"Dark was the tunnel, narrow and full of angst.
Your nerves are going to frazzle, are tense.
Hope is almost lost, but always there was this light.
Far, far away, still at the end of the tunnel right at sight.
Powers spread free you never knew you had.
You got to know that nothing, really nothing, can defy your will.
Fighting hard, you're near the bright end.
Suddenly everything is right, everything is clear.
Happily I cried, happily I cried.
All banks broke, but there followed no catastrophe.
Happily I cried, happily I cried.
I was a little bit proudly ashamed of my tears.
Happily I cried."
"Happily I cried", PUR
(very free English translation)
Short word by the author:
Well, I know, there are many people (in Germany) who don't like that music a lot. You could argue about PUR, that's sure, but I simply like their lyrics. It's easy to "feel" them and every time when I am extremely sad or extremely happy, I am taking my PUR CDs and listen to them for hours.
And while listening, such stories evolve in my head -.
The persons mentioned in this story don't belong to me, but to Takeuchi Naoko. I am just borrowing them with love, as always.
I don't like it when some writes "to wail" or when someone is called weak just because he has to cry. Tears are an expression of feelings. And since when are feelings bad?
Happily I cried(by April Eagle)
My first memory…
I do not know how old I had been. Maybe three, maybe four years. Like it had been yesterday, I can still see my father jumping over tome. Yes, he jumped, because I liked that. It looked so funny that I had to laugh every time I saw him this way. Surely I laughed loud and high. Children at that age squeak more than they do laugh. Meanwhile I got to know them really good. Small children, I mean.
Then my father jumped over to me and took me into his strong arms. He swirled me around in the air and I am sure that I had to squeak even louder. It had been in the garden behind the house. The sun was shinning brightly and some birds sang their happy songs. It had been spring, because white cherry blossoms were floating in the soft afternoon wind. My mother sat in the green grass and smiled up to us. Her dark green eyes sparkled with gentleness. Gentleness, kindliness and endless love. It was alike whatever I did, which dish I broke, how often I did not want to go to bed and trudged angrily through my room, she had always been patient with me. My mama. Just like my papa. Both had loved me. The way I had loved them. My parents, my world.
This is my first memory.
Afterwards there had been other afternoons I spent with my parents. In the garden behind the house, on the playground near my kindergarten, on the beach near the city where we lived. Nevertheless those moments stayed the best in my mind. Even today I can feel the spring wind I my hairs, hear my father laughing and see my mother smiling when I close my eyes.
Mir first memory… and the same time the most painful one when I have to look back at my childhood. Because three years later they died. I would really like to erase that day from my memory, but it is always the same with the bad things in life, you cannot easily forget them. They come back just like a bad nightmare you cannot get rid of even after a wonderful day full of sunshine. One shadow, one wrong word and it is there again. Just like my memories.
Well, it became easier. I grew up and time heals all wounds. That's at least what all people say even when I could not believe them during the first weeks and months.
How should I have had the faith in those words? The pain inside my heart was too big, I could barely stand it. Now one seemed to understand me. How should they? All those aunts and uncles who appeared so suddenly out of the blue and looked so pitiful down at me? Wordless, faceless, without any comfort. Real comfort. But, how should they have comforted me? A seven year old child? Just old enough to go to school? To a school I did not want to go to during several weeks. I was aggressive when my aunt who became my new guardian wanted to send me back to school. She only wanted my best, but I already panicked when I saw that grey-cold building. When the memories were crashing down on me like a raging see. Like endless deep waves which seemed to choke me.
Because I waited on front of that building. For hours. I waited for my parents who wanted to fetch me up and go to the zoo with me. I was nicely and waited for them. Until the sun set and the moon rose. Until a police car came and a friendly policemen came over to me. Yes, he looked friendly at the first sight, but I did not like him any more after he had to tell me what happened. To my beloved parents! They died in a tragic car accident, he told me. The breaks of a big truck broke, they had no chance. They died at the place where it happened, while I was standing at that dammed school, waiting hopefully for them. For my parents who would never come again and take me home.
No, my aunt did not know about this, I never told her. Just like I did not tell her so many other things. At the beginning I was pouting, because she was not my mama! There had been days when I was really angry with my aunt, because I believed she wanted to take away my last memories of my parents and take my mother's place. We moved from the inner city of Tokyo into a calm region near the sea. I got a beautiful room with a look over the sea. My aunt gave me a brand new bike and I had a lot of freedom. Nevertheless I hated her during the first months. I hated this women who was my mother's sister. She looked a little bit like my mother: The same blonde hairs, the same dark green eyes. But, dammed! She was not my mother. Not at all!
When I am looking back now, I have to see, that it was never easy for her. Being my guardian. I never made it easy for her. She only wanted my best – and I wanted to have back my parents. An unreal wish she could not fulfil, of course not. Even when she would have done everything to have my mother back for she had loved her younger sister, too.
Maybe I had seen aunt Susuka already earlier in my life, but the first time I really noticed her had been the day of the funeral. The son was shinning warmly from a crystal blue sky und I cursed God for this weather. It was too nice, too bright, too happy for my mood. Why did it not rain? The rain had wetted my cheeks and hide my tears. But so they ran openly over my pale cheeks, for everyone to see.
It had been the last time I ever cried. One uncle shouted at me that I should behave like a real man and stop wailing. He said that I should see that no tears of this world would ever bring back my parents.
Suddenly aunt Susuka had been there. She screamed at the uncle, some brother in law of my father, and protected me against him.
After the reading of the will where my aunt Susuka became my only guardian, she took me home. But it took long years until I called this strange house my home. I guess I had been 18 when I said that sentence for the first time: "I am going home now.", meaning the house by the sea.
No, I never made it easy for her. Und it got worse when she fell in love. He was not even a bad guy. He was loving to my aunt and of course always friendly towards me. Of course it happened what I did not want to see. Of course they became engaged. And of course they married only after almost a year after that man stepped into aunt Susuka's shop and right into her life. One year later my aunt got pregnant and gave birth to a son.
Oh, how I hated them!
I had been fourteen years then and obsessed with the idea, that they all only tried to take away my parents. I could not and did not want to accept them. The whole situation escalate when aunt Susuka's husband, Shinji, wanted me to call him "Daddy". Surely he loved then like a daughter, I believe that now, but that day I reacted like a fury. I screamed at him and could not calm myself down. I had been so angry that I did not even see the sad expression on his face. The deep disappointment and the pain.
One week later I stood in front of the building with packed suitcases. A big building that became my new home over the following years. It had been a boarding school. But not one for badly brought up children. It was a normal boarding school. Aunt Susuka had been against this solution. Just like her husband who muttered the whole time something about "puberty" and that they should not take my outbursts of rage too seriously. But I could convince them that it's better to go. For all of us.
So they let me go.
I had been young then. Impetuous. I always wanted to run with my heard right through the next wall. My mind was full of hate and my heart still full of mourning. My parents death had been seven years ago, but nevertheless the wound in my soul did not heal.
So they let me go.
They tried to visit me over the following years, but each time I did hide somewhere in the boarding school and kept disappeared for the whole day. They wrote me letters, but I never answered. Often they invited me to come home for Easter, Christmas or summer holidays, but I never came. I was so stubborn. Stubborn and unyielding. And incredibly stupid.
They loved me. They loved me so obviously. But I had nothing better to do than pushing them away and to flee whenever they tried to get nearer to me. Of course they did not want to replace my parents. They knew too well that this was impossible. But I had the chance to find some kind of family again – in them. A family, security and love. If I had not been that damn proud, if I had taken all they offered to me…
But… well… I was young and hurt. Confused and in the crazy idea that I had been all alone on this world. That everyone – even my aunt and my new uncle – were against me. Just like Hitzuko, their son. My cousin or half-brother, or whatever.
Surely he does not even know the way I look. It is a long time that I saw him for the last time. I had been a rainy November day. Different to the funeral of my parents the weather did fit to my mood then. Aunt Susuka and uncle Shinji wanted to talk to me in peace, but I only screamed back. With a red face I took my suitcases and did not want to listen to their calming words. The little Hitzuko-chan started terrified to scream and that made me finally go. Raging I called for a taxi, took all my things and left. Still today I can see the sad face of my aunt when I look back. The way she stood near the entrance door and looked after the taxi. Her face had been wet and I assume that it had not only been the rain.
This memory, the last one of my aunt, has the same sharp like that memory of my parents in the spring coloured garden. It is strange which moments you forget so quickly and which memories you will never forget again in your life – no matter what will happen.
My aunt did not really let me go. Regularly she came to the boarding school – and I escaped whenever I saw her. Regularly she wrote letters, sent me little parcels with my most favourite chocolate or one of her fresh baked tarts. I never answered. I never reacted. I never wrote a single letter back. Then, after my eighteenths birthday, the letters, the phone calls and the parcels stopped. First I was relieved. I had a lot to do. During the past years I got to know that I was a Sailor Senshi and that I had a mission: To search and to find three talismans. This task had been very hard and dangerous. There was no time left for other things than this mission, so I had no time to care about people I tried to get rid of for such a long time. After the hard search for the talismans we had to fight against our worst enemy: Sailor Galaxia and I almost died. This incident opened my eyes. Just after I left hospital, I went back to the calmer region of Tokyo to visit my aunt. To ask um forgiveness and to be a part of that family again – if that was possible. But when I arrived at the big, known house, I had to see with horror that my aunt did not live there any more. She moved away. Surely a long time ago. At that moment I realised that it over four years since I got a lost letter from her.
It is true what old people say: You truly see what you had when you lose it. At this day I felt like losing my family again. Then I realized how much they really meant to me: Aunt Susuka, uncle Shinji and our little Hitzuko-chan.
I searched for them. Very hard. But no matter what I did, no matter where I searched, I could not find them. It looked like they disappeared into nothing. I had to see that my regret was too late. Too late for over ten years.
It is really strange what memories you have to think of if you have enough time to let them come. Just the same it is really sad that you cannot return to that time. It is alike how hard you try, they are only memories. Surely, no one is able to take them away from me. Like no one will ever be able to take away the bitter sweet pain I feel when I sew cherry blossoms. Like no one will ever be able to save me from the regret and the shame I feel whenever I have to think of my aunt. I did that a lot during the past time. Maybe even too often.
I am so sorry, aunt.
Oh, I would really like to cry it out loud. To tell it the whole world. To scream this single sentence like I screamed at her that day I left. But she won't hear me. She is not here and it looked as if she would never return again. Just like my parents…
I got a second chance and wasted it.
I clench my fists and stare determinedly on my blanket. I am trying to get all those thoughts out of my with medicine hazed mind.
I hate those memories!
But the same time I know that I will never get rid of them, that I did not want the to disappear. Because they are a part of me.
My papa, my mama, they will always be a part of me, no matter what will ever happen.
My aunt, my uncle… I wish they would be a part of my life again. But I know that this thought is just a dream. And dreams are not real.
Just like such bitter sweet memories…
"Ruka?"
Silently the door to my room is opened. My dark thoughts disappear, at least for a little while, and I feel a wide smile spreading on my face as I watch a young woman enter. She walks softly, graceful. The sun, shinning through the window, is mirrored in her sea green curls. Her deep blue eyes sparkle with happiness. They look like the sea, I could sink in them. Drown in them. Staying there forever.
My Michi.
I had been two days in that boarding school when I got a new roommate. To be honest, I wanted to have a single room to have my peace. But there were some misunderstandings in the office bureau and before I could react, Michiru stepped into my room and into my life. With her beautiful dark blue eyes she looked around and asked me which bed could be hers. Until today I have no idea why she got mine which was higher and nearer to the window. I simply gave it to her without even starting a fight. Guess it had been love of the first sight.
Suddenly there was someone who understood me. Who accepted me the way I was, but who could also tell me to stop. I could Michiru not treat the way I treated aunt Susuka. Michiru made her point clear: She wanted to be my friend, but not the punch bag I could kick when I was in a bad mood. Those days I had been in a bad mood almost all the time.
Yes, Michiru had been my saviour, my angel. For the first time since my parent's death I felt save and loved. With her I experienced feeling I never let my heart touch while I had been with my aunt and my uncle. Suddenly I was not alone any longer, because Michiru was there for me.
The following school year we had been the best friends. Inseparable. I got to know Michiru's parents and had to fight with my own jealousy. Michiru still had so loving parents, I did not. Okay, sometimes Michiru asked what my aunt was doing, but I never answered and so she stopped asking after a while. I guess she expected me to come to her and to tell her about my family when I was read. Surely the time had been near and I really wanted to tell Michiru who knew so much about me, all of this ugly stuff. I trusted Michiru completely. She was my best friend and the only one who did really understand me. She knew how to take my bad mood without having a terrible fight for hours. Sometimes one word from her was enough to calm me down. Maybe I really wanted to go to her and to tell her about my parent's death and my angry feelings towards my aunt and my uncle, but before I could react we were confronted with two golden sticks, dozens of youmas and a quest after three mysterious sounding talismans. Suddenly my day was filled – besides boring school lessons – with fights and endless searches. I had no time to care for anything else than learning and fighting. We had enough trouble being Senshi, there was no time left for personal problems. Without the youmas and all those fights, I am sure, Michiru and I would have seen our love earlier, but so we needed almost a whole year while we were searching and fighting, being hurt and pushed to our limits. It was in the St. Marine's Cathedral when I realized that I loved my Michi. My Michiru who lost her heart crystal in front of my eyes. Her heart crystal that turned into one of the so long searched talismans immediately. It was a miracle that we survived that fight. A very clumsy, often crying miracle with long, blonde plaids. This miracle was Sailor Moon, our future Queen. We had to protect her in the following year during the attack of Sailor Galaxia. Again we fought for our lives and for some moments it looked as if we would lose.
Another memory which is haunting me down in my nightmares sometimes. Still I see Michiru lying on the roof. Being pushed to death after losing her star seed. My beloved Michiru cried silently and took my hand. She did not want to be alone. She wanted to be together with me. Just like I wanted to be together with her. In that moment. Up to the end of eternity. An eternity that seemed to last for only a few more seconds. And while Michiru cried – because of me, her family and herself – I suddenly missed my aunt. Her parent's would mourn about Michiru, my aunt would not even get to know that I died.
Another terrible fight took place and again Sailor Moon rescued our lives. I do not want to think about all those times this clumsy, often so openly crying girl saved us, I guess I will never be able to thank her enough. Although I know that she would only laugh happily and tell me that it was normal. That she would always save a dear friend. Friendship is very important for our future Queen. Friendship and her family.
Family…
I gulp as I feel Michiru's warm hand, tenderly squeezing my suddenly ice cold one. A shadow appears on her beautiful face and she looks a little bit frightened at the drip that is standing right beside my bed. Clear fluid is running from it right into my arm. Into a slightly punctured arm. But those little wounds will go and even if I'll keep some scars, I know, that they are worth it.
"Everything alright, Ruka? Are you in pain?"
I can see the concern in Michiru's eyes and have to shook smilingly my head. Of course I am exhausted and the doctor will surely kill me if I should stand up again and walk to the toilette without his permission, but at the whole I feel fantastic. So wonderful light and happy.
"If you're saying so…" Michiru looks doubting down at me and my smile deepens. Of course she does not believe me. I would not believe myself, too. Not after the past night. Michiru had been there and had seen all the blood. Nevertheless I am feeling incredibly well. The big pain is gone and although I feel some stings in my belly when I move, I know that this pain is good. It is different from the pain I experienced during the search for the talismans, I experienced while lying on that roof, hearing Sailor Galaxia's mean laughter.
"I am feeling great!" Slowly I raise my free hand and stroke some curls out of a reddened face. "Just like the little one."
"Almost eight pounds, one food and eight inches. Healthy." Marbles Michiru and raise. Slowly she goes around my bed and bows reverently over the child's bed that is standing right beside mine.
"Hey, our daughter does not only exists of numbers and facts." I protest but have to grin as my lover blushes even deeper and stokes carefully over a tiny heard.
Sakura.
Our own daughter.
Yes, I wanted to have a family. A real family. I already wasted two chances. Partly because of cruel fate and partly because I had been the cruel one, pushing them all away.
"She is beautiful…" again Michiru whispers and tears are standing in her eyes. Carefully she takes the new born child in her arms and rocks it lovingly. "So beautiful…"
"Of course she is beautiful. With those mothers." Again I have to grin, try to tease her although my throat is very tight, too.
Sakura.
Our daughter.
For many years it had been our dearest wish to have an own child. Of course Hotaru, our adopted daughter, belongs the same to us, but after Chibiusa, Usagi's daughter, and Leonhard, Setsuna's son, were born, we were crazy about little children. Our wish for an own child – and a little sister for Hotaru – grew stronger. We asked our future Queen to help us which failed the first time. Michiru was not able to children. She had been very ill as a small child and now her period was weak – too weak. We waited about one year in vain for a miracle until I went to Usagi to talk to her own my own. After some magical words, some oaths and some more weeks I was pregnant.
It was an easy pregnancy, if you ignored Michiru's crazy behaviour and my strange desire to eat carp covered with strawberry jam. Only the last two months had been a little bit nerving. I felt like a walrus, was hardly able to move any longer and was not even allowed to drive my beloved Ferrari with my big belly. Setsuna's and Usagi's nice advice almost drove me crazy and Hotaru was sad that her "papa" couldn't play horsy any longer with her, because the belly of the nice horsy would have dragged behind me on the carpet. But she was incredibly happy as she understood that she was getting a little sister.
"And, my little one?" smiles Michiru and the next moment tears are running down her face. Just like the last night when this little girl came finally into this world. After nine exciting months – and about six hours of pain while I cursed God and the world and everyone else that I was a woman. I threw Usagi and even Ami, who will soon finish her medicine studies, out of the delivery room and I guess it was only Michiru's curiosity, joy and endless love that let her stay with me although I screamed a lot of nasty words at her she did not deserve at all. But she forgave me. Immediately. When she was allowed to hold our daughter in her arms for the first time. Such a small being who already controlled our world, held our hearts in so tiny hands. At the moment I was allowed to hold her, too, I knew that she had been worth all of the pain.
"I am so proud of you, Ruka." Sobs Michiru silently and rocks the bundle in her arms softly. The little girl sleeps deep and tight, only making a slightly disturbed face as Michiru kisses her on the tiny forehead.
Sakura.
Cherry blossom.
Our daughter.
"Tell me that sentence again when we survived the first year."
Michiru beams at me with an overwhelming smile and nods happily.
"I can't wait to live that year. Just like all the other years that will follow." She leans forward and gives me a loving kiss I repeat hungrily. Right at that moment someone knocks at the door and we separate hesitantly.
"That will be Usagi and the others. I am glad that Rei took Hotaru over the last night. It would have been too much for her."
I nod and look attentive at the still closed door. Attentive and a little bit nervous. After all I want to show my best friends who became my family over the past years my new born daughter.
As I would show my Sakura-chan six fantastic, but sometimes totally crazy aunts.
Carefully the door was opened. I frowned, because the way I know Usagi – and especially Rei – they would never be so shy. Normally they would have run into the room and fallen over my daughter. While Setsuna would have bought tons of Teddy bears and other toys with her and Makoto would have looked sceptically at the food menu. I just considered in throwing Minako out if she would start a live show and wake Sakura up with her crazy singing, as a boy appears in the door frame. Unsure he looks over to me and hides his hands in the pockets of his jeans. He's fourteen, maybe a little bit older. A real teenager. I have never been good in guessing other people's age, but he's still at school, that's clear. Something remembers me about him. His blonde hairs are cut short, but some strands are still hanging in his face. As he raises his head and looks directly at me, I can see his dark green eyes. They remember me of someone. Some moments I stare at him in silence before I realize that he has my eyes. It is like looking into a mirror, but the reflection is ten years younger and male.
Nani?
"Tenô?" he asks shyly and steps a little bit closer to my bed. "Tenô Haruka?"
"Hai?"
"Are you Tenô Haruka?"
"Well… five minutes ago I had been." I respond a little bit mocking and wonder who he is. He can't be from the newspapers. Those guys are ganging around the hospital since I arrived here yesterday. To get a picture from the famous car racer and her new born daughter. But he cannot be a son of one of my team colleagues either, can he? I thought I would know my colleagues by now. All of them – together with their families.
Now the boy is smiling and suddenly I recognize him.
"Hitsuko-chan?" I whisper in disbelieve. But he does not answer, instead he turns around and screams so loudly out to the corridor that he surely woke up everyone trying to sleep in this hospital.
"Mom! Dad! I found her! She is here!"
Nani?
Before I am able to react the door is pushed open and suddenly she is standing in my room: Yomoko Susuka, my aunt. Behind her I can see her husband and her son. They are all older, they all changed. But there are still those gentle looks in their eyes. The gentle looks I ignored so merciless just ten years ago.
Nani?
I am not able to move nor speak. Speechless I stare at the three persons, believing to see a fata morgana. I searched so desperately for them over the past years and now that I almost gave up the search they are here, standing in my room and smiling at me as if nothing happened at all.
"Who are you?" asks Michiru politely and raises, still holding Sakura softly in her arms. Still the baby is sleeping but it is only a matter of time until she will wake up and start hungrily to scream.
"We are Haru's aunt, uncle and cousin." Grins the boy and now he walks more self-assured over to Michiru. "We are her family and want to see the new born child."
Michiru does not turn around to look at me but I can feel clearly her confusion. Of course she is confused. I never told her anything about my family. First we had no time and then… then I believed that it had been too late. Why should I have told my love about my family I lost because of my own stupidity?
But now those persons are standing right in front of my bed and are looking curiously at my new born daughter. Those persons I screamed at so often, I hated so openly, I hurt so deeply. Hitsuko likes Sakura at the first sight and wanted to hold her and to carry her around, but Michiru and his mother held him back in his enthusiasm.
"She is beautiful, Haru-chan."
Haru-chan.
That is the nick name my aunt always called me. Even when she had been angry or disappointed – because of my stubborn behaviour.
"Congratulations." Says Shinji and the knot gets tighter inside my throat.
"How…?" that's the only word I can croak.
"We are regularly reading The Sun." laughs Hitsuko and shows us a crumbled newspaper.
"Oh, great!" groans Michiru who hates such "newspapers" where you can hardly read any news but a lot of gossip. But suddenly I am incredibly thankful for the rainbow press, because it was the big article on the front page which led Sazuka, Shinji and Hitsuko to me.
"Why…" Somehow I can't croak more than just a word. It sounds incredibly hoarse.
"Because I wanted to congratulate my most favourite niece to such a beautiful daughter and to wish her all the luck this world can offer." Aunt Susuka looks over to Michiru who is rocking Sakura tenderly in her arm and smiles knowing. "You must be incredibly proud parents."
I nod and gulp hard.
The next moment I feel soft arms being lovingly wrapped around me. Just like they used to, shortly after my parent's death. Again I feel the safeness, the understanding and the unconditional love they wanted to gave me then. Feeling I pushed away blindly.
So much happened but my aunt seems to love me even now. Probably she searched for me the same I searched for her and could only find me about that newspaper article. Probably she already knew where I lived, but was too unsure to visit me, because I never answered a single letter, ignored every single telephone call. But nevertheless she is here. Simply like that… and offers me her love and her forgiveness.
The knot solves in my throat and for the first time since my parent's death tears are streaming over my face. I did not cry since the cruel words of that emotionless uncle. I did not cry in the St. Marine's Cathedral, nor did I when Sailor Galaxia defeated us. I did not even cry last year when Sakura was born. Well… instead of crying I scolded everyone and everything a lot and kicked a little bit around.
But now the tears are streaming down my face, meeting no resistance while I embrace my aunt in return, almost clung myself to her. Suddenly I have incredible fear that she could disappear and leave me alone again. Ten years ago I wanted to be alone. But right now I had to see how stupid I had been. No, I do not want to be alone again. I do want my daughter – our daughters – to get to know not only Michiru's family but mine as well. I do want Hotaru and Sakura get to know my aunt Susuka. To get to love her the same way I love her…
"Forgive me, aunt Susuka. Please, forgive me."
I do not know when I begged so strongly for the last time, but Susuka's loving squeezing shows me that she did understand – and forgive me.
"We did all our own mistakes, Haru-chan. Let's start right from the beginning again, okay?"
"Okay…" I sob and even more tears run down my cheeks. But different from the tears I cried at my parent's funeral, those tears are streaming over a smiling face.
The first time in my life I cry happily. I am crying like a small child but I do not feel ashamed. Not at all. Here is my aunt, my family – beside Michiru and the girls – and she forgave me.
Suddenly I know that this is going to be one of the moments I would treasure forever in my memories. No matter what would come in the future.
It is the most wonderful memory of them all.
Finis
Thank you for reading this story. I'd be happy if you'd at least take a short look at the other fanfic that belongs to this one. It is called "Geweint vor Glück". It is the German translation of this story and I would be happy if you would at least read the reasons why I wrote this story in both languages.
It is very important for me.
April Eagle
7th August 2002