~*Three Step Story*~
by Lalita
Disclaimer~ Yes, I am secretly the owner of Lufia. That is why I have to write fanfictions instead of making more sequels and whatnot. *rolls eyes* I don't own any part of Lufia.
Summary~ The first step to recovery is recognition. Then, it's determination. Will Jerin and Aguro follow this plan?
Author Notes~ This short Aguro/Jerin fic idea popped into my head awhile ago, and so, tada! Here it is. The Hero in this fic is called Max- simply because that's what I named him in my game. Yes, I know, I'm so creative… Anyways, please read and review.
Chapter One~ Recognition
The ocean off the docks of Lorbenia was blue. Of course, all water in lakes and such was blue, but this water was of a hue so deep that one couldn't see more than two inches into it. A small, petite girl looking to be about sixteen dangled her legs over the edge of the dock, her shoulder-length silver blonde hair tossing in the cool breezes sent occasionally her way. The sun's warm rays gave her skin a glowing look as she basked in them, eyes closed and breathing in slowly. The setting was so serene she could almost forget about why she had come here in the first place, why her right knee was scraped in a hasty stumble, and why her eyes were red and her cheeks as salty as the ocean below her. Almost.
Jerin sighed heavily. "Leave it to that damn, stubborn ass to ruin the moment," she thought wryly. She refused to give that damn, stubborn ass a name. Thinking about that damn, stubborn ass would only make the peace she sought flee. Already, her muscles had tensed and her hand twitched, as if itching to give that bastard the slap he deserved.
Jerin leaned over to the ocean and let her hand trail through it. She scooped up a handful of water and rigorously splashed her face with it, as if hoping to erase all the tell-tale signs of their recent fight. One would only think that after living with him for two years, she would have been used to all his annoying habits, all his witless but cruel comments, and the taunts that never seemed to end. Oh, she knew she did her share of prodding and poking, but if he could just look at her as an actual person instead of just some bratty, whiny half-elf with hardly half a brain...
She glared reproachfully at a stray bird squawking as it swooped down to grab a fish not thirty feet away from her. Stupid bird, interrupting her quiet. Jerin scowled. Alright, she was more or less taking out her frustration with Aguro on the bird, but still. Maybe it was a good thing the bird had cut off her train of thought. Being alone for too long always led to that dangerous path of wayward, absent thoughts she hardly meant at all, and the bird's cry was just the thing to cut off that nonsense. Nay, if she was to think at all, it might as well be about something useful, like finding a new place to live.
Oh, Aguro had threatened to throw her out often enough, but she had never truly believed he would cast her out to the streets and leave her to live like a beggar. She knew she could find work somewhere, and if she really wanted to, could travel back to her old village, but living with Aguro was like holding on to her only memories of her adventure, of defeating the Sinistrals, of Max...
Jerin shook her head. It was not possible that after all these years, she could still be hopelessly infatuated with a man who had eyes only for one person. A person who was dead, who had betrayed them and was all in all a worse brat than she was. Jerin felt a quick stab of envy, followed by a pang of guilt. It wasn't right for her to be taking shots at the dead, especially when the girl she was taking shots at had turned out to save their hides in the end.
Jerin quickly withdrew her feet from the water, feeling a shiver. Thinking of Lufia always invoked feelings like that. The water, which had minutes before seemed so calm and relaxing, now looked like dark strands of Lufia's hair, wanting to twist around her ankles and yank her in.
No, she was smart enough to know that her infatuation with Max had been just that- an infatuation, and one she would best be rid of. Max hadn't been seen or heard from since that fateful day when the Sinistrals were finally defeated, the day Lufia had fallen off of Doom Island and was presumed dead. The day when after being transported back to land, Max had left them without a backward glance or a goodbye.
Jerin felt her throat constrict. She hadn't thought it possible, being an elf, or a half elf, that humans could be wrapped up so tightly in their emotions. Even she hadn't felt much despair and grief over her own parents' deaths. Perhaps it was because she was young, or that in some part of her she understood there would be others to share her life with, but she hadn't even shed a tear. The day Max walked away from her forever was the day she finally cried. She didn't cry only for her loss, but for his loss as well. And that had been the day that Aguro had awkwardly patted her back and offered her a place to live when she confessed she didn't have anywhere else to go. That had been the only day in her life that Aguro had said or done one kind thing for her, and when she felt like chucking a knife at his heart, she reminded herself of it.
A tall, dark shadow looming behind her made Jerin tense up again and she turned slowly, although she didn't need to to know who was there. Aguro stood a few feet behind her, brooding and utterly contrasting with the moment of nostalgia she had just went through. Aguro was here now, bringing back her present situation.
"If you haven't come to apologize, then I'd like it if you'd leave," she snapped, turning her gaze back out to the water. Lufia's hair swirled angrily in protest, the ripples in the water looking like the tendrils whipping up, trying to grab at her. Jerin swallowed hard and focused on Aguro's reply.
"Since when have I based my life on what you'd like?" he said, equally riled. His voice was tense, but it held an undercurrent Jerin couldn't distinguish.
Jerin gritted her teeth and stood up, swinging around to face him. "I never said you had to!" she yelled.
Aguro ignored her. "Everything's about you, isn't it, Jerin?" he demanded. "Who cares if I can't even have a girlfriend because you're there. Who cares if I'm the one putting most of the money into everything. Who cares if everything's been messed up because of you. As long as you get what you want, you're happy."
Jerin flinched. It was the same dirty accusations as always. Her defenses kicked in again. "Exactly how did I mess everything up?" she asked heatedly. "If I remember right, you were the one who told me I could stay here. You were the one who brought it up!"
Aguro glared. The wind whipped his emerald hair around his face, temporarily blocking his view of her. "Do you know why I'm not getting that promotion, Jerin?" he growled, and then, not waiting for an answer, said, "It's because of you. My captain feels that he needs a man with more honor to take his place. A man that can marry a woman instead of just living with her and using her."
Jerin felt cold. "But it's not like that between us," she protested, looking down at her hands. "Doesn't he know that?"
"We've been living together for two years. We're not even related," he reminded her. "Think about it. If the situation was the same with two other people, don't you think it'd look a little suspicious?"
Jerin bowed her head, unwilling to let him see the hurt in her eyes. Okay, so he had a point- for once. She felt the familiar sting in her eyes, and almost cursed him right then and there. Stupid human. Whenever she was around him, it was like she didn't even have control of her own emotions anymore. "I guess I'll have to leave then," she said, her voice unsteady and wavering. She turned her back to him, not wanting to see his nod of agreement. She could only imagine what he would say. "About time," or "Thank God," or "Finally," but strangely enough, he said none of these.
"I'll be packed up by tomorrow," she continued. "I think there's a ship coming in with new items for the stores. I'll wait at the inn until it's done unloading and what, then I'll buy a passage. I'll find somewhere. Maybe I can sign on as a hand or a cook or..." she broke off, realizing she had been rambling and because Aguro was now laughing.
"You? A cook?" he chuckled. "You'll have to think of something better than that. I don't want to be responsible for them throwing you overboard after your first meal."
Jerin bristled. "I can cook perfectly fine," she sniffed. "Just because you've been raised on army food and you don't know good food when you taste it doesn't mean that others don't appreciate my cooking."
"Besides," Aguro interrupted, "you don't have to stay at the inn to wait out for a ship. You'll waste all your gold." He looked at her sharply when she snorted in disbelief. "I'm not all the big bad bastard you think I am."
"The first step to recovery is realization," Jerin said tartly.
This time it was Aguro's turn to wince. Fights with Jerin were always like this, more verbal sparring than anything else, and not nearly so satisfying as knocking heads together or blacking eyes. Of course, that was what Aguro usually did in training after a fight with Jerin, to relieve his frustration. He couldn't trust himself not to blow up around her unless he got rid of all his excess energy somehow. Only recently had that tension become on a more sexual level, and so only recently had the whores of Lorbenia been gaining a bit more coin from a certain green haired knight.
Of course, Jerin didn't know about that, and he didn't intend to let her know, either. Then she really would blow up, if she knew that occasionally these whores would enter their house. She really would leave then, even though it wasn't her business what he did with his free time, and something about not having the short, spunky girl with him didn't sit well with him.
Jerin crossed her arms over her chest and said flatly, "You can leave now, Aguro. You're mission's been accomplished. I'm leaving, which is what you wanted all along, isn't it?"
The accusation was flung across the air and it hung between them. The waves crashed on the side of the dock harder, higher, rising almost as high as the unresolved stress between the two. Jerin fixed Aguro with a steady gaze. The gauntlet was thrown. There was no way he could turn down the challenge now.
They locked gazes, both too prideful to look away, not caring what their eyes revealed. "What makes you say that?" Aguro asked slowly.
Jerin barked a bitter laugh. "Please, Aguro," she said. "I know it's hard, but try to act as if you have some intelligence."
Aguro squinted, going through his mind and recalling all the times they'd come to blows. Roaring, furious, he'd yelled more often than not that he'd rather her be gone, and just last month he'd demanded when she was going to find a new home. But it wasn't as if he had meant any of it, though his life would be much less complicated without her in it. "Alright," he conceded, "you have a point."
"When don't I?" Jerin said smugly. Aguro mentally groaned. Dealing with women was always impossible, but Jerin was doubly worse. There were times when she could match him for stubbornness, grit, gall....
He shook his head. "You're impossible, you know that?" he told her, voicing his thoughts.
"And you're an ass," she shot back. She didn't care if Aguro had opened a door for reasonable conversation. She was angrier than a hornet, and she felt like stinging him just as bad as one.
Aguro knew that no words could soothe or placate Jerin when she was in this mood. Not that he'd put the effort into it, anyway. The damn woman. Damn, fool woman...
Aguro nearly jumped. Since when had he started thinking of Jerin as a woman, instead of a mere girl? Was it because her face had lost the pudgy roundness, because her eyes, large and expressive, had a fire of their own? Was it because her body, though still small, really had started maturing? Aguro absently raked a hand through his tangled hair. He wasn't hitting the point. His recent attraction to her couldn't be just because of her looks, because if that was all it took for any woman, he'd have been married ten times already.
"Hello? Aguro?" Jerin waved a hand impatiently in front of his face. "Deep in thought, are we? I never thought I'd live to see the day you put any brain power into anything."
Her remark brought Aguro back to his senses. "You know you'll live longer than I," he said, amused to watch her reaction to his next words. "For all I know, you could be lying to me and really be one-hundred years old. You never can tell with an elf."
She turned red, a mixture of anger and embarrassment. She hated the mention of her age. "That blush really is becoming of her," Aguro thought idly. "I suppose that's why most married couples can forgive and forget. Women are much more beautiful when angry."
If that was the case, he could see why Max had fallen so hard for Lufia. Aguro never had been attracted to her, despite her beauty. She didn't smile enough, and was far too jealous and protective for his tastes. But it was plain for all to see that Max was in love with her, even if he didn't realize it himself. It had also been painfully obvious to see that Jerin was equally besotted with Max as Lufia.
His mind went back through the haze of memories to the time Jerin and Lufia had a fight over their hair, girlish as they still were. Lufia had spitefully said Jerin looked like a boy with her hair cropped short, and Jerin had turned as red as a ripe tomato. Maybe that was why she had been growing her hair out longer, even though she had always told him it was much more sensible to have short hair that didn't get in the way. Even though she had told Lufia she wasn't so vain as to put her hair before more important things, like being useful to the team.
He wondered if Jerin felt guilty over Lufia's death. It certainly hadn't won her Max, and all their confrontations must have lingered in her mind, always there to set her off into a melancholy mood of regret, in which she would come here. And when he asked what was wrong, she would throw a fit like a child, insisting nothing was wrong and why didn't he just leave her alone?
"I am not old," she said crossly, her face pinched. Aguro couldn't explain why, but he had a sudden urge to tweak her nose. It was what his older sister had always done to him when he was younger, when he was pouting and putting on his "sour apple face."
"It looks like I'm not the only one in denial, then," Aguro bantered, a wide smirk taking place on his face.
Jerin's eyebrows lowered ominously and the familiar furrow in her forehead deepened. "Better watch out," he told her, "else those lines or your face will be permanent and then you really will look like an old woman."
Jerin's eyes blazed in anger. "You... You..." she sputtered, apparently unable to come up with a name foul enough to suit him.
"Me... Me..." he mimicked her, knowing he was probably pressing buttons he shouldn't.
Jerin's hands curled into two small, balled fists. Her nails, whatever little was left that she didn't bite off, dug into her skin. "I hate you!" she spat out, then, brushing past him so swiftly so that he wouldn't see her tears, she held her head high and stormed off.
Aguro followed her, relentless. "Do you now?" he asked her, grinning widely. "That's why you live with me, right?"
The insinuations his comment induced were too much for Jerin to think about. She turned around again, not caring if he saw her tear-stained face. "You're so insensitive! You don't care at all, do you? All you care about is fighting with swords and fists and living your life just the way you want it! And if you don't like me so much either, why do you let me live you?"
"Maybe because I do care," he suggested, his voice ten decibels more tender than usual.
Jerin blinked in disbelief. "Ha," she snorted. "Load of dung, that is. If you really cared-"
"If I didn't care then I wouldn't want to do this," Aguro broke in, then leaned down to softly brush his lips on hers. Jerin hardly had time to register what was happening, to take in his musky scent and the feel of his rough, chapped lips on her own before he broke away and it was over. She stared at him, gawked, really.
"What?" she managed to choke out. She never had put much stock in the feminine trait of fainting, but by God, the way her heart was pounding she wouldn't be surprised if she joined that rank of ninnies!
Aguro shrugged. Jerin felt so confused, there only seemed to be one thing to do to rectify the situation.
She smacked Aguro squarely across the face.