affairs and occurrences
(to understand the occurrence of them is not the same as experiencing them.)
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It occurs to Doctor Klim that this is the man that Akane is in love with.
His eyes are tired and look like they have not brightened in years, and his whole figure radiates the words old and bitter. The old man is just that: old. He is cliché, in a way, because he is old and tired, and because he's grown bitter. He is everything an old man should be, almost too perfect a specimen of a stereotype.
However, Akane insists he is so much more than a stereotypical old man. He saved her almost half a century ago, and has been her light in life ever since. She wants nothing more than to be with this man, and is willing to go through with this whole AB project for it.
She loves him very, very much. So much that the Doctor wonders…
"Want to see Akane?"
The question is so, so rehearsed and the Doctor wonders if he'll ever feel candid while saying that.
Not a surprise as to what happens next. The man turns around, as if a bomb just dropped behind him.
Well, that's probably what if felt like, to an extent.
The Doctor gives him the information and then they bring up the young boy. Quark. The real light in the bitter old man's life. The young boy who warms his heart. Quark is certainly a contender for Tenmyouji's heart.
As much as Tenmyouji would like to believe that Quark owns his heart, the Doctor knows otherwise. Akane is in control of it. She has been forever.
It does not matter which Akane it is, or which one is Tenmyouji's. He will come looking, because the woman has his heart, and in turn he has hers.
It's ridiculous to think anything otherwise.
Luna had asked him about it, once. Such a silly girl with her silly little questions.
"Doctor… Do you think that Akane – "
"She loves the man very much."
"Do you love her?" is what he expected her to ask. Instead, she stays silent because she knows more than the Doctor expected her to.
Had she asked that, he would have laughed in her face and told her not to ask such stupid questions, and that would be an order, damn it. Then he would go on to ponder the topic only to decide that he does not love the woman.
He couldn't.
Not when he's met the man that she loves. He could never be that. He could never spend years searching in vain for a woman he did not consider to be the same as the one he had loved so many years ago. He could not do that, because he does not love her. He does not know what it feels like.
If that is love, then, no, he does not love her.
It occurs to the Doctor that the man Akane loves is blindly in love with her.
It seems the two have that in common. They are both pitiful creatures that he almost feels bad for.
"Come along, Luna. We have work to get done," he starts, but then adds, "Work that does not concern the affairs of the heart."
Luna understands, in that instant, but still gives him that look. That look of utmost respect, and that happy, trusting smile that could melt anyone down to acid. Luna is Luna, and she always seems to be in love when she gives that smile.
But she could not understand affairs of the heart, the Doctor starts to note, only the occurrences of them.
The Doctor wishes he could be like Luna, because understanding the occurrences of affairs of the heart is not the same as experiencing them.
He does not wish to experience them. Not anymore. Not after what he's seen happen to Tenmyouji based on his heart and its affairs. He never wants to end up like that: searching for the unfindable, growing obsessed and bitter and losing sight of hope.
The heart is trouble, the Doctor decides, and blocks all sight of his feelings as he begins to awaken three women, determined to not let his heart get the better of him around them or the young robot behind him.
He does not want to be in love. He does not want to be in love to save some woman he cannot save.
No, he does not want to be Junpei Tenmyouji.