Author: White Kiss - PG-13 - English - Romance
Winter ~ Wintergreen: //Aya//
Notes:
Weiss Kreuz is property of Koyasu Takehito, Kyoko
Tsuchiya, Marine Entertainment, and Project Weiss.
This fic was inspired by a lot of Savage Garden.
- White Kiss [formerly Rina Garet]
03/25/02, 4:04 pm
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Youji…
What I fool I am. What a fool I was.
I wish you were here, so I could tell you that.
I made a foolish mistake, based on insecurity and paranoia. We all pay for our mistakes. I don't know when I'll stop paying for mine.
I pay for it every morning when I wake up, and he's not there. I pay for it whenever I think of something I'd normally mention to him, and wait for his offhanded, usually sarcastic remark, and he's not there to give it. I pay for it every night when I go to sleep, cold and alone.
I pay for it with each tear shed over something lost for nothing.
Every few weeks, I think about calling him, but I can't do it. I dial his number, pausing over the last digit, and slam the hook down before I can finish. Then I go and do a hundred sit-ups, or fifty push-ups, until I've drowned my doubts in sweat and exhaustion.
I fully expect that the next time we meet, it will be as enemies. Neither of us have the guts to reconcile before that happens.
Not like he misses me anyway.
He was always popular. He always had people banging down the door to get to him.
How could I have been so stupid? He gave all that up for me, and I repaid him with a broken heart and shattered promises.
Has Youji forgiven me? Can he ever forgive me?
The problem never was him. The problem was me.
I didn't like his behavior, his lifestyle, his habits. He changed for me. He drank less. Smoked less. Went out less. Stopped seeing countless women.
He told me he did that because, when I was with him, he didn't need it anymore.
I passed it off as his usual smooth talk. I was stupid. I ignored the one time he was most serious with me. The time he spoke exactly what he was feeling, and said screw the masks and illusions and facades, and was just himself.
I never gave him enough credit. I never gave him anything in return.
I worked with him. Lived with him. Slept with him.
But that was all.
I still kept my heart in ice, kept my emotions locked in a freezer. It was just so easy to assume he'd been the same way.
Maybe we should have talked more. Maybe we should have discussed 'us'. I took him for granted. I thought that I was just another one of his passing bed partners. I didn't realize what I meant to him, or what he meant to me, until I had already crossed the line.
It wasn't until I was gone that I realized some of that ice had melted after all.
It melted, and I cried.
I cried for the first time in years. I cried for all the pain I'd been through, all the pain I'd caused, and everything I'd lost because of myself.
I cried that night, and swore it was a one-time thing.
I lied.
I convinced him he meant nothing to me. He's moved on. I haven't been able to.
The first few months, I stayed as far away from him as possible. I refused to walk on that street, refused to drive by the shop. Every time I saw flowers being delivered, my heart caught in my throat. I purposely avoided any situation where I might see him.
I thought my heart had finally let go.
Never believe your head, when it comes to matters of love. It's always wrong.
I had to drive on that street… THAT street… For a job. I had to go past the Koneko, and I saw him. Nursing a cigarette, lazing against the side of the building.
As always.
Just for a moment, I felt like everything was back to normal.
Then the horn of the car behind me blared, I was ripped out of my thoughts, and slammed the gas pedal.
I wasn't going to think about him anymore. I swore I wouldn't. That time in my life was past. That person in my life was past. That relationship was over, done with. Dust in the wind.
But I was sitting there, staring out the window at him just the same. Stopping traffic in the middle of the road, heart beating fast in my chest. I couldn't forget, even though I tried.
At night, I sit at home alone in an empty house, at a lonely kitchen table, and just think.
I switched jobs for the money. Yes, I am that shallow. I know what my priorities are. I need to take care of my sister. If I can make more money for the same dirty work, then why shouldn't I do it? Why stay, just because I was in love?
Love doesn't matter in the real world.
Sometimes I throw the blame. If he loved me, he would have followed me. If he truly loved me, he would have given up everything for me. Then I realize how foolish and selfish that sounds, and I laugh. Just because I gave my life and happiness on a suicidal binge for money for my sister doesn't mean everyone is like that.
I walk on that street at night. I bought a large wool coat and a hat, so no one can recognize me at first glance. The nights are cold, so someone walking bundled isn't suspicious. I stand across the street and watch the windows.
Watch him in the window.
My stomach tightens. He pulls the shades closed. I watch shapes, silhouettes, move behind the curtains, closely together. I want to close my eyes. I want to tell myself it's nothing. I want to tell myself it isn't happening.
I can't close my eyes.
I can't turn away.
I watch the lights go dark. The shapes vanish. I swear I can hear the sounds, all the way out here. I swear I can feel hot breath and sweaty skin from where I'm standing, freezing.
I can hear him whispering.
But the name on his lips is never mine.
A tear rolls down my cheek, freezing in the cold wind, stinging my face.
My eyes finally close.
I feel him holding me. I feel him whispering against my ear. And then a car shoots by, rustling wind and making noise, splashing water, and I'm jerked out of my fantasy. My memory. I sway, feeling faint, feeling about to fall, and hold myself up against the lamppost on the street corner.
I can't get warm enough. And under my hat, under my jacket… no one can see me cry.
There's no one else. No one on the empty streets. No one in my empty life. No one to see my tears empty my foolishness and bitter regret from my eyes.
People walk by, brush by, rush by, but I don't see them.
No one is there.
I had love, and I let it slip through my fingers.
Is this what I thought I wanted? Wandering the streets alone at night, watching windows, crying softly, and holding on to memories better forgotten? I thought I wanted to be the one to leave, not the one left in the dust. I'm the one that left, but… I'm the one crying in the streets, hypnotized by the lights and shadows of the city.
I didn't want this.
But I made my bed, and now I'm lying in it. Lying cold, lonely, and alone, buried under blankets to take away the chill that never fades.
I'm stopped in front of the flower shop.
Maybe… if I had one more chance… he might take me back. He might forgive me for everything I did to him. He might say he loves me, and I'll believe him this time.
Maybe… if I could just say it once.
I'm stopped in front of the flower shop, fingertips reaching out to touch the darkened glass windows.
"Youji…" I whisper softly against the glass, pressing my cheek to the cold window.
I look back up at his window, and the lights are still out. He's leaning on the windowpane, smoking a cigarette. I remember waking up a few times to find him doing that. Looking out the window at the city while he thought I was asleep.
He always waited until I was asleep to get up and have his cigarette. Or until I pretended I was asleep. His fingers stroked my hair, warm breath on my neck. I always turned my back to him, but he let me, just smoothing my hair until my breathing slowed, and he thought I was asleep.
Sometimes, I did fall asleep. I let myself sink into a soft, warm feeling, and let sleep close hazily over me. Sometimes, I stayed awake. I would feel his weight lift off the bed, hear clothes shift as he lazily pulled on a pair of pants, and shuffling as he reached for his cigarettes.
I would watch him sometimes, leaning out the window, tendrils of smoke disappearing in the air from his lips and the burning end of the cigarette.
He would finish his cigarette, close the window, and come back to bed. He would touch me on the shoulder to see if I was awake, and I always feigned sleeping. He would wrap an arm around me from behind, set his chin softly in the juncture between my head and shoulder, and breathe softly, smelling of cigarette smoke and cool night air.
I blinked, clearing the glaze over my eyes, looking up at Youji from under the awning of the flower shop. He couldn't see me from his window, but I could see him.
I wondered who it is, in his bed tonight.
I wondered whose name he cried out.
I wondered whose hair he softly stroked to lull them to sleep.
I wondered if they were watching him like I did, pretending to sleep just so they could watch him smoke in fascination, and feel his arms around them when he came back to bed.
Is it a woman? A soft body, silky hair, and light gasps in a sweet voice? Or was it a man? Smooth, taut muscles, long limbs, and moans murmured in a husky tenor?
Blonde? Brunette? Redhead?
Why do I care?
Of course I know why I care. He's moved on. I haven't changed.
I should call his name. I should call him, and he'll see me. We can talk. I can tell him what I fool I was. What a fool I am. How meaningless everything is without him. How much it hurts that I threw him away.
My lips part, and I try to call him. Say his name. Make him notice me. Make him see me, down here in front of the flower shop, waiting and watching.
I try. Nothing comes out. No words, no choked pleas, no soft apologies. Nothing of the things I want to tell him. I can't do it. I can't talk to him.
I turn away from the shop with tears in my eyes, and whisper his name softly.
It lingers on my lips like a warm kiss. I cover my mouth with a hand to savor
it, as I walk down the cold city streets and find my way home again, tears
splashing quietly against the cold pavement, mixing with the dirt and crushed
underfoot by strangers' footsteps.
Finally, I find my voice. I stand in the
doorway of my apartment, door open, cold air pouring in, my back to the empty
street. The wind whistles, blowing the door shut with a loud crack, and I can't
take it anymore.
I slump against the wall, frozen tears trickling down my cheeks, wondering why I didn't take my chance. Why I couldn't call him.
Sliding down on one knee, not caring that the floor is cold, I press my cheek to the wall, and cry. And I say what I've been longing to say out loud ever since the day I left, but have only said to myself.
"Why?"
A single word slips out between sobs, and I hug myself tight and wait for the pain to end.