could push his or her real feelings aside and live a lie. She could understand that Hiruma couldn't have lived in a relationship he didn't feel 100% comfortable in just as she couldn't fall in love with someone else, who she didn't love at 100%. And although her dream life would remain a dream, it gave her a save feeling to know that she was still a part of his life, even if it was a small one.
With light steps she entered the huge building, greeted all the colleagues on her way friendly as ever, as if she wouldn't have almost cried a few minutes ago. She played the role, Hiruma had given her, perfectly. He sometimes joked around and called her 'the flower of work'. She knew it was an expression men loved to give the office ladies. Although she had nothing in common with those young girls who only cooked coffee and made copies but didn't have any other qualification. No, she was intelligent and creative and she was able to speak her mind and she was a good help. But she appreciated that strange compliment because she knew that it must have been his kind of expressing that she cared for his company like a mother for her baby. And by arriving the 49th floor, she reminded herself why she became such a workaholic. She felt that Hiruma's company, which they had built and raised together, was something like their child. It was something she understood as Hiruma's apology for being her boss and not her husband.
Surprised she entered the floor. Usually Hiruma already waited for her in front of the elevator and told her every news on their way to their offices and of course to get his coffee , which she brought with her every morning from the shop a block away. But today he wasn't waiting. He didn't take his coffee with a smirk in his face, he didn't start talking his head off about new information. He simply wasn't there.  She left the elevator nervously when one of the secretaries told her, that he already had arrived but hasn't come out of his office for half an hour so far. She thanked her and decided to pop in his office. It wasn't unusual for him to show up earlier than her, but what she saw confused her. She closed the door silently with a puzzled look in her face.
Yeah she had noticed that he had been behaving slightly different for a few weeks now. He had been looking tired all day long but she had never ever seen him like this, leaning his forehead against his hand, elbow resting upon his table, while the other hand lay on his keyboard – sleeping almost peacefully.
She started worrying. But still put a smile up on her face.
''''''''''''''''''''
Hiruma woke up all of a sudden by the loud knocking and the door opening. Quickly he brought his body into a position that didn't reveal that he had fallen asleep.
'Good morning, boss', Mamori said with a fake smile in her face placing his coffee in front of him. She sometimes called him like that to tease him a bit. From her fake smile he could tell that she might have noticed, but pretend to not know about it when he grunted a hoarse 'thanks'.
'There is a problem about the new screen in the Tôykô dome. Go and solve that problem, make some phone calls… you know, the usual', he added with a dry voice and took a sip of his coffee to get rid of his crappy sounding voice. He didn't feel like he had the strength to talk to her like he usually did. He just wanted her to leave as quickly as possible to wake up properly.
When the door closed he sighed deeply and ran his hand yawning though his hair. He felt horrible. It had never happened to him in the office, feeling so tired that he fell asleep just like that. Hiruma couldn't believe that this happened right now. The truth lay above his head ticking like a dangerous time bomb. He wouldn't have much time left to hide the symptoms. Some of them started to become damn obvious. Especially for Musashi and Mamori, the two persons that knew him best and were around him every day. And he felt bad for sending her away with such a lazy order. He was assured of her starting to wonder, just as Musashi did.
He remembered very well one morning, when he had woken up quite early, which happened less than it had used to. He had woken up and felt good at first because he had had the chance to do a little research.  But while taking his shower and making coffee and getting ready and everything he had felt this pain in his right shoulder. He never had had problems with his joints and all of a sudden getting a mug from the kitchen cupboard felt like someone would try to rip his arm off. He couldn't understand why it had to be the right arm first, when the season was about to start. Maybe it had been something else, maybe there was another explanation to it, maybe it was something that disappeared that day a few hours later and would again show up now or tomorrow or in four weeks. He just couldn't tell. He couldn't calculate it. And that made him go crazy in his mind.
So he had spent one hour sitting on the couch feeling miserable, not able to do something. He didn't even noticed Musashi standing behind him and observing him. Feeling busted he simply had ran off, ran away from him, ran away from a potential conversation.
He figured out that it had been easier to hide such moments when the damn dog was around them, because dogs always got excited when someone else entered the room. That might have warned him, pulled him back to reality. But he hadn't got a dog anymore. And it was stupid, really stupid. He could spank himself for admitting that it was right what he had been told: Pets make you feel good, when you feel down.
'Fucking shit… ' he mumbled to himself, drinking his coffee. What a stupid idea to think, that a dog would prevent others from noticing soon, what a stupid situation, that two people already seem to have noticed something and how stupid the season would start and he already knew that it could be his last one as quarterback in the Japan National Football League.
Of course playing football wasn't really his job. But it was his life. And he didn't want to imagine quitting his dream at the poor age of 27 – especially if his real job was all about football. He bought stadiums, let them built, bought football teams, made them rise and basically promoted the world of football to Japan and made a lot of money by doing that. What his company exactly did was pretty hard to tell. But the fact was, that by being surrounded by football relating assignments and tasks while not being able to play it anymore would feel like hell to him.
And he wasn't sure if he could deal with that. He knew that no one would do so.
All this thinking brought nothing but headaches and stomachaches. Even staying in his office until late that evening didn't help at all. So he decided to skip taking the train home and walked across the streets, taking deep breaths of the fresh air at spring time although it started raining. Hiruma desperately searched for inner peace right now. He didn't want to muse again about that, he wanted to have clear thoughts. He wanted to make every game in this season work perfectly well and by plan. And after that he would retire, telling the public that he'll be concentrating on his company, telling Musashi finally what was going on and everything will be fine. But this season… he had to play perfectly. He had to turn it into the season of his life. He had to go with guns blazing and nothing else. This last thing was left to do. This last thing was something he desired to simply happen. No, he expected it to happen as planned. He would not start praying or hoping for it.
Just when he put his decision on that he crossed a small box at the corner of a street. Actually he wanted to pass by but something caught his attention. A silent grunting came out from it and the box started wobbling a bit. Hiruma came closer and heard a few scratching like sounds, slight whimpering and again grunting followed by the hell of a sneeze. When Hiruma looked over the edge he saw a small brown puppy ducking inside the box with his little furry ass up and his tail wobbling excitedly, jumping at the inside of the box and trying to escape. The box looked pretty fucked up, it was wet and smell rotten and moldy. The puppy grunted again. And just by snarling this small brown cotton swab started to sneeze again.
For the first time that day it put a waggish smile on Hiruma Youichi's face.
'That's a pretty shitty situation you got there, fucking puppy', he mumbled. By its look the dog had obviously been abandoned.
Somehow Hiruma liked that wet and dirty thing at first sight. And although it looked so shabby, he stretched his arms and grabbed this very small and pathetic being. Instantly the dog kept quiet when it saw Hiruma's face and felt his fingers around its belly. It stopped whimpering and grunting from one second to another and turned his face to an ugly expression by letting his tongue hang out while slobbering and panting heavily.
'Are you just a spineless fucker or thankful?', Hiruma snickered a bit, 'well, we'll figure it out.'
Said and done. He took it with him.
'And shut your little dirty trap', he whispered, when entering the house. The lights were switched off and everything stayed silent. So Musashi must have been asleep already. Hiruma was thankful because he didn't want to make a fuss over bringing a new dog. Somehow he felt the joy of life returning into his veins. The bad mood from the past days and the gloomy thoughts were gone all of a sudden, when he tried to free this ugly and dumb looking dog from all the mud and filth. He enrolled it in a towel and tiptoed upstairs. He crossed the bedroom to go to the bathroom and took a short look at Musashi snoring like hell, almost hugging a fucking pillow.
'That fucking man always in need for a fucking stupid hug', he sighed, but after returning from the shower he suddenly felt like… being hugged. Too good Musashi didn't notice ANYTHING when he was asleep. He just kept on sleeping like a log when Hiruma lifted his arm to put it around himself and rubbed his back against Musashi's vibrating torso. It felt warm… and cozy… it felt good.

''''''''''''''''''''
Musashi woke up in the middle of the night finding himself embracing Hiruma tightly, who breathed deep and silently. Not that he had worried about Hiruma coming home so late, but he felt glad right now that he held him in his arms, feeling his soft body. He slowly hugged him tighter and wanted to put a leg around him, when he noticed Hiruma's tummy moving.
Wait a second right here… his tummy… moved?
Musashi lifted himself up confused, but the blanket was moving and grunting… just like it did when Cerberus II jumped into their bed at night. He just couldn't believe his eyes… was he hallucinating? Did he really become old now?
And the movement was so small and the grunting sounded so quietly… it couldn't be that fat dog. No he couldn't be it, he was dead! Musashi hesitated for a second and carefully grabbed around Hiruma's waist to lift the blanket. What he found was… ugly… but cute. It was a really small and tiny slobbering stupid looking and loudly breathing puppy.
'Hello there…', he whispered and softly grabbed it. It was so small that one of his hands was enough place for it. 'What are you doing here? Is this the stupid elf's doing, hm?', he mumbled and petted the small head. The answer came quickly, when the puppy yawned and jumped back to where it was lying before, snuggling up tightly to his new master. Surprised by this déjà-vû-like sight Musashi smiled kindly.