Warm water cascaded unevenly around her, and the air grew thick with steam. For a while, Trini let her mind grow empty and merely enjoyed the pleasant feeling of being clean. It had been a long time since she seriously meditated; her lack of discipline showed, because she could not quite forget that it was Jason's shower she was using, in his apartment.
No matter how she tried to clear her mind, some stray thought always came skittering back in, and those stray thoughts were always about him. The room was small, like the rest of the apartment, but clean. The decor was simple and utilitarian but undeniably masculine. It even smelled like him. And so on and so on; round-about and senseless, wandering, but always sneaking back to him. She hadn't suffered from this sort of distractedly single-minded focus since the crush she'd had on him back in high school.
High school... the others had changed so much since then. They'd moved on to new things, new lives. Not completely intertwined, but still together, or close enough to it. And she... she was still trying to prove something. She had cut herself off from the people she loved and the city that was still "home" in this stupid effort to prove that she was more than this, more than just the girl who had been the Yellow Ranger. She had wanted to prove that she could accomplish great things as Trini, even though she wasn't necessarily the most charismatic or the prettiest, even though she didn't have the Yellow Ranger's powers. All she was proving was that she was willing to torture and alienate herself to prove a point.
It was difficult to accept. It would be harder to get past it. But seeing Jason and Kimberly again, the easy friendship they shared, and the way they could welcome her back into their lives as if no time at all had passed since her departure... it had opened her eyes. Jason had been right when he said she needed to come home.
And he'd struck something deep inside her today when he had admitted to wanting to date her. She was respected, cared for, wanted exactly the way she was.
She leaned against the cool tile of the shower wall and breathed deeply, seeking inner calm. Here, with him, she had nothing to prove. She could slow down, look around her, and find the zen place deep in her heart that had gone missing almost without her knowing it. Jason was willing to help her, to be the rock she could hold onto until she found herself again. And with that she could change the course of her life, and find her way back to family and friends and happiness, instead of pursuing this fruitless dream of being more.
More than what?
She didn't even know anymore.
But she could take back the self she had let go. All she had to do was take the first step, and Jason was handing her that. Pizza and a movie, hanging out at his place just like they'd done in high school. And... more, if she wanted it.
I can do this.