This was supposed to be an artsy scene rewrite but it might have just turned out short. And odd.
For day three of Gundam 00 Week.
Set mid season one, with spoilers for Setsuna's backstory.
Resentient
noun; a thing that causes a change of feeling
May 4, 2016
She lies sprawled on the couch, boots kicking off the edge and pale arms wrapped around the pillow she clutches to her chest as she cries, sobbing her heart out. She cries until the mascara trails down her face and her voice is hoarse and raw.
Saji sits beside her stiffly, hands worrying in his lap as he looks on. But he does nothing, says nothing.
The other boy stares at her without moving, tousled hair falling over uncomfortably sharp eyes as she continues to wail.
Her voice cracks and her body tells her there are no more tears to cry. She shudders and buries her face as they dry. Then she pulls back, sniffling. Strands of hair clump to her wet cheek and she demands to know what he's looking at.
"Why are you upset?" he asks.
She squints. Dangerously. "My mother is gone."
He stares for too long, unblinking, and his dark eyes see all the way through her.
"It's not like she's dead," he finally tells her, when the silence has stretched too long.
(it's not like she's killed her)
(not like she raised her gun without letting it shake and stared at her with deadened eyes as she blocked out her desperate pleas and watched her mother disappear into the dust of the wall behind her once she finally pulled the trigger)
(she can see her mother again)
"I hate you. I hate you," she spits.
Saji tries to laugh it off. "You don't really hate him," he tells her. "You keep saying things you don't mean."
She whirls around. "Hit him. Punch him," she demands. "For me."
His eyes grow wide in alarm and he throws up his hands in the air. "I won't do that," he stammers his protest.
(he'll never do anything)
"Make him leave," she says. She won't take no for an answer. She wants him gone.
The boy stands like he has been waiting for a chance to walk out the door. "I'll go."
His eyes meet hers and her heart pounds in her ears until everything becomes white noise. She tries to say something, but doesn't know what, and the words fail her before she even begins.
He stares at her, into her, through her, and she shrinks back because he sees too much. He knows all that she is and all that she isn't. He sizes her up in a glance, and passes his scathing judgment without his expression changing in the slightest.
She cannot defend herself because he is right and she hates that he has seen in a moment what she so desperately hides from the world.
She needs him gone.
"Setsuna…" Saji protests weakly as his neighbor walks to the door.
He turns but won't listen to his host even if he finds the words to ask him to stay. But Saji doesn't press, though his outstretched hand hangs hesitantly in the air between them.
"Go," she calls after the boy with his hand on the doorknob, unwilling to let him have the last word in this. "Stupid! Idiot!" she shouts because she doesn't believe it. "Go away!"
He doesn't react as he slips out the door.
It clicks shut behind him and Saji is quick to sigh, "Louise…"
She doesn't care.