7A/N: So… this is just a little spin-off one-shot of my story, The Center of Everything, which is a Tai/OC – centric fanfic. (Aaaand, I probably lost 90 percent of my audience right there!)
It's also kind of AU, which explains why it's not in the original story to begin with. I just had a prompt about two people sharing a space made for one and this is the product.
Read at your own peril of course. If you can't stomach Tai/OC or hints of Sorato and Takari, then don't read. If you also don't like the English dub names, then don't read. You have been warned.
I own nothing except for Hana.
Happy reading!
xXx
Fun House
xXx
Hana was having blatant misgivings about going to the Odaiba summer fair. The others—Matt, Sora, Tai, and the rest of the former Digidestined—had all been keen on going, if only for the sake of tradition.
"We really just go for the funnel cakes," said T.K.
Hana wasn't opposed to the booth games, ring tosses and Ferris wheel. The carnival atmosphere was lively and vibrant, particularly at night. She had no reason to dislike it, save that when she was six—the last time she had gone to a fair—she had been frightened by a clown.
Amidst the dizzying lights and the intoxicating aroma of popcorn and cotton candy, her six-year-old self had wandered away from her parents' watchful eyes and had snuck into the House of Mirrors, or 'Fun House,' as her mother called it.
It was a small tent, striped orange and yellow, and it sat between two others: one, a venue for a clown act, and the other for a juggling routine. Performers overlapped between the two tents, and so the House of Mirrors was a convenient short cut. With the minimal lighting and abundance of mirrors, Fun House patrons rarely saw or cared about a lone clown scurrying through.
When little Hana had drawn apart the tent flap and entered, the colorful lights and laughter of the outside vanished, replaced with an incalculable darkness ornamented only with great slabs of silver glass. Her breath caught in her throat as she stood motionless for a second, her skinny arms reaching out to feel for walls since the black floor melded with the black walls and black ceiling. She felt like a lone planet hovering in the glittering web of space.
She grew increasingly disturbed by her divided reflection as she traveled deeper into the House of Mirrors. Her green eyes were visible somewhere on a mirror hanging from above, but her arm or foot was seen on another mirror meters away.
The fragmented visuals confused her, made her feel stretched, larger than what she was—a tiny, six-year-old girl—but less of a person. As she looked at the mirrors, she saw not herself, but shards of it.
Her heart began to beat louder in her chest, her palms sweating as she grew aware of her distance from her parents. The House of Mirrors closed in around her, pressing her with its darkness and shrinking walls, disorienting her with its flashes of glass.
Her breath quickened, and her hands searched frantically for a way out. Fingers roamed over the walls for anything—a crack, a doorknob, a latch. She found one unexpectedly, the familiar mold of a door latch exciting her enough to forego any fear. Quickly, she yanked at it, catching a little pinhole of light on the other end.
She closed the door behind her, expecting to move toward the light, but found herself trapped in utter darkness instead.
A scream ripped out of her throat first, followed by the pounding of her tiny fists and feet against the black walls. In her panic, she couldn't remember (let alone see) where the latch to the door was and so continued to wail and struggle against the confines of her space.
Her face contorted. Her mouth shrank into a pout. Her green eyes had just flooded with water when she felt a wall behind her give way. She stumbled backwards and fell directly at the feet of a fully costumed clown who looked at her quizzically before bending down to pick her up.
The shriek of terror that launched out of her mouth as the red nose, the ghostly pale face, and the wild blue hair loomed over her shook every piece of glass in the tent. She bolted from the clown and ran smack into a mirror that promptly fell to the ground and shattered.
All of the noise coming from the Fun House drew the attention of park security and personnel, and before Hana was so out of her wits that she wet her pants, her parents found her, sobbing in the center of all of the commotion. They hurriedly scooped her up in their arms, comforting her with unheard coos while she wailed, unceasingly, "I hate the fair! I want to leave! I hate it!"
The memory still made her uneasy, and she felt sick when her friends paused before another rendition of the dreaded House of Mirrors, the sick, twisted resurrection of her despised 'Fun House.'
"Uh… you all go ahead," she told them. Tai was already leading the way into the tent. "I'll go see about winning a goldfish or something."
"It's just mirrors, Han," said Tai. He was holding the tent flap up as his friends filed through, Matt and Sora entering hand-in-hand, Kari holding onto T.K.'s arm, Davis proceeding in with a 'whoop!'
No, it's not just mirrors, Hana thought. It's darkness and crazy clowns and broken glass…
"Really, Tai. I just prefer to stay out here."
"What? Afraid you won't like what you see?" he teased. "Come on." He beckoned for her hand. "Sure, it's a bit dark, but you're not afraid of the dark, are you?"
"No," she snapped. "I just…" She didn't see the use in telling Tai her real reasons for avoiding the Fun House. He'd only make fun of her for it. "Fine," she said, approaching. Her heart thumped crazily as she neared the tent, blood rushing to her head. "Just do me a favor and—"
The flap fell behind her, and, again, she was locked in that familiar darkness.
…don't leave me, she finished in her head.
"Tai?" she said softly, a hand rising to guide her.
"I'm right behind you. Relax."
She winced when she felt a hand on her shoulder.
"Don't creep up on me like that," she said.
"Fine. Then let me go ahead of you."
His arm brushed against hers as he passed, going through what seemed like another flap before entering the hall of mirrors. Hana pursued him and was surprised to find that the Fun House was better lit than she remembered. She could see herself clearly in the mirrors, and when she looked up at the ceiling, there were bright, white stage lights beaming down on them.
Tai was still ahead of her, making faces at one mirror that distorted the body's proportions.
"Huh," she began, coming up behind him. "This makes your hair look even bigger than it already is."
"It's like I have an afro or something."
"Nah," she said, flicking the ends of his unruly hair. "Too spiky to be an afro."
They continued to travel down the mirrored corridors, Tai wondering where the rest of their friends had gone and Hana wondering how she could have misinterpreted such a place when she was younger. Perhaps what made the difference was that she was wandering the House of Mirrors accompanied this time rather than alone. She was re-experiencing the Fun House and was so fascinated by (as opposed to being fearful of) it that she didn't even notice that as she and Tai continued onward, the lights dimmed and the mirrors faded into the background.
"Is it just me," said Tai, "or is it getting darker?"
"What?"
Hana turned and felt a familiar chill trace up her spine.
"Do the walls feel like they're shrinking?" she asked, arms reaching out. When her fingers made contact with one, she reached out with the other hand, able to touch two opposing sides without moving.
"Well, it didn't before, but now that I can see that you can do that…"
Tai scratched his head.
"It must mean we're nearing the exit. These tents are always built to make you feel a little claustrophobic before you get out."
"No, really?" Hana smartly retorted. She began, just as she did when she was six, to feel the walls for a door—anything—to get them out.
Although it had only been a year since Tai had been inside the Fun House, he couldn't quite remember what the trick was to exiting the tent properly. A house that split up your reflection into ten thousand pieces and trapped you in periods of absolute darkness wasn't the type that would just let you out Scot-free.
"Hold up a sec, Han," he said, touching her shoulder. "There's an easier way out than just smacking the walls for an exit."
"Tai, space is getting a bit tight, and I really don't like being stuck in a small space, okay? So excuse me for trying to get out of here the old-fashioned way."
She dodged the frame of a mirror and searched the wall behind it for an exit, her breath coming short when her fingers roved over the grooves of a door latch. The coincidences were getting eerie, and while the six-year-old Hana had been in such a panic that she lost all concept of time and space being trapped behind that door, her sixteen-year-old self was far more intelligent. She knew that once the door closed behind her, all she had to do was ignore the suffocating darkness and press on toward where the light should be.
"I found a door in the wall, Tai. We're one step closer to freedom!"
"Hana, I don't think—"
She didn't listen to him. She grabbed his wrist and hauled him through the gaping hole in the wall with her. The same little spark of light could be seen on the other end, and she took but one step toward it before the door clicked behind her and the small salt grain of light disappeared.
"No problem," she breathed aloud in the pitch blackness. "The exit is somewhere down here and I kn—"
Her toe ran smack into a hard object, offsetting her balance and making her tilt forward, her face meeting resistance.
"Wha…"
Her hands reached out, fingers spread apart, pawing at what was now, apparently, another wall.
"Well… there goes your exit theory." Tai spoke into her hair. The space that Hana had so expertly trapped them in wasn't particularly roomy. He could touch all the walls—even the ceiling—with hardly the stretch of an elbow. In fact, the ceiling was painfully low, forcing him to bend his neck and slouch.
Hana stood against him, her shoulder blade digging into his chest.
"Shit, shit, shit!" she muttered. She felt Tai's body chuckling behind her and she looked down at the floor, that was, if she could still see it.
"Pardon my French," she said.
"Let me see if I can open the latch from inside," Tai suggested. He turned around, blindly hitting Hana in the face with his elbow and then stepping on her toes as he tried to maneuver.
"Ow! Would you be more careful?" she cried.
"Well, sorry, Hana, but if you hadn't dragged me in here with you, maybe I'd still be able to see what I'm doing!"
She gave him a shove, her blind aim impeccable, as it had hit him square in the back and launched him into a neighboring wall. He rubbed his sore nose.
"Latch, latch…" he mused to himself, his hands feeling what he believed was the door they had gone through. It was a difficult feat to do, as Hana was still so close that if he tried to bend down or reach anywhere, he'd run into her, or push her, or nudge her.
"I'm not finding anything, Han. I think it locks only from the outside."
"Are you kidding me? We can't be stuck in here! There has to be a way out!"
Going by the sound of his voice alone, she moved toward him, only to bump into his body, her chin hitting what she thought was his arm.
"Okay, this isn't working," she said, the panic rising in her voice. The air left for them to breathe was getting hot and stuffy. She wiped the sweat collecting on her forehead, feeling the back of her hand sliding over the fabric of Tai's shirt.
"You can say that again," he murmured.
"One of us just has to stay still while the other goes around poking the walls for a way out," she said. "If we are both moving, we're just going to end up smacking each other a lot."
"Hana, in case you haven't noticed, it doesn't really matter if one or both of us is moving. We're going to run into each other."
His breath hit her in the face, which told her, spatially, that he was facing her.
"So what do you suppose we do, Taichi? Just stand here until someone comes and gets us?"
"No." He paused. "We can… make a lot of noise. Maybe that will get someone's attention and they'll find us."
"Oh, fantastic idea, genius," Hana scoffed. "What do you want me to do? Screech like a monkey?"
"Roar like a lion if you need to," he replied, laughing.
"You just think this a joke, don't you?"
"Well, it's kind of hard not to laugh at you, Hana. You're acting like you're going to die."
I sure am, she thought. Before we know it, some murderous clown is going to burst through the walls and—
"I just… I don't like tight spaces," she said.
"Yeah, well, that makes two of us."
Tai reevaluated his comment upon the realization that Hana was squished against him, their hips knocking, their feet overlapping, their arms in awkward positions above their heads or at their sides to keep them from touching anywhere inappropriate, which was everywhere in so small a space.
Sort of… he thought.
xXx
"My neck hurts."
Hana tried to ignore Tai's most recent complaint. She herself wasn't feeling particularly peachy at the moment. Her arms and legs ached from having to remain frozen and twisted in that dark, close space.
"Do you want to, I don't know, crouch down? Kneel?" she asked, unable to withhold her concern.
"I want to sit. Or at least be able to stretch my neck."
"Well, maybe we can make that happen."
She was willing to comply because they had been stuck in the same position, trapped inside that abominable closet, for what seemed like an hour. That was an agony no one should ever have to endure.
"How? There isn't enough space for both of us to sit."
"Well, let's see first if there's enough room for one of us to sit." She extended her hand blindly, planting it square on Tai's chest. "Okay, so you're here. Could you move a little to the side? Is that possible?"
"I think I can turn sideways."
"Okay. So I'm going to try to get a feel for how wide this hell hole is. Don't move. Don't do anything, all right?"
"Why?"
Hana didn't respond. She leaned back, pressing her spine against one wall, while gradually lifting one of her legs. She wiggled her foot a bit, the toe of her shoe touching, briefly, the opposing wall.
"Okay, so I think there should be enough space for someone to sit… crosslegged or with knees up, at least. You can have that honor since you need the weight of the ceiling taken off your neck."
Tai snorted.
"You're so kind."
If she had anything else to add, he didn't want to hear it. He just wanted to sit, and he didn't wait for any more direction from Hana before he began to crouch down. Even the slightest repositioning of his body sent relief to the back of his neck as the pressure of the ceiling was taken off.
"Taichi, wait," said Hana. She reached out, her fingertips grazing his shirt, which she grabbed. "Let me move out of the way. Compared to me, you're a giant. You're going to need leg room which I'm currently occupying."
When she said "move out of the way," he thought that she would move to the side, or slip away from him in some other fashion, but she didn't. She moved closer, into him. So close that he could feel her ribs pushing into his torso, and, consequently, the steady heave of her chest as she breathed, the air leaving her hitting him somewhere beside his right ear.
"Umm…"
"Just don't say anything."
"Right."
He continued sliding down the wall panel, occasionally pushing Hana forward or back depending on the space he needed to finally rest his bum on the ground. When at last he reached the floor, he realized that his knees were brought up, close to his chin, as that was all the room the small space could afford.
"Let me move my feet of out of the way."
Tai felt what he thought was the opposing wall move back, the scuffle of Hana's feet freeing up space, enough of it for him to sit without being curled up into a ball.
"So… where are you in all of this now that I have all of the floor to myself?" he asked into the darkness.
A slight nudge against his hip told him that her feet were planted right beside him, one foot standing against each side of his waist, which meant that she was standing over him while he sat on the floor.
It was in that moment that Tai remembered that she was wearing a dress, and that, if it weren't for all the darkness currently rendering him blind, he would be in the perfect position to look up her skirt.
Oh, God…
He wiped his face with a hand.
"I have to admit though, it's roomier up here now that we're occupying different hemispheres," observed Hana. She exhaled noisily. "Though, it's still insufferably hot."
"Aren't you tired of standing? You've been standing longer than I have now."
"All those years of ballet training weren't for nothing, Tai. I can last."
"You sure?"
Because he knew exactly where her legs were, he ran a few fingers up the side of her shin, and he grinned when he felt her tremble at his touch. He didn't know why he did it. Perhaps the veil of darkness was making him reckless, or her proximity and the shifting of body against body was giving him ideas better left to his imagination. Or, quite possibly, it was both.
"Taichi," she warned.
"Just checking to see where you are," he lied. "Though, honestly, Hana, you should probably sit. You're making me feel like a jerk—" (and pervert, he added mentally) "—having me sit here while you're left lording over me."
"And where, exactly, would I sit, Tai? On you?"
"You don't weigh much. I think I can handle it. Besides, judging from what I felt of your legs, your muscles are… pretty tense. I wouldn't want them to cramp up."
"Maybe they are tense because I'm still trapped in this blasted coffin," she growled.
"Just sit, Hana."
He tickled her leg again.
"Would you cut that out?"
"I will if you just sit down."
"Fine. So long as it gets you to stop."
She gradually lowered herself, stopped only once by Tai who set a hand on her bare, bending knee to keep her from hitting him in the face.
Her bottom hit the incline of his raised lap, and she slid down it until she was, rather comfortably, seated on his pelvis. She had never been so thankful for complete darkness. Tai would never have to see her blush so hotly.
She cleared her throat, attempting to regain her composure before reaching out into the blackness. She was momentarily amazed when she didn't hit a wall or Tai's shirt, but, instead, touched his open hand.
"You're there?" she asked softly in the dark.
"Yeah. I'm here. This is my face, so that you don't hit it by accident." His fingers closed around her own and guided her hand, her fingertips able to trace his jaw and cheek.
She laughed lightly.
"All right. Well, here's mine, in case you were wondering." And without letting go of him, she brought his hand to where her face was, which in reality was but a few inches away from his own.
Her whole body tingled when she felt his fingers roam over the curve of her jaw, his fingertips skid over her flushed lips.
"Hana," he said gently, his warm breath hitting her nose.
"Yeah?"
She had difficulty breathing when she felt his hand wander up her leg, gliding under the hem of her dress.
"So… why don't you like Fun Houses?"
She laughed, her nose bumping into his, the two of them exchanging sighs as he pulled her closer.
They never traded anything beyond their breaths. One of the walls gave way in that instant and they were temporarily blinded by an outpour of light.
"Well, hello," said a familiar voice.
xXx
Tai and Hana lingered behind Matt, who was leading them back to the others. Their heads hung slightly and both of them had their hands out of view—Tai's in his shorts' pockets and Hana's in the pockets of her dress. There had been a proper way to exit the House of Mirrors, just as Tai had originally believed. The secret was to exit via one of the mirrors—not go searching the black walls for way out.
"It's common sense, really, guys," Matt told them, when both Tai and Hana had recovered from the light to get up and out of the small space they had shared for under two hours. "Mirrors have long been symbols of gateways, looking glasses, the list goes on. I can't believe you didn't remember that, Tai."
Yeah, well, I had other things on my mind, Yamato, Tai thought.
"Well, you know me, Matt." He coughed into his fist. "Bad memory."
"So, how'd you find us?" asked Hana.
"Well, when we realized you two weren't with us, we retraced our steps. And then one of the attendees at the Fun House said that you two were never seen leaving it, so I assumed you got trapped in one of these secret doors. And, what do you know? I was right. I hope neither of you got a bad case of claustrophobia while in there."
Tai and Hana exchanged glances.
"Uh… no," she said. "It was more… how long can we stay in here without wanting to kill each other?"
Matt simpered. He had, after all, been the only one to see them almost kiss.
"Well, you both managed not to do it, so it couldn't have been that bad, being stuck in there with one another, right?" He smirked knowingly at them.
The would-be couple laughed uneasily.
"Yeah…" said Tai, rubbing the back of his neck. "It wasn't too bad."
"I agree," Hana added. She tugged discreetly on Tai's shirt sleeve. "It was actually kind of… well, fun."