Disclaimer: I do not own Sailor Moon and associated characters.
Chapter One: Last day of Usagi's life.
Usagi
Usagi walked downtrodden with a tear stained face. Days could be either bad or worse for her, but today was an usually horrible one. She could barely make out anything through her watery vision. Strangers on the sidewalk were dim shapes as they passed. Each step, each breath drawn was an unimaginable horror she struggled through, yet for an unknown reason. She was on her way to school, her senior year. Although that seemed to hardly matter as things stood now. Pain seemed to grip her heart in a pinching vise every moment of her life. Pain that came from all the hate.
She spied a phone booth off to her right and made slow, steady progress towards it. Everyone's eyes were full of hate, glaring at her as she passed. Usagi quickly entered then shut the booth and the rest of the world off. Falling first to her knees, then her rear, she proceeded to sob her heart out. She started calling out softly, between heavy sobs and hiccups, 'Mamoru! Please help me, Mamoru!' Usagi felt her grasp on reality slip as she fell into a tumbling black hole of memories.
It had been two weeks since Usagi had disposed of Chaos, she should feel happy and free. But that hadn't been the case, recently. Everyone was growing distant and aloof. While not bad in itself, she was the type of girl who thrived and lived off her friendships and love. And now Rei had actually been mean. Not in their playful, always fighting way, but in a hurtful, ugly way. She hadn't spoke to Mamoru in a couple days, and even before that, he hadn't called her that much. So now she was on her way to see him to talk about Rei and why he had been avoiding her. Usagi thought she knew why he wasn't seeing her too much recently, or so she hoped. Maybe he was planning a surprise for her and didn't want to give it away too easy. Satisfied with that answer, a wide grin spread on her face and she continued to skip to his apartment.
She stood before his door, nervous, just like she was on a first date. Shaking her head, Usagi chided herself for such silly feelings. She gave a couple of loud raps on the door and called out, 'Mamoru! It's Usako! Let me in!'
She heard footsteps coming closer to the door, but they paused a little too far away. 'Usagi, I don't want to see you, go away!' He sounded angry. What did I do? Usagi thought. Footsteps sounded, moving away from the door. She couldn't let it end like this, it can't be like last time when he was trying to protect her. She could fix this, whatever she did to upset him, she could change. She had too, Usagi couldn't imagine living without Mamoru again.
Usagi tried the door. Surprisingly, it opened. Quickly letting herself in, then closed the door behind her.
'What? Who's there?' Mamoru's question floated from his living room.
'It's me, the door wasn't locked. I just want to know what I did.' Her voice held a little bit of a whine in it. She needed to stop that, what if that's what is making him mad?
'GO AWAY! I told you I don't want to see you!' Pain lanced her heart, as she heard his words.
'But, please!! I don't even know what I did wrong! I can change, I promise. Just tell me what's wrong.' She found him standing up from in front of some papers he was working on, and then started to back pedal when he saw her.
'Just… stay… away from… me!' He kept backing up as Usagi tried to get closer to him.
Her face was already wet from tears flowing free now. Mamoru backed right up into his glass door to his balcony, but he wasted no time in opening it and proceeding out.
Usagi was starting to panic and sobs were escaping her lips. She reached out for him, arms extended, pleading with her whole being for him to just embrace her. It was not to be, for one moment, he was against the railing of the balcony, the next he flipped right over it and began to fall the seven stories down.
Usagi was frozen, shocked by what she just saw. It took such a big mental push for her to unfreeze herself and go to the railing to see if what she saw really happened. She was just in time to see Mamoru meet the pavement below. Frozen again, with her head leaning over the balcony, she couldn't even cry out. Only silent tears coursed down her face and then they fell the seven stories down and met pavement and Mamoru's body.
She woke with a jerk from her black hole of horror, left with the memory that she was catatonic for a month after that. Doing things only automatically, sleeping through life, is what it felt like. After that, it was almost constant tears. The tears never really stopped, not even almost two years later. Besides that, everyone just got meaner and meaner. Her friends cussing at her and just plain avoiding her. Even strangers on the street would give her a hateful glare. In fact, the people passing the phone booth right now were glaring at her, eyes full of hate. Her sobbing started anew, fueled by the hate that encompassed her life now.
It didn't make sense, she loved everybody. She felt that life was precious and that it shouldn't be wasted. Although, there were times when she wanted to end her pain filled life because of the lack of love in it. But, she wasn't a hypocrite. It would destroy everything Sailor Moon and the Sailor Scouts have worked for if she ended her own life. But, today was one of those days where the pain felt like it was too much. She had no one to share the burden with, no one that cared for her anymore. Even her parents and brother, Shingo, treated her with hate. At that moment, it all just seemed too much. How much longer do I make myself suffer? She thought.
Usagi felt like she was having an outer body experience as she watched herself stand up and exit the booth. She felt terror as her body walked up to the guard rail that separated the sidewalk from the street, knowing full well what was to follow. Then resignation as her body stepped up on top of the rail, where traffic was moving at a fast pace. She saw a huge truck on its way and slammed back into her body ready to time her jump. Just as she bunched her leg muscles to jump, strong arms encircled her waist and pulled her back from the railing.
"We wouldn't want to do that, now would we, Princess?" An angry voice whispered into her ear.
Usagi could smell the owner of that deep voice, the voice of her rescuer. He smelled of roses, and sounded exactly like him! She turned slowly in his light embrace to look at his face, the face she thought she lost almost two years ago.
Chapter 2: A friend at last?
The face she expected to see had a slight frown upon it. But, it wasn't the same. This stranger looked exactly like Mamoru except for his black hair, a shade or two lighter, and dark Forest Green eyes staring into her Cornflower blues. Everything else matched like a picture, from the color of his skin, to his height and build.
So many words rushed to her mind, but found no exit. Usagi just stood in his arms, with her hands on his chest, shocked witless by visions of her lost love. She knew she looked like an idiot just then, wide eyes and slightly parted mouth, but she couldn't seem to utter one single word.
"Life is precious; you shouldn't just throw it away. Nothing is that broken that you can't fix it." His deep, warm voice echoed her own ideals back at her, causing her to mentally bash her head against a wall for humiliating herself in front of her love. Wait, it wasn't Mamoru, was he? Her eyes said no, but her heart screamed yes.
"Look, I can't stand here all day holding a beautiful girl, I just don't have the time. So, you are going to have to promise to me that you won't try that again. Okay?" His eyes were serious, but held a warmth she hadn't felt in ages.
The first thing that came to mind was yes, she would love to be held all day by someone who actually cared. Right at that moment she was trying to soak in all the positive energy radiating from this handsome man. The second thing was the fact that she would never try to commit suicide again. She felt her face flush by the thought of disappointing him by her actions. Unfortunately, she still couldn't force a word past her lips.
"Do you promise?" he prompted. The best Usagi could manage was a slight nod. With her promise, he gave her a bright smile, let go of her and walked off into the crowd.
Tears welled up in her eyes again as she realized that she didn't even get his name. The first person to treat her like another human and she just let him slip away. The pain came back even sharper than before. It was like staving for a week, then given a bite of delicious pie, and then starved again. The fresh comparison had made the pain that much worse.
She glanced back at the traffic, which was going to be her executioner, and then looked away. Not even a dark thought had crossed her mind when she looked. Her promise was worth more than gold.
