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Temper the Soul

Chapter 12

By Zapenstap

Relena did not know when she fell asleep on her bed after crying, or how long she slept. When she woke, she felt groggy, heavy and a little panicked as to how much time she had lost in blissful forgetfulness. Falling asleep in her tears seemed too much like running away from her problems.

Despite her mood, when her eyes fluttered open and she regained her senses, the world smelled of summer. Sunlight streamed in through the windows, between the cracks in the curtains, creating streams and rivers of yellow light on the carpet and across the bed. Lying back on the pillows, Relena played with the airy blue summer dress she was wearing, tracing the vague and shadowing patterns of white flowers imprinted on the gauzy material over her mid-drift.

Heero…

It came like a continuing sigh in her head, like an echo across a lake or a continuing wave of rain over the countryside.

She couldn't help imagining him with her, the way he might cuddle up beside her and touch her stomach with one hand, smoothing his palm over her abdomen, or kiss her shoulders and rub his face against them while those wayward locks of hair fell over his eyes. Her eyes drifted close as she thought of it. She might talk or joke while he moved to kiss her neck. Sometimes he would reply with throaty whispers in her ear. Maybe in the right mood he would sit up while she lay still to kiss her chin or her cheeks before tasting her lips.

But he was gone.

She turned over on her side, hugging the pillow underneath her head, feeling something like a sick sinking in her stomach. A lump of distilled tears stuck in her throat.

Whenever she had fought with Heero it was hard like this. They didn't fight often. Usually they could smooth emotional turmoil over with gentle kisses and soft words, actions that would escalate to passionate touches and then either explode or wind down into love-making. Afterwards, exhausted, satisfied and emotionally connected, everything was all right.

This was the first time they hadn't been able to use sex to fix a misunderstanding.

She rolled over on her stomach and settled her chin on the back of her hands, staring at the wall in quiet contemplation. Heero could say exactly what he meant cleanly and concisely. He could tell her he loved her even, but he still couldn't just talk, especially about himself. Not for the first time she wondered if maybe she didn't know him as well as she thought she did. She felt him certainly, his soul, and she perceived the way he thought about things, but there was so much she didn't know…

She had once asked him where he was born. A kiss was her response. At another time she had asked him if his training still affected the things he did. He had smiled at her and they had cuddled while he talked a little about the Wing Zero. But he never answered her question; he never talked about anything that had happened to him before they met. Respecting his privacy, she had eventually stopped asking, but….

Come to think of it, she didn't tell him much about her vapid and useless life before she met him either. She always felt it would tear them apart because it would highlight differences between them that had never mattered to her. But she knew they mattered to him. Whenever her status became important he would become quiet, almost as if he were only the shadow of a person while she was in the spotlight. He had never admitted to her that his life was valuable outside of her desire to keep him around. It wasn't that he was self-pitying or angry or jealous of her; he just naturally dismissed himself and slid into the shadows, into the undercurrents of her world. And after she stepped out of the spotlight he would attack her with a ferocious possession. She had given a speech the night before their last episode of love-making.

It had been awhile since she had thought of him in context of being an ex-gundam pilot. It had been awhile since she had thought of the past, the simple honesty and dedication of their youth when all of their interactions revolved around some greater purpose than one another; lately it was all about her need for him. No, it was more like her need for his body, as a reminder of where his heart lay, but... Well, she had tried to get him to talk.

But he couldn't. Maybe their habits had done them a disservice. Maybe they substituted physical communication for intellectual communication. Maybe that's what Zechs meant by saying they went too fast, not because it was wrong to want Heero physically, but because it stunted the expectation to communicate in other ways.

But she still wanted him. And now he was gone.

Tears flowing up suddenly in her eyes, she collapsed her face into the bed with a sudden sob that ripped through the quiet of the room. The sunlight streaming over her bed angered her as her body shook with the need to divulge her unhappiness. Waves of emotional pain surged up her gut and leaked from her eyes in the form of hot tears soaking her pillow. She loved him so much. She loved him. She wanted him. She missed the way he held her, the way his hands could smooth the hurt from her mind and body simply by stroking her hair. All the things she loved about him were too much to think about. They made her feel sick to her stomach even when things were good. All the reasons she loved him made her entire body ache to know him better. It mixed and molded with her physical desires to touch him and express how she felt, but they were separate things. Maybe she had not treated them separately enough. Maybe she had overcompensated one to satisfy the other.

Now she desperately wanted to talk to him, just talk. Words came to her mind in a babbling torrent, sticking to her throat. All the things she would say… All the things she would ask. And she would listen if he would talk. She knew he listened to her nonsense often enough. She imagined it, but all she could see was her touching him in a desire to understand. With every desiring thought she had to deepen her understanding of him came waves of desire to touch his body. But that was the easy way to feel him out, she knew. It was pleasurable to her and allowed him to indulge in her without working to express his thoughts with words. God, did he even think of it that way? Heero was a boy. Boys were said to want sex for sex and nothing more, to not naturally equate it with any kind of emotional understanding. But surely sometimes, with the right person…

Her hands clutched the covers on her bed as she cried, her body twisting to rid itself of its strange and horrible pain. Angry with herself, she sat up, weeping still, dashing hot salty tears from her eyes and trying slowly to calm herself down. At length she managed to swallow her tears. She hiccuped in the sudden silence and bit the back of her hand. She continued to hiccup anyway.

A second flood of hurt and tears welled up in her gut as soon as the first wave was subdued and his face became clearer in her mind.

"I need to see you, Heero. Please come back to me," she breathed in a petitioning whisper, gasping to hold back her tears, wanting desperately to see him and talk to him again, wanting him to hold her.

There was a sound like a door swinging shut behind her and she stopped moving, freezing on her bed with her bare legs sprawled about her, her hair mussed from her thrashing and her cheeks smeared with tears.

"I have," Heero's voice came to her in the way he always spoke.

*****

Noin entered Zech's study without knocking. She peered back and forth and then raised an inquisitive eyebrow. "I thought I heard shouting down here."

"Heero," Zechs said. Nothing further need be said.

Her expression was almost amusing. "Zechs, what did you tell him?"

"Don't worry about it," he replied casually.

She half-scowled and crossed her arms. "If by 'not worry' you mean to imply that you refused to allow him to even talk to Relena…."

Zechs shook his head. "I was hard on him, but that's not what happened."

She sighed. "Well, knowing him, you probably couldn't stop him anyway."

"Probably not."

"Well, what did he say?"

Zechs wasn't going to tell his wife what Heero said about wanting to marry Relena just yet. If he made good on his promise there would be time enough, though he had little doubt Heero would keep his word. He was hardly the sort to turn back down or not finish a task begun. Actually, he was quite impressed with him, on all levels, though it was not all that surprising considering whom Heero Yuy was. Still, what he had said needed to be said, to clarify his feelings and concerns if for no other reason. Let them be angry. At the least they would not be regretful. If Heero had his heart truly set on Relena, not the strictest demands or rebukes in the world would be able to dissuade him. Things being thus, as Relena's protector in this matter, he might as well demand much to get a little. And Relena could use a little chastising herself really. He had never expected her to react to the possibility of Heero's becoming disinterested in her by hitting him first and fleeing the country. And it seemed Heero had not grown disinterested at all. Zechs wished he had known that before, but there was no use worrying about it now.

"Well," he said in answer to Noin's expecting silence. "I imagine they will try to work it out in a matter that will satisfy everyone."

"Are you kidding?" Noin said, leaning against the wall. "I can't see you ever being satisfied by this."

"Noin," he said, looking at her with a close-lipped smile. "Trust me."

*****

He couldn't tear his eyes off of her. And he couldn't move. He hated it when she cried, when she shook with such sadness, especially on his account. It might seem natural to wish to wrap his arms about her and draw her close, but he could only stand there without expression and watch her cry.

Zechs hadn't shown Heero where to find her, or even allowed him the chance to look for her on his own. He practically had to sneak up here. Whatever Zechs believed, Heero meant to see Relena now. He needed to see her. Now that he was here, he felt somewhat like an invader, an unwelcome visitor, but he supposed there was no reason why he should feel otherwise. At least he wasn't stopped.

When she called him to come back to her he was stunned. Why had she left, if this was the result?

"I have."

She turned her head, her hair flying in wisps about a face streaked with tears. From the look in her eyes, it seemed she didn't believe what she was seeing, but it was those gorgeous, sad, sad eyes that propelled him into motion. He took a few steps toward her, but her voice halted him.

"Heero." The word fell off her bottom lip and hung in the air like the last note in a ballad.

He stood perfectly still.

"Hmm." He lowered his eyes to find his strength, his hands clenched at his sides. When he raised his head again, she had swung her pretty slim legs and shapely feet off the edge of the bed and was scrubbing tears from her cheeks.

"What are you doing here?" she choked, and though she had been crying his name a moment before, she now looked a little angry. It wrung his heart. Had she not just asked him to return? But he supposed what she imagined in private and what happened in reality were different things. Of course she would still be angry, to protect herself if for no other reason.

"I have something to ask you," he said, standing only a little ways from her now. "And some other things to tell you first."

She turned her face away from him, the hands on her lap too still not to be controlled. "What makes you think you can just come back here like this?" she said quietly. She still refused to look at him. "We broke up. I meant all the things I said, Heero."

"Yeah, but it's not that easy. I love you. You need to let me explain."

She was silent for a moment, staring at her feet. He couldn't help but wonder what she was thinking, in what circles her mind was running. She needed to let him explain. "Heero," she said slowly. "I asked you then to explain and you turned me away."

"I know. It was bad timing, Relena. That thing with Damion and all the things I have to say to you made it hard…"

Her eyes flashed and he started, stepping backward as he head whipped around in suddenly fury. "Too hard to explain to me?" she implored. "To speak to me? Heero! I threw my heart at your feet and you pushed me away!"

He took deep breaths and felt his body relaxing into the sort of emotional void that surrounded him during battle. Every gesture, ever shift in her tone came to him as battle data, and he knew his own face was perfectly flat, his own gestures non-existent. It was like a shield that he put up to protect him from the enemy, to keep his emotions out of the conflict. But she wanted his emotions. She wanted him to express himself. No, they were not going to fight now. He wanted to tell her… he had to move quickly or he would lose her again! "I'm jealous!" he seethed finally, breaking out of the void in desperation, trying to express what he was feeling beneath the layers of control and dispassion. "I'm very possessive of you, Relena. I love you. You told me you kissed another man, and Damion! He's a friend and an old attraction of yours. How could you expect me to just take news like that and ask you to marry me in the same breath?" There, he said it, sort of.

"Damion's your friend? Please, Heero! As if you know anything about him other than that he's rich and powerful and used to date me. Do you even care what he's going through?"

Did she not hear him? His emotions were loose now. Loose and too wild to be locked up again. "Damn it, Relena. I don't want to talk about Damion! Just forget about that." He tried to calm himself, to petition her again. He did not want to shout. He was trembling all over. Marry me, Relena. Didn't you hear me? Please… "I don't care about the kiss anymore anyway, okay? I'm trying to talk to you about us."

She was up off the bed and in his face in and instant, angry and aggressive. "Yeah, we should talk!" she cried at him, hitting his chest with the flat of her hand. "Why did you treat me like you treated me? What do you want from me? Why can't you accept that you deserve my love and…?" He caught the wrist of the hand that had assaulted him gently, staring at her, trying to communicate with his eyes what he was feeling, the waves of feeling that assaulted his senses, confused him, and the level practicality with which he now embraced it. She seemed to be melting, swaying toward him. She stopped suddenly, staring at him with eyes that swam with sudden and overpowering emotion. "What did you say?" she whispered in unbelieving tones. "A…a minute ago, about…?"

He shut his eyes. He had wanted to petition her in love and submission, but… "I've been struggling lately, Relena, with what you mean to me and where we're going."

She didn't say anything but her other hand flew to her face and over her mouth in sudden realization. She had heard him.

"I want to make you my wife," he said slowly, gesturing vaguely with the hand that did not gently encircle her slender wrist. "I don't know exactly what that means, but I know I want to take care of you forever and I know I have the fortitude to do it…if you'll have me." He released her and closed his eyes, awaiting her verdict in breathless silence.

Cool, trembling hands touched his face. He opened his eyes as she stepped into him and raised herself on her toes to reach his face, her expression almost awe-struck. Snapping back into reality, he wrapped his arms about her back and pulled her up to him, kissing her deeply and expressively. It was incredible. He had done nothing but dream of holding her, kissing her, loving her, since she had gone.

When she pulled away, she did not go far. Inches from his, her eyes were blue-green, alight with color like the waters of a lagoon, and they moved back and forth as they searched his face. She trembled still in his arms. "God, Heero, do you mean it?"

"Yeah," he said. "I do. That's what I've been thinking about, why it was so hard to talk to you before…" he took a deep breath, grasping both of her hands. "Relena, this isn't the way I had envisioned it. I don't have a ring yet. I'm not sure your brother even believes my intentions are true." He brushed hair from her face, tucking loose strands behind her ears. "But I know I love you. I may not be fully prepared, but… Relena, you need to give me an answer."

She looked so bewildered as her hands grasped his head gently, swiping wayward locks of brown hair out of his eyes. "Oh, Heero, I love you and I would be glad to marry you, but…" He trembled, swallowing.

"But…?"

"Heero, I feel like I don't know anything about you."

He caressed the small of her back and let his hands run around her hips, feeling strangely cold and distant. "You know more about me than anyone," he said, pulling his head out of her hands as he looked down at the floor.

She caught his face again, pulling his eyes back to look at her. "I know. Don't look away, Heero. I just want to know everything about you. I just want to be sure this is what you want, that you're prepared to let me into your life."

He smiled. "Do you know what I want?" he asked.

"No," she said softly.

"Do you know why I love you?"

She looked down, her hands falling to his chest and digging into his shirt. "No," she replied.

"After the last time we made love I had a dream," he said. As he said it, he saw them in her mirror on the side of the room, him holding her with eyes hard and cold as marbles, expression flat as a board. In contrast, she was looking at him with such tenderness, such love and desire that it made his heart beat painfully.

"I dreamed of you," he continued when she only looked at him in puzzlement. "It was during the war and I was a soldier again." He was desperate, cold and arrogant, without care for anyone. "Your spirit…sparkled, and all I did was seduce you."

"Was I the Queen of the World?" she asked quietly, almost amused, as if this were a game he was playing with her. But he also felt she was trying to get at something. "Was I the representative of Romafeller again, rich and powerful, attempting the impossible ideals of world peace?"

He pushed her back until her legs hit her bed, trapping her. He stared into her eyes. "No," he said with more urgency. "You were ordinary wearing your old school uniform. You were just fascinating and confusing and beautiful."

She stared at him, mouth slightly agape.

"You weren't as beautiful then as you are now," he said quietly. "Not that I appreciated beauty then. Relena, do you remember what it was like?"

"Yes," she breathed, and he felt her fingers squeeze his hands. He wanted to pull her close and hold her, but he had more to say. "I can't describe how I felt about you then. You were just a mysterious boy, but there was something… I felt like I had known you my whole life."

Releasing one of her hands, he brushed a strand of hair from her forehead. "I thought nothing of you for a long time," he said harshly, honestly. She pulled back from him, stunned and trembling, but he tightened his grip on her hand so she could not escape. "I meant to kill you." He knew his eyes must be terrifying.

"It's against your nature," she gasped. "Heero, you're a good person."

"You always thought so. I couldn't destroy you in either case."

"Why not? You cared nothing for me?"

"Nothing," he said, but he lowered his eyes. "I never thought much about girls, Relena. I was a soldier and I came to the Earth to die."

Her eyes softened and she touched his face, stroking his cheek. "I know," she said with such understanding. Her expression was so sweet, so innocent and beautiful, such a thing to fight and live for. "I've known."

"You're the strangest person I've ever known," he continued. "I always thought I was the only one like myself, so intense, so dedicated. But then I met you and it was like the world turned upside every time you opened your mouth, echoing me. Whatever we set out to do gets done, you know. For me that was always the efficient completion of any task, and if possible, the equal efficient completion of my life. But I never died. But you, for you there was always something more. Your spirit was kind like mine, but a dazzling ordinary, set on reviving and enflaming whatever beauty existed around you. You believed in goodness more strongly than I ever have."

"Heero…" she said with the soft glimmer of tears in her eyes, grasping both his hands again. "You're wrong. I was a flower in a tempest pretending to be a wall of stone. You were…"

"Don't stop me," he cut her off, knowing her thought before she said it. "I've never thought I was beautiful. I always considered myself the means to other people's end. But you were interested in me. You said you were on my side. No one has ever said anything like that to me before. You went out of your way to learn things about me. It was unsettling. You made me nervous. But it was air in a closed room. I danced with you because you asked me, but I had never danced with anyone before. The things you knew…"

He shook his head at the memories. "I know too much about you, Heero. Are you still gonna destroy me?" Her father had just died and she proposed to dance with the man who promised to assassinate her.

"And I couldn't kill you," he said in a soft voice, caressing the side of her face, pushing her hair behind her ears in almost a frenzy to touch her. "I tried several times. Did you know that?"

"I would have let you," she said. "If I were the last."

He shook his head at her, unable to breathe or swallow. He was shaking all over; every nerve as taut as the skin over a kettledrum. "How can you say that?" he exclaimed. That was so frustrating. "I thought when I first met you that you were the delicate, refined, lady-like type to faint at the site of blood, and then you threw yourself before guns and stood under threat of flame and fire. You would die with a smile on your face."

She stared at him. "Heero…"

Pulling her tight against his body, he clung to her, feeling every part of her pressed against him. She clove to him without protest, like she belonged there. Smoothing her hair and kissed her forehead gently, fighting to control his desires, his passions, his love for this strange creature that seemed to be put on Earth and in his life just for him. And she held herself tightly to him, willingly, greedily almost, but with a soft gentleness that made him want to claim her all the more forcefully. What was wrong with him?

"Heero?" she questioned in almost a bleating tone as he crushed her more tightly into him, fingers curling and clawing into her clothes. He laid his head sideways on top of hers, feeling her hair against his cheeks and felt tears leak from his eyes. "Heero, I can't see you," she murmured into his chest.

"I wish I could make you part of me," he said hoarsely, "like I could absorb you into me." He kissed her again, feeling his sexuality stir at their proximity, "but I don't want to absorb you until you disappear, I just…." He hugged her until he felt her struggle against his chest for lack of air. Easing up, he kissed the top of her head again. "I can't explain it."

"I feel the same way, Heero," she mumbled into his neck, hot air on his skin. "I love you so deeply." He closed his eyes, reveling in those words so strongly and sincerely spoken. "That's what the sex is about for me," she continued, trailing how fingers along his collarbone, "when it's good and meaningful and passionate." She lifted her head, staring up at him with eyes full of tears that shimmered like the sparkle of so many stars. "I know it so well when we love like that. I understand so much."

"I feel terrible," he choked, squeezing his eyes shut, shaking. "I feel like I abused something that could have been beautiful before I really understood it. Relena," he looked down at her, "I've always loved you, but not always like this. I remember the first time I desired you. I loved you then and you filled me with fire, but I didn't understand what it was I wanted from you except the way I imagined your body would make me feel. That's why I refused you so many times. I was trying to decide what you really meant to me."

She was quiet then, plucking at the buttons on his shirt.

"It's okay," he amended. "It's wonderful and I enjoy it. It is all I had imagined, but Zechs is right in a way. Having that, my feelings for you grew stagnant. I focused so much on our pleasing each other physically I think I forgot how I truly felt about you. You almost became a different person in my eyes. I became a different person. I didn't think about the past or the future or how we were changing. I saw you as this unattainable vision that was suddenly mine and then everything that was real dissolved or became displaced. I don't know if it was really wrong to love you as I have, because God it felt so right, but it couldn't have lasted forever like that." He brushed his knuckles over the smoothness of her cheek. "I know it's too late, but I think, and I know Zechs does, that we should take time off of focusing on our bodies. I love you, and I think I understand now the desire I have for you, but I want to show others and myself that I can wait for you, and it won't be long."

"Heero, that's hard," she choked

"I know," he said simply, "but it's the only way I can redeem myself in the eyes of your family. Relena, you mean more to me than sexual pleasure."

"I need to touch you."

It was intoxicating that she desired him so much and it made that much more difficult. "You can still hold me," he said, brushing a finger against her lips and looking into her eyes. "I don't know what I would do if I couldn't hold you."

Closing her eyes, she half-stepped, half-fell forward into his embrace, wrapping her arms around his middle and burying her head into his chest. On a whim, he picked her up. She gasped as he swung her around and pulled them both haphazardly onto the bed. Perhaps it wasn't the safest place, considering his declaration, but it was the easiest way to lay beside her, wrap his arms about her and entwine his legs with hers as intimately as he would allow. Once thus entangled, they lay perfectly still. Her scent made his head buzz and his eyelids heavy, and she was quite beautiful both to look at and to touch just lying there. This was going to be really hard.

"I promise," he said into her ear. "As soon as I can buy you a ring I will. It might only take two, three months maybe, or less. I'll work construction during the day and be on reserves for Preventor missions. Lady Une will understand."

Relena turned her head on the pillow and kissed him, softly and non-seductively. Even so it sent thrills through him, such personal contact, and he was silent with her face so close to his, feeling the soft wetness of her lips on his. When she broke away they were left staring at each other, bare inches between them. He could see every imperfection in her face, ever line of care and worry and did not care at all. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. "I'll wait for however long it takes, Heero," she said, and reached up to caress his face. "As long as you're sure."

"Start planning the wedding now," he told her. "I'll have that diamond for you soon, if I have to starve in the mean time. And I will see you often. We will do things together, and talk about things, or just sit around if you like."

She was silent a moment, staring at him, and abruptly sat up. Her hair swept over and then off of the pillow, blowing out like a curtain before coming back to hang around her face and shoulders, clinging with static. The movement was so sudden it caught him by surprise, and he sat up with her, reaching out to touch her shoulder gently. When he made contact she stood up out of his reach and walked across the room toward the window, looking out over the gardens with one hand on the wall inside the window frame.

"Relena?" he asked. "What are you thinking. Did I say something wrong?"

"No," she said, shaking her head. "I'm so happy, it's just…."

"Relena, what?"

"What I said before."

His heart raced, galloping in his chest like a horse. He swung his legs off the bed and stood up, crossing the room in three long strides. He meant to trap her against the wall and kiss the uncertainties out of her vocabulary, but just thinking of that made him hot with desire, and maybe he should hear what she had to say. So he stopped, and waited expectantly, praying it was nothing he couldn't handle.

"Heero," she said, lowering her eyes. "I'm tired of guessing all the time."

"I love you," he said immediately. "I will always tell you what I am thinking and feeling if that's what you need."

"Thank you," she said, "that helps, but…"

He waited breathlessly.

"I know who you are, Heero, but I want to know about your past, about the things you never talk about, your training and your dreams, and…"

"I'll tell you," he said quickly, though a black ball of anxiety settled in his stomach. It was getting harder to breathe. "I'll tell you everything, anything you want to know. Just… give me a little time to think about it, how to say it. I don't know some things and I don't remember others."

There was so much emotion on her face it was difficult to handle. He wanted to retreat from the concern there, the caring and love that almost overwhelmed him. He swung his gaze away, looking at anything but her. "Heero," she cried, reaching out. "Don't turn away! Please. I love you. Nothing you tell me will make me love you less!"

He stiffened his knees. "I know," he said, both to reassure himself and her.

She bit her lip. When she spoke, she said the strangest, most incomprehensible thing he had ever heard. "Tell me you love yourself. Before I agree to plan a wedding, tell me you love yourself and you know you're worthy of me."

He couldn't reply. She came at him, close to him again, touching his neck and the skin around his eyes and mouth with cool, frantic fingers. He closed his eyes, grabbing her hand. "Please, Relena," he said.

"Tell me," she cried, her hand curling into a fist. "I love you so much. Tell me my love isn't misplaced in your mind."

He couldn't even say that. That would mean admitting he was worthy of it. All he wanted was for her to allow him to take care of her forever. He couldn't speak.

She kissed him suddenly, passionately this time, clutching his shirt around his sides and pulling her body close to his until he was on fire from head to toe. His arms wrapped around her automatically. He could feel her moving against him as she paid loving attention to his face, her body rubbing up against his, and the friction was driving him crazy. "Relena, stop," he protested into her mouth. It was the hardest thing he had ever had to say. God he wanted to touch her. "Stop doing that. You're making me lose control." He tried to school his hands from feeling her up, tried to tame his mind from wanting her to start removing his clothes and relieve him of what she was doing to his body.

She broke away, breathing hard through her mouth. "I want you so much," she gasped, "because I love you so much. Tell me I'm not a fool to feel this way!"

"I love you," he said raggedly, still burning and cooling down slowly.

"I know. But that isn't all I want to hear. I don't want you to be arrogant, Heero, but I do want you to believe you're worthy of me, to believe in yourself. Or else how can I, can we… I mean…"

That was sobering. He swallowed, weighing her words and their implications. She waited patiently, as if just expecting him to be able to blurt it out after a moment's thought. "Give me a little time," he said earnestly instead. "I'll think on it."

She looked positively stricken. "Heero…" she breathed, as if just realizing how completely incapable he was of telling her what she wanted to hear. She swallowed, hands stroking his neck again. "I always suspected, but I never really knew…"

He closed his eyes. "I believe in myself," he said. "I make decisions I believe are correct and I act on them."

"But do you love yourself?"

"I don't really know."

"All right," she said in barely a whisper. "I would love to marry you, Heero Yuy. I would love to build a home with you and a family. But I need to know you love yourself, that you would love any children you and I might have together," she looked down when she said that, blushing, and he swallowed. "That you would take care of me knowing that you deserve to for you and not just because I say you can."

"Okay," he said. "I understand. I'll try. "

Tears welled up in her eyes as she looked down at her feet. Feeling like he had broken a spell, he put his arms around her, hugging her. She lifted her arms around his neck and hugged back, kissing his cheek. He swayed with her, rocking them both almost like a dance, eyes open as he breathed in and out, rubbing her back with his hands. Then they stood perfectly still, locked together in a position of warmth and care. He didn't want to let go.

He'd never felt this much love, had never dreamed it existed. She would marry him and be his forever, body and soul, if he could buy her a ring and confess love…for himself. He was equally elated and traumatized. What did it mean to love himself?

"I should go," he said quietly into her hair.

She nodded, stepping reluctantly out of his embrace. "Take care of yourself, Heero. For me."

He smiled and brushed a lock of hair from her eyes. "If that's what you want." She smiled at him as he turned again and headed toward the door. "I'll see you soon."

"Okay," she said, folding her hands in front of her. "Don't make me wait too long."

She didn't mean about seeing her. "I won't," he said.

"Remember what you promised me," she called after him as he walked out of the room.

"I will," he said, just loud enough for her to hear. He had promised a ring, and to feel worthy enough to give it to her. It was his strangest mission, and one he both yearned and dreaded to complete. But she would be his wife. He missed her already, like he had left a part of himself behind somewhere.

When he walked out into the hall he saw Zechs cross through another hallway, but they stopped and stared at one another. Heero kept his expression constant, but he couldn't hide the light of triumph from his eyes. After a moment, Zechs smiled, nodded at him and kept walking.

Yes, this is a lot of sap. I promised. Anyway, remember to review now that you've gotten this far. Why not? It only takes a second. Coming up in the next chapters: As Heero struggles with his identity, Damion learns something unexpected about Audrey and her past.