Time Skip – Cronus's Recovery

Cronus== Go home, the struggle is real.

Kankri had fallen asleep after the two of you shared an innocent kiss. As much as you wanted to french him, you knew that it probably wasn't a very good idea. While Kankri slept, you stayed awake. Your mind wouldn't stop thinking about what had just happened, it's not like it was a big deal, but it made your heart beat hard in your chest. So hard in fact, that it started to bring you physical pain. Cronus Ampora, killed by a kiss from Kankri Vantas. You thought about how this might've sounded if it were on the news or something. You were anticipating a heart attack, you could hear your pulse in your ears, and it was almost like your heart was trying to break out of your body. Of course you didn't literally think you were going to have a heart attack, you weren't that incompetent.

Nobody else had the power to make your heart beat like that. Kankri was in fact your first love, and as much as you wished that he would stay by your side forever, you knew that one day he might leave. The thought made you sad, it hurt you in fact, but everyone knows that it's a miracle if your first love is your last love. You would live much longer than him, you would probably spend years alone in the future, but that didn't matter to you. What matters is now, because what you do now affects your future.

His love was like the sound of rain on the roof of the house, it was gentle, sometimes is poured down, sometimes it was a delicate mist. You loved the rain, and often times you found yourself standing outside with your face to the sky. You see, Kankri was your rain. He gave you life, he revived parts of you that had gone dry, the parts of you that were dying. And just like the rain, he brought with him the sweet smell that was in the air before the storm. He was unpredictable, his next move was unknown. Just like the rain.

You got up out of bed after delving deep into your mind. You didn't do this often, for it made you feel exhausted. The nurse notified you that you could leave today, and gave you a prescription for some pain killers. She reminded you about physical therapy and gave you a business card of a place she recommended you to go. You thanked the nurse as she left the room and she waved it off as to say it was no problem.

Gog did you want a shower right now. You decided that when you got home that you would take one. At the hospital it was a bit hard for you to get up, and as you healed it hurt to even move your arm. Even if you could shower, there was bar soap and not liquid soap, which meant you could drop the soap, and every time you did in the past, your brain made you think about some ass bean criminal making his way with you. To keep yourself from picturing that for the rest of your life, you refused to use bar soap. It was stupid, you knew that, but you didn't care what anyone thought.

You dressed yourself and looked down at Kankri. He was still asleep, he looked so peaceful and you were reluctant to wake him up. You were the reason he hadn't gotten sleep lately, and he was sleeping on the hospital bed beside you more frequently. You didn't mind though, and you thought it was cute. There are some people that kick and slap in their sleep, and others that cuddle and hug. Kankri was a sleep cuddler, and you are not sure if he knew that yet. Often times you found yourself trapped in his arms, with his legs wrapped around your waist, it was such innocent love.

You couldn't help but yawn a few times as you started your mission to wake Kankri up. You really, really didn't want to, but you had to.

"Kankri," you moved his hair out of his face, and he continued to sleep.

"Wake up chief," you placed your bad arm on his shoulder and shook him gently.

Still nothing, Gog was he a heavy sleeper. You started to accept the fact that you would basically have to slap his across the face to make him wake up. You weren't going to do that, and you started to put plan B into effect. Your plan B was to flop all over his body like a dying fish until he woke up.

You crawled onto the hospital bed and nudged your head into his armpit, you started to sneeze and huff as you wiggled around. He started to stir and you sniffed at his face to tickle him. You heard him groan as he started to rub the sleepiness out of his eyes. Gog he was the cutest thing with his messy hair and groggy attitude.

Kankri == Wake up to your face being sniffed at.

You were still waking up, and you were a bit slow at first.

"Cronus w—what are you doing?" You opened your eyes a bit to find his face inches away from yours.

"Waking you up, plan A didn't work so plan B was next."

"Shouldn't you be in bed anyway?"

"Nope. The nurse said I could leave today."

"How long have you been up?"

"About 20 minutes, I let you sleep a bit longer, I know it's my fault that you haven't been resting well lately…" You watched as he nervously scratched the back of his neck, watching as his eyes trailed away from you.

"It's not your fault Cronus, I've just been worrying too much." You laughed a bit, trying to lighten the mood. You were happy that Cronus was finally doing better, but he now had a scar on his shoulder. You didn't care about scars, they were just a mark of the past, and you weren't sure why people disliked them.

Cronus didn't respond, he obviously wasn't buying the whole 'you totally didn't make me worry shitless' act. You sat up in the hospital bed and hopped off onto the floor. You fixed your sweater and ran your hands over your pants as if to dust them, or to smooth them out. Cronus was yawing, and he obviously should've slept more, but you knew that he was happy to be leaving. He didn't really have much to do here, and often times he was writing in a journal. He never did let you see what he was writing, and it made you think he was hiding something. He claimed that they were just poems or songs he thought of, and he didn't like other people reading them. You believed him, but you were nosey and wanted to know if they could've possibly been about you.

"Ready to go Kanny?"

"Yes," you both gathered your things, Cronus his journal and miscellaneous items, and you your things as well.

You followed him out of the room that you had stayed in for the past month together. He would've recovered earlier but he also had a very bad concussion, and he needed to be monitored. It was now safe to say that you and Cronus knew each other very well. During his time in recovery, you both told stories and learned things about him you never knew. They weren't bad things but some of the things he told you surprised you. For example, you never knew that he loved the rain, you hated it, so you could not relate very well to how he felt. He tried to explain the rain as graceful, refreshing, and yet dangerous and powerful. You however didn't see it this way, you disliked how it felt on your skin, it darkened the skies, and not to mention that sometimes it caused flooding. You both shrugged away your differences, rain is rain after all.

There was something that you noticed about him. He saw the good in everything, he saw the poetic side. He saw the power and the grace in everything. If you gave him something to talk about, say fire for example, he would talk about how wild it was, yet he knew about the beauty of its freedom. He talked about the warm colors of the flames, and the golden light that it cast upon everything in reach. He said it was like a piece of the sun, a droplet of the sky's golden essence.

You had both made your way back to his car in the parking garage. You had driven it there after calling 911, you didn't want his car to be broken into. You knew how expensive it was. He opened the passenger side for you like he always did, and shut it after making sure that you were fully in the car. You watched as he walked around the car to the other side, and looked away when he started to pull his keys from his pocket. You were thinking about how scared you were to drive his car all the way here. You barely drove anywhere because of the anxiety it gave you, the past still bothered you, and sometimes you saw it happen all over again in your head.

Cronus had hopped into the car and started the engine, he fixed his seat and checked his mirrors. This is why you felt safe with him driving, he didn't get distracted, and he always made sure everything was just right before driving off.

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You were on the road when Cronus started to talk to you, he sounded a bit distressed, but you knew that was because it was rush hour and there were cars everywhere. After you told him how you felt about riding in cars, he was a bit on edge when there were a lot of other cars around. He didn't want you getting hurt, and he didn't want to be the one to cause that.

"Kanny, do your friends know that we are matesprits? I mean, we aren't really dating yet, since we agreed to just not see anyone else, but do they still think you are celibate?"

"No, I haven't told them yet."

He was silent for a moment but then he spoke, "why?" He sounded a bit sad.

"I don't know… They can just be really immature at times, and they would probably tease me about it, in a friendly way though."

"I make you happy right? Sometimes I feel like I'm holding you back, and I don't want to prevent you from succeeding in life."

"Why would you think that you are holding me back? Or that you make me unhappy?"

He shrugged a bit, "it's just something I had to ask, I know how smart you are about everything, and now that I think about it, I'm not really smart enough to have conversations with you about your work or your research."

"Cronus."

"Yeah?"

"You don't hold me back, you help me move on from things I used to worry about in the past."

"Okay…" He didn't sound satisfied but he didn't look as unhappy as he did before. You should probably ask him to be your boyfriend, you had known him for over a month and during that time you were always by his side. You felt like you had met him somewhere before, but you could never quite remember where.

"Hey Kanny."

You responded with a 'hmm' to let him know that you were listening.

"You don't remember me do you?"

"No… what do you mean? I always felt like I've met you before."

"You know that kid in middle school, the one with the glasses that never talked to anyone? Well, that was me. I was only at your school for a year in 8th grade. We didn't have any classes together so I thought maybe you didn't recognize me. I was the one who wrote you that poem and slipped it into your locker. I know I look nothing like I did when I was younger, puberty hit me like a bus. I've had a crush on you since I was 14"

You remembered that kid now, he never talked to anyone and was always nervous around you. Cronus actually wasn't a stranger at all when you met him, you just didn't remember him from before. Everybody left him alone, he didn't get picked on but he just wouldn't talk no matter what. You thought it was cute. Your first love had loved you since he was young.

"Why didn't you talk to anyone?" I looked over at him.

"I was afraid. The therapy left me anxious and withdrawn from everyone."

"You know, you were cute when you were a kid. Not to say that you're not cute now, because you are, but you were also cute when you were young."

You saw him blush a bit, Gog he was such a nerd back in school. He wore glasses and had braces.

"So I guess you're not a stranger after all then." You asked him, not allowing him to respond to what you said. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"I wanted to start a new relationship with you, I didn't want to be known as that quiet kid in class. I thought that you would've just thought I was boring. Plus, back then I wasn't the same person I am now, you know? I was in pain, but I didn't know what was happening to me. I was just hiding from the world."

"I'm glad that fate brought us together again."

"Fate?" Cronus didn't take his eyes off the road.

"Yes."

"I think it's more like destiny."

"Destiny?" You were the one asking the question now.

"Look at how much we have changed each other. We have helped each other get through hard times, and I don't think I would be alive right now if it wasn't for you. It was my destiny to meet you, at least that is what I believe."

I smiled a bit, and tried hid my face in the neck of my sweater.

"Nope." I was confused when I heard him speak, what was he saying 'nope' to?

You watched as he slowed down and pulled the car over, it was the dirt road that led to your house, so no other cars were around. He leaned over to you and pulled the fabric down from your face, and he kissed you. His lips were on yours quicker than you could process what was going on. He gently bit your lip and pulled away, he smiled, and you could feel how hot your face was.

"Cute." He laughed a bit and continued his journey down the driveway to your house, while you sat flustered like a school girl right beside him.

You remembered the poem he wrote you back in middle school, it went something like this;

"You will never notice me,

Until I become

Important

Like you too,

I don't know if that day will come,

But I promise this- I promise that it's true.

I will never be able to bring myself

To stop from loving you.

Even if we never meet again,

Even if we never touch,

Know that my heart is at war,

For it is in love

With a diamond in the rough."