She was twenty-two years old when she lost her heart for the last time. The exact moment, the exact second, could be pinpointed. It was the feeling of hopelessness that accompanied the pain that let her know she had lost it forever. There was no slow realization, which may have been better, but a sudden feeling of being incomplete.
Years past, she might have been surprised at the sudden turn of events. But things were different now, yet so much the same that the familiarity of the situation made her want to laugh until her throat bled.
"So here we are again. Somehow, it's almost a relief." A small bitter smile accompanied her statement.
There was no reply from her companion, only a look so hollow that emotions echoed in his eyes. Slowly, he turned away from her to look up at the moon. It shined high in the sky, shedding silvery light that cast everything into black and white and shades of gray.
She turned to look at a leaf that had landed on her shoulder. Picking it up, she stared at it for a moment before crushing it in her grip. The mangled remains of a symbol so important to them fell to the ground. They both watched as she stepped on it, slowly grinding it into the cobblestone.
" Ten years since I've met you. Ten years, feels like twice my lifetime even thought it's less than half. Though I suppose I'm lucky to have made it this long."
Again, no reply. Just the empty look that held so much. His posture was as straight and noble as ever, never betraying the weight that lay on his shoulders, on his soul.
"Luck. Or maybe misfortune. Sometimes the two blur together."
Slowly he walked forward, closing the already short distance between them. He reached for her shoulder, but was stilled by a noise he never wanted to hear.
A broken laugh burst free from her lips. Sounding so, so wrong from her sweet, sweet voice. It was unnatural, this damaged expression of ironic mirth coming from someone so pure. He wanted, needed, it to stop, but knew he had no right to ask anything of her.
"Do you still have a soul? Mine aches."
The hand that had stilled moved again to rest over her heart.
She quickly shook her head.
"No, not there. That is lost." Her voice was soft and sent shivers up his spine.
She gently moved his hand to the center of her chest and held it there.
"This. This is what hurts. When you walk through those gates, it will rip. One half will go with you. The other will find my heart, wherever it's lost itself. And I, I will remain here and watch a new soul and heart and they form, right here." As she spoke the last two words, she moved his hand from her chest to her abdomen.
His eyes widened and his hand twitched, pushing closer to what he knew was inside of her. Again the broken laugh sounded. In the laugh he heard the echo of his damaged soul, and the scream of their identical pain.
"I wonder. Can someone with no heart or soul nurture new ones?" The broken laugh gave way to a broken sob, and the broken girl wrenched away from the hand of the broken boy.
He watched as she walked away, returning to their empty home where the promises he had made would echo in her ears until she could hear no more. Turning away, he headed for the gates a second time, towards keeping the only promise he had not abandoned.
Three years later, he returned with half of her soul, only to find that it's vessel could not be found. Slowly, with dread filling his being, he walked towards the wretched stone that gave testament to the greatest type of pain his kind could feel. There, etched in the dark marble he found her, and the last part of her soul slipped away from him to be lost with the rest of her.
Sensing a presence, he turned to see the blonde whiskered hokage, standing there and staring at the stone. Wordlessly, he removed the hat that belied his station, and from it removed a tear stained scroll. Reaching out to the stone, he traced her name, before silently handing over the scroll and walking away.
Opening the scroll the dark haired man opened it as slowly as possible, before reading the small script.
"Your son was born in the Spring, with a full heart and pure soul."
Falling to his knees, the broken man let out a broken laugh as he remembered the broken eyes of his broken love.