A/N: There was one scene that pissed me off! I rewrote it twice and then cut it out and rewrote an entirely new scene. That scene took on a more humourous approach that's why I needed to change it, I didn't like it at all. But I like the new scene I wrote, it's tone is darker. I guess by the end of the chapter you'll see which scene I was talking about ;)
I hope you guys are liking Dearka's character, I find him fun to write, always gotta have the comic relief right?
Many thanks to the reviewers, the followers and the favouriters from the last chapter. I hope to see you all again for this chapter :)
(a little side note: for those who are unaware of what 'taking a hit' means, it means taking another smoke...)
Paparazzi
Chapter III: I Can't Be James Dean
Athrun's forehead is pressed hard against the dashboard of Dearka's rolling van, his fingers are trembling. The whiteness of his skin turns grey.
He screams, "Just give me a fucking cigarette, Elsman!"
Dearka roughly yanks down Athrun's hood. "What's gotten into you, man?! Are you star struck or something? 'Cause if you are, you're just acting like a dumbass lunatic! Or are you pissed off because –"
I'm very sorry, sir.
Those four words keep drilling themselves deep inside Athrun's head. The pain is continuously gnawing at him like a reopened wound. After three years, those were her only words to him? Her words mimicked those of a stranger, but the way those draining eyes stared at his face gave out a hint of vague recognition.
He puts a shaky hand to his mouth. Eyes are closed.
I'm very sorry, sir.
A laugh tears through his lips. The muffled laugh is vivacious but beneath the layers are maniacal pulses. His back quivers, as his other hand slaps onto the hand that stifles his mouth. He can't stop laughing, and he despises the very sound of it.
He sounds like he's being strangled by a noose that isn't his.
Athrun abruptly stops, breathing unevenly.
A cigarette hits him in the ear.
"What the hell is wrong with you?!"
He glances up, feeling the warm sweat on his forehead. A lighter strikes his nose. It lands on his thigh beside the fallen cigarette. His hands fumble to grab the items that are supposed to provide tranquility to his thoughts.
Athrun quickly places the cigarette between his open lips and holds onto the lighter tightly. Hands are no longer shaking.
Rolling down the small spark wheel on the lighter, he hears it click and the flame appears. The orange glow ethereally reflects on his pallid fingertips. He brings the flame from the lighter to the end of the stick, and sees it burn amber with black smouldering the edges.
While he puts the lighter down, he sucks in the smoke and fluidly pulls the cigarette out. A puff of smoke is blown out of Athrun's mouth, mingling with the whitish blue wisps swaying out from the cigarette.
He takes another hit with his chest rising, he's inhaling the smoke fully, feeling it itch down his throat and into his lungs. Exhaling, the smoke makes it way up, warming him but scratching his throat. Athrun smothers a cough while the white wisps reappear in front of him. He gazes at it with calm eyes.
Two more hits.
And his body feels light, as though it is merging into the air.
Athrun's eyes go shut and her goddamn face appears.
The face with the distressed smile and soft skin... it morphs into a face that laughs raucously with lips that bare no trace of red stains. Don't you look cool, Athrun?
Eyes are now wide open. He feels something grasp at his chest.
"Is your psycho self feeling better now?" Dearka asks, while rolling down the window.
Athrun doesn't respond. He just watches the last strings of smoke evaporate into the air.
Dearka momentarily steals a nervous glance at him. The edge of his bottom lip is bit.
Athrun notices, but keeps himself silent. He stares out the window, trying to witness the colours of cars blending in one another speeding their ways through. Within the blurs, he sees a still image of himself on the window, a reflection of his face.
You look like you died, and were brought back to life by some shitty scientist, he thinks to himself. A self-directed smile creeps along the lines of his mouth. I look like shit, and she saw that. While she looks like a doll, I look like shit. He tries to repress a laugh but he's shaking again.
His mind flashes to those words, each letter excruciatingly fogging any sort of clarity that was present when he saw the grey wisps.
I'm very sorry, sir.
What kind of apology was that?
Was it one that was meant for the insufferable loneliness he felt?
Athrun wants to hit his head against the window to shatter it and feel the shards pierce through his brain.
Acknowledging the shakiness of his fingers, he snuffs the cigarette out the window.
Cigarettes don't work anymore, not for him at least.
He couldn't keep himself calm. That caged enragement that squirms inside his chest makes him want to laugh at himself, at his own foolishness.
"Look Athrun," Dearka suddenly says with a small voice. "I know it's hard to contain your excitement of actually meeting your favourite star and all..."
Wrong.
When Athrun doesn't respond, Dearka continues, dragging on his concerning voice. "But sometimes you gotta chillax...and not act like a fuckin' psycho that makes his only friend shit his pants... I swear to god, if you start crying now because of Cagalay Yala Aimon or whatever her stupid name is, you gotta stop and think to yourself 'Why am I crying over some famous bitch that I don't even know on a personal level?'
They're just people who are rich and people like us get rich off of them getting rich. It's a whole friggin' ecosystem. But like an ecosystem, you don't get attached to a fish you're going to eat, you eat it without knowing it personally." He is babbling on words that don't string along coherently.
"What the hell are you talking about Dearka?"
"Hey! That's the simplest way I can explain it! I tried, but even a good photographer might not even have the brains."
"You're not a good photographer, Dearka."
"I was talking about you, dick wad." Dearka has a tiny grin on his face, as though he is hesitating to smile. "But anyways, that video of her being nice and picking up your camera is probably going to be all over the internet. I could already see it..."
He alters his voice to become lower, mimicking the forced professionalism of a news anchor. " 'Breaking news! ...while twenty people died in a highway incident, check out what the sweet Cagalay Yalu Imon girl did! This 'rags to riches' sensation was kind enough to pick up a paparazzo's camera. Of course she would do that! She used to be as poor as everyone else in the world! Now she's just spreading her kindness to everyone! Let's pay her even more, for just existing!" Dearka takes a hand off the steering wheel and pretends to hold an invisible mike towards Athrun. "Now, Mr. Athrun Zala, how did it feel to have this blonde beauty pick up your camera? Did you get to see her boobs?"
Athrun scoffs but decides to play along. "No, she scratched my lenses with her nails."
Dearka chuckles. "Already got you in a better mood, eh, buddy?"
"Yeah..." he reluctantly replies.
"There's one good thing about her saving your camera."
"And what's that?"
"All the dumbass photographers are gonna start dropping their cameras so that she'll pick it up and once their camera is damaged they won't have a chance at taking more pictures of her. Actually, maybe I should do that. Then get a boob shot of her with an extra camera while she bends down!" He wistfully sighs. "I smell big bucks already."
"Your schemes are crap, Dearka."
"A boy can dream." He stops the van in front of a condominium that towers over many other condos with its mirror-like windows. Its architecture looms with modern edge due to the straight and sharp angled design.
"Thanks for the ride Dearka," Athrun says, stepping out of the vehicle. His satchel slung over his shoulder.
As he is about to close the door Dearka tells him, "Flay Allster is rumoured to be hitting up some clubs tonight, Miriallia and I are going to meet up with some paparazzi people to track her down. You wanna come?"
Athrun shakes his head. "I've had enough of celebrities for today."
The glaring brightness of the afternoon sun is blocked by the sunburnt blinds of Athrun's windows. The half light reveals the murkiness of his inhabitancy, a thin layer of dust coats the TV, coffee table, and even the dining table.
He settles himself down on the couch, placing his satchel beside him. His slouching body feels heavier than before. He rubs his eyes, and then stares at the ceiling above him.
Athrun tries not to think of anything, he tries to keep his a mind blank slate. But the memory of her keeps replaying over and over again like seven minute film reel.
After three long years, she's finally encountered him.
He's been in hiding for so long, and the one time he decides to catch her in the light, he is instead captured by her vacant beauty.
She had acted so strange towards him. Her polite words and the way she carries herself is reminiscent of an old Hollywood beauty – one that is shy and elegantly graceful in the way her body moves and of the words produced.
He has seen her in interviews.
The language of her body is so foreign to him.
Even though she is already petite, she would make herself seem smaller, with her legs crossed, and her hands on her lap. Her voice would turn into resounding shyness and the refining smile she took with her always bounded fans into the realm of adoration.
Athrun recalls the interview she did with an online fashion magazine many months ago.
She had been sitting on a rouge couch, wearing a white chiffon dress that draped over her thighs like a sheer blanket. Cagalli's posture was perfect, her legs were crossed so delicately and her hands rested on her lap, not fiddling with anything.
"How did you meet the love of your life?"
"Miguel?" She lightly laughed, with her mouth concealed by a dainty hand. "I used to work at this restaurant and he would always be playing acoustic songs on his guitar. He'd be singing ballads –"
"Ballads for you?"
She smiles a tiny smile. "I guess you can say that. He used to approach me at the end of the night when we were closing up the restaurant. Miguel always started these charming conversations with me."
"That's adorable! How long have you been married for?"
"2 years... I've never been happier."
"I'm so happy for you!" The interviewer said with such energy. "How do you feel about Miguel going on tour with his band? Do you ever worry about groupies and stuff like that?"
The camera zoomed in on Cagalli's face then, expecting an emotional or heart wrenching answer.
Except her face did not change, it kept the facade of delicacy with that smile.
"No, I never worry... because I love him and he loves me."
Athrun had stopped watching the interview after that answer. He had felt his stomach tighten, and even thinking about that interview made those feelings return.
He grabs his DSLR from his bag, and turns it on.
The first image that surfaces is the medium close up shot of her face.
She is the focus of the image, as she usually is. Her eyes are shifted down, signing autographs in her hands. You can see the glimmer of sunlight on her hair, and the way her skin radiates against the light. The makeup is evident by the streak of dark red lipstick, and the long false lashes that fletch onto her real ones – it gives her eyes a bambi like quality. Underneath those lashes the ochre eyes are hiding.
Athrun stares at her distressed smile, he notices the camera scratches that spawn over the image. The lines entrap her smile, like clear spider webs distorting the peace of life.
He is wondering what she was thinking at that time. He wonders whether or not nervousness bubbled up in her stomach or if she believed that he was make-belief. Maybe she convinced herself that he was just a figment of her imagination so that she could ease the emotions that might have come over her.
Maybe she felt nothing at all.
But what did he expect when she allowed those apologetic words to fall out her mouth? Did he want her to utter his name like a question?
He wants that. Just for her to acknowledge him as a person from her past.
He was trembling as the autumn winds carried themselves at him, rattling at his bones as though they were wind chimes.
A lit cigarette hung precariously between his fingers. Its smoke drifted into the air.
A younger Athrun stood outside a coffee shop, leaning against the wall beneath a dusty lamp. The rotted yellowness shone above his head, it was a weak light compared to the glow of the night's moon.
He huddled his hands together and blew his breath on them. The warmth faded away quickly, barely making a difference. "Damn cold," he muttered, pulling up the zipper of his leather jacket all the way to his neck, scraping at the skin.
With shaky hands, he took a long drag from the cigarette. The nerves that bellowed up from his stomach had threatened to paralyze his unspeaking mouth and body. Besides uncontrollably trembling and having a cigarette move to his lips, he was immobile.
What the hell was I thinking?
His insecure thoughts buckled at his throat and his eyes flitted back and forth, stinging with dryness. The starchiness of his tongue evaporated words that could have came out earlier.
Why the hell did I feel risky today?
He knew he would have lost nothing. He owned nothing. Apathy was his only acquaintance at that time. Athrun had easily detached the very existence of emotions days before – when he came to the realization that he would be alone. So why not do things on a whim? He wanted to feel the typical high that people his age felt.
"You're... you're a fucking asshole," he heard someone say to him. The voice possessed a husky quality that seemed to verge on the beginning of a cry.
He turned his head, and the door of the shop was open.
A girl with short hair stepped out, leaving the door to draw back to its frame. A bell rang when it closed fully.
She made her way over towards him, the bottoms of her combat boots dragged along the cement ground. Standing in front of him, she made a cautious decision to be a small distance away from him.
The two of them were trapped in each other's presence.
Athrun wondered if she could feel the looming shadow of anxiety that took over his aura.
She was clutching tightly onto her elbows, digging her fingers into the red flannel sleeves. Teeth were clattering as her body continuously shivered. Her back was hunched over and her eyes were averted from him.
Athrun could only stare at her shivering figure.
"Where's your jacket, Cagalli?" he asked gently, leaving the cigarette between his lips. His gaze wandered over her form. She was ridiculously dressed with a red flannel shirt that loosely hung over a deep cut black tank top. She wore torn shorts with stockings underneath. He could see the winds go through her and wrap itself around her blood. It somehow made him colder.
"Go back inside," he said. "It's cold."
"I'm not going back inside," she replies briskly, venom was seeping in her words. "You-you can't just leave me inside for thirty minutes to take a damn smoke!"
Athrun didn't know what to say, but he saw her eyes brimming with unshed tears. His silence beckoned her to speak.
"You ask me out for a coffee date... and then you have the audacity to fuckin' leave? If you lost interest in me, you could have just let me know, instead of... instead of...being a coward and walking out on me!"
Athrun kept his silence.
He had asked her out on a date hours prior... and he hadn't really given a damn if she rejected him or not.
Athrun had expected her to say 'no' and feel the pangs of rejection, but instead she had said 'yes' to him with a shy smile. He succumbed to ecstasy momentarily until he realized he had absolutely nothing to say to her, as for the last two months since University started, his mouth barely opened for words. They only opened for cigarettes.
He took another hit, the fragments of smoke wavered out his mouth. Its whiteness fogged over Cagalli's face, acting like a small veil. It faded out the sadness that ached over her features.
"I know you don't give a shit. I don't even know why I'm even bothering with someone like you..." She looks up at his face for reassurance that her assumption was right. They wander from his eyes, to his cheeks and to his lips.
Athrun's face was expressionless.
She looked away from him again.
He felt the chokehold of guilt.
"Cagalli..."
She was shivering even more. She rubbed her hands and then clutched at her arms, as though she were engaging in a hug with herself. Her open lips became chapped as Athrun heard her ragged breathing.
The diminishing whispers of smoke continued to disillusion her face. The yellow light harshly brought on a sinister radiance but the moon's natural glow fought its way to illuminate the shadows that played on her skin.
The dark and the light made her the perfect balance of unconventional beauty.
Athrun could no longer breathe anymore. But he felt his breath suck in the smoke from the cigarette that rested on his mouth. While taking out the cigarette, bursts of stringy smoke slipped out between his lips, coiling around Cagalli's head.
He noticed that she was closer to him. Her dazed eyes gazed through the smoke and at his lips.
"Don't you look cool, Athrun," she said, her voice was smoother than the smoke that floated amid them.
The cigarette dropped from his grasp.
Leaning over, his tobacco tainted mouth met hers.
He almost flinched at the touch. It was... surprisingly warm.
She didn't kiss him back.
He emancipated the lip lock.
"Athrun, what the hell?!" Her small hands pushed him against the wall. She bit her lip before she said, "I don't understand you!"
He didn't immediately respond. His daring action had numbed him. He glanced down, and saw his cigarette being crushed beneath her grey boots.
"I'm sorry," he said, hearing his voice crack. "I don't understand myself either." He hesitated. "It's just been hard for me...these past few months. I can't get a hang of university... I think I hate everything here. I've stopped caring... about a lot of things."
He refused to look at her. His stare went beyond her shoulders. He didn't want to see her sympathy... he already felt it.
"I think I have a lot of anxiety problems..." he continued. The words felt so strange yet honest. "I'm away from home. I can't fucking speak to anyone. Everyone seems to already know each other. I just stay cooped up in my apartment room, staring at the ceiling, thinking of nothing." The way the words flowed from his mouth somehow made him feel lighter than the cigarettes ever did. "You don't need to pity me – I'm sure my problem is not uncommon."
There was silence.
"Athrun..." She put her hand inside her bag, ruffling the contents inside. "...take this, please."
Cagalli reached for his hand, and placed something cold inside it, folding his fingers over it. He looked down to see what it was.
A sleek red digital camera was lying in his palm. He looked at Cagalli, puzzled.
"If you take pictures of your surroundings, and you examine the image more afterwards, you start to see a lot of beauty. It sounds cheesy. But, if you could find the beauty of where you are, then maybe you'll become happier." Cagalli then smiled at him thoughtfully.
He stared at the device in his hands. He started flipping it over, his thumb brushed over the buttons. "Are you sure you don't need this, Cagalli?"
"I'm sure. You can borrow it until you feel better."
"That's an unusual way of therapy."
"I tried my best."
Athrun smiled at her. "Thank you."
With his free hand, he grabbed a hold of hers. Freezing fingers tightly interlocked.
"Let's continue this date."
A pinkish hue coloured her nose and cheeks.
His phone vibrates against the glass surface of the coffee table. It rumbles viciously, moving on its own, clearing the dust underneath it.
Athrun lays his camera down on his lap. An arm reaches for the cell phone.
He glances down at the screen.
An unknown number.
His mind starts to spin.
Cagalli? No – it can't be....
His heart heaves against his ribcage.
A thumb hovers over the green 'answer' square on the screen
He taps at it and slowly places the phone to his ear.
"...hello?" he says warily.
"Wow... I didn't expect you to pick up."
"Who is this?"
"Miriallia."
Athrun's pulse returns to normal. A sigh is released.
"Oh."
"Who else were you expecting?"
"No one."
"Cool, how's everything going?"
"Just...fine."
"Have you been on the interwebs lately?"
Athrun almost wants to laugh at her silly phrasing but a frown tackles his face. "No."
"Just so you know, before you become an internet phenomenon... I want to write about you on my blog."
He could tell that she is grinning.
"A.K.A an interview! There are some people who got the whole thing on video. Everyone's wondering who you are."
He stares at the photo on the camera. Eyes linger at the person beneath the scratches. Cagalli Yula Aiman. No longer Cagalli.
"I'd rather remain nameless..." he murmurs.
"Huh?"
"I'm sorry Miriallia."
Athrun hangs up.