She supposed she had really loved him, once.

She stares at her reflection in her bedroom mirror, barely visible in the complete darkness of their room. When did those lines appear? What was it that stole the brightness, the twinkle from her eyes? She begins to undress, pulling off the dirty, uncomfortable suit and substituting it with her nightgown. She sighs, and pokes a finger through one of the holes that are starting to appear in her worn t-shirt. She never imagined her life would turn out like this.

A shadow falls across her reflection and she looks toward the doorway, where her husband stands, watching her. He yawns tiredly, and walks around her to his side of the bed. His t-shirt and boxer ensemble are reminiscent of his childhood pajamas, one of the few things from the past that wasn't destroyed by her. They make eye contact before he pulls back the covers, getting in bed. Neither smiles as she mimics him, sliding down between the cool sheets and next to his warm body.

She turns over to face him only to find that his eyes are closing steadily and he's already practically asleep. Only now does she smile at him, a small smile, but a smile nonetheless. She snuggles closer to him, and he blinks sleepily at her, throwing an arm haphazardly across her waist and smiling a small smile back. She whispers, "I'm sorry," to him, and he shakes his head; she was forgiven long before she ever muttered the words.

His eyes are closed and he still wears a smile as he whispers back, "There's nothing to be sorry for." But she knows better, and she's sorry every day of her life that she didn't trust him when he told her he needed to destroy the gift. If she had just let him smash it like he did every other gift, if she hadn't seperated his gift from all the others, maybe, just maybe, her life would have turned out different. She's so sorry that she couldn't prevent this, this monstrosity, from happening. She's sorry that she let her ruin everyone's future. She's sorry that she let the light be stolen from his eyes, that intellectual, accomplished look; his confidence and intelligence- she let it all be taken away. Why didn't she stop her? She's sorry for so many things that she begins to lose count, and the way she has his forgiveness no matter what she's done completely overwhelms her tonight. She feels tears drift down her cheeks, and before she knows what's happening she's clutching onto his shirt like if she doesn't, he'll be snatched away from her just like everything else and she sobs.

He's awake in an instant and doing his best to soothe her. "Shh...it's alright, I'm here, it's alright. Shh..." he whispers into her hair. He rubs her back in little circles, smoothes down her hair, anything to bring back a smile to her face. "Shh..." Her tears have stopped coming, but her eyes are sore as she searches his face. Her breath is coming in shaky breaths and hiccups. He kisses her softly on the forehead, again on her lips, holding the last kiss a bit longer than the first. Whispered I love you's are lost in the space between them as they fall asleep, closer than they have been in quite some time.

She supposed she had loved him once. And in the stillness of their bedroom and the warmth of his body, she knows she loves him now.

Fin

I'm not sure about this one. I've been toying with this idea for a few weeks now. I don't think it came out the way I wanted it to or planned it to, but it's still (hopefully) a nice little...ficlet type thing. It's a lot more serious than most of my stories usually are, and it's kind of dark, which is something I tend to stay far, far away from.

This is set in the bad future, where Libby is an evil dictator. I figured that future-Cindy is the way she is toward future-Jimmy partly because it's her nature and partly because of the stress of living under Libby's rule. And yes, the two people are Jimmy and Cindy. :)