Esto Perpetua
a c a n t h a - c h a n
Authoress' Notes & Disclaimer: I'm not sure what made me write this little (or not so little, depending on how you see it) drabble of mine, but although I don't abuse the female characters of FF XII by pairing them with every single other fe/male character out there, this is sweet, simple, and subtle - if I'm allowed to compliment my own work. Furthermore, I don't happen to own the FF XII copyrights - that'd be Square Enix you're thinking about.
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"The unexamined life is not worth living."
She likes to think he's made an impact on the flighty wanderer, a dashing man whose life is all that Vaan seeks, but Penelo knows better to assume foolish things. He enjoys her company, perhaps; he enjoys being able to drink her under the table every night, just maybe; he enjoys pretending he likes her just a little bit more than a man would a woman, but only in her head. However, delusions like that are the sort of imaginative fantasies only lovestruck young women think of, so it might be that it's only logical Penelo can't resist the man's vagabond smile, his eyes the color of smouldering ashes (they match her own, so she should know very well), the classy assortment of exquisite jewelry, not even his erudite fashion of speech.
So it seems, love is not at all what she expected it to be; the man with whom she had fallen in love with, too, was not what she had been expecting.
Her girlish mind dreams up all sorts of scenarios in which they meet - a variety of possibilities, but only one ending was she particularly fond of.
It was a fairy tale ending, in a twist of universal irony, as Penelo had never been the sort to think up such things as stories based on human desires.
In fact, now that she'd thought back on it, the young lady's only thought is how the path to reaching maturity was paved with all sorts of mental strains (and physical, as she'd noticed in the mirror than morning) that were designed to improve upon that which one lacked. As a child she had always hated fairy tales because they weren't realistic enough for her taste. Quite frankly, Penelo preferred bread on the table rather than story in the mind.
It was a little too realistic, now that she'd contemplated exactly why she thought that, and finally came up with the conclusion that it was only because she had never lived a fairy tale sort of life that she'd never wanted to.
And after all, you never know what you have until you lose it.
Eternity doesn't last forever, you know.