The rabbit hearted girl became a lion hearted one.
The first days were like a defective sequence, a skewed metric – a dream. Aelita waited for Jeremie, waited so patiently. Held her breath, sucked her teeth, painted her face, waited. Read books about war, books about romance, books about arithmetic, waited. Aelita listened to a playlist that Odd had made for her, to acquaint her with the "better" music of the era, traced her fingers on her foreign skin, flushed her hair against her scalp, pouted her lips at the mirror, waited. Jeremie had a heavier courseload than everyone else, and Aelita understood, really, and no one knew how to wait better than her.
But this wait was punctuated by a loss of purpose, a loss of feeling. Aelita gazed at the ceiling and pressed her nose to Jeremie's pillow, felt strained and sharp inside her own skin, her bones razor sharp, jutting. She lived this strange life, held her breath to see if she was really alive, sang to remember the sound of her voice. Aelita learned about Aelita Stones; how heavy her legs felt when they anchored down, how the pads of her feet dragged across the floor, how her luminescent face, angular and sweet, floundered in the light. She learned how her vision was slightly off, how her elbows were tinted dark, how there was an actual space between her legs that served a purpose she didn't understand. She learned that she was human. She learned that sharp edges slid across her skin and left puckered marks, that gravity was severe in repeating the most important lesson of all: ordinary, you are ordinary. Aelita learned about Aelita until she was sick with knowing, until she couldn't bear the feeling of her tongue, of her veins, of her pulse, of her breath. And then she waited. Waited for the generosity of the clock, waited for the violent call of adolescent excitement, thundering through the dormitory halls.
Jeremie opened the door. He swept her into his arms, fingers tangling in her hair. Aelita waited for him to remove the frames from the bridge of his nose, waited for him to delicately place them on the table beside him, waited for him to thumb the luxurious peaks of her cheekbones. He smiled at her, his eyes were bright as his nose brushed against hers. "I missed you," he murmured, his voice falling beneath the octave of boyhood that was so quietly slipping from him.
Aelita waited for the dragging press of his mouth on hers, waited for him to realize she never closed her eyes, that the trembling was a weakness she did not own, was not a mutual interest between them. "I love you," he whispered, his breath short and punctured as he held her close, closer. Aelita had become so good at waiting that she did not mind waiting for the day that she would feel something.
"Princess," Odd hollered from across the cafeteria. Everyone stared as she made her way towards him, angling her hips in the form she'd seen the other girls do. Odd nudged her with his elbow and smiled as they played follow the leader all the way to the lunch tables. Aelita wasn't quite used to being the follower, always knowing where the tower was, what was coming their way, knowing all the secrets. She was special then – the chosen girl nymph who was trapped in a digital world, smarter, faster, and quicker than the rest. Now she was just a not-human girl sitting down in the middle of a crowded lunchroom with a boy who was looking at her like she was still something special.
Oh and she loved him, because he treated her like nothing was amiss, like she had been here all along. No one would tell her, but she knew he wanted things. Things that she could give him, but never would. That was not the plan. Jeremie fought for you so he deserves you, don't be confused about what you are – you're a consolation prize. He couldn't bleed with us, but he tried. Aelita, you're just a diamond, thrice as robust, a facet of our generosity. Still, Aelita wondered, and that was a crime punishable by scrutiny and displeasure. She brought them together and now she was tearing them apart. No one could wave away the stale air between them, when Odd was so promisingly making the corners of her mouth tilt, and Jeremie glowered under the discovery that they didn't have much in common after all.
Once, in a past life, when she had the markings of a dead society on her face, Odd had looked at her so serenely and said, "Yeah, I can get you there, but it looks like I'm going to have to die." Aelita wondered how many times Odd would have to die before it meant something.
"Odd, " Aelita smiled sweetly and felt the grandeur of that feeling blooming in her chest. "Aren't you supposed to be in class?"
He grinned so rebelliously that it made her fingertips ache. "So?" he was ridiculously charming in his bravado. "Let's get lost."
Jeremie looked so displeased and flustered when she walked through the door, stark against the inky night, hair tussled with detritus.
"I'm sorry," she replied, pressing a kiss to the back of his neck as she put her jacket away.
"Yes," Jeremie bristled. "But where have you been?"
"Somewhere," she teased, slipping her scarf from her neck. Her throat stung with that itch that often came when one heard a person misinforming another.
No, Jeremie, she wanted to say. Not where, but who.
In between late nights and stolen time – in between silences and misplaced apologies, missed dinners and condescending sentences, they died. They both felt it a personal failing, as was customary with their perfectionist culture. The death was so slow and quiet that neither thought to check up on it, to keep it at bay.
They basterdized the plan, the motions failed them.
And Odd was there, after every heated argument, every cold silence, every missed opportunity, a wolf, waiting at the back door, with a knife ready at the hand. Ready to blow everything down.
One night, they fell asleep on the cool glass. Odd turned to look at her with something so treacherous in his eyes that Aelita knew she had strayed so far she'd gotten lost.
"It feels so good to be alive," Aelita whispered. Odd pressed his mouth to her shoulder, Aelita closed her eyes. "But why does it hurt so much?"
"This world was not meant for you," he traced the arches of her eyebrows. "You're too fucking beautiful."
"This conversation was not meant for us," she murmured, opening her eyes, so stark and cutting. Odd did not move, did not flinch. His breath fanned over her cheekbones, his hesitation dappled her jawline. He didn't know the thorough calculations that dotted the landscapes of her dreams, but he knew music and understood beauty – something, that Jeremie had only grasped in her face and in her name, so slowly fussed over her mouth, once. It was something she desired so callously and so winningly, that Aelita felt herself pinned by Odd's sight, delighted and decaying. Her chest hurt so much, and Aelita mused that it could very well be a sign of poor health, but the detriment in her spirit was due to the fallacy, the playing house that she carried in these hours with this boy. The understanding that it was a handsome caricature, but only that, and it was only a matter of time and circumstance before she returned to her place and to Jeremie's side. Where else could she go? Where else did she belong, but by the side of her savior and creator, her prince and her hero?
But Odd was so good at bleeding. And when he bled, he painted the walls and flooded the floors; with his liquor and his brassy arrogance, his languid limbs and his pathology. He slurred apologies and heady comments as Aelita poured him a glass of water. She meant to help him up but he took her down with him, a change of pace and roles – and his mouth was vomit and regret. But Aelita did not regret it, him, or the blood that was on her hands, so delicately painted by his wanting mouth, his formulaic fingerprints. Marking her, tracing lines on her ashen face, promising heaven so he could steal the world.
"I'm failing and I can't even try," he sobbed into her shoulder.
And this feeling that he so openly offered, the unrealistic thrill of the realistic – the weakness in her chest and knees, the surplus of discontent at the limitations of hands and lips. Oh, Aelita wished she didn't know so much. For the first time, she was ready to throw herself to squalor, longed to become one of those simpering girls who when questioned simply said: "I don't know how it happened." But Aelita knew how and why and when, now, and now was too soon.
"Odd, no," she reprimanded and drew herself upwards.
"That," he heaved. "Is not a word you should even know around me."
Aelita laughed. "Don't be silly," her mouth drew into a smile. "Why wouldn't I know it?"
"Because, I've never said it to you."
Ah. Yes, that was true. So the awkward truth destroyed the possibility of an indiscretion, and with all of their skeletons scraping their bony fingers at their wrists, Aelita could not reply.
It was not until much, much later that Aelita realized that she too, was bleeding.
The weight of living a life you never dreamed of, that you were not prepared or programmed for, was immense. Aelita found herself bent and crooked beneath it, guilt coloring her every movement. She kept waiting for Jeremie to ask her what was wrong but he never did. Maybe he knew, or maybe he could not accept that his creation was flawed. Aelita wondered if he punished himself for her failings as severely as she did.
Slack against the wall, Aelita politely asked Yumi if she minded temporary company in her bedroom for a few days.
"Of course not," Yumi replied, with that confidence that soared and peaked in her tones. She looked quixotic, but was too clever to ask.
"Don't tell anyone," Aelita further elaborated. Yumi nodded, and did not speak of it again. Aelita was so thankful she cried in her bathroom that entire night. Yumi did not stir from her bed, but Aelita knew with shameful certainty that Yumi was sensitive to the slightest anything, and she could hear her as if she was tucked into her bed.
The next morning, Yumi showed her how to dab the corners of her eyes so that they did not look so streaked.
"I'm sure you already know," Aelita murmured.
Yumi clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. "Not exactly," she confessed. "But I'm sure I can guess."
"I'm so sorry!"
Yumi looked so surprised, startled at the girl in her arms, so very unlike the warrior she had fought to free.
Aelita continued. "I know that I'm supposed to love Jeremie, and I do! I do, but I … Sometimes I just feel like – there are so many things that he doesn't understand, and he just doesn't feel about things the way that I do. I know, this is why, this is why… I was brought here, but it doesn't feel…"
Yumi closed the door.
"Ah," was all she said.
"Odd makes me feel… and it's wrong – "
"Aelita," Yumi cut her off so tactfully. She moved subtly, as if she had everything she needed to diagnose the cancer that was killing her. "You can't punish yourself for not loving someone who loves you. Jeremie didn't bring you here to be his girlfriend, he brought you here so you could be free. Don't forget what that means. It means that no matter what you do, Jeremie isn't going to stop loving you just because you changed your mind."
"I wish he would."
Yumi smiled, and Aelita was certain she was thinking of William. "No," she said. "What you wish is that you could walk away and that no one would get hurt. But hey, this is what you wanted, right? Isn't it great to be human?"
"I could end this, right now."
The grass was cool underneath her, his shadow cooler, over her.
"What?" she asked, startled.
Odd pressed his nose to hers. His breath fanned over her cheekbones.
"I could kiss you, right now, and you wouldn't say no."
"Then why not?"
"Because," Odd said, rolling away, tussling his beautiful, beautiful golden hair into the mossy green. "Knights serve, not steal."
"Maybe you'll be happy," she says. Her hands linger at his neck too much. The pressure feels good, reliable. She could end this too, if she wanted to.
Odd closes his eyes and lets her break his bones with her breath.
"Before you go," Jeremie's voice is very calm, level. "I want to tell you that I love you – still, and I will love you even after you step out of that door. I will love you as the days go on. I will love you as you feel guilty because you feel relieved, I will love you until you feel nothing at all. I will love you until you feel a polite amount of time has passed, enough to speak to me again, and I will still love you when you decide it is okay to love someone else. I will love you when I know who you love, and I will love you both because I have loved you both all along."
The wanting was so naked in his voice, his hopes were so obvious. Odd stared at her for such a long time that Aelita was not sure if this moment had already passed and she was only remembering it.
Aelita pressed her nimble fingers to a crown of golden hair. Odd shuffled deeper into the sheets, groaning. The neckline of her shirt snagged in his hand, the hem of her skirt flirted with his thighs. These moments were idyllic in their normalcy, which was all she ever wanted. Odd finally turned to her and slid one eye open. His mouth curled.
"Hello gorgeous."
Aelita wanted to say something like, I love you or I am so happy, but all she could think was – a golden haired boy loved me once and I betrayed him.
Odd was so hurt by her memories that he couldn't speak. He saw the signs that Jeremie had failed to notice, saw the pinprick in her chest where he was pouring all his love, where it leaked out. Saw the idle drops of blood, breadcrumbs to the end.
"I won't let it happen," Odd said, mouth slack with liquor.
Aelita let him believe that he could stop her from going, and let herself believe that she'd arrived in the first place.
She really did like this prison he built for her, a structure built on noble intentions and misplaced adulation. She liked it so much all she wanted to do was to burn it down to see if he would build it again. That's what she was good at, Aelita decided. She was good at pulling people from death so she could kill them herself.
Aelita wanted to laugh, laugh hard and terrible at the realization that they had read the story incorrectly, that Xana had tried so hard to save them all from her, that she had been the virus all along.
Odd curved her hair behind her ear, teasing her for it's gaudy color.
"Aelita," he said, serious and still. He cleared his throat. "I love you."
Aelita smiled and waited.