15. Indefinable.
T: Only a few hours late thus I'm certain I'll be forgiven! This is the final chapter and so I wanted to take the opportunity to thank Laustic for the continued support, lovely reviews and general niceness! Teeny chapter alert, other than that warnings remain the same!
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"How was your vacation?" He enquires as she settles down into the seat opposite.
"Educational." She responds, the smile on her lips, as well as the rush of warm emotions that flows from her, letting him know that she is joking around a little…that she is, on the surface at least, better.
"I'm sorry." She remarks after an instant of companionable silence.
"You don't have to apologise, Tsubaki, you did what was right at the time…also, it was better that things were ended by someone other than myself."
"A sentiment that means you've talked everything through with Tsuzuki-san."
"I believe 'argued' is the more appropriate term, but yes, he's brought me to see things with a more 'logical' eye."
"How are you finding things?" She enquires after another instant of silence.
"Strange and yet I expected that to be the case, for years he defined everything that I was fighting against, after all, gave my 'life' meaning and thus to 'loose' him was never going to be an easy thing to deal with." He pauses briefly then says, "Having Tsuzuki has made it easier than it might otherwise have been, for 'being there' for him has given me something to focus on…you, however…" His words escape him as her mood darkens and he opens his mouth to retract the statement, to 'make things right', when she says,
"For a while I was also frightened of such a thing….was frightened that, now that he was gone, I'd find my life filled with nothing other than my own self loathing. However…" She pauses and, her fingers stretching across the table to capture his own, she says, "A wild edge of expectation has taken my heart and I am able to believe that such fears will prove baseless, that the hope that that emotion has instilled in me will be enough to bring meaning to my 'life'."
She holds to his fingers for a few moments after she has spoken those words, the contact a deliberate conduit for the broil of positive emotions that exist now in the very depths of her conscience. He knows that, eventually, she will give voice to these emotions, that she will confirm the suspicion that her words have sparked in his heart. For now, however, he is content to allow her privacy, is happy simply knowing that she too has begun to move away from the shadow that Muraki's influence had placed upon her life.
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T: And thus the beast is dead. Review??