Every morning and afternoon he took the same decrepit train, subjecting himself to the gum-covered seats and skip jolting in turn. He hardly noticed how old it was, how overused it was, and how it was falling apart at the seams anymore than he did when he first started college – that train was his own. It was his own like his flat, which was just as dirty and decrepit as the public train – old, overused, and falling apart at the seems. His flat had everything that the subway had but the people. He was almost always alone.
For the hour that he rode it he thought about whatever came to him – blitzball, school, loneliness. He had once tried to read to kill the time on the subway, yet that had only ended up in nausea. His tinted eyes always seemed sad as he looked to the other people riding the subway. Most of them were always talking, even though it was the early morning. Most of them had other people to sit by and communicate with.
Except her.
Her eyes always seemed narrowed, as if she was always calculating whatever fell into her mind. She always carried the same black briefcase, and he had always watched how the light gleamed off the polished leather in strange ways. It was always the little things that he noticed, like the way her lips were painted a soft lavender hue no matter what suit she was wearing, the way her hair was always neatly braided and adorned… the way she never smiled. He always watched her lips, the way they never moved, never opened, never parted. They were always pressed together as if she was angry – yet it never looked as if she had anything to be angry about.
He noticed how she always tended to black suits – and left her hands adorned with light rings that accentuated the slender curve of her fingers. Her neck was normally bare, save for a necklace with lavender beads… like her lips. He watched the way that her hand would move to brush away the hair from her eye, how even that movement was as fluid as if she herself was not real. Her nails were always neatly painted; there was never a chip, a crack, or a lapse in color. It was all even and perfect… perfect.
To him, she was an embodiment of perfection. Her body form, her smooth skin, her graceful movements and her eyes… There was so much depth to them, yet he never looked her straight in the eye. She never noticed him. The only thing that her eyes saw was the outside world which flashed by the window where she sat. Her gaze never faltered. Even when he had fallen once in the train – she had never even turned to glance over. She had a strong hold on her curiosity.
He had never heard her voice before, yet he imagined it to be as smooth as the way she carried herself. There was an apparent air of dignity around her, a regality that he was nothing against. He felt dirty compared to her, sloppy compared to her, lazy compared to her, everything and nothing… in her eyes. He went to school in sandals – she went in high heels. He went with wrinkled clothes, and she went in clothes that were so pressed he doubted he could cut them with a knife. He went in street clothes… she wore suits. He never was able to see what pass she took when the subway stopped, yet he could only guess she was a freshman in law school.
Wakka leaned back in the seat as he tore his eyes away from her, realizing that he had been staring for almost thirty minutes without faltering. It never occurred to him to ask her name – inside he felt unworthy of even speaking to someone like her, especially since he knew that he would make a fool of himself. He was always such a dunce, as most had called him. He didn't know how to talk to women for one thing, and he didn't consider himself intelligent enough to.
He laughed to himself softly, as he pushed the headband up on his forehead slightly. He always endured one day of school for Blitzball practice afterward, where he'd get to talk to Tidus and do something he was actually good at… yet he still stood in the young Blitzer's shadow. Tidus had the looks, the charm, the fame, and the skills that Wakka just couldn't bring himself to attain. He had tried.
It was true that Wakka didn't know her at all. He didn't know her name, her hobbies, her likes or dislikes… but he knew her eyes, and the way that the light glinted off her skin. The time that he had worked up the nerve to get up and ask her name he had fallen hard. She had not even turned her eyes to see him. She always seemed oblivious to everything, until the subway stopped and the door opened.
He gave a silly grin as he spun the Blitzball in his hands. If there was one thing good about his day, it was Blitzball practice. If there were two things good in the day, it was beautiful women and blitzball practice. If there were four, it was beautiful women, blitzball, and sleeping.
He remembered having asked Tidus the one thing that he thought was good in the day, and Tidus had answered with Wakka's first answer of beautiful women. When Wakka had asked him what he thought the two good things in the day were, and Tidus had answered beautiful women, and taking beautiful women home. Wakka decided not to ask the three good things in a day, but he was not so dense that he could not figure it out for himself.
When he thought about Tidus' night life, he realized that the Blitz star had never been the type to truly tie down to one woman for more than a week. He, on the other hand, ended up being more of the romanticist, yet Wakka himself was such an oaf that he could not speak when around women he was interested in. Most of the time he would stutter uncontrollably, before they would laugh at him and leave… Most of the time he just isolated himself, knowing that he would never have what every other guy seemed to. He knew that it could also have been spurred by the fact that he had not had a girlfriend since he was in eleventh grade, and even then she was about the ugliest girl anyone had ever seen.
The subway took another jolt under him, and Wakka was force to reposition the blue band on his forehead. His new sandals tapped on the floor impatiently as the subway neared the next stop, waiting to be able to talk to her, or at least ask her name… At least to hear her voice, that would be enough for him.
His gaze moved back to watch her, while his heart almost stopped in his chest as her gaze had caught his. Her eyes held something else within their depths, and to him, it looked to be amusement… arrogance. He felt redness burning in his cheek, before he gave a scowl and sunk down into the seat. He found himself watching her eyes until hers moved to gaze out the window and he forced his eyes back down to the Blitzball that was spinning in his hands.
He dazed out for what seemed like hours, when in truth it had been only mere minutes.
"You're the captain of the hometown Blitzball team." Her voice came, and it was just as he had expected it to be. It had a cool, calm air to it, yet a sharp edge that cut at him lightly.
Wakka, in turn, blinked in surprise. "Are you… talking to me?"
"Do you see anyone else with a blue band and a blitzball?" Her eyes betrayed the cold tone in her voice, yet she still continued to stare out the window as if she was not speaking to him at all.
In the meantime, Wakka was busy looking for another guy with a blue band and a blitzball. When he found none, he laughed, settled in his seat, and sighed. "Ya."
"Tell me your name." He noticed the gentle tone in her voice, and tried to study her eyes.
He honestly felt that if he had died then, he would have been happy. "W-w-a…" He shook his head, before smacking his temple lightly. "Wakka."
"Listen to me then, Wakka."
"Mm?" He turned his body fully to her, intent on what she could have to say to him.
"Stop staring at me."
It was then that Wakka really wished he would have just died earlier.