Author's Note: Okay, so this is my first story. It's just a quick one-shot about Minako after the Three Lights returned to Kinmoku. It's not alternate universe, but I took my creative liberties in deciding that she wanted to become a writer.
Disclaimer: None of the characters of Sailor Moon belong to me.
Graphite Thoughts
It was odd. An aspiring writer could not even find the words to begin; could not even place the freshly sharpened graphite tip of her pencil onto the dusty white sheet of paper.
It shouldn't be this hard, Minako Aino thought. But for some reason, it was.
Words.
They were all just empty words.
Damn it! Why couldn't she make them mean anything?
Readjusting the pencil in her hand again, she thought back to the last time they had seen each other. She'd told herself not to count the days, yet she knew it had been over three months and the number would only increase.
"Have you ever wondered how many stars are up there?" Yaten had asked.
They laid side-by-side on a hill, surrounded by dead grass and dirt, staring up at the night sky, unaffected by the street lights so numerous in the city nearby.
"I don't think I have," she'd responded. "I guess I'd always just accepted that I would never know."
"There are a lot of things we'll never know. It doesn't mean we shouldn't wonder."
"I wonder all the time."
She still did. She wondered what had gone wrong every day. And now, sitting in her creaky old chair at her desk, she wondered how she could even say what needed to be said.
How could she say that missing him was the worst pain she'd ever felt?
How could she say how every breath she took reminded her of him?
How could she explain that she'd never seen anything as beautiful as him in her life?
How could she say that loving him was the worst damn thing that had ever happened to her?
And how could she say that loving him was the best thing that had ever happened?
"I wonder a lot about the future," he said softly, staring up at the stars, an unusual moment of vulnerability for him.
"I do too," she'd said. "Do you ever wonder where we'll end up?"
"No," he'd said sharply, but she knew he was lying.
How could she say that she'd always convinced herself that they could find a way to be together despite everything?
How could she say that "Goodbye" was the hardest thing for her to ever hear?
How could she say that she would have loved to spend her whole life with him and that she would have given up her own life for him any day had she been able to?
"Don't go."
"You're being selfish, Minako."
There were no words to express how she felt.
So she picked up her pencil and settled for simply, "I love you".
She hopped out of her chair to run to the post office to send her letter. On her way out of her bedroom, she passed a cardboard box filled with almost fifty white envelopes. The door slammed shut behind her and left the envelopes in the darkness of her abandoned bedroom, soon to be joined by one more letter that did not reach its destination and was sent back to the return address. One more letter that was sent to an apartment that was no longer occupied. One more letter tearstained with shaky handwriting. But one more letter that never quite said what she wanted it to say.
It wouldn't be long before she was writing another one. But Yaten would never read her words. And she would never say what she wanted to say. And she would never know if he still thought about her.
But she would continue anyway.