Fixed
By: Shima And Tempis
Warning: Written late at night (for me).
Also Wrote Broken.

Heartbreak is one of the most painful wounds a human can feel. I have felt it in many different forms, and that same heartbreak for many different people. The multiple personalities that have broken down into my own form have made me recognize that break so well now that I may be on first name basis. Heartbreak occurs most often when the one you truly desire does not seem to love you back.

That heartbreak may be what you felt that day when you saw them together. Why you ran away so blatantly with no care for the world around you. I was privileged, maybe, to witness that your running away was not because of some foolish crush. You were deeply hurt by everything going on around you.

I do not blame the “others” for your pain. Love is a controlling feeling that causes us to be broken, that makes us do unintelligent things in spite of everything. So the fact that he loved another woman instead of you was completely understandable.

I’m still not sure why I ran after you. The adrenaline and care for you as a friend flooded my veins and I knew I had to follow you, because it was obvious that no one else would. If no one else, then I chose to take the role of your night in shining armor, as if that would make everything all right again. So as I ran, I was not aware of the rain pouring down upon our heads, or the chill that batted at my senses. In fact, by then my senses were dead to the world, except my eyes, which could barely keep track of you among the students running for cover.

Watching you climb so courageously up into the tree out front, with your feeble legs barely supporting you, gave me a feeling almost as bad as the pains of all my predecessors. I wanted to be there helping you, but I was still too faraway. That, and I think you needed just a little time alone with your thoughts, a little time to collect yourself.

You didn’t think anyone understood your pain, or even recognized it for what it was, did you? You thought that all you had to do was put on a bitter smile and everyone in the world would be unaware of your anguish. I have to say, as an experienced person of masks, I could see through your smile as if it were transparent. Running while smiling so weakly is never much of a cover, is it?

When I did muster up what was left of my own calm façade, I appeared beneath you with a smile on my face. I was trying to flood you with a happiness that isn’t real but powerful nonetheless. Was I trying to weave a spell on someone so strong? Maybe I was. I wouldn’t know.

“How long do you plan to be up there, Daidouji-san?” I asked, and it seemed like you just figured out there was a world outside your own head, that you could in fact look through your glossy violet eyes and see something worthwhile. Though I’m not sure a soaking schoolboy with a smile on his face is much of a comfort. With the look you give me, I’m highly sure that I was right, that I am the last person you wanted to see. I could’ve sworn that that position had already been filled by the boy who’d hurt you so much, but apparently I’d been wrong.

I felt like a grinning toymaker thinking that everything in the world can be made better by a perfectly working toy. I was disgusted with my own self for ever thinking such foolish thoughts, and for comparing myself to such an ancient occupation. Of course, my own soul is just as ancient as the men that worked in those shops, but I myself am not.

All of these words pass through my head before I realize that you have not answered. I look at you more carefully and then feel shock race up and down my spine. That running has done no good for you, has it? Your ankle tells me the answer for you, and the broken way you lay among the branches solidifies my theory.

“Your ankle is swelling.” I’m very sure that if you were talking you would salute me for being Captain Obvious at a horrendous time such as this. Instead I receive a dry glance, which I feel is much worse than any snide comment you can make to me at his point. The toymaker deep within me is telling me to look at your voice box, pull the string on your back again and see if any gears are turning. Then reality returns and slaps me upside the head.

“Well, shall we get you down? Or are you really going to stay up there? It is raining, Daidouji-san, and I’m very sure your mother would have a fit if she saw you. I shall take you to dry off, Daidouji-san, dry the rain as well as those evident tears.” Your name feels nice on my tongue, so I say it twice. Exasperation overwhelms me however when I notice you’re not about to speak up, and for a few seconds my smile leaves me. Then I remember that I’m trying to put up an image that will get you down from that tree and somewhere much warmer, somewhere dry. I’m convinced you’re awfully surprised that I can see your tears among the raindrops that have fallen onto your face, because aren’t the teardrops and the rain really the same thing? They just happen to be sorrow coming from two different entities.

I grasp that I’m getting nowhere by standing below you, so I sit instead, and I can almost feel your gaze. My little toymaker is telling me that something must be working inside of you if your eyes can still move, and that maybe you are just worn out and need a good tune up so you can get talking again. However, my good friend reality is back with his fists and bashes the thought away.

“Kuro didn’t mean to hurt you, Daidouji-san.” Stupid, stupid me. Mentioning thy enemy in the midst of heated battle? Such stupidity on my part is making me act nothing like myself. “He didn’t know that you cared for him so deeply.” I’m defending someone that I should be furious with for putting you in this condition, but I take into account that I am not angry with any guilty parties. Including ones that are unaware that they’re guilty.

I’ve made another startling realization—I’m speaking with the mud collected in front of me, instead to you, the one I really need to speak with. I may be going insane because of the weather, which I could easily cease if I wanted to, but the atmosphere seems to fit the way I know you’re still crying just above me. Almost as if instead of the rain down my back it’s your tears. Now I must do what is right for both of us, because we do in fact have classes tomorrow and it would not do for us to have colds. I stand.

“Damn it, Daidouji, come down!”

Look at that. I am not myself again, and my eyes narrow as if they never have before, which is quite probable. You’re frustrating me so badly, and I just want to grab you from that tree and bring you down bridal-style, but I’m convinced that would make things terribly worse. Terribly worse than the situation already is, of course. You are lying there like a dying bird, and that damned toymaker that has taken residence in my heart is feeling sympathy, which overrides my own irritation. So, with the hands of mine which seem to be so good with fixing toys, I begin to climb the tree you’re sitting in, tools at my non-existent belt for my pants fit just fine, ready to make you look and feel like new. Reality is decidedly absent for the time being.

“If you will not come down, Daidouji-san, then I will just sit up here with you until the rain stops. When it does, I shall take you down, Daidouji- san, for Sakura would get very angry with me if I just left you here alone. Now do you see what you have done, Daidouji-san? We are two birds stuck in their nest during an autumn storm.” I want to laugh. My stubborn nature does not derive from Master Clow Reed or the father Fujitaka. No, this is one of my own flaws. Besides, my comparison does seem to fit us awfully well; two drenched blue-covered youths with dark hair stuck to their head by rain. Twin birds, even.

During reality’s absence, my toymaker self decides to make another jarring attempt at cheering you up. “Kuro already had a girlfriend, Daidouji-san. Did you know that? She is very pretty, Josie is her name. They have been dating for a while, Daidouji-san.” I pause, taking a few needed breaths. “Kuro’s a dense boy, Daidouji-san. He didn’t even know she liked him until she told him straight out. It isn’t your fault, Daidouji-san, but you shouldn’t have gone after him. He is weak hearted, and without Josie to support him he is a nothing with no confidence.” These facts are also obvious, for you did bare witness to Josie and Kuro together, and found out the hard way that Josie is in fact Kuro’s girlfriend. All of this is irritatingly apparent to you, and yet I speak it anyway as if I can’t shut my mouth, and I continue to say your name as if it can pick you up from your helpless state.

And through all of this my other self, the one untouched by the toymaker and usually controlled by reality, that self is wiping the tears from your face along with the rain, as if that could help you somewhat. Your skin is so soft, and the tears so heart wrenching, I cannot stop myself. So while the toymaker controls my mouth, and reality is somewhere hiding away in my shoes, I wipe your tears. Then, when the tears have stopped and I am successful, I just run my hand along your cheek, attempting to wipe your heartache away. I do wish reality would come from hiding and control me, as well as the toymaker that now forces out words that may not help you, but seem to make me feel better.

“You are not Josie, Daidouji-san, you are quite a lot better.”

And then, because reality is being awfully lazy, I place my hand behind your head and pick you up, letting your legs dangle for a moment before you get situated on my lap. Then, while my mind begins to work, I hug you tightly as if I can absorb some of that sorrow that you have and help you shoulder the burden. Reality may be waking up from what I thought was its permanent nap, but I have begun to fight its tempting rationality.

“I’m sorry, Daidouji-san. I really am. Kuro doesn’t deserve you, Daidouji- san, you are much too good for him.” Bloody hell, that toymaker has some sweet phrases in his vocabulary. They come out of my mouth like a tune I’m whistling while I oil the gears of a beloved toy getting it ready to return to... to what exactly? To reality? Reality, the annoying voice in my head that is contradicting my conscience?

Now I bury my head in your shoulder, as you have already done to me, and my own tears decide to mutiny and escape from this confusing person I have become. How can I cry at a time like this? Am I really so selfish as to seek comfort in someone so obviously broken as yourself? If I haven’t gone insane, then I must see to it that I do something about this temper.

“But that’s not good enough, is it?” I’m despicable. I’m yelling at this toy that is just about to be fixed, just because some gear of my own fell loose. How can I be so cruel? “No, it can’t be. Daidouji-san, I’m sorry for what Kuro did to you. I’m sorry for what Sakura did to you.” I think maybe reality and my toymaker are beginning a duel inside my heart, because my voice cracks as I talk. The fact that the toymaker managed to get me to pile on another one of your problems is already an amazing thing, but the fact that he can even try to fight reality is starting to make my eyes go wide.

The duel is even thus far. The toymaker is ready with his wooden sword that he made himself for a boy who used to live in town but moved away before he could give it to him. Reality wields, however, a real axe that could easily destroy the sword if it got too close. The toymaker has speed on his side, and I root for him even as I hold you.

In the end, reality does in fact chop the poor toymaker’s sword in half, but he put up a good fight and bows gallantly to reality, stepping away from my conscience and voice box to let reality through. It walks up to the controls with confidence, and I begin my descent down the tree, clinging to branches that have begun to dry. So reality observed that the sun was out, did it? It’s a smart little thing.

Surprising everyone including itself, reality gestures to my petite toymaker to take over the controls when I finally reach the ground again, and my head tilts upward to look expectantly up at you. Then the spotlight comes down on you even though you aren’t moving. The orchestra is silenced and the toymaker steps away from the controls after making my arms open wide. All eyes, however, are turned to the beautiful spectacle up in the tree, the one that now jerks ever so slightly, and pulls herself to her feet ever so gracefully, and when she finally appears before me I ever so gently wrap her in my arms and hold her as I did up in our tree. It has become ours, because a historic battle has taken place, where my toymaker and reality have finally become allies.

“I know I’m not good enough, Daidouji-san, and I know that I cannot suddenly inflate your heart.” Without even the toymaker’s help my choice of words is flawless, and I smile not only for you but also because of my own pride. Still selfish, I see. “But I will protect you and let you take flight, even if that means I have to carry your burdens along with mine. Please, Daidouji-san, could you come inside and get dried off?” I take your arm, and realize this one isn’t in top condition. So that one was broken like your ankle. So I take the other, smiling, and though you do not return the look, you let me pull you towards the school.

I do not notice as the toymaker steps up to the controls one more time, and has me place an arm around your waist.