English is not my first language. Please bear with grammatical errors.

Disclaimer: I don't own GS/GSD.

Season of Farewell

Chapter 9: The Fight

His girlfriend opened a door to the school ground and they went out of the building. Although the weather wasn't too cold to spend some time outside, it was still not quite pleasant. It seemed especially odd that she, who didn't care for the cold weather, had chosen to leave the warmth of the building.

Athrun studied Cagalli, though she was walking a couple of steps ahead of him and he couldn't see her face. Still, he could tell she was nervous, tense, from the way she carried herself. Not to mention she had looked exactly that way when she had come to his homeroom after school and asked him to come with her, explaining there was something she wanted to talk to him about.

Even before that, he had sensed something was wrong. She had not seemed different last Friday, but after school that day, she had suddenly canceled coming to the study session—which he had actually felt somewhat relieved at. And she had not texted him even once during the weekend, which was quite rare since they had started dating. He had even considered sending a text himself despite his attempt to avoid her, though he opted not to in the end.

And today, she had been in a low mood. Kira had said that she had been like that since Friday night but didn't tell why, looking as puzzled as Athrun was feeling. She seemed to be avoiding explaining the reason of her mood to their friends, either. Having some secrets of his own, Athrun had been reluctant to try to pry the answer out of her. Plus, she usually didn't let her low mood linger or keep secrets for long; he had assumed it would resolve soon if he didn't do anything. And his theory appeared to have been right. She was taking him somewhere for a talk, where she was likely to confide in him with what was troubling her.

They walked some more and turned around a storehouse, then she stopped. A glance over his shoulder told him that they weren't to be seen from the school buildings, covered by the storehouse. She must want privacy very much. A part of him was actually glad and relieved that her problem, whatever it was, seemed big. It would hopefully lead her to forget about his odd behavior, if it hadn't already. At least a part of his problem seemed to be going away soon.

Her movement was slow as she turned toward him. Her face was strained as he had expected. She stared at him with wide eyes for a moment and he looked back calmly, ready to comfort her or help her solve her problem, or both.

Her mouth tightened before opening. "Friday, I went to your homeroom after school."

He looked at her quizzically. "Did you? I didn't see you."

She shook her head stiffly. "I didn't go inside. I...heard your conversation with Meyrin and Lunamaria." He nodded, still puzzled. She swallowed, clearly preparing for what she was going to say. "You aren't okay with my going to Tassil...are you?"

His eyes widened. He had not expected the words. He couldn't possibly have. "Where...what makes you say that?" He struggled to keep his voice and face neutral instead of guilty.

"It's hard to explain. But you aren't, right?" she pressed. "Answer me, Athrun."

He averted his face, his lips pressed together, discomfort and embarrassment filling him. He had been caught completely off guard. He had been prepared to talk about her, not about himself, especially not about this.

After a minute of heavy silence, she asked in a shaky voice, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want to bother you," he replied in a low voice, his eyes still away from her.

"But I wanted you to say it if you didn't like it. I didn't want you to pretend like that. I don't want you to."

He glanced at her and found her looking at him as if he had done something bad—as if he had done her wrong, instead of doing her a favor, by not telling her what he actually felt.

Anger began replacing guilt and mortification in him. He had been trying to be a good boyfriend, suppressing his feelings for her sake, even when it was so hard and painful. He had been trying to support her and protect her from the truth she wouldn't like. How could she blame him for that? Besides, it wasn't like she had asked for his opinion—or about his feelings.

"What's the point? You wouldn't have changed your college choice, would you?" he said in a tense voice colored with annoyance.

"But...we still could've talked about it. Then maybe we could find some..." She struggled for the word. "...solution?" she finished uncertainly.

"Like what?"

"I don't know, but—"

"I'm telling you," he cut her off, irritation clear in his voice, "it's no use. You would've never changed your mind. You would've chosen your dream anyway. You would've never chosen me."

Her eyes widened even further with shock. "I...I'm not choosing my dream over you, Athrun."

"No," he said coldly, almost spitting out, "you are just putting your dream before our relationship. And you didn't even ask me how I feel about it. If you wanted to talk about this, you should've tried before you made the decision. But it didn't even occur to you, did it? Because your dream is so important that our relationship can never compete against it. It's not even worth a fraction of the thoughts and time you've spent on your dream, huh?" He couldn't help a little venom slipping in his voice.

"That's...that is not how I feel. I don't. I didn't mean to…" She didn't seem to know what to say, or how to say what she wanted to say.

She just stared at him as if looking at a stranger. Orange sunset was probably making her face appear more shocked than she actually was. He turned his eyes away anyway. He knew he was being childish, and maybe selfish.

He shouldn't act like this. He should support her in following her dream. He should apologize to her for upsetting her—no matter how unreasonable and unjust her reaction was—reassure her that he knew she was working for a noble cause and promise to do better, to give her more understanding. That was what a good boyfriend should do.

Still, the apology didn't come to his lips. He didn't want to say it. He couldn't say it. He couldn't pretend it was all right anymore. Because it wasn't. He was hurting due to her choice. She was hurting him. And he couldn't contain his unhappiness anymore. He had thought he could take almost anything in order not to lose her, but this was more difficult than he had expected, becoming too much.

Furthermore, if she wasn't acting as a good girlfriend should, then why should he act like a good boyfriend? Meyrin's words from three days ago came back to his mind. There were girls like that, girls who surely wouldn't dream of moving far away from their boyfriend. Why couldn't Cagalli do like them? Why couldn't she be like them?

Why couldn't she love him enough?

Neither of them said anything for a couple of minutes. Then a rhythmical song suddenly broke the silence, which he knew was her ringtone for Kira. He slowly shifted his eyes. She was looking down at her skirt. The shock still lingered in her face and she looked like she wasn't sure what to do with the call.

"You'd better answer that."

She sent him a hesitant look, but her hand tentatively took out her phone.

"Kira? I...no, I didn't read your text. Listen, I'm in the middle of something, so..." She glanced at him.

"I'm going," he told her, and turned his back toward her before she made any response. He didn't want to stay. He had no reason to. He had already said what he had to say—which apparently had not changed their situation, had not made her change her mind.

As he started walking, emotions were swirling in his chest. He had been right. She wouldn't choose him. She would still choose to leave him behind even after learning that the decision hurt him. He couldn't be as important to her as he wished. She didn't care about him enough.

He turned the corner of the storehouse, disappearing from her sight, and she still didn't say anything to stop him, proving him right.

"—great, thanks. So, Cagalli, never mind about the textbook. My classmates say they let me see theirs. You can give back mine later. Bye."

Kira hung up before she said anything back. Cagalli blinked several times before moving her phone away from her face to stare at it. She had nearly forgotten that she had still been on the line with her brother. He had called her to get back his geography textbook which she had borrowed before the fifth period and had not returned yet.

Absently, she checked texts and found one from Kira telling her to bring the textbook to his homeroom, explaining he had to correct the geography quiz he had taken during class and resubmit it before going home today. He seemed to have sent it after class, but she had not noticed it, her mind occupied with the plan to talk to Athrun, which went terribly wrong.

She looked in the direction Athrun had left, half hoping that he would come back any minute to say that he had been just carried away with an embarrassed face. But it didn't seem to be happening.

Sighing, she stashed her phone and started following his steps. As she turned the corner of the storehouse, she looked around. He might be staying near, not willing to return to her but also not willing to completely leave her. However, the midnight blue hair so familiar to her eyes was nowhere to be found. There were some people in sight, far away, but in the twilight, the scene looked desolated. Or it just looked that way because the person she wanted to be here wasn't. She shivered, feeling like the temperature had dropped a lot since she and Athrun had come outside, though it could be due to her emotional state.

With another sigh, she resumed walking, or rather, trudging, toward the school building. The heaviness in her chest were slowing her steps.

Almost unconsciously, she tugged the chain around her neck and grasped the ring on it. However, it no longer gave her the reassurance, the sense of certainty, it had provided her for the past three days after she had heard the conversation between Athrun and the redheads. The feel of hard metal, which she had once found comforting, now seemed to add to her distress, reminding her of his face hardened with exasperation, of his harsh words. Of his rejection.

The image of his back, of him walking away, kept flashing in her mind and stabbing her heart. It pained her more than anything that he had just left like that, as if he didn't want to see her or talk with her anymore. As if he wanted nothing with her anymore. As if she didn't mean much to him anymore.

But could she blame him? He was right. She should have given proper thought to what he would think of her going to Tassil instead of jumping to the conclusion that he would support her decision. She shouldn't have taken his understanding and support for granted. She should have thought more about his feelings.

Remembering the anger and pain in his eyes, she felt a pang. She had never meant to hurt him. But she clearly had. Tears started to prickle her eyes.

Would he ever forgive her? It was obvious that her negligence had wounded him deeply. And it wasn't even the only reason why he was upset. There was something else making him unhappy. Their problem was larger, and she wasn't sure how to solve it.

She had thought that discussing it with him would help. That they could come up with a solution that satisfied both of them even though she couldn't on her own. Two heads were better than one, right?

Besides, if there was no such a solution...then, what would happen? Did she have to give up her dream of studying at Tassil University, under Professor Ashman? Letting go of the ring, she pressed her hand against her chest, feeling another kind of pain. Was it wrong of her to still want to go there? Did it mean she was choosing her dream over her relationship with Athrun, over him, as he had accused her of?

She had not meant it that way. She had never seen it as a kind of competition to begin with. Was it actually what this was, though? At least, Athrun thought so. And he didn't think their relationship mattered much to her.

But she did cherish him, her relationship with him. She really did, with her whole heart.

The problem was, she apparently had not been doing a good job of showing it to him. She had never thought it would be a problem for her. She had always been told she was expressive of her emotions and thoughts, sometimes too much so actually. How come she had failed to express her feelings enough in one of the most important relationships to her? She didn't think she had ever held back her love for him, especially from him, especially after they became a couple.

Well, except when she was feeling shy. There had been times when she couldn't really touch him or look at him, or when she acted nervously while doing it, especially in the beginning of their romantic relationship. Emotions he stirred in her after she had realized she was in love with him were so strong that it had taken her a while to get used to it. But he had not seemed to mind it. He had usually looked like he knew that the reason of her behavior was her strong feelings for him, not the lack of love. He had even appeared to enjoy watching her reaction.

Was it possible that she had been mistaken about that too? Their misunderstanding had begun that long ago? Maybe she had just assumed he understood about it, just like she had assumed he understood about her college choice. Probably she should have tried harder to show him how much he meant to her, told him more about her feelings.

Speaking of which, she should have told him that she really cared about him earlier. But then...would he have believed if she had? If he no longer trusted her, her words might not mean much to him anymore. After all, he had left before hearing her explanation, how she actually felt for him, hadn't he? It had been partly her fault, though. She shouldn't have kept dumbly silent like that, not even trying to convince him. But she had been shocked and bewildered by his accusation. It had been so out of the blue, and out of place.

She shook her head. It was of little use to dwell on negative possibilities and how stupidly she had acted in the past. What she should focus on now was finding a way to fix this. She should somehow straighten out this misunderstanding. She could do it, right? If she tried her hardest, at least she could make him see she really loved him, couldn't she? She just needed to figure out how.

But...what if this wasn't really a misunderstanding? The thought floated up from somewhere deep inside her, where her old fears and pains were stashed. What if her everything was just not enough, to convince him, to satisfy him? What if he actually understood how much she loved him, and still thought it wasn't enough? What if she was just not capable of giving him what he wanted?

Her chest tightened even further, squeezing her heart which was filled with a new but familiar pain.

That kind of thing sometimes happened, she knew from her experience with her father. Sometimes, no matter how hard you tried, you were just different from what they wanted. It didn't mean you lacked something important or you weren't good enough, as her mother and grandfather had repeatedly and firmly assured her. Sometimes, two people were just not compatible, their lives not fitting together well, because they were too different or wanted very different things.

Like her and her father. Whatever he wanted—a successor to everything he had accomplished and was going to accomplish, especially the position of head of the hospital he had been eyeing for years, she assumed—she wasn't it. She wasn't even eligible for a candidate. In his eyes, Kira was the only candidate. It had always been that way. Because she was a girl and Kira was a boy. Ulen didn't see much beyond that.

When she had been little, she had tried to change it, make her father look at her, really look at her. As one of those attempts, in the first semester of the fifth grade, she had studied extra hard and tried to act like a model student so that she could show him an excellent report card at the end of semester, which she hoped would change the way he saw her.

He had indeed praised her, which made her happy, and told her to continue the effort. But then, he had shifted to discussing Kira's report card with her brother, which wasn't nearly as good as hers. With a frown, she had tried to get back her father's attention; she had tugged at his arm and held out her report card in front of his face, wanting more comments from him.

But Ulen had dismissed her, saying he was satisfied with hers. He had been a lot more eager to talk to Kira, albeit it was mostly a lecture, than to her, exactly like when her report card was worse than Kira's. The best grades she had ever gotten and her homeroom teacher's praising comment on her report card, all the effort she had put into getting them, had not affected the way her father treated her even a bit.

She had felt crushed, sensing that nothing she could do would make her father shift his focus from Kira to her, not even for two minutes, not even one time.

Shaking, she had yelled at her father, who was lecturing Kira, "I hate you!" She had promptly ripped her report card into pieces and stomped to her room to refuse to come out even for dinner.

Her mother—who had not witnessed what had happened because she was preparing for dinner then, but apparently had heard about it—had brought dinner to her room instead, along with her report card neatly taped back together and comforting words.

By then, Via had become more honest with Cagalli about how little interest Ulen had in his daughter, not trying to cover it up as she used to when Cagalli was smaller. She still had not outright said it herself, but had not denied it when Cagalli mentioned it and her attitude had clearly shown that she agreed with Cagalli. Her mother's honesty had helped Cagalli deal with the situation even though it still hurt. She wouldn't have doubted her mother's love for her even if she had lied to her, but her mother acknowledging her feelings as legitimate had somewhat eased the pain. It had reassured Cagalli that at least her mother was seeing and treating her the way Cagalli wanted.

As Via left, Kira had also come to say he was sorry even though it wasn't his fault. Lying side by side on her bed, her brother and she had shared complaints about their father; Kira had had plenty of his own. Then, they had shifted to just talking, about anything and everything that came to their minds, until they got sleepy.

Two days later, her grandfather had called, even though she had not called him about the incident, and given her detailed praises and encouragements, and long talks about her classes and school life in general, many of which they had already had to an extent but repeated anyway; he had given her what she had wanted from her father.

With their love and support and through many other incidents, she had eventually learned to let go of the desire to change her father's attitude toward her especially since the only thing the attempts did was hurt her. She had come to terms with the fact that she and her father couldn't have the kind of relationship she wanted. Apparently, it wasn't what he wanted and he wasn't willing to try to do anything about it, work out their difference so that they could have a better relationship, if not the one she originally wished for. She couldn't change that, change him. As her grandfather had said, although other people could make you want to change, the only person who could actually change you was yourself; Ulen didn't seem to have any intention of making the effort, or want to in the first place. And she wasn't going to waste her life on trying to change him, she had decided years ago.

Such incompatibility could happen between any kind of pair; a parent and a child wasn't an exception. The tie of blood didn't automatically make two people compatible.

...And certainly, it applied to a boyfriend and a girlfriend, right? Maybe...she and Athrun weren't exactly as compatible as she had believed. Maybe...what he wanted wasn't her just like her father's case? After all, Athrun had refused to discuss with her how to solve their problem, as if he had no intention of making the effort to improve their relationship, their situation—just like her father. Maybe...what if...even the way Athrun saw her was somewhat like—

She stumbled back a couple steps as she bumped into someone. "Oh."

Pulled out of her thoughts, she became conscious that she was already inside the building and walking down a corridor. Well, she had been walking until her path collided against that of someone she actually knew.

"I'm sorry! Oh, Cagalli-senpai." Meyrin gave her a shy and relieved smile; a blonde girl who was probably Meyrin's friend also smiled apologetically. "Sorry for running into you. Me and Abby are a bit in a hurry..." Meyrin's voice trailed off as her face turned puzzled. "Are you all right?"

Cagalli put on a weak smile. "Yeah, I'm just—"

"Your boyfriend must feel happy you care about him that much." Athrun's words suddenly echoed in her head.

Would he be happier if she were a girl like Meyrin? Was she making him unhappy because she was a bad girlfriend who wasn't "girly"? Because she was a selfish person who wanted to follow her dream even though he didn't like it?

Couldn't he be happy if she was...herself?

She took a sharp breath, feeling suffocated. "Sorry, Meyrin," she choked out. "I-I gotta go."

She ran past the younger girls. Once she started running, she couldn't stop. She thought she heard someone—probably a teacher—scolding her for running, but she couldn't even slow down. She just ran and ran, up the stairs and down the corridor. Until she reached her destination.

She pulled open a door to the classroom with force, breathing hard. There might be several people in the room, but the only thing her mind registered was her twin paging through a book at a desk. She went straight to him, not caring that she bumped into some desks on the way. Her hands clashed the surface of his desk, her body almost slamming into it.

"What—" Kira took one look at her and his voice stopped. He dropped the book and stood up, his eyes wide and worried. "Cagalli, what's wrong?"

No words came to her. She just flung herself at him and her tears coursed down her cheeks. Gasping for air, she clutched to him tightly, as if he was her lifeline.

"There, there, it's all right." He gently caressed her head, securely holding her body with an arm, anchoring her as her world was shaking and shaken up. "It's gonna be all right. There, there."

Her tears stopped before long, and she felt slightly better as she usually did after crying. The suffocating feeling had diminished to an extent. But her body still felt heavy, tired. Exhausted, even though she had not cried that much. She felt like just curling up on the floor and staying there like a little child.

While she slowly rubbed her face with her sleeves, Kira asked two girls who seemed to have been studying with him to straighten the desks Cagalli had disturbed. The girls accepted the request. Cagalli thanked them who told her not to worry about it. She felt a little embarrassed at the scene she had caused, but she was too preoccupied to be really bothered by it.

Putting his stuff in his bag, Kira gently pulled her hand. "Let's go."

She started to follow him, but stopped. "You said you have something to do..." she said weakly, and shook her head, trying to clear it. "The quiz?" She looked at the girls working with the desks. They must be the ones who had offered to share their textbooks with Kira.

Her brother shrugged. "I can hand it in tomorrow. I'm sure Mr. Neumann will understand," he casually said before tugging at her hand again.

She still hesitated, but couldn't find the energy to argue with him. Resuming her steps, she decided that she would talk to the geography teacher and explain that it was her fault her brother had not been able to resubmit his quiz in time. But it would have to wait until tomorrow. She couldn't do it today.

They went to her homeroom to collect her stuff and headed for home. On the bus, she dozed off a little, resting her head on his shoulder, but soon, he woke her up. They reached their house, then her room, and then her bed.

In front of the bed, he finally released the hold of her hand which he had never let go on their way back.

"I'll come back in a second."

She nodded wearily, and as he left the room, started to peel off her clothes to change into her pajamas. Her head and eyes and face were heavy and a bit hurting from crying. The fatigue was even worse after the little nap on the bus. Feeling like she was half asleep, she faintly wished that this was all a dream. That what had happened between her and Athrun was just a dream, a nightmare. But mostly, she didn't want to think about it, about anything. Not yet.

She was crawling into under the covers, her uniform strewn on the floor, when Kira came back with a glass of iced tea and a damp cloth. She drank half of the tea, then exchanged the glass with the cloth to wipe her face with it.

"Now you can go to sleep," he said, collecting the cloth from her hand.

She nodded and placed her head on her pillow. "Kira..." Her voice came out small. "Thank you..."

Putting down the glass and the cloth on the floor, he caressed her head before tucking her in and dropping a kiss on her forehead like their mother used to when they were little. "Sleep tight, Cagalli."

She closed her eyes and gave in to the merciful darkness.

Thank you for reading. See you next week!

···

Below are replies to reviews.

To BlueberriesGoneBad:

Thank you for the review!

I hope you enjoyed their fight in this chapter. Now they are finally on the same page (more or less), and it's the first step to finding the solution to their problem, whatever it will be.

To Fuyu Aki:

Thank you for another review!

Glad you understand Athrun's sentiments. And thanks for looking forward to my fic so much :)

I hope this chapter wasn't "a cheap melodrama," or not too much of one at least. And I wonder how much it fit into your expectations or didn't.

I appreciate your compliment about the openings of chapters. I think it's partly because I'm not very good at writing a filler, and I rather want to write only scenes necessary to the story. So I tend to skip what happens between the necessary scenes, only giving a brief explanation in a later chapter if needed.

I also don't really like dividing one scene into two chapters, ending one chapter in the middle of a scene and beginning the next chapter exactly where we left off.

Each chapter has its own purpose and a scene almost always fits either one of the chapters' purposes, not both. In my case, anyway. And I like to include in a chapter all the scenes necessary to its purpose. (That's why the lengths of my chapters quite vary.)

I understand the usefulness of such writing, and have nothing against it. It's just not my style. I prefer to have clear boundaries between chapters. Dividing a scene into two chapters kind of blur the boundaries.

Not to mention I need to skip days and even weeks between chapters, or sometimes scenes in one chapter, since this fic extends over months.

I'm happy to exchange PMs with you. But you haven't sent one to me yet, right? I see none from you in my inbox.

To PegasusInCage:

Thank you for another review!

Yeah, the previous chapter was the shortest. Hopefully, this chapter was long enough to satisfy you. If not, the next chapter probably will since it will be the longest so far. So please be patient :)

*posted 03/10/19*

*edited 05/11/19*