He sighs as he flips over, the moon glaring down at him like a suspicious mother reluctant to accuse. His bright orange bangs flop into his face, and he pushes them back, only to have them return stubbornly as soon as he turns again.
She stares at her ceiling, trying to figure out what is missing. It is a frustrating feeling. She has lost something but cannot remember what it is. Or maybe she has never had it.
He reaches up a hand to the sky, as if to catch a star with his palm. Indeed, if he could only do just that, not just any star, but a star he had loved since their meeting. He sinks farther into his makeshift bed of blankets, savoring the warmth but longing for the cold.
She sits up in bed, and looks around in the darkness, seeing nothing, hearing nothing. She lies back down again, her head face down on the pillow, muffling her emotion. She is grateful for the distraction as her lungs begin to burn for lack of air. Is this what it feels like to lose everything?
He is restless, impatient, but he does not know why. He loves the night, yet hates it, because it keeps him awake with thoughts he does not want. Faces flash through his mind, but nothing stays. He sighs again.
She lifts her head from the pillow, taking a deep breath of air that is suddenly sweet. Why was it not sweet before? Why had she not felt this exhilaration before, to breathe, to live? Why?
He throws the blankets off of him, shivering as the cold hits him. He once again tries to push his bangs back, and they once again they fell back defiantly. Now it is not faces, but names that run past his consciousness, names shouted ugly and jeering.
With one hand, she pulls back her thick brown hair, and finds herself wondering if anybody loves her. She has friends, she knows, that would do anything for her, but does anybody really love her? Is she wanted by someone, kept awake tonight with her image?
Carrot top. Orangey. Baka neko. The pain fills his heart for a moment, but he shrugs it off. He is not weak. He will never be weak. He can't be hurt by words, only the feeble are hurt by words. Only the feeble are hurt by names. But sometimes he fears…
Sometimes she fears that she will die alone. Sometimes she fears that her love will stay hidden away, tucked in her heart until her dying day. But what if that day does not come? What if she is the last one left?
He stands, the wind ruffling his hair and stinging his sharp eyes. Something is making him nervous. He begins to pace, a habit he tries to hide from the others. He tries to hide almost everything from the others. But how will anyone know him? How will anyone know how he feels?
She reaches out a hand in the darkness, and finds a lamp. She switches it on. The fear subsides, but does not disappear completely. It stays in a corner of her heart, where it always is, where it always haunts her, this fear of being alone one day. But the night makes it worse.
He paces faster, his eyes glancing this way and that. He is waiting for something, but he does not know what. Maybe a someone. He takes a chilly breath, making a small cloud in the air by his mouth. It is cold tonight.
She stands, her eyes rid of all sleep. She walks to her door without really knowing where she is going, and she turns the knob, wincing a bit at the creak. Tiptoeing now, she climbs the stairs at the end of the hall, stopping whenever a creak echoes through the hall.
He is thinking thoughts, now that he didn't want to think. Thoughts about his past, thoughts about his future. Thoughts about his heart. It seemed full to bursting sometimes, and others empty as space. It seems he will never figure himself out, not without help. He sits.
She reaches the top of the stairs, and pushes the door open, shivering slightly as the cold air meets her on top of the roof. She sees him, sitting, and she is not surprised. She knows he wouldn't be inside on a night like this. She walks over to him without a word, and sits behind him.
He knows she is there, but he does not look. If he looks, it will be ruined, the whole night will be ruined, shattered into a million tiny fragments just like that. It is delicate. So he does not look.
She feels his presence, and she feels his anxiety. She smiles a bit, feeling wise for her age. She looks out into the distant city lights. "Kyo-kun?" she asks softly, the words barely escaping her lips.
He pauses, and nods, hardly perceptible. But she notices, he knows. She notices, and she replies.
"It's not a crime to love." She stands, surprising even herself, and leaves, even with her heart begging her to stay.
He sits in shock, not believing what he had just heard. Tohru-kun…? He sighed, and put his head in his hands, his heart a jumble of emotions.
Back in bed, she smiles. It wasn't tonight, but it could be tomorrow, or the next night, or the next. She hadn't proof yet, but somehow she knew, somewhere, someone really loved her. Not a friend love, but a real love. And she was satisfied, for tonight.