Alright. My spurt of reposts is finally winding down. There are a few ones that are still missing, but I probably won't be putting them back up (Nights of Indigestion, It's A Matter of Privacy and Domesticity were stripped for being in "script format"). This was the second AGU/RR fic that I ever wrote, after "Road Trip". This is the alternative ending that was released on Valentine's Day, not the original. And the lyrics are, of course, gone.

Love Song
Acepilot

Disclaimer - The characters are property of Klasky Csupo Animation.

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Ever since she got married, it's been a thousand times harder to come to these things with a smile on my face.

It's all my fault - I had years to speak up. Endless damn years. I could have said something to her, told her how I felt. Of course, she had to be the only person around whom my legendary confidence - so strong I was often thought to be smarmy, can you believe it - faltered.

So she met a guy.

And she fell in love.

And the rest is history.

What hurts most, of course, is the knowledge that I probably could have had her if I wanted her. It was all there. She flirted with me as much as I did with her. But I waited too long to make a move, and she fell from my grasp and into someone else's arms.

Mistake? You bet.

And so I pretend to laugh at Tommy's joke, but I'm watching her across the yard as she talks in her impossibly vibrant manner with Lil. And I can't find anything funny at all.

The dying afternoon sunlight glints off the rings on her finger, and I feel tears prick at my eyes. But I blink them away quickly. I can't afford to let emotions loose. Not now.

"Why'd you come in here?"

I look up from my newfound spot on the Pickles' couch to see - just my luck - her.

Freedom had seemed so close.

I shrugged. "Just wanted to get away from all the people for a minute."

I'd like to hope I was giving off very negative body language. Either I wasn't, or she was ignoring me.

She sat down on the chair opposite me. "You owe me an explanation."

I raise my eyebrows. "Oh yeah? What do I have to explain?"

"Why we never talk."

I try to look quizzical. "We don't talk?" I've never been a good liar, and I know it.

So I'm hardly surprised that she sees right through me. "No, we don't."

I shrug. "Distance?"

"We live two blocks apart."

"I never said long distance."

"For once in your life take something seriously Phil!" she practically yelled, and I jumped back a touch. She didn't yell much, and it was pretty scary when it happened.

"I am taking it seriously," I assured her, but only halfheartedly.

"No, you're making it into a joke. Like you always do."

"What do you expect me to do!"

"Be real, Phil! This is our friendship we're talking about! Do you remember us being friends?"

"Vaguely."

"See! Joke!"

"No!" I'm sick of it now, I'm not holding back any more. "No, I'm not joking. Because Kim, yeah, we were friends. But we haven't been for a long, long time. We came to close to something else. We danced around the whole thing for years, but we weren't friends then. It was you and me, and it was something else. But then I waited too long and I couldn't bear it. So yeah, I have memories of being friends. But that's all they are. We aren't friends anymore, Kimmi."

And the shocked look I see in her eyes makes me regret every word.

"Wow." Her previous tone is gone, replaced by a barely audible whisper.

"Sorry," I mutter, for once serious, for once honest. I should have just kept my mouth shut. After all, doing that's what got me into this mess, but it could have just as easily gotten me out of it.

"I...I thought...when you didn't make a move - "

"Yeah, well, I was an idiot."

She looks up into my eyes, and it's only then that I realise I'm standing. "You...you...l..."

"Loved you."

"You don't anymore?"

I slump back down into the couch, the energy seeming to have drained from my body. "I don't know what I'm doing
anymore."

"I'm sorry."

I look away from her, suddenly unable to bear the sight of her eyes welling with tears, blurring the confused look on her face. Maybe tears are getting the better of me, as well. "It's not your fault, don't be sorry."

It's several minutes before I feel a hand on my shoulder turn me around. But after that I lost all sense of time.

She's invading all my senses. I've fantasised so many times about kissing her, and most of the time they were passionate but plundering - brutal and invasive, almost. But this is a completely different type of passion, one I never imagined possible. This is soft, sensual, loving. Slow, and beautiful. I slide a hand into her long black hair and run my fingers through it, and her hand seems to snake around and settle on my back. I pull her down onto the couch with me, and she doesn't resist, and everything is just perfect. It's like the last two years - her engagement, her marriage - never happened, and this is where we were always meant to be.

She raises her other hand to cup my cheek, and I feel something...wrong. A spot of cold in the otherwise beautiful warmth of her body.

I open my eyes to look at it.

Her wedding ring.

I push her off me, slowly, painfully. It actually physically hurts.

"What..." she begins, but then her eyes follow mine, and she realises what's happened.

"Yeah," is all I can muster, and I pick up her wrist, raise her hand to my lips, and kiss her palm, the back of her hand.
She's genuinely crying now and I realise that I am as well, but I'm not ashamed or surprised. "I can't. You can't. You shouldn't."

She shook her head, slowly and regretfully, her gaze dropping to her feet, seemingly ashamed. "I'm so sorry, Phil."

"Don't be," I told her. "It was my fault."

"I kissed you!" she sobbed out.

I shake my head, kissing the palm of her hand one last time, before lowering it into her lap. "It's my fault that we had this discussion. I could have made a move years ago, but I left it too long. And I have no right to make one now. I had no right to tell you about my feelings. Not after this long. You're married."

She looks up at me. "For the first time in my married life, I wish I wasn't." She holds up her hand. "I wish this ring wasn't here."

I nod. "So do I. But it is."

She nods back, averting her gaze again. "It is."

And there doesn't seem to be anything to say, so I stand, kiss her forehead, and take a deep breath.

I look out into the backyard, and see everyone mingling, socialising, just like old times. Having fun, celebrating.

And I realise that I don't belong here. Not right now.

So I go to the front door, grab my coat off the hook, and walk out. I don't look back, I can't look back, because I'll see her, sitting there on the couch, tears in her eyes.

But as long as she's married - as long as that ring's on her finger - then that road will only ever cause pain.

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