Black and Bitter
I watch her take a sip of her coffee; black and bitter as it always is. She told me once that it actually helped her to wake up more, despite the horrid taste. Her nose would always scrunch up in a not exactly cute but not exactly stupid way as she drank it, as it did right now.
I know every little detail about her. She hates rap and prefers soft rock and country. She goes to church loyally every week and wears a small, silver cross on a thin chain. She adores romance novels but pretends to hide them from me so I can't make fun of her. She loves the cooking network but leaves abruptly when I fiddle around on the History channel.
She sleeps early and wakes up early. She makes a face when I pour myself a bowl of cereal, believing that I'll rot my teeth out one day. She prefers fruit over candy, apples over chocolate.
When I wake up in the morning, we're sometimes cuddled up real close and sometimes there's a gap between us that makes my head swim. There's never a fight for sheets or a rush for the first shower. I never accidentally use her vibrant purple toothbrush, nor does she mistake my sea green brush for hers. We never hit the snooze button, no matter how much I sometimes just want to cling to the warmth of our bed for the rest of the day.
She loves watching the stars and sometimes I can see her looking at me with bitterness for making her move to the city where the electric lights and smog always dim out the nighttime sky. On rainy days, she likes to lock herself up in our apartment, reading something light and happy, diving into a world where there is only sunshine and romance and stars.
Sometimes, I think she just wants to stay in those fantasies, regardless of whether I am with her or not. Sometimes, I think she could care less about me, about my dreams or my aspirations.
Sometimes, I know she doesn't love me.
But I pretend. I like fantasy worlds too, where I succeed at my job, where I'm always healthy and forever young, and where the girl never leaves. And then something happens, as it always does, and I'm forcefully yanked out of my made-up world, as if someone had just slammed my fairy-tale book shut without warning.
These "somethings", they're always little things that make a huge impression on me. Tiny things that I could ignore, that I should ignore, that eat away at me until I feel slightly sick and empty inside.
She doesn't come home until an hour after the set time. She promises to go somewhere with me and then easily forgets. She throws away my favorite novel because she tells me it looks too worn and torn, though she doesn't actually tell me until I've got slightly nuts with panic a week later.
She hangs up without saying so much as a "Bye!", let alone an "I love you!".
Small things adding up to equal one big problem. But it was okay; I still had my fantasy world where everything was perfect and there was no rain.
And even that, she had to shatter eventually.
"I can't believe you're dragging me to this," I mutter. My arms feel like soggy lead as I drag them over and across my chest. My gaze shifts all over the car, out the windows, at the speedometer, at the empty pharmacist bag...
Fuck.
One hand gripping the steering wheel tight, Kairi, the girlfriend I know too much about, the girlfriend I pretended so much for, takes a small sip of her – bitter – coffee as a soft keening sound rises at the back of her throat.
"I-I know you hate this, but I really think it'll be g-good for us, you know? We're just going to go once, see how things go. It's worth a chance, it'll be good for us, Riku."
Riku. Stop saying my name; I'm so sick of hearing my name coming from those lips! Over the years, I'd heard her say "Riku" with a condescending tone, an upset tone, an angry tone, a happy tone, a passionate tone, a guarded tone. I'd have preferred any of those to the Wild-Animal, as I had so dubbed it, tone she was using now.
Soft, unsure, patronizing, cautious, pitying. I hate it, I hate hearing it. I hate her–
No. I hate myself; I would never be able to hate her, I know. Not even after what she had done to me, what she had done to us. It's sickening, horrible, unfair. I have every right to hate her and more.
I shake my head, silver hair falling into my face; I give an irritated huff, pushing the annoying strands out of my eyes, and decide to snarl back.
"It'll be good for us?"
What a motto. I believe I have heard that line being repeated to me at least 25 times a day for the past fourteen days.
Bitch. Destroyer. Whore.
...I still can't hate her.
"It'll be good for you, you mean," I snap as my face tightens with anger. "Try to assuage your guilt any way you want, Kairi, you're not fooling anyone in this car."
Kairi seems shocked – this is, after all, the most I've said to her in the past two weeks and I bet she was hoping for forgiveness or something. I almost snort aloud; I may not be able to hate her like I want, no -- deserve to, but I certainly don't owe her anything.
We hit a little bump in the road and I hear her sharp hiss as her cheap-ass black coffee sloshes over the top of her lidless styrofoam cup and splashes her on the back of her tiny hand. Agitated, she sets her coffee down in one of the cup holders and tries to inspect her reddening skin as well as navigate through evening traffic.
Time seems to slip over us in the slowest possible way. Finally, Kairi opens her pursed lips and lets out an agonized sigh.
"I know you're angry, but I think--"
Just stop, I mentally order her, just stop. Aloud, I say, "You think this, you think that. Funny how you can do all your thinking after you apparently weren't thinking at all."
The hiss she lets loose now has nothing to do with hot coffee; it gives me small tingles of satisfaction. If it wasn't for her driving, I know she would have turned to glare at me angrily. I don't give a flying fuck now, though. Before, perhaps, one of those glares would have shut me up instantly, probably made an apology fly from my lips in a quick babble. Not anymore; I am so sick, so tired.
It doesn't matter; shedoesn't matter.
I still can't hate her, though.
"Riku, you... bastard..."
But both she and I know she's not going to say anymore than that. Not when I'm justified, not when there's nothing she really can say. Not when all her excuses are bullshit, flimsy when held up to the light.
She's just angry at everything, at everyone. At me, at herself, at her coffee, at the sky. At the words I say, at the fact that everything I accuse her of is true, at the fact that she did this to me and herself. The fact that my blame is not misplaced.
She hates being the one at fault for once, hates at having fucked up so badly. She's so pale, so tired nowadays, ever since that Monday afternoon two weeks ago. We both have bags under our eyes and we're both slouching over, though whether from laziness or from a feeling of vulnerability, I can't say.
I can't hate her, but I can hate my life.
She pulls up to our destination, a nondescript building located in the middle of nowhere and surrounded by some fucking woods, and gives me an expectant look.
Fuck. You.
Glaring with all I've got, I stubbornly stay in my seat, the seat belt digging into my hipbone uncomfortably. She wants me to get out, to leave the car first. Hell no; I don't even want to be here.
"Riku," she says, and this time, it's a mix between the Wild-Animal tone and the condescending one. I bristle up immediately, as if reacting to her as a real wild animal would. Finally she relents, releasing her own belt and leaning over to give me a small peck on the lips.
The burst of raw hate comes spiraling through me and I grip the cheap upholstery of our car with white fingers. It's not for her, though; of course not, never for her. For me. For letting her give me those chaste little kisses, for agreeing to come to this... this... thing after nonstop badgering. For still staying at our tiny apartment in hopes that everything will disappear and my shattered fantasy world will return, good as new.
Funny. I'd never been one for self-hatred or self-pity or self-searching before any of this happened. I'd always been confident, on the verge of arrogant, with a simple outlook to life. Focus on the good things, ignore the open wounds. Lie, lie, lie.
I was – am – such a liar. But only to myself.
Everything's alright. Lie.
There's nothing wrong here. Lie.
She loves you. Lie.
She would never cheat on you.Lie.
You're always told that you'll reach a certain point in your life where you look back on what you've done and what you've said and just think, "My god, what an idiot I was!"
And it's true; looking back will always make you wish you had done things differently or not done things at all. Sometimes, at good memories, you'll be happy with everything you did and you won't need to taste the bitter taste of regret or hear the irritating chuckle of amusement. Most of the time, though, you're looking back years, to a time where you were younger and more prone to idiocy; the pain from back then has since dulled and become more bearable, more reminiscent than present.
In my case, however, I look back to barely three weeks ago and can only shake my head. How could I think that a farce like this would hold up forever? How could I just subject myself to this? How could I not have left, to go find something better, to put a stop to all the lies before the shit hit the fan?
I was so stupid. I still am.
I wish... but no.
No.
Wishing is for stars, for sunshine, for make-pretend worlds. And now, all I've got left is smog and rain and a girlfriend who gave me her fucking HIV after sleeping with one of her side-boyfriends.
Why is it so hard to hate her?
I exit the car and walk inside the Life Support building and idly run my tongue over my lips.
I can't taste her coffee, but the remnants of bitterness almost make my eyes water.
Actually, this should not be a long fic at all (maybe 3-5 chapters, in that ballpark I believe?) so I'm pretty confident in my ability to finish it... though I won't blame you if you lack the same confidence (knowing my awful track record...).
Please tell me what you think; I have a lot of interesting ideas for KH that I've been dying to write for FOREVER. This is only one of 'em. Also... the tense is not something I'm used to here and I feel like I'm making plenty of mistakes. If someone could proofread this for me or if all you fantastic readers could just see if you can point out any errors, I would be forever grateful.
Thanks for dropping by; hope you enjoyed the first chapter!
OH, PLEASE NOTE: I am not trying to make Kairi the plain black and white, "bad guy". She made a huge mistake and Riku is struggling between feelings of love and betrayal and anger and disbelief for her. This is not going to be the story where Kairi is an evil bitch with no heart who holds either Sora/Riku in her prissy clutches before the two boys discover each other and run away after pwning her ass. Sorry. Just... keep that in mind. Riku's no saint either; he just didn't cheat on Kairi and infect them both with HIV.
.incessant insanity.