FINALLY! The fourth Chapter is finished! Now for my quick rant...
IMSORRYIDIDNTFINISHTHISSOONE RSCHOOLWORKWASBRUTALPLEASEDO NTKILLMEITSHEREIGOTITDONEITJ USTTOOKMEALONGLONGTIME! Okay I'm good. ANYWHO, here is the chapter I promised. At most, the next chapter shall be done a week from now.
**Disclaimer** I don't own the anime. I only own A.J.
Chapter 4: Womanhood
I stood outside, sweat moistening my skin and making my white shirt cling to me. I let out small breaths as I swung the hatchet with my arms, chopping blocks of wood for firewood or building. I wiped the sweat from my brow and half smiled, standing tall (for what I thought) and looking up at the sky above. My long, wavy, wayward and brown hair billowed a bit in the breeze, some strands flitting over my green eyes and tan-ish face from being out in the sun all the time. I had grown up into a woman of nineteen with a small, but lean form, but with more prominent muscle than most, since I worked like this most of the time. But these were only comments that I had heard from other people. I wasn't sure whether to believe it myself… I had noticed no great change in my appearance. I was still the same Anne.
"Good work today, Anne…" I heard a British voice say. I turned to see the full-grown Arthur. He was a young man now. Still sunshine blonde, still green-eyed, and still with the ridiculously funny-looking thick brows, but he was different in attitude towards me lately. He was very attentive and always making sure that I was alright. I was glad for it, because it made me feel important… It always had.
I turned to him with a tomboy smile and wiped the sweat away from my neck, then set the blade of the hatchet into one of the remaining pieces of wood.
"Thanks, Arthur… Where ya been hiding today, hmm?" I asked him. I already knew though. If I was not here to work for him in return for shelter, then most likely I'd be in the cool too. He held something in his hand that I couldn't see because the sun was directly behind him.
"Inside. It's hot today," he chuckled slightly. He was right. It was hotter than usual, which was why I kinda wanted to be inside. When I was able to see him clearly, I could see that what he was holding was a glass of water. He smiled and handed it to me. "Why don't you take a breather for a while?"
"Heh… Thanks…" I said gratefully and gladly took the glass from his hand, taking a long, refreshing drink of water. Arthur smiled a bit and then gazed away from me to the stables, where a teenage Alfred was cleaning a pen. I looked the same way he was and watched. "Anything on that mind of yours, 'sir'?" I crossed my arms and smiled sideways.
"Mm… Wondering where time went… For the both of you…" he said and looked at me. I chuckled.
"Heh… Yes… Things are always cuter when they're little…" I said in a joking way, as I usually did around him. Whenever he said something, I could almost always find some way to be sarcastic or joke around about it. So it was unexpected when he turned to me without so much as a chuckle.
"No… I do not agree…" he said, his eyes not leaving me. I paused for a little while, then cleared my throat and looked down.
"Well, okay then…" I said quietly, my voice wavering just a bit. My thoughts were broken when Alfred ran over with a wide grin spread across his face.
"Hey! Anne! Arthur! Can I go ride for a little bit? I'm done with the work I was set to do," he said, panting from running over, eagerly waiting for the answer.
"Why shouldn't you?" I said, shrugging. I didn't care if he went out to ride, not as long as he didn't do anything stupid. I nodded to him. "I think it's alright, but really it is Arthur's choice, as he is the one running the place at all."
"I would think it would be alright," Arthur said with a nod. Alfred nodded without another word and ran back to the stables with the quickness of a rabbit. I could only wish he worked just as fast. I chuckled to myself at the thought. Arthur cleared his throat and I looked up at him. He was holding his arm out for me to take hold of so that we may walk. I laughed.
"Really? You're offering your arm to one of your servants?" I chuckled. He shrugged and smiled.
"Why not? I have known you longer than most," he replied with. I crossed my arms and paused as if to think about it, then shrugged, taking his arm in both my hands.
"Fair enough." With that, we began to walk around and talk a bit, just to pass the time, no longer minding the heat of the day that we had previously been talking about. Instead we talked of more fond things, memories.
"You remember when you were upstaged in strength by Alfred? Oh wait, you still are…" I snickered. An anger mark pulsated on Arthur's forehead.
"Oi…! You aren't ever going to let me live that down are you?" he said. I snickered.
"Nope." I chuckled at some point in our talk. "God I never thought we'd become nostalgic, especially not you," I said, nudging his side a bit with my elbow. He paused as he gave me his stern glare, but then he slowly softened his look and smiled before just shrugging and walking away. He could not stay angry with me for long.
"Anne!" I heard my name be called by my brother and he once again came running over, leading Arthur to quickly unlink arms with me. I looked at Alfred with a quirked brow and walked over.
"What's wrong, Alfred?" I asked him. Alfred pointed to the stables.
"Bane is sick!" he said in a somewhat loud voice, as he generally did. I twitched a bit at it and I went over to the stable he'd pointed to.
"Let's have a look then…" I said. I saw Bane lying on the ground breathing softly and I quirked a brow, looking at Alfred.
"I tried to get him to stand up but he just wouldn't!" he complained. I sighed.
"Please be a little quieter, Alfred… Did you clean out his pen?" I asked as I walked inside the stable. I was going to check to see if there was anything that might have made Bane sick. Alfred shrugged.
"Yes… Why?" he asked, blinking. I checked way in the back, where normally a horse would feed on hay. I looked there and picked up yellowed hay, damp and a little moldy. I wrinkled my nose and sighed turning to Alfred and going to him with the hay.
"Because it seems you missed a spot," I said. Alfred blushed, embarrassed and smiled awkwardly, scratching the back of his head. He chuckled nervously.
"Well… I guess I might have missed a few places…" he murmured. I rolled my eyes and face palmed.
"This would be why Bane is sick. Old hay like this needs to go, otherwise he eats it and ends up like this… I'm just glad this was the only stable you were set to cleaning, otherwise there'd be even more sick horses. Give me an herbal poultice… He needs to take some so he'll get better… And then when you give me that, you can ride Geth while I clean up the places you missed here…" I said to him calmly. Alfred nodded and ran off to get the herbal poultice I asked for. Meanwhile, I kneeled down and started picking up the old hay clumps that he didn't clean up, sighing. In my peripheral vision, I could see someone lean down to help me and I looked over to see it was Arthur. "You don't need to help me, you know…" I said.
"I want to," he said firmly. I quirked a brow, debating whether I should argue with him, then shrugged, deciding I didn't feel like it right now. As we grabbed for the hay clumps we got closer to each other until we bumped heads with one another.
"Ow," I muttered as I rubbed my head, looking up at him. He put a hand over his with one of his eyes squinted almost closed.
"Sorry…" he apologized awkwardly before we leaned down, getting the last of the hay. I picked up the last clump and smiled.
"There. Not that hard-" I cut off when I looked up and mine and Arthur's faces were extremely close to one another's. I blushed a lot, but neither of us seemed to be moving away. He too turned red in the cheeks as we gazed at each other for what seemed like a few minutes but was, in reality, just a few seconds. I saw just how much of a deep green his eyes were. I also never noticed the hard and soft swimming in them all at the same time, as if he wanted a friend or someone to be close to, but was to proud too show it, and so tried to hide. It took a while before we noticed our faces were only a couple of inches from one another. Then and only then did we finally back away. "S-Sorry…" I stammered out slightly, looking away from him.
"N-No, it's alright…" he said also looking to the side, blushing a little.
"A-herm!" we heard from behind us. Both of us turned to see Alfred with his arms folded across his chest, a smirk planted on his face as our faces became red with embarrassment. "Am I interrupting something?" he teased. I growled.
"Be quiet, Alfred!" I grumbled.
"Stay out of other's businesses!" Arthur barked at him. Alfred didn't seem affected though. He simply chuckled and gave me the herbal poultice.
"As per your request, my lovebird sister," he snickered. But before I could make a comment, he walked away to Geth, put on his saddle and bridle, mounted him, and rode off. I sighed and shrugged my shoulders, looking at Arthur.
"Well err… I suppose I'll ride for a little bit too…" I said awkwardly. The real reason I was saying that of course was because I wanted to avoid that strange moment we just had, but I wouldn't tell him that. Before that, we'd had many awkward moments similar to it. But this one seemed even more strange somehow. For reasons I knew not, this one actually made me uneasy. Now all I needed to decide was whether it made me uneasy in a good way or a bad way.
After I gave Bane the poultice, I patted his cheek. I stood up and walked around the stables, taking Marigold and setting her up with a saddle and bridle before opening the gate to the fields outside. I mounted her and rode away from the Kirkland manor fast through grassy, brown land racing against the wind and wanting to travel to Earth and sky's end. I smiled and let the air whip my hair behind me and blow against my face and through my clothes.
For a moment it was just me, free as any soul could ever hope, running away from time itself. But soon after, a second set of hoof beats thundered behind me. I quirked a brow and looked over my shoulder to see Arthur following right behind me on the back of Blacktail. He grinned at me and laughed, catching up right beside me and looking at me challengingly. I smirked back and whipped the reigns.
"Hyah!" I rode ahead of him. Normally I would just have a race with nothing but myself, but now I was racing with Arthur and watching as we both tried to get ahead, but in the end we were neck and neck, just riding to nowhere. We ended up in the forest part of the land, riding fast through the trees and blurring through the growth, only getting glimpses of each other in between.
Slowly the growth became smaller, until we reached an empty path in which what blocked us was a river flowing steadily. Arthur turned to me when we came to a stop and smirked a little.
"I'm pretty sure I beat you," he said in a proud voice as if triumphant. I smiled coyly at him.
"So you think," I replied mischievously and whipped the reigns. "Hyah!" I rode across the river slowly, making sure I stayed on the saddle and that my feet were locked into hold as Marigold crossed. Slowly and carefully, with a soft bray, Marigold climbed up onto the other shore. I turned to wait for Arthur to see how well he would do in the same situation.
Arthur rolled his eyes and clicked his tongue twice, making Blacktail gallop fast towards the river unexpected to him. Blacktail was actually Alfred's horse and so responded to different commands. But I guess Arthur didn't think about that, because when he got to the river, he fell off and cried out, his hands releasing the reigns. Blacktail meanwhile, galloped out of the river without his rider. Arthur surfaced and spat water out of his mouth and coughed, simply soaked.
"OH, BLOODY HELL!" he cursed and growled. I burst out laughing with heart and I dismounted Marigold, walking over. "Be quiet!" he barked at my laughing but I wasn't phased by it. I just calmly walked over with a smirk and waded through the river until I was in front of him, then held out my hand to him as if to help. He held out his, but just as he was about to grab my hand, I dunked it into the river, then swiftly brought it back out, splashing him in the face with more water.
"Beat that!" I snickered and grinned. But I cried out when Arthur suddenly grabbed my arm and pulled me into the freezing cold river with him. He laughed hard and pointed at me.
"Challenge accepted!" he said and I grinned back at him, tensing my muscles, ready to go.
"… Oh, it's on." I lunged at him and so began a wrestling match in the waters of the river between me and him. We rolled around, splashing at each other and chucking each other into the deeper parts. Both of us were soaked, but still we just played around, fooled about. Never did Arthur do this except when no one else was around save for me. Otherwise, he went back to the calm and composed Englishman he was. Personally, I liked this side of him much better. It was more fun that way.
As we rolled around in the water in a playful tussle with each other, we moved so much that we ended up close to shore at some point. He lunged at me, pinning me to the shore and chuckling a little, since now I couldn't move… Or rather, wouldn't move… The top halves of us were surfaced while our legs were still in the water. He and I panted a little from moving so much and neither of us would move out of the position we were in. I just stayed there beneath him, even when his grip on my wrists lessened.
As it turned out, he wasn't so sure about moving either. He stared into my eyes, his breaths returning to normal as mine did too. His eyes seemed to cloud a bit and he slowly leaned down to me. I blushed and my eyes widened a little at what I was pretty sure he was going to do.
"Err… Should we… Get up?…" I said, my voice cracking. I honestly did not mind the thought of kissing him, but at the same time I was nervous about it, as I'd never been kissed before at all. Many a boy I've passed did want to kiss me, but I'd find some way to deter them. It never felt right for some reason. And even though right now I was trying to avoid it, it was not because it didn't feel right, it was because it did. Arthur paused for a moment to process my words but he shook his head.
"Not yet…" he whispered. That was new and unusual… I remained red in the face and my breath hitched, my heart beat so fast it could have stopped at any moment, and I did not want to move at all. I was letting it happen. He leaned in closer and closer until I could feel his heart; it was racing just as fast as mine was. I could feel his breath on my lips; his lips were just centimeters away from my own. I could hear the blood roaring in my ears. Slowly, I felt myself leaning up towards him too, until the gap between us was closed. He pressed his lips a little harder to mine when I did that and wrapped his arm around my waist while I snaked my arms about his shoulders.
It was then that I realized why I had deterred all those other boys; I had always had my eye on this one.
As I laid in my bed, remembering that day, my right hand came up to my mouth, touching my lips lightly and sat there. I shut my eyes gently, trying to remember the feel of that, but being unsuccessful in my attempt. So I sighed and slipped my fingers away from my lips, laying my hand down at my side, staring at the ceiling, unable to fall asleep for most of the night.
It was only when my nostalgic mind slowed to a stop that my eyes let the heavy hands of sleep lower their lids shut. As usual, dreams of my past would plague my head and no doubt it would all happen in one or two hours, by that point adding one to the count of sleepless nights I've had.
There we have it. Chapter 4. WASN'T DAT CUUUUTE? 3 3 XD anyways, I have resorted so that fanfictioners wont get angry with me for not posting chapters to making a facebook page for you guys to visit and check for updates. :3 Go check in my profile to see it.
Be sure to check it out while I get Chapter 5 done! At most it should be done a week from now. See ya! :)
