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Thrown Shadows

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Their silences were never really anything. But they were never really nothing, either. The silence was just them – her and him- sometimes only her. For very, very rarely was it ever just him. No, she'd have to fill in the blanks if it was just him. And she doesn't.

- have too, that is. She doesn't have too.

She already knows about the blanks.

Sometimes he wishes Hyperion only shot blanks. But it doesn't and, after the fact, he is usually glad for it, and hey, whatever (he hates that word), that's not the point anyways except for maybe (maybe) that sometimes Fuu reminds him of Hyperion. She never fires blanks either, except for once. That once , years ago, when they were on the Lunatic Pandora -he was the lunatic, surely, for she would always be his Pandora- and she fired a blank at him. She left him for Squall and then she ran away. If that wasn't a cope out, Seifer doesn't know what is.

He purposely doesn't think about the part where she spoke, the part where she used her voice – her whisperingly perfect, crushed velvet voice- because if he does he may just snatch her up from where she is sprawled out on the green grass next to him and kiss her, and kiss her, and kiss her, and kiss her, and ruin their conversations of silences and blanks in the process.

So he doesn't think about it.

Her blue jacket is tucked beneath her head like a pillow, leaving her almost exposed in the white undershirt she wears beneath. The wind stirs the trees and leaves above (but it does not stir her, no, never her) and sunlight trickles down through the openings between the branches, throwing patterns across the bare skin of her arms. She looks like she is glowing. And, yeah, she's pretty, okay? But he just wants her to wake up so she will talk to him. Or not talk to him and just listen to him talk because he hates listening to himself.

He considers waking her up himself, with a word or with a touch. He even tosses about the idea of waking her up with his lips…but that thought is fleeting and is thrown away before it can even properly form. He wants to wake her up but he doesn't.

Besides, her reflexes are something fierce and Seifer is not in the mood to treat any more bruises today.

The patches of sun on her skin still make her look like she's glowing. And it's pretty, but big freakin' deal. He can't tell her that, not when she's comatose (he wouldn't tell even if she was awake, it just makes him feel better to think it).

She's not ugly, she's never been ugly, and he likes the eye patch. It's cool and it's Fujin. So there.

And…other boys think she is pretty, too. He's heard them talk. Only the thing with Fujin is that she is Fujin and that makes her strange by default. Pale and exotic, quiet and ferocious, lovely and strangestrangestrangestrangestrange. And boys don't know how to talk to strange girls, especially the lovely ones. And you might as well pluck off all of his facial hair – and, Hell, his balls too - because being twenty one doesn't mean a thing if, when sitting next to a strange girl, you still feel like a fourteen year old boy.

You still feel like a boy because you can't man up and tell her about all those slippery emotions that have been brewing for years.

And he wants to tell her.

Doesn't he?

He is not fond of the slippery emotions. They're tricky. They make him feel warm and safe and scared and trapped and so, so, so terrified because, Holy Hyne, what would he do if she didn't-

If she just didn't.

Seifer throws himself back on the grass next to her. After a quick glance at her profile he stubbornly refuses to look at her anymore.

She's still glowing. He still won't say anything, he'll just wait for her to wake up. And when she wakes up he still won't say anything. And somehow that is still okay in that way when it's not okay so much as it is normal. And the thing that is normal is the simple fact that their entire relationship has been built on silence and glances and soft touches and- and fuck it.

He rolls over onto his side and props himself up on his elbows. He has every intention of snatching her up, getting kicked, and kissing her, kissing her, kissing her, kissing her, just like he wants to (he even reaches out his hand) except that he can't because kisses, kisses, kisses, are not bandages and will not fix all the things that still need to be fixed in his head – three years later and there are still wounds rubbed raw and bleeding in his skull- and it will not fix him and the kiss he has wanted from her since he was fourteen will be as nothing because it would not be his lips on hers so much as it would be his shadow.

Seifer lies back down and seethes, rising and rallying against his mind and falling back against the mental wall every time. Fujin lays by his side – as she will for ever and ever and ever- glowing and quiet and beautiful and oblivious. And it's not alright -because it has never been alright- because they have always been broken and out of sync and so wrong that they can cancel each other out and just be.

It's not alright but it's normal, and it's them, and it's not enough. And it was a silence that didn't mean anything -because it really meant everything- and it's just another day and he just wants her to wake up so that they can be quiet and imperfect and aware and awake together.

Even if it's not how he wants it to be, it still is. It just still is.

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Thrown Shadows: End.

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