Chapter 28: My White Lotus

CHAPTER WARNING: BLOOD, KNIVES.

The harsh winds inside the tent had died down, instead they were replaced by the soft and gentle winds of Shu who has been tamed. "It's okay, you're okay.." The white haired tightened his hug to him, caressing his ash colored hair with his long fingers.

When Estes and Shu were taken in a long embrace, and their hearts were in the closest distance, they could feel each other's feelings, all the guilts and loneliness.. like it was almost reassuring that somebody also shares the same pain as they both have. Shu had completely fell in the tranquility of the white haired boy's embrace, giving in to Estes' figure, and being drunk on his flower-like scent that soothed his heart.

Estes would speak so gentle; "As long as im here, no one can hurt you." His voice would soft vibrations to Shu's heart getting the hang of calming him down. With the help of the surrounding lights of the fireflies and his scent, Shu finally fell asleep on his safest embrace.

For days, even weeks of Shu's restless walk towards death, he finally felt the peace and quietness, the comfort and warmth he so longed to be felt was just here, obtained within the stranger he mysteriously met like a gift.

Estes would read this feeling inside Shu's heart, and translate those poems to actions, as if trusting this injured stranger were the most normal thing to do. It was as if they've exchanged thousands of conversations before, like lifelong companions since their last lives.

It was a very funny feeling full of confusion.

Standing from one spot, Estes rubbed Shu's thin and skeletal back, wondering what must've he went through to lose the flesh and fat of his skin. Pulling his head back, his golden eyes landed on Shu's softened expressions, checking if he was already asleep. As he expected, he was totally right; Shu had already calmed down and was out cold in his hold, sleeping so still and soundly while leaning on Estes' chest.

How he slept in a flash made the white haired boy chuckle and it was also as if the fireflies were lovingly laughing too around the air. Estes gently stepped and guided Shu's body to lay down the bed without waking him. Successfully doing so, he sighed, wiping his sweat. He observed the curious boy, and bent down again to tuck his four limbs to fit in the bed, making it creak a bit.

After a few moments of thinking what to do next, he turned around and set his eyes down the boy's ravaged and cut in half clothes. He walked towards it and picked it up, smelling the familiar scent of blood that spreads around the air triggering emotions inside Estes' heart.

He shook his head and gulped away the fear that was trying to overpower him. As promised, Estes doesn't plan to get a wink of sleep, instead, he searched for the bandage and sat beside Shu, quietly lifting his arm and wrapping the fabric around Shu's injured wrists. After doing both of his wrists, Estes in struggle lifted Shu's upper body, and quickly wrapped his chest wounds and tied the fabric together, praying solemnly that his body could still be healed, and so he could have a piece of clothing and feel more warmth in his sleep.

After the tiring bandaging session, he placed Shu's body back to the same position, and removed a layer of his own outer clothes then placed it above Shu's sleeping body to cover him and for it to serve as a warm blanket on Shu's bare skin.

Thinking of clothes, by the time the issue notified Estes, he turned his heel and tiptoed silently to a wooden chest carved with spectacular snowflake illustrations. Rummaging through the kind box, he sighed in relief as he found larger white clothes that may fit the boy. Standing up once more, his hand would grasp the pleasant touch of the thick and rich quality of the hand woven lotus threads made by his mother, giving a bit of a painful smile to the air.

The chair creaked when Estes slumped down his body on it, sitting with a very strange position, he started sketching an identical body of Shu wearing a set of customized clothes on a paper using hardened orange clay to roughly scribble his design in mind. After finishing a clean and simple looking clothing sketch, Estes pulled a flower pin behind his ear and placed it on the papersheet, clamping it on a page of his own book, filled with his unique and exotic designs.

He grabbed the blood-soaked clothes of Shu, and also the very clean and white ones of his and started to combine them in a new piece. Estes sat in an even more complicated way, but his eyes wanders off to Shu's direction everytime who was still laying in bed, deeply asleep from the help of aromatic fragrance of herbs.

With both black and white fabrics in his hold and the book resting on his lap, Estes gathered the strong and white thread and needle as well as the shears which he used so carefully, trying not to make any noise to disturb the other's sleep.

The night had sank even deeper, and only the sound of the fibers getting ripped was heard from the kind tent of the beautiful white haired boy. He cut and sewn the battered and cropped clothes in his size, from night to the yawning break of dawn, he made a new piece of black and white clothing just for Shu. Despite the accidental pricks on his fingers and the pain on his neck, Estes simply thought that these foreign clothes which was in ways very different from what he typically wears, are a waste to be thrown.

The sun had finally risen with Estes just admiring the new clothes he just stitched, After a long sitting, when Estes stood from the chair, he could feel the strain on his back and how his neck was sore. He suddenly felt like an old man.

"Ow ow ow ow.." his face cried, stretching his limbs and back. Each minute with Estes stitching the wrecked clothes, he would glance up to the sleeping boy to check if he's still sleeping. The muscles of his long porcelain legs felt extremely numb down to his toes, wanting to relax them, he sat on the same bed as Shu and just watched a person sleep for a few moments, noticing a pair of thick and long eyelashes and a tall, pointy nose. It was handsome for Estes' opinion, it was a first for him to see another human-being this close again for years.

"He sleeps like a breathing rock!" He whispers to himself, trying to suppress his laughs. But honestly, Estes could never stop the giggles from escaping his mouth, instead tears form under his eyes and he would start shaking since he's just so teeerribly bad at keeping his laughs.

The bed has been shaking from his laughs, and so he decides to stand again, breathing out his laughs when he opens an orange dawn before the tent's doors.

A fascinating sight beyond him unfolded once more, the gigantic trees were brightly glowing, and the sun's raw rays peeks from the orange leaves. The wind was still cold from the night and fog drifts over the wide village, making the fantasyland even more dreamy. Estes would sigh and the birds would follow. The winds would blow his dress as he looks back to the sleeping boy in his bed. "What a morning."

"Dan... Dan! Where are you going?!" Shouted the eleven year old Shu from afar, seeing his small friend's back slowly disappearing. He tried to move forward and run after Dan but he could not. Looking down, the ground vanished and he was floating up in the air, something behind him was restraining his body. The mud on Dan's feet squelched as he turned around to face the helpless floating Shu. The ash haired boy's eyes bulged and felt like his heart sank, when he saw his friend turn, Dan did not have a face, only he was holding tightly onto the precious necklace of his birth mother which she left him. Shu's breath hitched, the memories of their first meeting through the necklace would flash infront of his mind, then snippets of imageries of knives and blood would torment Shu's head, wanting to scream but his voice was gone.

Shu panicked at the absence of his voice, so he grasped his throat and felt a great sting, when he looked down at his hand his pupils shrank at the sight of blood that came from his sliced neck. He was feeling the horror and confusion storming inside him.

When he saw another figure walk along Dan's side, the eighteen year old Shu would try and force his throat to scream: "Mom! Mother! Can't I tag along?!" His voice was rough and hoarse, he felt blood gush down down his neck.

"Why are you going away?! Mom! Dan!" He cried out to them, wanting himself to be heard even if the two were already far away.

Like it did, the woman's body turned around and opened her mouth, saying in a distorted voice; "Because you couldn't save us." Then her face appeared, "Now everything is black."

Shu gasped and opened his eyes, immediately sitting up from the bed. Despite having a difficult time from breathing, his eyes immediately scanned around his surroundings, searching for a certain person.

'Where is he?!' Shu's head turned everywhere, and when he saw the glimpse of white standing at the doorway, he ran behind Estes and stood panting on his back.

He raised his bandaged right hand and reached for a strand of Estes' white hair caressing it slowly then sighed in relief.

The jolly Estes in front felt the presence behind him and the gentle tug on his hair. When he turned his head, he jumped back in great shock. "WAH!!!... You surprised me!" Estes pants and holds his dear heart. "Please make a noise next time- hooh.." he breathed in and out, trying to figure out Shu's face that made him worry.

Shu nodded, agreeing of the 'making noise' act after he wakes up or whenever he's near Estes. His face looked pale and afraid, he wore an unchanged and neutral expressions while looking down on Estes' strange tiptoed feet.

Estes noticing his face smiled widely, "Hum! Flowers?" A bouquet of violet, red, pink and white hibiscus flowers landed on Shu's bandaged chest, and when he looked up, he saw Estes' lips having faint tints of red, guessing that it was from the red pigment of the petals.

'For breakfast?' Shu blinked, completely forgetting the nightmare.

"Hibiscuses aren't a bad meal!" Estes brightens and plucked a violet petal and eats it, Shu's face still unchanging and just looked at him with unbelievable eyes.

'I will die for meat.' a monotone voice inside Shu's head said, his stomach doing outbursts of flips from the mention of grilled and sauce dripping meat.

"Come on and finish it, we'll head to the river after, its nice bathing in the sunrise!" Estes cheered along with the colorful and large flying birds around the tent.

Unfazed of the beauty outside the tent, Shu wondered inside his head; 'thats.. isn't bathing early in the morning cold..' he shivered.

"Oh no! Not at all not at all!" Estes aggressively shook his head and started explaining heavily how taking baths early can bring energy and refreshments to a person. But all Shu could think was: 'Can he really hear my thoughts?'

The ripping sound of petals caught Shu's ears, and suddenly a bunch of soft and sweet pink petals were shoved inside his mouth, Estes saying; "This goes in here—" then Estes grabbed a fistful of flowers and dumped it inside his mouth; "—and this goes to here, yep! Let's go!"

With a basket on the other hand, Estes placed his fingers on his lips and whistled a melody, calling his pet, Raja.

A monstrous tiger.

'Woa-!'