Journey's End
Chapter 12: Not Enough
Time has this strange tendency to move at different paces. It's kind of like how the wind blows the sand in different patterns, sometimes. How one ripple might look like an ocean wave, another like a flower, and another like nothing but a pile of plain-old sand. It crawls when you want it to move faster. It speeds up when you need it to slow down. It stops when you least expect it.
I hated how time was crawling. I wanted it to move faster, I wanted this hideaway and pregnancy to be over. I wanted everything to right itself. But time is funny. Time does what it wants, and it controls everyone else while it does so.
Time's cousin, kind of like me and Yunie, you could say… well, Time's cousin's name was Consequence. Consequence has this strange tendency to throw everyone's stupid mistakes back in their faces. Yep, that's Consequence. Or, that's the side of Consequence I'm familiar with, anyway. It also holds people accountable for every action they make. In my case, most actions have fallen into the category of 'stupid mistakes'.
Sometimes, I think that sleeping with Gippal in the first place was a stupid mistake… but most of the time, I don't. Only when I'm having a really bad day. No matter how bad or good my day is, I always think that running away from him was the stupidest stupid mistake I've ever made. Other stupid mistakes include drinking myself silly when I was twelve and getting caught by the Oasis patrols from Home, insulting a maester and getting myself thrown into this big pit of scariness that's also known as the Via Purifico, and eating a suspicious piece of cake that Barkeep put on the table and getting sick. Among other things.
Time and Consequence are nearly always on the same side. They get all Trigger Happy on the poor little people. And it makes me wonder, sometimes – when I'm on the receiving end of those bullets – why we don't think about the consequences time will bring along. Why we go on with life until life bites us in the ass and then the painful hindsight makes us actually acknowledge life. And we keep acknowledging it, until life itself is satisfied, I suppose, and then the whole stupid process starts again.
And even when I know all this… I still tell myself that everything is going to be okay once the baby's born. That I'll work things out with Gippal, and that we'll grow old together, somehow, with no problems and no heartache. Would you call that stupid, or optimistic? I don't know what I'd call it.
A dream, maybe.
"I can't believe you! You let her find out from a stranger? That only makes it worse! And I'm nearly six months pregnant, besides! You should have told her!" Adena stood behind her kitchen counter, as far from me as she could get. And I couldn't blame her.
I didn't want to have to deal with me, either.
"I tried." My voice sounded weak to my own ears.
She tossed her hands in the air. "Stop. Don't you do that."
"What?" I asked, leaning against the door. I didn't know how much more of this I could take. Rikku ignoring me, locking me out of the house… Adena glaring and getting angry when I was in her presence. Barely any contact with Telan, and no one to talk to.
"Stop making pathetic excuses. Admit it."
"And where will admitting it get me?"
Two weeks and Rikku and I had barely spoken. But she and Adena had. Often. And while I knew it often turned to angered shouting matches, it was still something. Something more than a plate of cold food left in the kitchen at the end of the day.
"I don't know."
I opened the door, stepping down to the stairwell. "I should've told her. And what did that do?" The anxiety that I hated hadn't eased. Nothing had changed. It wasn't enough.
Bevelle. A beautiful city, full of beautiful, righteous Yevonites. All of them honored, all of them welcome. Except me.
My initiation into the Crimson Squad would be private. I should have been glad that they were letting me in, after all. But just because I wasn't Yevonite didn't mean I didn't know the prayer, didn't mean I couldn't show respect. I deserved to go through the ceremony with the rest of them, inside the palace.
I waited outside the doors as the rest filed in, saluting my commanding officer clumsily. He was an understanding man, clasping my shoulder as he walked past, recognizing the hard look in my eye. "Just think of it as bein' special, kid."
I ignored him, looking straight ahead at the bay. The constant doubt among the masses of Spira made me edgy. I had no one to talk to… none in my local training group would look at me. I guess they were afraid my blonde hair and tanned skin would burn their Yevonite souls to hell or whatever the hell they believe in. I often asked myself why I'd ever left Home. Sure, I'd gotten to see Bevelle, the city that no Al Bhed ever walked in. But was it worth it?
I stepped off the hover at the end of the Highbridge, waving my thanks to the driver as I tossed my bag over my shoulder. I was done being invisible, done with being the bad guy. I had to make everything okay again, for Rikku, for Adena, for Telan… and for myself. And I had to start somewhere. I had to forgive before I could be forgiven.
Bevelle was different than it used to be. Different, now that I took the time to notice. No stares, no disapproving head shakes when everyone else got a prayer. Now it was all kind smiles, with small children from the cloisters asking you if you'd like to buy a flower. People bowed to each other in the streets, and while it was still too formal for my taste, it made me feel more welcome. And it was nice to be able to walk through the streets and look around, instead of hiding behind walls and doorways so I wouldn't be spotted and mistaken for a Youth League soldier.
When I reached the main entrance to the palace, I nodded to the guards. The acolytes within prayed at me when I passed, which was a change. I still thought New Yevon was just as big of a crack of shit as the first old Yevon was, but I had to deal with it. If people wanted to cling to the past, that was their problem, not mine.
I'd been clinging to the past. I'd been acting like a Yevonite, holding grudges, hiding actions. It wasn't like an honest Al Bhed. It wasn't like me. So I sighed and knocked on the large door, waiting for a priest to open up.
"I'm uh… I'm here to see the Praetor."
I waited in his office, tapping my foot on the sprawling stone floor incessantly. He had a great view of the Lower City and the shipping area. I was a little jealous. My office had no view. Just solid stone walls, cold to the touch no matter what time of year, like steel bars that were holding me in.
My tapping foot began to annoy me. No longer served the purpose of distracting me from my thoughts. I wondered if Rikku even noticed I was gone. It'd been days since she'd last made eye contact. She didn't speak to me unless she had to. It was like she was getting angrier as the days went by. Like I couldn't hold on to her anymore.
The door opened and shut quietly behind me, and I quickly tore myself away from my thoughts. I stood and turned to face him.
We stared at each other for a long moment, tension so thick you could cut it with a butter knife flowing between us. His eyes were guarded, full of regret and uncertainty. I knew mine were the same. Yevonite and Al Bhed… but no different, in the long run. Still people, both of us. Still friends, underneath it. We nodded to each other, I think, because we both knew that. He took a deep breath, holding his hands up.
"Gippal… I didn't know it was you, I wasn't trying to… well, I only called to make sure…"
"I know. I uh-" I paused, brushing my hair back. "I came to say thanks. Because she'd still be in the dark, if you hadn't saw us. So, thanks."
Baralai had a strange expression on his face as he took a step closer to me. "I'm sorry about before, I should never have touched her."
I shook my head. "No. You know if I could tattoo my name all over her, I would." He smiled weakly. I guess it didn't sound like the joke I'd intended it to be. "But I'm not going to keep holding it against you. At least you didn't get her pregnant." I laughed, a bitter sound. Not the kind of laugh I liked. Not the kind that made a smile stick to your lips. The kind that accompanied a frown.
"Nope. That's your job." Both of us paused, staring at each other once more. Baralai looked as if he wanted to smack himself for even saying it. And for a moment, I wanted to smack him, too… but then my laugh came back. Bitter, at first, and then angry… too loud, and uncontrollable. And for a moment, when I felt the tear drops on my face, I thought it was because I was laughing too hard.
And I kept laughing too hard until I was out of breath, until I was lightheaded. Baralai grasped my forearm tightly, reminding me of the day I'd woken up, a bullet wound through my torso on fire. When he'd healed much better than I had… when he and Paine had held me down while the doctors and mages did what they could and sweat and silent tears rolled down my face from the pain.
He was telling me, in that way of his, that it was okay to cry here. I wasn't in my prison of an office anymore, I was in his wide open and welcoming one. Far away from home and all my troubles. And it was okay to let it go.
"Have you talked to anyone about this, at all?" he asked, after a long while, as I was wiping my most recent silent tears away.
"No."
"How long have you been trying to cover it up?" I had to remember to thank him, later.
"Two… three months? I don't remember… since my engagement party." I stared down at the floor, shaking my head. "We never even planned the wedding… and now she won't even look at me."
"It'll right itself. Everything always does."
"How?" I started tapping my foot again, an anxious habit.
"I don't know how, but it will." He grinned, obviously trying to lift my mood. "I have a plan... You love the girl, you marry the girl. You have your babies. And somehow we'll convince them both that they slept with the wrong guy. And look at that, friend… you just got me a kid and a girl, and I didn't even have to do anything."
He grinned at me, and I laughed lightly, despite myself. The first real laugh I'd had in a long time. "And they're just gonna believe this, are they? They're Al Bhed girls, they argue."
"You got me a firey girl, then."
"Great plan, genius." He cuffed me on the back as we stood to exit the room.
"If only it would work, huh?" Baralai asked, closing the door quietly behind me.
"…yeah." I followed him down the hall. Noticed, for the first time, that Bevelle was a place for windows, not stone.
I watched the diamond, sparkling in the faint light of the room. Telan was sound asleep in her room. Save for the sounds of her soft breathing on the baby monitor, the house was silent.
Gippal had been gone for two days, and he hadn't left a note. He'd taken a large stack of clothes with him, and none of them were work clothes. And all I could think about was how badly I wanted to throw the ring he'd given me at his head, much like I'd thrown the vase at him all those month's ago after I'd caught him and Adena in the first place.
That, and how much I was worried about him, disappearing without a trace. How it was about time he took his turn to run away. He'd done a good job of holding himself together and hiding her, though I would never tell him that. He deserved a break, time to figure out what he was going to do. Time for us to calm down. Time to make decisions that could potentially change everything.
I swallowed, looking out the little window at the rain. We'd all have to deal with the consequences of our actions in due course. We'd all have to find a way to live with them. So I watched the rain and put my ring back on, because there was nothing else for me to do. Time would decide the outcome, and all I could do was wait.
Hey everyone. I'm back at school, and I'm going to work on another chapter this week in my spare time. Please let me know what you think, not just about the plot, but also about the dialouge, characterization, believability, etc. It would be a big help! Thanks!
