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Once the mission had ended, and the Suzaku conglomerate had been taken down, Edamura decided he'd earned a damn drink or two.
Cynthia was already about ten steps ahead of him, unsurprisingly, and Laurent was right behind her.
They were both sprawled across lawn chairs aboard the bow of the ship, talking and laughing with shit eating grins that took up half their faces.
After Edamura was a few drinks in himself, he'd decided that their shit eating grins were pissing him off.
He grabbed one more glass of whatever top shelf wine Laurent decided was fit for their expensive taste and made his way to the stern. As he walked back, he heard the faint clinking of glasses, followed by boisterous laughter that was begging to get under his skin.
It was all a damn game to them, really. Hell, they'd gotten to enjoy their roles. That was the issue really; they always got the pleasure of acting.
In L.A., they got to watch first hand as Edumara went through moral dilemma after moral dilemma. Got to watch him scream and rage when he thought he'd lost his colleagues. (little did he know, it wouldn't even be the last time he'd have to go through that.)
In Singapore, Edamura could almost picture them; all gathered together in someone's hotel room, eavesdropping with some listening bug probably planted on Shi-won Kim, if not himself, as he'd gotten jumped once, almost twice. They’d probably laughed hysterically.
Hell, they'd laughed their asses off when Edamura dared to think he was a good mechanic, when he'd thought he'd done something with his life, instead of learning once again how to be their pawn rather than their teammate.
And when he reached the back of the boat, and the alcohol sat festering in his stomach, heating his body up with unabashed loathing, he'd decided that everything he'd gone through in Japan had been the last straw.
Every step of the plan, revealed to him one by one, was a separate punch to the gut. Once again, everyone but him knew what was going on. Abby said it was because he was too emotional. If that was really the problem, why not get someone better? Someone who could do what they needed, without having to be deceived time and time again.
"Are you back here brooding?" called a dull, uninterested voice. Abby.
"Brooding? Seriously?" he gripped the railing of the ship and stared off into the boat's giant wakes as they dispersed into the open sea.
"The job’s done, dunno why you're still pissed about it," she stated, flatly. Her monotone voice was a part of her, but right now Edamura couldn't help but feel even more pissed off because of it.
"If you're that disinterested in how I feel, why are you here?"
"Because you're being immature. You don't have to take it so personally. Like I said- job's done."
"Jobs done? Is that seriously all you have to say to me?" his voice was giving him away, exposing just how strongly he felt, "I watched children get kidnapped, I watched them get sold, I had to pretend to fucking sell them. I had to watch you die- again! I cried for you, Abby. Is this really, really all you have to say?"
"Listen- I get that you went through a lot, but-"
"No! No, you don't fucking get it Abby. If you really got it, you wouldn't be here, talking down to me, acting like everything I went through was a means to an end- like I'm being childish!"
"I just wanna make sure you're okay."
Ok? Was she fucking serious?
"This life can be a lot sometimes, Edamura,"
"Why do you even care? Why now?" he spat out, finally whipping around to face her. His face was red with anger, and he was damn near seething.
This made her take a step back. ‘Good,’ he thought.
"I just-"
"No! This whole time- this whole damn time, you've made it clear that you see my emotions as nothing but a hitch in the plan, an inconvenience. You've done nothing but talk down to me. So why now? Why does it matter how I feel now, Abby?"
Abby had always been a woman of few words, but now, it seemed she had none.
He watched with half-lidded, cold eyes as she looked him up and down, pulled her lips into a thin line, and walked away.
Edamura watched her go with the overwhelming urge to scream. He wanted to scream his lungs hoarse with enough power to knock her over. Maybe then she'd understand, maybe they all would.
Or maybe they'd laugh. ‘There goes Edamura, with his feelings’ they'd say.
He had feelings; feelings that were hurt. Fucking sue him.
He'd opted now to sit down, rather than stand up. His brain was beginning to tire out his body.
The wine in his glass was a shining blood red, highlighted by the white streaks of light coming down from the moon.
Around him, the waves of the ocean were calm, much to his dismay. Part of him wanted them to be roaring with him. He wanted to watch them rise and break, wanted them to crash against the ship, sending everyone on it stumbling from one side to the other; doing what he couldn't do.
All that he could do was slosh his cup around and watch the wine spiral and dance before sending it shooting down the back of its throat- earthy and bitter.
When it joined the rest inside his stomach, Edamura felt himself shift from rabid with anger, to exhaustion. His head drooped, all his rage melting away, leaving nothing but loathing in its place.
He halfheartedly tossed his wine glass into the ocean; Laurent could afford a new one. (Though, he immediately felt bad for the fish.)
He needed his hands to hold his face, he had a strange feeling his head would fall off if he didn't. Screw Laurent and his dumb wine glass.
And speak of the devil, the soft pitter patter of dignified footsteps began to fill his ears, he didn't even need to turn around to know who it was.
"Edamame! How goes the night? Our Abby says you're having a bit of a crisis back here," he saunters over with poise that shouldn't be present given the alcohol in his system, but he manages it anyway.
"I don't want to talk to you Laurent," Edamura sighs, fingers dangling loosely over the thin wire of the railing.
"Come now, don't be cruel, Edamame, " says Laurent, leaning back against the railing of the ship and spreading his arms out wide over the cool metal.
"Don't be cruel, he says," spits out a tired Edamura, "Watch kids get trafficked, watch people die, get lied to over and over, but don't be cruel, Edamura," he laughs, dry and somber.
Tears are welling in his eyes, and he starts desperately praying to any god listening that they don't spill out. That would truly be the end for him, "but wait, you don't even call me Edamura, you call me that stupid nickname, which I hate- by the way."
He heard Laurent let out a long sigh.
"Perhaps I've been too hard on you, Edamura. For that, I apologize. But it's my fault, not Abby's. She may not have shown it, but you hurt her feelings."
"Her-" Edamura chokes, and gods be damned, he just can't hold back his tears anymore. Not after everything he’s just been through, "Her feelings, Laurent?"
Laurent's neutral face shifts, a thin frown replacing the flat line that his lips had been previously pursed into.
"Edamura, I'm sorry you got hurt. I do hope you believe at least that much."
"That's not it," Edamura replied, "It's not that I got hurt- it's that I'm the only one ever getting hurt. I'm the only one who ever gets left in the dark."
"Authenticity was crucial in-"
"Nobody else had to be authentic but me!" he cried, "If my emotions are really that much of a risk factor, find somebody else! Someone you don't have to lie to for your plans to go smoothly. I can't do it, Laurent."
He was met by silence. For a moment, Edamura let the burning tears fall down his face without saying a word.
Eventually, Laurent pushed off the railing, turned his body around, and sat cross-legged next to Edamura.
"I chose you Edamura. I want you to be part of the team, not somebody else."
"We aren't a team." says Edamura, glancing over to get a peek at Laurent's face, which now looks as tired as his own, lips twitching slightly at his words, "That's what you told me. It's what you all tell me. Every time."
Laurent doesn't reply.
"If you want me to be a confidence man so badly- if you're just going to find some way to manipulate me into coming back to you every time I try to leave, why won't you- why won’t any of you- at the very least call yourselves my friends?" he says, voice breaking once again, “If you don’t want me to have a normal life, and meet people who care about me, why won’t you care about me?”
"Edamura, it's more complicated than that," Laurent breathes out, and it sounds so small.
At this point, the dam breaks, "Why?" Edamura yells out, and an ugly sob follows, "Do you know how hard I cried for Cynthia? For Abby? I nearly starved myself to death when I mourned them, Laurent! I broke down in the arms of a human trafficker! That's how badly I needed someone to be there- to treat my feelings like they were anything other than a fucking bump in the road!"
He turned to face him, tear-streaked eyes and running nose, "I need people to care about me Laurent. I can't keep living like this. I can't keep losing my mind over you people when you wouldn't do the same for me."
It was then that Laurent turned his body to face him, too. When Laurent finally took everything in, he was at a loss for words, Laurent didn't look smug, or disappointed, he just looked beat. It was just so Not-Laurent that Edamura almost didn’t recognize the man in front of him.
"Edamura," he said, and that seemed to be the only thing he could muster up.
"Laurent," he said back, "Everything you did, everything I had to do, you put all this together for Dorothy, right?"
"I did."
"Would you do it for me?"
"I- what?"
"You're not a team, you're not friends, but you did all this for her. I went through hell. I sacrificed so much of myself for this mission. Tell me, Laurent, did I do all of that for someone who doesn't care about me? Because if that really is true, then I can't do this anymore."
Laurent looked at him with an indiscernible look in his eyes. For a moment, they were frozen there.
Then, Laurent closed his eyes, and dropped his head down completely, letting it land softly against Edamura’s shoulder with a slight thud.
"I'm sorry, Edamura," he said for what must have been the tenth time that night, "I'm sorry I lied to you."
"Laurent? What-" Edamura started, but the words shriveled up in his mouth as the Frenchmen gripped desperately at his white shirt.
"I loved her so much," he muttered, "but she's gone, and you're here, and we made you pay for that."
"You did," he agreed.
"And we do care, Makoto," the use of his given name made him gasp softly, and his arm seemed to have a mind of its own as it wrapped in self around the blonde man's slumped shoulders, "Cynthia is so, so mad at me for lying to you. Abby is concerned, even if she has a hard time showing it. We're all just cowards, Makoto, we're actors; being genuine is our greatest fear,"
"You all should work on that then," Edamura says, chuckling softly, if only to lighten the mood
"Makoto, I want it to be you -really- no one else will do, " he said.
Then, all of the sudden, Makoto Edamura was frozen still. because Laurent Thierry's right hand came up behind his neck and carded gently through the hair gathered at the nape, fine and thick, brown like the earth.
"Laurent? W- What are you doing?" he asked, cautiously.
"I'll stop if you say the word," he drawled out, nuzzling his face against the crook of his neck, "But if you can find it in your heart, would you just let me do this for a while?"
His head was resting on his right shoulder, one hand on his shirt, the other raking through his hair, and for some reason Edamura really didn't want to think too hard about, he found that there was no way on earth he would refuse. (In reality, he knew; he knew the moment Laurent had gripped his shoulders and put that stupid pin in his suit pocket)
"It's fine," he breathed out, light as a feather.
"Merci, Makoto," Laurent sighed, releasing the hand on Edamuras shirt in favor of wrapping it around his middle, grasping him tight, "Merci beaucoup."
They sat like that for a while. The night was silent, save for Laurent's heavy breathing and the oceans gentle waves spreading across the surface.
Edamura still wasn't fully satisfied. He still had things he wanted to say, to each of them, but that could come later.
Right now, Laurent was putting his trust in Edamura, allowing himself to be rawer and more vulnerable than he'd ever been with him before, and Edamura had to give him credit for that.
After an unspecified amount of time had passed, Laurent spoke, barely audible,
"I would, by the way."
"Hmm?"
"Do the same for you. Je promets. I promise,"
Tears threatened to spill out of Edamuras eyes all over again, but he kept them down.
Laurent pulled back, letting Edamura free from his grasp and instead looking into his eyes, searching for a reaction.
"I believe you, Laurent," he said, allowing a smile to graze his face.
The Frenchman brought his hands up to hold Edamura’s face, tilting it upwards, towards his own.
"From now on, I'll be honest with you. No more being left in the dark. You have my word."
Edamura brought his hand up to cover Laurent's, and he nodded slightly, letting his eyes fall shut as Laurent brought his face closer, little by little, giving the other plenty of time to pull away.
Edamura muttered out a small, "thank you," before the Frenchman finally brought their lips together.
It was quick and gentle, but it meant so much to Edamura. This kiss was invaluable when compared to any verbal apology. It was so much more than that; it was Laurent being honest with him.
When they parted, Laurent pulled the other man into his arms, and placed his chin atop his head, kissing it lightly.
"Abby really does feel bad. She wanted to come back, but I told her to wait until tomorrow. I wanted to- I needed to talk to you first."
Edamura sighed, almost content, before he spoke.
"She better come up with one hell of an apology. Cynthia too."
Laurent laughed, pulling him closer to his chest.
"I'll pass the word along."