Life Greetings
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Goodbye.
Don't forget to say it, don't forget who says it, don't forget what it means.
They tell you this, sometimes with serious faces, sometimes with bitter smiles. When you ask why, they'll just shake their heads, and you can hear the irony in their voices as they say they'll tell you later.
Because they never do. Because once it happens, you never forget. When the news comes that your best friend is dead and your childhood rival is missing, you remember exactly how he'd smiled before he'd left, exactly how she'd looked when she'd waved goodbye.
Bye. Later. Ciao.
So this is the life of a shinobi. When your friends die a little every time you say goodbye, and you all know every farewell can be the last. When they're bright and happy and so damn alive one week and just... gone the next. When you hate yourself because you can't feel anything but numbness and disbelief, because you didn't do anything, didn't say the things you should have when they left.
God, no. This isn't happening. This can't be happening.
But most of all, you hate that your mind seems to accept it when your heart hasn't, and sooner or later, you find your grief doesn't blind your eyes from tracing their names on that cursed black stone anymore.
Because it does help, saying goodbye. Sometimes, its hard to remember that they're truly gone and not just on another mission. Sometimes, its hard to remember they aren't going to show up at the usual place, that you aren't going bump into them on the streets. But because the unofficial farewell has been said, its easier to let them live in your memories- forever young and vibrant and strong- and let you grieve, heal, and move on with the world.
They didn't tell you this when you chose this life. They didn't tell you why you should say goodbye. They didn't tell you, and the unspoken words say more than you want to know.
This is life, deal with it; this is death, live with it.
So you do, and sooner or later you find the graves aren't quite so painful to visit, and the guilt no longer claws at you when the memories of their faces blur and fade. Because you realize they didn't tell you one more thing, that goodbye isn't really the right words to say.
See you soon, you say, and your friends echo your words as you turn away.
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Do you die in every goodbye? Do you live only in another's mind?
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A/N: Because I hate how fanfiction screws with the formatting, how fanfiction only shows the first chapter of this fic when theres NINE, how I'm procrastinating like hell when I've got 4 exams this week and have not finsihed studying. Which explains why I've written this the day I uploaded the other seven chapts. Great. ::sigh:: Once again, constructive critcism and comments very welcomed.