dinohouse | [Rescue Fire/Gaia fusion] For Tatsuya

"You're my brother and you won't even give me a fry? I would've given you mine." Tatsuya looked like he would have liked to continue in this vein for longer; but, on seeing Katsumi distracted, waved a hand in front of Katsumi's face.

"You didn't even ask," Katsumi pointed out. Oh, now he was channeling his aunt. Not a good sign.

He blinked as Tatsuya's hand waved in front of his face. "Hm?"

"You're away with the fairies." Tatsuya flashed him a ketchup-smeared grin then took advantage of Katsumi's absent-mindedness to commandeer Katsumi's milkshake.

"Am not... Hey!"

Katsumi eyed him in resignation, not bothering to try and get it back. That would only result in it hitting the floor as well and then the servers would have another mess to clean up.

Tatsuya's face fell at the sight of Katsumi's expression and without taking a sip he passed the milkshake back, "... sorry." He chewed up the last of his fries in silence.

"No, it's fine," he said hurriedly, pushing it back. "Yours ended up the floor, we might as well share it."

Well. This was awkward.

Tatsuya took the lid off the milkshake so they could each stick a straw in and slurp. For once in his life he actually took a moment to give Katsumi a head start.

Katsumi's eyebrows rose slightly. Was Tatsuya actually waiting for him to do something instead of running on ahead?

"What happened?" he blurted, unsure if he meant what happened that day or just in general. He knew the basics of what had happened to his parents, his aunt and uncle had never hidden it from him, but he didn't know anything concrete. And even now he still didn't know why they'd been separated in the first place.

"What happened to who?" Tatsuya blinked and took a smaller than usual sip of the milkshake, trying for Katsumi's sake not to slurp.

...Was he really that dense? He didn't remember Tatsuya being quite this clueless.

"Mom and Dad," he said eventually, picking up one of the serviettes and methodically shredding it. Well, it was as good a place to start as any.

"Right ..." The question threw Tatsuya a little as his mind had still been on milkshakes, and he wasn't expecting Katsumi to just ask about something like that. He wasn't sure where to start, "you know about most of it, right? When you were in the hospital."

"Yeah, I know the basics. You guys were out, there was a fire, the building exploded and," he waved a hand. "You know."

He sighed and propped his chin in his hands. "I only got it in bits and pieces, though." Logically he knew that was probably down to either not having information at the time or concern about his health, but he'd had to piece a lot of it together himself, after they'd finally told him. "And no-one ever told me why I never saw you again. I just assumed..."

Assumed that Tatsuya had died as well. Which had turned out not to be the case.

"No one ever told me, either. I lived with -" Tatsuya named a distant aunt, "for a couple of years, but it didn't work out, so I went to a children's home. Himawari School! You've heard of it, right?" Without waiting for a response he went on "I never understood why she couldn't take both of us. Maybe she couldn't afford it."

Katsumi stared at him blankly. That... did not make sense. A children's home? When he'd spent the rest of his childhood with different relatives? "But... why?" How in hell had that happened?

"Himawari... was that the one that burnt down?" He vaguely remembered hearing about that. "Arson or something?"

"Yeah ..." Tatsuya wasn't minded to go into everything about Ukaen now, "She never told me why no one else in the family would let me live with them. But it's OK! I was happy there!" He flashed Katsumi another of his too-bright smiles. By the time he'd been sent to Himawari he was so miserable that almost anywhere would have seemed like an improvement.

"You shouldn't have had to," Katsumi said fiercely. "I don't understand why they only took me and not both of us."

If anything, it should really have been the other way around, considering Tatsuya was the healthy one at the time. Why didn't anyone else do something?

"But I was happy," Tatsuya repeated, and took another gulp at Katsumi's milkshake. "Maybe they could only afford you, just like she could only afford me." He had been told so many times what an expensive nuisance he was and how much he was costing his aunt to keep that he was certain there was no way she could have coped with Katsumi as well.

That... doesn't seem right. "Maybe?" He studied Tatsuya closely, trying to figure out what he wasn't saying. "Maybe if they hadn't had to worry about my hospital bills they could have had both of us." If expenses had been the reason in the first place.

"Yeah, but it's not your fault. It's more important for you to get better." Tatsuya pouted back at him but cheered up when he noticed that Katsumi had left some fries.

Like having his brother around wouldn't have helped, Katsumi thought sourly, taking care not to mention that out loud, taking his attentio off his remaining fries. "Would have helped if they'd told me what happened to you, though."

Tatsuya shrugged, "Maybe they didn't know. I don't think she ever wrote to them. I used to ask to see you, but she said I wasn't allowed. So I stopped asking." He began dipping the leftover fries into the pile of ketchup on his plate, "could you get me some more ketchup please?"

"She had no right to do that." Gritting his teeth against the anger, Katsumi stood up and stalked over to the counter for more ketchup. How dare she do something like that, lying to keep them separated, and for so long.

Tatsuya accepted the ketchup eagerly and began wolfing down the remaining fries, seemingly oblivious to Katsumi's rage. When he looked up at his brother his face fell, "what?"

How did he not understand what a big deal this was? Katsumi wondered in frustration. "It doesn't bother you that she did that? That she lied about it, repeatedly?"

Along with everything else. Why was he the only one pissed off about everything?

Tatsuya cringed. His instinct was to hug Katsumi or try to calm him down in some way, but he didn't want to be punched in the nose nor to create a scene in the restaurant, "It's sad, and I wish I could have been with you. But she couldn't afford to have us both! She kept saying it was too expensive for her to look after me!" As difficult as things had been, he still considered his time at the Himawari School the happiest years of his life; the only way to improve upon them would have been if Katsumi were there with him.

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