Death Note fanfiction, as usual
Nov. 20th, 2008 07:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tallulahgs[Title] Priorities Other Than Serial Killers
[Rating] PG
[Pairings/Characters] Aizawa/Eriko (his wife, named in Episode 17 or so)
[Word Count] 1425
[Warnings] None, I think? It's canon that she threw something at him during a row once ;)
Written for and crossposted to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
dn_contest, prompt "anniversary".
The house seems so small and low-ceilinged and it smells of kids and juice and crumbs. You'd expect that working in such a ridiculously new building would make you despise your home, but Aizawa doesn't; he likes places that look and feel and smell like real people live in them.
By now he's used to getting to bed in the dark; easing his shoes off gently, not tripping over the steps, letting the tap run quietly as he brushes his teeth. Eriko's always asleep. He doesn't usually put an arm round her or anything, in case he wakes her up.
It's a routine, of sorts.
But tonight the lit window is hanging there as he walks up to the door and when he gets to the bedroom she's not just awake, she's sitting up, reading, as if it's only nine o'clock or something.
(He's always figured you'll run out of things to say to your girlfriend eventually, but even now, when it's two a.m. and the dorm heating went off hours ago and they've both given up on sleeping, even now she whispers how they'll be made mincemeat of in lectures tomorrow because they'll both look so tired and he says he doesn't care, everyone'll figure he had a wild night, and he feels her laugh - she's in his arms 'cause it's so cold, forget the agreement to stop making out at midnight - and she tells him not to ruin her reputation.)
"Did you have a good day at work?" she says as he steps into the bedroom, which proves he must have made her angry somehow because she's saying it so coldly even someone like Matsuda would pick up on the subtext of I hope it was disastrous.
"Same as usual. Uh... why are you still up?"
"I was waiting for you."
"Why? You know the hours aren't going to get any shorter -"
"So you couldn't make an exception, then?"
(He doesn't know how to ask someone to get married. Flowery proposals have never been him, and it seems pointless anyway because she knows it's something they're going to have to get on with soon. Her parents have been getting at her as well. But he remembers that this sort of stuff is important to girls and he doesn't want to start off by letting her down or, god forbid, putting her off completely, and so he asks her to come for a walk with him. It's cold and the sky is grey and the pavement is slippery with dead leaves and she has her arm tucked through his and they circumnavigate the same block three times before he manages to spit it out.
After the acceptance and the cold-mouthed kiss they're walking, not really going anywhere, just saying things as they occur, and she says she assumes once they graduate she won't see him so much, right? That even if they give it a while before they actually get married, it -
He doesn't want it to be that she gets all clingy, she's always understood stuff before, more or less, and so he just shrugs and says yeah, he reckons so.)
"Don't be stupid," he says, and he almost says it only because he's tired.
She slams her book down and stares at him and she says, "Excuse me?" Which is what she always does when she's angry, makes him say it again, but that's fine, he's happy to repeat it, "I said, don't be stupid. This is serial murder, it's not something I can decide I quit just because I can't be bothered tonight."
"You realise Yumi hasn't seen you for forty-eight hours?" she snaps back. "We both had fathers who were actually around, is it so hard to give her the same?"
"I know it's been a busy week, all right?"
"It's been a busy year."
He'd like to deny that, but then he'd look like the stupid one. "Well, that's just the way things are. Can we please not talk about this now?" And his eyes flick to the clock, to say something incredibly clever like it's one in the morning, staying up this late just to fight is pointless but the clock is one of those that has a date underneath it and all at once something clicks in his constantly sleep-deprived brain and he realises.
What he should say, he knows, is oh, god, I forgot, I'm really sorry darling, I'll make it up to you as soon as I have some time that isn't spent hunting psychopathic vigilantes and watching some sociopathic detective eat cake. And perhaps he would if it weren't so late and he weren't so tired and he weren't already feeling he's skiving the case, fading out of the team, because he isn't there twenty-four-seven. But it's one in the morning, and Eriko isn't looking tearful or vulnerable, she's looking sour and cold and like she can't even be bothered to try and understand.
And so he says, "That's why you're still awake, isn't it? You stayed up just to yell at me for not buying you flowers. For god's sake, this is ridiculous."
"I'm so sorry I thought you might actually remember our anniversary!" she hisses in that don't-wake-the-children voice they've cultivated for all their fights. "I'm so sorry I thought you might remember something that isn't to do with work!"
"Right now work is the only thing which is important, why can't you get that?" And he wouldn't have said because people are dying or because they killed Ukita or because I promised I'd help catch the bastard and sometimes it looks like we never will but it probably doesn't matter because she almost starts screaming at him and then she remembers the children and instead she snatches her book up again and throws it at him.
(He knows his temper's too short, always known it; at school he was always in trouble for fighting even if he never actually started it and more than once he was in trouble for saying what he thought or saying it too loudly. And girls were always scared of him, or he made them cry without meaning to and then that made him even angrier. But Eriko doesn't get scared. She gets angry as well, her temper is short and sharp and flicks out but because of that she knows when he's angry that that's all it is, anger, and so afterwards they'll be able to look at each other and laugh and he figures at least that won't change.)
The corner of the book glances off his forehead, and Eriko puts a hand to her mouth, scrambles out of bed, "Oh god. I'm sorry, are you all right? Oh god, you're bleeding -" And he is as well, the sharp edge of the dustjacket hit him at just the wrong angle, and she hurries out to the bathroom to find him a plaster and when she comes back he hears himself say, "I search for serial killers all day and then get brained when I come back here." He sounds like he isn't sure whether to be sarcastic or joking. But she looks at him and then she gives a little snort of laughter - kind of tears, but mainly laughter - and he finds himself grinning back at her.
"I'm fine," he says, but she insists on putting the plaster on the tiny scratch even though he points out that no one would've noticed it otherwise. And she says again that she's sorry and so once they're both in bed and the light is off he manages to say he's sorry too. They don't say anything more than that because they both know it isn't all worked out now. But he puts his arms round her, and at least he's not sleeping on the couch.
[Rating] PG
[Pairings/Characters] Aizawa/Eriko (his wife, named in Episode 17 or so)
[Word Count] 1425
[Warnings] None, I think? It's canon that she threw something at him during a row once ;)
Written for and crossposted to
dn_contest, prompt "anniversary".The house seems so small and low-ceilinged and it smells of kids and juice and crumbs. You'd expect that working in such a ridiculously new building would make you despise your home, but Aizawa doesn't; he likes places that look and feel and smell like real people live in them.
By now he's used to getting to bed in the dark; easing his shoes off gently, not tripping over the steps, letting the tap run quietly as he brushes his teeth. Eriko's always asleep. He doesn't usually put an arm round her or anything, in case he wakes her up.
It's a routine, of sorts.
But tonight the lit window is hanging there as he walks up to the door and when he gets to the bedroom she's not just awake, she's sitting up, reading, as if it's only nine o'clock or something.
(He's always figured you'll run out of things to say to your girlfriend eventually, but even now, when it's two a.m. and the dorm heating went off hours ago and they've both given up on sleeping, even now she whispers how they'll be made mincemeat of in lectures tomorrow because they'll both look so tired and he says he doesn't care, everyone'll figure he had a wild night, and he feels her laugh - she's in his arms 'cause it's so cold, forget the agreement to stop making out at midnight - and she tells him not to ruin her reputation.)
"Did you have a good day at work?" she says as he steps into the bedroom, which proves he must have made her angry somehow because she's saying it so coldly even someone like Matsuda would pick up on the subtext of I hope it was disastrous.
"Same as usual. Uh... why are you still up?"
"I was waiting for you."
"Why? You know the hours aren't going to get any shorter -"
"So you couldn't make an exception, then?"
(He doesn't know how to ask someone to get married. Flowery proposals have never been him, and it seems pointless anyway because she knows it's something they're going to have to get on with soon. Her parents have been getting at her as well. But he remembers that this sort of stuff is important to girls and he doesn't want to start off by letting her down or, god forbid, putting her off completely, and so he asks her to come for a walk with him. It's cold and the sky is grey and the pavement is slippery with dead leaves and she has her arm tucked through his and they circumnavigate the same block three times before he manages to spit it out.
After the acceptance and the cold-mouthed kiss they're walking, not really going anywhere, just saying things as they occur, and she says she assumes once they graduate she won't see him so much, right? That even if they give it a while before they actually get married, it -
He doesn't want it to be that she gets all clingy, she's always understood stuff before, more or less, and so he just shrugs and says yeah, he reckons so.)
"Don't be stupid," he says, and he almost says it only because he's tired.
She slams her book down and stares at him and she says, "Excuse me?" Which is what she always does when she's angry, makes him say it again, but that's fine, he's happy to repeat it, "I said, don't be stupid. This is serial murder, it's not something I can decide I quit just because I can't be bothered tonight."
"You realise Yumi hasn't seen you for forty-eight hours?" she snaps back. "We both had fathers who were actually around, is it so hard to give her the same?"
"I know it's been a busy week, all right?"
"It's been a busy year."
He'd like to deny that, but then he'd look like the stupid one. "Well, that's just the way things are. Can we please not talk about this now?" And his eyes flick to the clock, to say something incredibly clever like it's one in the morning, staying up this late just to fight is pointless but the clock is one of those that has a date underneath it and all at once something clicks in his constantly sleep-deprived brain and he realises.
What he should say, he knows, is oh, god, I forgot, I'm really sorry darling, I'll make it up to you as soon as I have some time that isn't spent hunting psychopathic vigilantes and watching some sociopathic detective eat cake. And perhaps he would if it weren't so late and he weren't so tired and he weren't already feeling he's skiving the case, fading out of the team, because he isn't there twenty-four-seven. But it's one in the morning, and Eriko isn't looking tearful or vulnerable, she's looking sour and cold and like she can't even be bothered to try and understand.
And so he says, "That's why you're still awake, isn't it? You stayed up just to yell at me for not buying you flowers. For god's sake, this is ridiculous."
"I'm so sorry I thought you might actually remember our anniversary!" she hisses in that don't-wake-the-children voice they've cultivated for all their fights. "I'm so sorry I thought you might remember something that isn't to do with work!"
"Right now work is the only thing which is important, why can't you get that?" And he wouldn't have said because people are dying or because they killed Ukita or because I promised I'd help catch the bastard and sometimes it looks like we never will but it probably doesn't matter because she almost starts screaming at him and then she remembers the children and instead she snatches her book up again and throws it at him.
(He knows his temper's too short, always known it; at school he was always in trouble for fighting even if he never actually started it and more than once he was in trouble for saying what he thought or saying it too loudly. And girls were always scared of him, or he made them cry without meaning to and then that made him even angrier. But Eriko doesn't get scared. She gets angry as well, her temper is short and sharp and flicks out but because of that she knows when he's angry that that's all it is, anger, and so afterwards they'll be able to look at each other and laugh and he figures at least that won't change.)
The corner of the book glances off his forehead, and Eriko puts a hand to her mouth, scrambles out of bed, "Oh god. I'm sorry, are you all right? Oh god, you're bleeding -" And he is as well, the sharp edge of the dustjacket hit him at just the wrong angle, and she hurries out to the bathroom to find him a plaster and when she comes back he hears himself say, "I search for serial killers all day and then get brained when I come back here." He sounds like he isn't sure whether to be sarcastic or joking. But she looks at him and then she gives a little snort of laughter - kind of tears, but mainly laughter - and he finds himself grinning back at her.
"I'm fine," he says, but she insists on putting the plaster on the tiny scratch even though he points out that no one would've noticed it otherwise. And she says again that she's sorry and so once they're both in bed and the light is off he manages to say he's sorry too. They don't say anything more than that because they both know it isn't all worked out now. But he puts his arms round her, and at least he's not sleeping on the couch.
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no subject
Date: 2008-11-20 11:24 pm (UTC)I also really felt for Aizawa's stress here. it ain't easy spending almost all of your time trying to catch a serial mass-murderer.
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Date: 2008-11-23 11:05 am (UTC)I feel really bad for Aizawa around this time in the anime, I'm glad his stress came through well - and that you liked the way I wrote Eriko! Thank you! :D