10. Of Two Minds

Before…

The days of our piano lessons together fly past oh so very quickly before my very eyes, and before I had the chance to utter what I should have long, long ago, our time is up and Helix has taken you back from their loan to the U.N. The day I watched you leave with that sorry look in your eyes as you no doubt trailed my healing cheek made me want to run to you and say that it's alright. That I am the one to blame; I was too rushed, too emotional- I had been hollow for so long that I had become reckless and I could not stop myself. I made you distance yourself even as you continued to care for me from afar. I…I drove the wedge between us.

And for that, mein liebling, I am truly sorry.

I am sorry to watch you go. I am sorry for taking advantage of your blind, soldierly trust. At least, I would like to say that I am but… I am not, not really. I would like to say that I stood at the hangar door long after the Banshee had disappeared and longed for you. But no; I was ravaging Ana in my bed to try to forget that I had cared for you so much I might have fallen for you, dear Captain. I feasted on her body and made her make me feel good but all I could think of was you. I am… sorry for that.

For I, too, am fallible, despite what others might have heard about me. I am incorrigible. I am fickle, selfish, demanding. And I never taught your Debussy's Pour Le Piano. I am sorry, for that, at least.

As a massive regional upheave in Cologne, Germany has me deployed with the twenty-first Airborne to quell the Talon-stoked Ominian crisis, I have eyes and ears to keep me informed of where you go. I hear you squashed a cell in Katowice. I heard you vanquished havoc-class units in Jalan Baru. I am slightly worried that Talon is everywhere, but I worry more for you.

I see newspaper clippings of you-helmeted- mouth frozen open in the photograph as rockets arc forth from you; my angel. The war photographer's hand had shaken as he snapped the shot, but technology has sharpened into eternity the image of the Omnics as lasers were trained on you- to kill. I purse my lips. Then I flip the page and see more. Your visor is down and you grimace as you photographed tearing tags from the fallen amidst the wrecks of Immortals your rocket barrage had destroyed.

I can see the strain. I can…see that it hurts you

Justice rains from above. The headline screams in bold print. Helden!, my local German newspapers read. Hero. Indeed, you are. Young girls are happy and their moms are happy too that you bring into this world such a shining example of female empowerment and… I suppose that's nice. The media takes you and turns you into a global icon for peace and security. Chinese toy makers are falling over themselves making action figure for you. But what does the press know about what you are really feeling? Do they know like I do how you sit staring at bulkheads for hours after killing young children in far-distant Vietnamese villages? Do they know like I do how you hyperventilate softly as you clean your armor again, and again, and again as your eyes unfocused while your mind take you back to the massacres of Sydney? Your armor is spotless. I see my dark eyes in them. But you still clean. Why do you clean so much, Fareeha? You cannot rub off blood stains! But hey… I suppose you could try. A drive deep in me we might call compassion compels me to look out for you. Not because I am absolutely selfless, no. More like because I am selfish; seeing so much of my own emotional suffering in others make me want to reach out and comfort them with the selfish desire for them to reciprocate my actions and ease my pain, too, however that works.

But still; the press, do they know anything about you? I torture myself with the question.

No. One syllable answer, because that is the truth.

At ungodly hours I lock myself in my office in the world-class hospital and dim the lights while I sip my hot tea and let my eyes glaze over at the press conference of you I am watching.

'Miss Amari!', they clamor for your attention', what are your opinions on what people are saying about the devastation at Reykjavik harbor?'

'Can you tell us your thoughts on the situation in Germany?'

'Are you going to deploy to Syria? There are news that the American Liberator-class siegecrafts have gone rou-'

'I-I…', you stutter as your squinted eyes flit between the dozens of flashing lights. You are disoriented; out of your elements, and everyone with half the brain can tell. But the reporters are hounds and they want to seize the first word that falls from your lips and blow it up into front page material. I grit my teeth as I take in the gaily-dressed men and women. The make-up. The décor. The microphones. The suit they put you in!

You hate it. You do not speak much, if at all. You hate this environment. You think a lot in your head- your lively eyes give it away and I watch you carefully like you are the only specimen of a precious species of flower and I might lose you to the first draft of wind. I know your eyes. Now, your eyes want you to run away. Mein liebling! If only you knew how much I wanted to be there for you…

It pained me that I could not. But… someone was. Was that… me? No. She looked like me, yes. She was a little taller. A little thinner. Like me, she was a blond. Like me, she spoke with authority and conviction, commanding all the attention with mere words. But her green eyes were cold and calculating as she stared directly into the camera and spoke up on your behalf, saying that questions end here. You are escorted out of the conference room, screaming reporters clawing their futile way at security to get to you. She has a hand on you, gripping your shoulders as she pushes you forth. You must be distracted, for you did not shake her off. What was that blonde to you? Helix Public Relations? U.N foreign correspondent? A mere attaché? Or another doctor, fortunate enough to have your ear as you stare at the ground and try to escape the stifling room while a thousand flashes and more blind you from every side?

Jealousy, black and deadly, consumes me.

(break)

One day…a long, long time later.

We both get rather tipsy on the French wine. I giggle as I lean against you and your strong, muscular arm squeeze my waist reassuringly, and my giggle turns into a quiet smile.

Even barely sober, you-my soldier- you are here for me. I sigh so happily the Cherubs from the High Heavens would have swooned at the sight. Our evening flashes before my befuddled brain and I start chuckling again as I remember you at our dinner earlier. The waitress comes and she is checking you out demurely from under her lashes. She asks for our orders. I say just wine, for the moment. She can't take her eyes off you so I lean over and kiss you on the lips. The French girl gasps.

I am the only non-flustered woman at the table after that. But… that's okay.

'What wine?', she forgets her manners.

You stare at me.

You stare at her.

I wiggle my eyebrows seductively.

'The best', you croak.

We are breathless as we fumble with the lock to the rented apartment. Soft, classical music plays from the opposite; so our landlady Eva is home. That's nice. I think she is rather lovely, and her voice is music to my ears- like yours is. Well… maybe a bit less. But we are breathless. It is very hot. France is so hot in the summer and I miss the chill of Switzerland, but then the door is unlocked, and I push you in, and you would have gone 'augh!' but I seized your lips and… mhmm, this is nice…

I rather like the way you tense under me as my fingers begin tracing meaningless patterns all over you. But I am soft. And you are…well…hard. Fit. Toned. So my weight doesn't bother you at all! I would have exclaimed happily. But not now. I am draped over you like a fine Persian blanket and I keep things mellow as I tease you- but not too much, na ah! No. I tease you to a point, then I kiss my way down, down, down…

We would have showered together but I am fat and lazy as hell and I fell asleep after pleasuring you. I know. Facepalms were had. I roll around on the bed slowly as I listen to the water run. I turn away from the light through the opaque bathroom door; I dislike light. Soon, you are out, and I stagger to do my own cleaning.

Mhm.

You say that I am not fat? Well, mein liebling, that's really nice of you! Well then, I suppose not. But I feel fat. Perhaps I shall go to the gym with you, love? Perhaps… but my thoughts get ahead of me. Let's get back to that blissful moment. That night on the sofa in Chilly Mazarin in the southern suburbs of Paris, ja?

We cuddle on the comfortable sofa and bask in the melty post-coital glow for long after you had reached your peak. You are so shy in these intimate moments and I get these…ugh… Fareeha, it might sound a little strange but I get these motherly vibes whenever you curl up next to me. Yes. How do you do it? How do you make me feel this way? How do you both make yourself smaller and yet big enough to cradle me in your protective arms at the same time? How do you make me want to spread myself to cover all of you and hide you away from the world for me alone even as you are doing that very thing for me?

It will forever be a mystery.

Rain comes belatedly and we are fourteen and nineteen again. Two teenagers secretly holding hands in the dimness of the darkened room as the movie plays, the flickers of the screen like probing eyes of strangers somehow so we time our hand-holding for when the screen is darker and we are veiled in darkness. Did I… make you confused? Ah. Please indulge me; indulge this old woman and allow her her reminiscence. For we both indulge each other. I; you, as I leaned up and kissed your forehead. You; me, as you made a bold move and seized my lips on the way down, kissing with your typical hopeless aggression. Ah…hmm. Yeah. See, I stopped to reconsider my words, after all- a kiss; aggression? That… might not have been the best descriptor? But it's true…

You kiss me like every kiss would be the last. You kiss me like I am the only woman in the wor- wait. No. Scrap that. Like I am the only human in the world. Like you would lose me if you dare let me go. I… I have never felt so secure as I was in your arms. Never, Fareeha.

When you hold me, I feel safe. From what… Talon? Danger? Some random fanatic charging me with a six-inch serrated knife? It has happened before, you know that. The short answer is everything. The long answer is you protect me from my own nightmares, my twisted dreams. My evil other half, Lily, who as you tell me you love me whispers in my other ear for me to end you in your sleep so she can take your place by my side and dance with me forward unto oblivion. Take a long walk off a short cliff. Paint a line down my wrist. Swing from a tall, tall tree.

I…am burdened, by the lives I have taken. Infinitely more so by the lives I could not save. To think I almost lost you forever, mein liebling…

But let's keep it mellow.

I smile at you radiantly; I am terrible at acting and you see through my forced positivity like it was not there at all. But you smile back- haltingly at first but you do- because you know how I feel and feel like I do.

And now, like then in Chilly Mazarin as it rained and I woke up screaming at 4 a.m in our warm cottage on the side of the Swiss mountains you hold me close to you and whisper that you love me. That you are here for me. That no one, nothing, will ever hurt me.

And I think back to a time when I questioned if I would love you forever. And I realize I had it a little wrong the whole time. That I was a little too busy envying others who had your favor. Too busy doubting everyone that dared come near you; too busy being selfish thinking only in terms of absolutes and…and. Well. I… don't know if I still make sense anymore. I tend to go off sometimes. But it doesn't matter. I don't need to stick around until past a hundred years old. I don't need to live forever. And that is because I have you.

For you; my love, my angel, my life- you, are my forever. You taught me to appreciate the sting of the cold, the warmth of linens. You taught me to be kind to others when I can, to be patient with others, and especially with myself. You, who showed me that I… me, wretched, accursed, despicable me, can still be loved. You, oh stupid, lovely, goofy you. You who woke up and stared at me for almost half an hour only to ask for my hand as I awoke.

'In marriage?', I yawned sleepily, not quite sure I was not dreaming; the nightmares of last night had drained me and I was very, very tired.

'Yes.'

You summon a gorgeous diamond-studded ring from the air and find my hand. You prepare to put it on. I wait for you to. But you stop. I was like…what?

'So…yes?', you ask. No tact! No subtlety! No candle-lit dinner in the finest restaurant, no Jazz in the background. But here, us tousled, messy hair; bleary, half asleep.

Of course I said yes.

It was a sunny, sunny day in Chilly Mazarin.