A/N: This idea popped in my mind when I read the meaning of the song 'Adolescence' by Kagamine Rin & Len. The words in italic in the beginning and the end are from the song. I didn't really recheck it after I typed, so I'm sorry for any errors. Enjoy! Disclaimer: I dont own Gundam SEED/Destiny We used to be rocked in the same bed.
The two of us were connected with our hands held together
The two of them were dancing to an old song. Their parents were clapping their hands, their uncles and aunts did the same. Their skins were glowing, caused by the fire on the fire place. She could remember the scent of pine tree they used for the Christmas tree. She and her brother were joyfully decorating it, with some help from their uncle.
Cagalli moved to the next picture, it was when their mother took her and Kira to play in the play ground, when she was sitting in a swing and Kira was standing behind her, swaying it for her.
Cagalli put the album on the nightstand. She leaned on the bed head and pulled her knees to her chest and hugged them. She shifted in her bed, feeling uncomfortable. She sighed. She felt like wanting to hit all the things in her new room, her own room. She wanted to scream, but that was unreasonable. She was in a bad mood.
Though her mother told her that the bad mood always come before the period.
Her forehead was on her knees. It was the third day of her very first period. She had been panicking when the day finally came. When she had wake up, she could felt the wetness between her thighs. And when she went to the bathroom, she was shocked and afraid to find she was bleeding. She had ran to her mom who was preparing breakfast, telling her—with tearful face—that she was bleeding down there. Her mother took her to the bathroom and gave her the thing Cagalli used to question her mother. She told Cagalli how to use it, and told her to calm down because this thing was normal for a girl, told her that she was beginning to be a woman.
Via had asked her if she was feeling well, because she thought Cagalli must be confused and she needed to explain to her. She told her it was all right to skip school today.
She watched with sullen expression—she didn't know why she felt that—as her mother called her teacher that Cagalli would be absent today. She watched Kira pouted because she was allowed to skip, while he had to go. It wasn't allowed for the children to pass the news that their friend was sick, it had to be straight from the parent.
And it had been a month since their parents gave her his room, Kira was using their old room, the room they had shared for twelve years. Kira was happy, because he didn't have to see all the girly things that belong to Cagalli. Cagalli was the opposite. She had been used to sleep with her twin brother, the one who had always soothed her every time she had nightmare, the one who had always accompany her to the kitchen or bathroom at night, the one who had always told her that she was silly because she believed in ghost. But she had been putting happy face, claiming she was happy too, to have her own room and could put her things everywhere she want.
Cagalli felt different. And she looked different. And so was Kira. They used to dress in matching dress. Her haircut had been as short as Kira; if not for their hair and eye color, no one would know who was who. But as time went by, they changed. Her mother had told her to grow her hair a bit, so she wouldn't look like a boy.
Nowadays when she went to school and gathered with her girlfriends, they teased her because they could see her breast showing; it was slightly fuller than the others. Her friend, Milly, would always defend her and took her away from her mean friends, saying that it was a normal thing because Milly was starting to show too.
Her brother didn't change much, but still he was different. His voice was becoming deeper, not too deep but still unlike his old voice. His body too, was slightly bigger and more muscular than her slender figure. Cagalli noticed that there was something on his throat, and thought maybe that was why his voice changed.
The more days passed, the more they went by their own. Kira didn't ask her to play together again. If she did asked him, he would usually suggest the thing that boys used to play. He refused to go everywhere with her, except to go to and from school. When she asked Milly about it, she told her that it was boys' thing. Maybe Kira's friends were calling him name because he was always with Cagalli.
They used to play princess and knight. Kira's line was stating that he was Cagalli's knight, that he would protect her from all the evil things around her.
Now, Kira didn't even want to be seen with her.
She missed her brother.
Cagalli yelped as she heard the sound of something hit the floor, and then followed by the thunder. After that, the sound of hard rain was all she heard, but not too long the sound of something out there scared her to death. She gripped her blanket that was engulfed her entire body as she curled in a tight all under it. The electricity was off when she was studying something. She had been startled and ran to her bed and hid under her blanket while screaming. Why was her parents had to be out in the time like this?
Even though the rain was hard, Cagalli could hear the sound of someone walking through the hall. She remembered the story Kira had told her on their 'happy secret time together' about the ghost of an old man who liked to kidnapped little pretty girls. Now as she heard the tapping sound, the story was flowing in her mind again. Cagalli chanted quietly to the ghost to go away and leave her be.
Her heartbeat went faster and louder as she could felt the person stopped in front of her room. She could hear the doorknob being turned. The person was now walking in her room, toward her bed where she hid. She trembled harder, wishing Kira was here; her tears already flowing.
As the person pulled her blanket Cagalli screamed out loud and grabbed her pillow as her protector. She gripped it hard until her knuckles were white. Her trembling hadn't stopped yet, she barely realized the person was shaking her shoulder.
"Cagalli… open your eyes, it's just me."
Cagalli moved her pillow and looked at the person before her. Kira was holding a flashlight, his other hand gripping the end of her blanket.
"You're a grown up, Cagz. And you still afraid of the dark?"
"You made strange noises! I thought it was a ghost!" Cagalli pulled the pillow and started hitting him. The idiot was scaring me, didn't he understand! It was his fault; he told me scary stories and made me afraid of ghost.
"That's a little childish, isn't it, hime?" Kira asked his sister, using the nickname he used to call her when they still played princess and knight. But he wasn't the knight anymore, and she was no princess.
"I'm afraid of ghost because you always told me scary stories." Cagalli started sobbing. He was her knight. Didn't he suppose to protect her from such thing? Now Cagalli was sure he was going to tease her endlessly.
"You were my knight," Cagalli sobbed. "You used to protect me…" She hid her face in the pillow she still had in hands. She no longer paid attention to the thunder and rain outside. Her knight had gone.
Suddenly, her surrounding got dark. The flashlight shined her, but blocked by her blanket, which was covering her figure now. She felt her bed moved, and the flashlight was clearer, with Kira. He put the flashlight near the head rest, and then he pulled his sister with him, as the laid in the bed together, hugging her.
Cagalli sobbed in her brother's chest, missing him too much, and feeling safe and comfort she had lost for a while. She missed him, after spending her time with her friend only, and being teased by the meanie girls. He was her only place to let her feelings all out. She didn't dare to tell her mother. Her brother was the one who understand her the most. And he used to tell her his problem too. They comforted each other; they do anything for each other.
They cuddled together, just like when they were younger, when they shared a bed together. They would wake up in the night, Kira would take the flashlight and they would hide under the blanket and tell each other's stories. No one knew about their 'happy secret time together'; not even their parents.
As if they could understand each other's feelings without uttering even a word, they gaze at each other, discovering the differences they now had, Kira's more masculine look, Cagalli's more feminine features. When they felt it was enough, Kira turned off the flashlight. Kira's hands were protectively encircled around his sister's body, while Cagalli was clutching her brother's shirt.
They had each other again.
Cagalli waited under a still-green maple tree for her brother. He had promised her to eat lunch with her; Cagalli was holding her and her brother's bento, made by their mother. She was a bit doubtful, for she had seen her brother went out with his boyfriends. They must have pulled him with them, and went somewhere 'appropriate for boys', where there was no girl at all.
He promised, Cagalli thought.
Cagalli was staring at her bento when she felt shadows hovering over her. She looked up, and found the meanie girls in front of them, with wicked smiles on their faces, except one face, who looked worried.
"What do we have here? Little Cagalli with her bento. Let's see what she has," Fllay, the leader of the meanie girls, took her bento roughly, but Cagalli gripped it tighter.
"Go away, Fllay!"That rhimes, Cagalli thought.
"Let go, you ugly duck!" Fllay pulled it harder.
"Fllay, stop this!" Lacus tried to help Cagalli from the mean girl.
"This is mine!" Cagalli shouted. "You let go, freak!"
"How dare you!" Fllay let go of the box, which made Cagalli fall to her behind, but she gripped her box so it wouldn't fall from her hands. Lacus was already beside her, asking if she had any cut. Cagalli sighed, and told her no. But when she looked up, she saw Fllay's hand up in the air, ready to slap her. She closed her eyes tightly, braced herself for the impact.
"You little—"
Cagalli waited, and didn't feel anything. She opened her eyes slowly, and so did Lacus.
"Let me go!" Cagalli heard Fllay shouted to someone.
"Stay away from my sister!" Kira shouted back, gripping Fllay's hand tighter.
"Let goo!" Fllay was swaying her hand to shove Kira's. When he finally dropped it, Fllay cradled her red hand and walked away. "You'll pay for this!" She went away with her other friends.
"Cagalli, are you all right?" Kira kneeled before his sister and looked over her, searching for any type of injury. Cagalli only shook her head. Kira never saved her again since he befriended with his boyfriends. It was always Milly who saved her. She looked at Lacus, who only smiled at the sight of the siblings. Lacus sometimes defended Cagalli from Fllay, but she wasn't around Cagalli as often as Milly.
"You're my knight again, Kira," Cagalli said, smiled at her twin brother.
"I will always be, Cagalli," he hugged her to him. He actually missed his sister as much as she missed him. It felt good to be with her again. "Now, let's eat!" Kira grinned.
"May I join you?" Lacus asked.
"Off course," Kira and Cagalli said.
"Kira! What are you doing there! You're not sitting there with girls, are you!" Someone shouted from afar. Cagalli and Lacus looked at the boys, who were shouting at Kira to go back. Kira ignored them and opened his bento.
"Kira…"
"I don't want to be with them anymore."
"You're a girl! You heard that!"
Cagalli cringed, and then she was mad. How dare they?
"They are leaving," Lacus pointed out. "Oh, I think Athrun wants to join us," she said, suddenly cheerful. She knew Athrun was a good boy. And that he was Kira's best friend.
Kira turned his head, and saw a boy with midnight blue hair running to their small group. The boy grinned at them. "Can I sit here with you guys?" he asked.
"You don't want to be with them?" Kira asked.
"No. I don't like them," he sat between Kira and Lacus. "My name is Athrun," he said, offering his hand to Cagalli.
"Cagalli," she answered, blushing slightly. She had been watching him from afar. But people always said he was Lacus' boyfriend. She looked at Lacus from the corner of her eyes. She was smiling at her, seemed like she knew what Cagalli was feeling, and smiled at her.
"Athrun," said a deadly cold voice. Everyone turned their heads and looked at Kira, who had a dark aura surrounding him.
"Err, yes…?" Athrun suddenly felt smaller, and Kira towered him.
"Don't mess with my sister, or you'll have to face me," he threatened.
"Uhh… Sure…?" Athrun answered, not really sure.
Cagalli chuckled. She was sure, she knew, Kira would always be her knight, who would always protect her from everything.
"Let's eat! I'm hungry," Cagalli said and opened her bento.
Even thought they were different now, even thought couldn't be together as often as their childhood time, they would always have each other.
Adolescence was, for sure, a difficult time to go through.
Stopping time, we now embrace tightly, as we try to synchronize our ticking heartbeat So, what do you think?