Allegretto Scherzando
I shouldn't have turned her away.
It's morning again, and all I can do is lie here on my back, staring at the clear sky above, shaking my head. The latest humid streak appears to have moved on, leaving it merely hot, though so early in the day it's almost refreshingly cool.
I screwed up. I was just... I just didn't want her to use me anymore, and I wanted her to know that. For once I was going to be strong, to deny her something she was trying to gain by bending the rules, just to prove a point. Even if it was pleasant for me in the meantime. I never thought she'd be the type to want something like that, especially with me, so it was hard to say no; for once, she was... nice. Even if we didn't say anything. Maybe because we didn't say anything.
But now I feel like an ass. When I rolled over, away from her, I figured she'd just get pissed and stalk back to her bike, maybe bitching me out or something first. But that's not what happened. Instead it took her a long time to move, and when she did, her footsteps were slow and quiet.
She wasn't mad. She was hurt.
When I realized that, it suddenly threw a new light on everything. As hard as it was for me to say no to her, it must have been nothing compared to difficult it was for her to come up here in the first place. She was extending me a truce. She's probably too proud just to come up and apologize, or ask for my apology or whatever it is she wants, so what she did was just to forego speaking altogether. If I'd been more receptive, I bet she would have stayed around when morning came, and things would have gone back to normal. Or something like normal.
Still, there was no need for subterfuge. Does she think that after all the stuff we've been through after Third Impact, followed by all that time alone, that if she'd asked to hang out I would have told her to screw off? If she wanted my affection like that, she could've asked, and I would have given it to her.
Oh my God. I would have given it to her.
Leaves dance above me in the moment it takes me to close my gaping mouth. So... I wonder if that means I like her. It seems like sort of a stupid question, especially now, but then again it should be answered. I mean, yeah, before I knew anything about her, I thought she was hot, and really I still do, but it's way more than that. There are so many things binding us together now that a relationship with anyone else would just seem shallow in comparison.
But maybe I don't want relationships. Maybe I just want friendship. Understanding. I haven't had a lot of that either.
Not like it matters anyway. I'm getting a little ahead of myself, I suppose.
With a sigh I sit up, throwing my blankets aside. I have stuff to do, and there's no reason I can't think and work at the same time.
Even without rushing it doesn't take me long to dress, and afterwards I spend a few moments munching on dried fruit to take the edge off my hunger. While eating I find my eyes drifting towards the city below, looking so peaceful in the sunlight. Peaceful and empty.
In moments I'm on my bike and sailing down the hill. It's a pleasant ride this morning, bordering on chilly, but I'm trying to enjoy it while I can. It won't be long until the heat returns or a storm sweeps in.
I should apologize. I'm not sure I could find her, though, if I went looking.
Today, I've decided, is a day for clothes scavenging. As such I angle towards one of the department stores in this part of town, since finding clothes in my size in houses or apartments is too unreliable, and half of what I do find that fits is actually for women. Plus, if I'm just going to be throwing this stuff away after a week or less, I may as well wear something that no one has grown attached to.
When I roll into the parking lot, it's getting hot out again. With a shake of my head I step through the shattered doors -- I've been here before, and she probably has too -- and flip on my flashlight. A cone of thin illumination plays over still shelves as I wave it around; gaudy signs jump out at me, promising great deals on some winter special the place must have been having. It smells dusty in here now, like concrete and darkness. It didn't, always.
Most of the sale signs have sparkly snowflakes on them. I wonder what snow is like. I wonder how many people coming here even remembered it, or associated it with winter.
Darkness weighs in around me, oddly concentrated in the directions the flashlight isn't pointing, as I climb up the motionless escalator. Men's clothes are on the first floor, but kids' are upstairs. I don't care all that much what I wear, since only I have to see it -- and maybe Asuka -- so it doesn't take long to pick some stuff out. When I head back down the escalator a few minutes later, I'm wearing a dark grey t-shirt with some sword-wielding cartoon character on the chest, and I've tucked something similarly silly under my arm. I also found a blue Dragons baseball cap in my size; I don't know why I didn't think of that before.
On the way out of the store, I slow and swipe a pair of sunglasses from a display near the registers. Something else I should have thought of before, with all the sun.
There's a residential district close to the store, so I head there after reclaiming my bike from the parking lot. I can already appreciate the benefit of the hat and shades. I'm an idiot for not getting that stuff before.
Maybe I should get some more flares. Then she'd know she was still welcome.
Quickly I reach a house I've stopped at before and duck inside, already pulling my new clothes off; I feel caked with mud and LCL residue these days, and the occasional shower doesn't keep it away for long. With my flashlight pointing at the ceiling from the vanity, I settle in for ten minutes of earth-cool water running over me.
But then, about halfway in, while my hair is still lathered with borrowed shampoo, the water chokes and splutters. And then it stops.
Blinking away stinging shampoo suds, I frown up at the showerhead. Somewhere inside the house, the plumbing grumbles angrily. This isn't good.
After a moment, however, something gurgles, and then the shower continues. I finish up as quickly as I can, then scowl at nothing as I towel myself off.
Crap. If the water is giving out on us, that's going to suck.
I think about that as I head back up the hill. It would seem pretty inefficient to bathe with bottled water. What else can I do, though? Almost as an afterthought I stop at another house, just long enough to grab soap and towels and a washcloth. It'll keep me going until I can think of something else.
On reaching my site on the ridge, I slow on my bike, then stop a good fifty meters away. There's another bike there, standing jauntily across the road as though to block all traffic. It's red, glittering metallically in the sunshine.
Chewing a lip, I lean into the pedals and close the last distance to what has to be Asuka's bike. There's no sign of the girl herself, but the trees are too thick to see the campsite from where I am.
Next to her bike I heel down the kickstand of my own, then slide to my feet and stand motionless. I can't hear anything, though. Nothing but wind murmuring through the trees.
Why am I delaying this? It's not like she's going to try to kill me. Probably not, anyway. Sighing, I grip the backpack's straps and make my way through the trees lining the road. The site isn't far.
Sure enough, Asuka is there when I step out of the trees. She's squatting on her heels, rooting through my stuff with a frown; on the muddy ground beside her she's already set aside my propane heater and a few bottles of water. Another backpack is slouching on the ground as well, one that must be her own.
As soon as I appear she glances over at me, cool as you please, then stands up, idly brushing red hair from her face. Like me, she's sporting muddy jeans, and her sun-yellow t-shirt is long-sleeved, but probably thin enough to breathe well. Blue eyes blink calmly at me, one kissed with a jagged ring of pink.
I stare back at her. Is she stealing my stuff? What is this?
Eventually she gives her head a toss and gestures at the vague pile of my supplies. "So, I was thinking this nylon rope would make a good clothes line, between there and there. See?" Pausing, she points at a pair of trees standing maybe ten meters apart. "And then with that burner we could make hot water, and actually wash our clothes."
After a few moments I manage to close my mouth. That's it? She's gone for three, four weeks, and then just shows up here and pretends like it never happened? I guess... so be it, if that's what she wants. "Um," I answer, trying to clear my frown. Seriously. "Maybe. I mean, yeah. Actually, no; I've just been throwing my clothes away when they get too dirty."
She rolls her eyes at this. "I have too, but it's stupid, really. Finding new ones is work we don't have to do; cleaning would be much faster."
I have a dark suspicion I know exactly who she thinks is going to be washing all the clothes, but I nod anyway. If that's what it takes, I suppose. "Whatever. Sure."
Her eyes narrow at this unenthusiastic response, but then she grunts. Squatting again, she starts tucking my stuff back to where it all belongs.
Giving my head a little shake, I shuffle into the campsite and let my backpack fall to the ground. She ignores me completely, moving quietly and without fanfare as she works.
I find myself just staring at her, albeit out of the corners of my eyes. What the hell is this all about, anyway? This is the same girl who ran away from me? And then snuck into my bed to sleep with me? Are there like... three Asukas running around now, or what?
Once my stuff is all together, she stands again, uncoiling the yellow nylon rope I picked up a week or so ago for no particular reason. When I say nothing, her brow furrows. "So are you going to help me, or what?"
"Oh. Yeah, of course." As I'm still speaking, she tosses one end of the rope halfheartedly at me, and I jerk to catch it.
Together we spend maybe a quarter-hour getting the thing tied up, which seems like a long time, but most of it is me wrestling with a faceful of pine needles. When we're done, I spend a few moments spitting a stray handful out of my mouth, and plucking others from my face and shirt, but Asuka seems totally unaffected.
Silence stretches, and belatedly I realize she's just watching me. Waiting. Her features are a little tight, her face slightly turned away from me; she seems... wary.
I guess it's my turn to keep up the act. "Um, have you eaten? I have some stuff, although I guess you've already, uh..." I trail off as she starts digging through my piles again.
Shortly she comes up with a package of instant noodles, then waves it imperiously at me. "I know it's hot, but it's been a while since I've had hot food, so I want this. Not yet, though. I'm not quite hungry."
It's been a while. There, she almost said it. Almost breached the topic of her long departure. Am I supposed to make something of it, or just brush it off? Eventually settling on the latter, I nod. "That's fine. It's... what, three hours before dark? We can eat then, I suppose."
"Sure." Carelessly tossing the package onto my pile, she frowns at her backpack. "Let's go through all of our stuff. We probably have some redundancy we could get rid of."
"Okay." Redundancy? Right now? Whatever. Shaking my head, I kneel down next to her backpack and unzip the thing. Inside it's overflowing with supplies, food and clothes and tools and such.
The next two hours pass surprisingly quickly. We're working together, close to each other, organizing stuff. There's little conversation, just a few half-sentences here and there as needed for our task, and I find that I'm studying her sideways an awful lot. She seems bossy, still, but I'm not entirely convinced; there isn't really much heat behind her words or mannerisms, not like there used to be, and I wonder if she's just falling into old patterns. I suppose I am too.
Once we finish with that, I turn to the little propane heater and start a pot of water to boiling. Once it's ready, noodles and seasoning go in, and in minutes it's done. This presents a problem, though.
"I don't have place settings," I admit, idly swirling the noodles in the pot. "So we'll have to eat from this thing, and one person at a time. You can go first."
Asuka lifts her eyebrows at this, perhaps deciding whether to dispute my decision-making ability, but after a moment she shrugs and swipes the pot from my hands. For a time she slurps and eats before passing it back to me, and then I slurp and eat.
Afterwards, while I'm rinsing the pot out with lukewarm water, Asuka hugs knees to her chest and stares off over the ridge. "Shinji?"
"Hmm?" I might have cooked the stuff for too long, because some of the sauce has burnt to the inside of the pan. A bit of scraping with a fingernail gets it off.
"I'd like a fire."
I blink up at her for a moment, but she's not paying attention to me at all. "Fine," I agree. "You can finish cleaning this, then." The pot plops to the dirt beside her.
"Fine."
Shaking my head, I stand and head to my tarp-covered pile of firewood. It's getting a little low; I'll have to get some more, soon. After grabbing an armful and then toeing the tarp back into place, I make my way back to the makeshift firepit I've been using and dump the wood on the ground next to it.
Asuka watches blankly as I rip more pages out of the books we once read, but she doesn't try to stop me. Shortly a pile of them are burning, courtesy of the lighter I picked up a while back, and an armful of twigs and sticks goes on top. The burning paper quickly makes the kindling catch, and in moments I carefully place a pair of split chunks of dry pine over it all. This is a skill I've gotten fairly good at recently.
Once the fire is going, I claim a seat on the other side of it from Asuka. She still hasn't said anything since I started making it.
Really, the silence is frustrating, almost painful. There's so much we could talk about, so much I could ask her. What the hell has she been up to lately? Why did she come back? For that matter, why did she leave at all? How should I act around her now? Should I be addressing the Asuka from before Third Impact, the Asuka from just after, or the Asuka who stole into my blankets to sleep next to me, who I could swear was caressing my arm once on that second night? I don't get it. I don't fucking get it at all. It's always something new with her.
I'm still glad she's back, though.
As I'm watching her, blue eyes flicker towards me, and I glance back out over the ridge. I guess I was staring. Why is she surprised? She's been here for a few hours and I still feel like I'm walking on eggshells.
Screw it. I have to say something. "So... you look good," I offer, nodding vaguely at her. "You must have been doing okay for yourself."
She blinks at me for a moment. "Oh! Umm, you look good too. I was thinking that earlier. Those sunglasses don't even suck." Frowning, she glances down at herself, fingering the bottom of her shirt, as though she's forgotten about me entirely.
Sunglasses. Right; I'm still wearing them, even though it's almost dark. Quickly pulling the things from my face, I fold them up and toss them onto the pile of my bathing supplies. Now our bathing supplies.
Is she moving in with me? Why does this feel weirder than when we were just walking around together, before?
I don't say anything more, though. The fire crackles happily away between us, though it may as well be an ocean for how easy it is to reach the other side. In the silence I chance another sideways glance, but she's still sitting there almost motionless. Firelight glitters on the A10 connectors still in her hair.
Eventually, when the last of the sunset glow disappears below the ridge behind us, I climb to my feet, aware of Asuka's eyes on me. Without trying to make eye contact, or make a big deal out of it, I find my toothbrush and toothpaste -- both of which she picked out for me -- and set about brushing my teeth. When I'm done, a little bit of water serves to rinse out the excess, and I spit what's left out over the ridge. She watches me the whole time, saying nothing.
Only when I tug my shoes off and slip into my blankets does she unfold herself and move. For a moment I tense, wondering if she's going to sleep with me again, but she merely finds the sleeping bag she brought up here and starts unrolling it. Shortly we're both lying on our backs, once again separated by the crackling fire between us.
I swallow. "Hey, Asuka?"
"Yeah?" Her voice is soft.
"You're... still wearing your A10 connectors. How come?" I swallow again after my question, wondering if this subject is out-of-bounds, but she doesn't explode at me.
Instead, she simply lies there for a moment in silence. "Because I'm a pilot."
I frown at this. "Umm... you're not, though."
"No, I know." She sighs. Between us, the fire pops, sending sparks flying up a column of hazy smoke. "I mean... I know I don't need them, but I like to show them off. Wearing them makes me feel elite." Her voice is still quiet, about as thoughtful as I've ever heard it. Probably as honest, too.
I nod against my pillow, uncertain how to respond. "It's just... who's going to see them? There's only me, and I already know you're good."
Silence. Leaves rustling, flames murmuring, sounds I've grown used to recently.
Eventually she sighs again. "Well, people will be back eventually, right? And a person has to have some sort of identification."
I shake my head at this but keep my mouth shut. We've been over this. Maybe people will be back, and maybe they won't, but I wouldn't bet my future on it. It's already been almost a month and there's still nobody but us.
When she doesn't add anything further either, I hug my blankets closer and roll to my side. Firelight dances in my eyes, but it's already burning down for the night, soon to be nothing but embers growing cold.
Slowly my eyelids drift shut. Maybe everything has to burn out before it can start up again.
