Chapter 15: The Truth Will Always Come to Light
Ami navigated the halls, cell phone clutched tightly in her hand. The day was a slap in the face, and yet it felt so surreal, like a terrible dream that should end soon. Her head throbbed, her body tense as she strode towards a dead end.
The milling crowd had thinned. She turned a sharp corner and found herself facing the door to the custodian's supply closet. Someone else was already there, leaning against the doorframe.
"So what's with all this secrecy, huh?" The girl waved a disdainful hand at the dark corner she had been asked to wait in. "What's so important you can't treat it like girl's room talk?"
Ami furtively glanced down the deserted hallway before stepping into the little space beside her friend. "You've got to help me out."
Two perfectly arched eyebrows shot up. "Yeah?"
Once again, Ami snuck a peek over her friend's shoulder. The hallway was still empty.
"You're freaking out, darling," Jessica laughed. Ami shushed her.
"My dad might have sent people to watch me."
"That's only because you're such a bad girl." Another laugh. Ami merely shook her head, hands fumbling for a piece of paper tucked inside her bag.
"This is serious, Jess."
A rustle, and then Jessica found a crumpled sheet of paper thrust in her face. She took it skeptically. "Medical report? What have you got? Leukemia?" Then her eyes scanned down the page and the smile slipped off her face. "No way." She looked up at her squirming friend again. "You didn't really bed Jason, did you?"
"I did."
She shrugged, stuffed the sheet back into Ami's bag. "So are you going to...marry him or something?"
Ami shook her head.
"It's really your only saving grace. Your parents would kill you if they found out."
"I know."
"So..." Jessica sighed. "Go propose or something. I'll back you up."
"I can't marry him!" Ami practically hissed through clenched teeth. Face buried in her hands, her next words came out muffled. "I don't know if it's his."
Jessica's jaw slackened. "So whose is it?"
Ami shrugged helplessly, her shoulders shaking. "I don't know, Jess. I don't know. It must have been at that party last month or something. We were all so wasted, remember? Something must have happened then, but I can't remember with whom!"
The girls fell into silence, one thanking the gods it wasn't her, the other, about to break down. Finally Jessica sighed. "Have you gone to the doctor?"
"Yes."
"Well?" she prompted. "Will they let you do it?"
"Not without a parent's consent." Ami sank down, her sobs convulsive in the echo of happy voices from down the hall. "Daddy's running for senate presidency, so he and mommy are really busy. Plus..." She didn't have to say it for Jessica to understand that her parents did not need another scandal.
"Can your big sister keep a secret?" Jessica asked one last time, desperately grabbing onto anything.
Once again, Ami shook her head. "She just made the Bar. Daddy's turning her into his protege. She wouldn't want anything to do with me."
The other girl thought for a long while. "I have one last option," she said, "but it's going to be risky."
"I'll try anything."
Jessica looked hesitant but at last said, "There's this woman in a downtown apartment. She might be able to help you..."
Chichiri gritted his teeth as the force that tethered him to the darkness convulsed as if trying to shake him off. He was seeing things he didn't want to...things he couldn't understand. And he desperately wanted to snap back awake, to see the waters roiling around him, to be carried downstream...to shift from this new nightmare into the old one he had so long ago fought off.
Anything.
He was desperate for anything but to feel her fear, her spirit's screams even as her body pressed limp against his. If she let him, Chichiri was more than willing to heed her cry for help. But she was pushing him away. He wanted to respect that, even if it meant erasing everything he thought he knew about her.
Unbidden, his thoughts jerked to that bit of conversation he deliberately overheard,
"...What do you remember?"
"Enough to be able to tell you're not the same person anymore..."
And he wondered who she was before she dropped into Konan. Who she was even before she became the person who dropped into Konan.
Maybe he would never find the answers. Maybe she would never tell him.
Maybe...maybe the answers were just staring him in the face, begging to be seen...
She swore that she would – could – never forget how she felt when she did what she did. The tear tracks were long gone, scrubbed away with the cold water that gurgled from the downtown apartment's rusty old faucet, but they would always be there, tattooed in her mind, a silent reminder of her biggest mistake.
When she strode back towards her friend's home, she told herself to walk straight, to pretend nothing had happened, and to ignore the cramping pain in the pit of her abdomen.
She wanted to be sick.
Pausing against a wall to catch her breath, Ami squeezed her eyes shut. The tiny room, cluttered with mismatched furniture, the middle-aged woman standing at the other end, drawing the curtains shut, the pills, the paraphernalia she didn't even recognize...the locked door jamb, icy under her sweating palm.
"Nobody would be able to guess what happened," the woman cooed, and Ami believed her. Gesturing to the bed, "I understand you don't have much time..."
"But I can pay." Her own voice even sounded alien. She knew she was going to regret it, but she still reached into her bag and drew out a thick wad of bills.
"On the table...yes, right there. And then we can start..."
She gasped sharply, sinking to her knees as the pain finally caught up with her, directing the rest of the harrowing experience into focus. Cold sweat broke out over her forehead and slid down her clammy arms. She felt like she was going to die. The scene playing out in her head was coated in a sheen of crimson and punctuated with pain. The whole thing was sheer pain.
"Hey, lady, are you okay?"
A passer-by's concern rippled out of focus, fading away and then booming close. She knew she was about to pass out, but she pushed the steadying arms away, the fear of discovery pushing itself before the fear for her life. "I'm fine," she forced herself to say, and couldn't hear herself. "It's just...heatstroke..."
Yes, heatstroke. In the middle of spring.
The emptiness within her suddenly pulsed, pulling forth a scream of surrender. The stranger grabbed her arm and she fell back against him, breathless, blinded by a cloud of the tears that once again resurfaced.
"Should I call a doctor or something?"
Her head lolled side to side. "No. Just...just leave me alone. I'll be all right in a moment..." Drawing a shuddery breath, Ami pushed herself away from the stranger. She tried to stand, but her legs buckled under her.
"Lemme call an ambulance –" she didn't hear the rest of his sentence, feeling only the dull pain as she collapsed onto the concrete.
Her supervisor wouldn't like it if she snuck out on duty, but Ami couldn't help giving chase. Dodging the people loitering in the audience halls, she shoved against an emergency exit door and burst out into the night.
"Mom!"
The woman continued striding towards the waiting Mercedes as though she did not hear the call.
"Mommy!" Ami cried again, legs pumping under her as she fought to catch up to the red-gowned figure. "Mommy! I'm sorry! I've been sorry for so long –!" she lay a hand on the woman's gloved arm and was instantly shrugged away.
The blue eyes that gazed back were like hers, only icier. "I believe you have more important duties than chasing guests around?"
Ami shook her head violently. "Nothing's more important than apologizing to you...and to daddy..."
For a moment the woman softened, but her gaze abruptly hardened again. "There can be no forgiveness for one who has sullied the family name. For generations, Amelia, the Langleys have always been prominent political –"
"It ruined my life!" Ami exploded before she could hold herself back. "I was made to do things I hated because of the family name! I wasn't me because of the family name! My own family didn't love me because I wasn't what the family name –"
A sharp slap resounded in the still air. The older woman was white with controlled rage. In an ominously quiet voice she replied, "You ruined your own life, Ami, when you refused to obey."
"But..but..." she bit her lip, her laboured breathing the only sound in the ensuing silence. "You can always forgive me, can't you? You and daddy both can take me back..."
The woman's head wagged sharply side-to-side. "The people demand perfection, and perfection is what they shall see." As she turned to go, Ami realized that she had only one last chance to argue her case.
"I tried! You know I tried! And I gave everything I had. I even gave...my baby's life..."
Her mother froze at her last words. Ami waited with baited breath, hoping her mother would reconsider, hoping she could at least go back to her family. But when the older woman spoke again, her tone contained no sympathy.
"It wasn't yours to give."
"What're y' doin'?" His amber eyes warily followed her movements as Lolita slipped into the rippling pool. A crack in the stone above let down a shower of rain, creating a mini waterfall. She had shed the heavy outer layers of her clothes and was sitting in the water in a thin robe. "Y' keep actin' stupid an' y'll catch a cold."
She laughed, the sound of her mirth carrying in the cave. "Care to join me?"
"What do I look like, a fish?"
Rolling her eyes, she sank deep into the waters. Tasuki spluttered and was on the verge of sticking his arm in to pull her out when Lolita resurfaced, grinning at him, chin cradled on her palms. "There's always something I've wanted to try..."
He raised an eyebrow. "I'm not sure I wanna know."
Unfazed, she continued, "I've always wanted to try kissing underwater."
He jerked violently and fell backwards. "No. No. No way."
"Come on, it'll be fun – achoo!" She giggled sheepishly. "Oops. Excuse me."
"See?" Tasuki sighed, lifting her out of the water. "No way I'm kissin' ya now. Ya might 'ave cooties!"
"Do not!"
"Do too!" Setting her on her feet, he tossed her her outer robes. "Get out of those wet clothes."
"Ooh. Someone's getting impatient."
He spun right around on his heels, face burning red hot. "Shut up and get changed, already!"
"No peeking!"
"As if!"
When Lolita exploded in laughter, he knew he had fallen for her bait. "Gotcha!" she cried out in a singsong voice and then rushed to hug him from behind. "Tasuki, let's play pretend!"
"Grow up."
"It'll be a nice pretend!" she promised, releasing him to plop down before the fire. "Close your eyes," she instructed, closing her own, "and think of the most wonderful thing in the whole wide world. ...Think of...a nice rainy day, for instance –"
"It's raining outside," he snorted. "No need to imagine that."
"Shaddup and imagine. Anyway, it's raining. And you're outside, no umbrellas, no boots, no nothing but the shirt on your back."
"I imagine some perverts would be lurking nearby for a sight like that," he added derisively, sitting down beside her. Lolita slapped his knee.
"It doesn't matter, though, because you're out there with me. And the rain clouds will all gather on your head –"
"Hey!"
"– because they know how much you hate water. And the little icy droplets will pound down your back, slithering all over you like miniature serpents –"
"Overactive imagination y' got there," he said, reaching over to grab her. Lolita's eyes flew open, but she didn't move from their awkward position. "Y're weird today."
"You tell me that everyday."
A snort. "Why're you suddenly all mushy-mushy?"
"Why are you letting me get all mushy-mushy?" She countered, cocking an eyebrow at him. Tasuki didn't spare her a glare, and only stared at the fire.
He shrugged. "I dunno. Maybe it's 'cuz..." then he trailed off, glanced down at her, and smiled sadly. "Ever since this mornin', y'know...I've had this feelin'...that yer not goin' t' be 'round much longer. So I thought...whatever ya wanted ta do...I'd let ya do..."
She buried her face in his coat because she couldn't bear to look at him. The hand on her shoulder moved up to caress her hair and finally settled atop her crown.
"Let's play pretend."
The sigh blew over the top of her head. "Okay," he whispered and lay down, bringing her with him. Lolita rolled over onto her back.
"Remember all the endings to those fairytales I've been annoying you with?"
A grunt. "Happy ever after?"
"Yeah. Well..." she stared at the ceiling and knew he was doing the same thing too. The stalactites glistened red with the fire. She sought his hand. He grasped hers. "Believe for a moment they can come true." She waited a few minutes before glancing over. Tasuki's eyes had closed, and he looked relatively calmer.
"An' then what?"
Propping herself up on an elbow, Lolita leaned over, wordlessly pressing her lips to his. And then this. Forever. That's happily ever after.
Stirring slowly, Chichiri took a good look at his surroundings. There was not much to see; only sand stretching in all directions, the monotony sometimes punctuated by a battered palm tree. The ground was soft and gritty beneath him. When he glanced down, he saw Ami's unconscious form huddled against him. She was breathing. Satisfied, he fell back. A splash. Chichiri heaved himself up again to drag them out of the giant puddle of floodwater. They were in the middle of nowhere, but at least the rain had stopped.
He reached up to touch his face but mask was gone. The fist thing he felt was the long scar that forever closed his right eye. He pressed a hand over it.
He was able to save her this time, but the expected rush of relief failed to wash over him. The arm that protectively curled around Ami slackened, and Chichiri squeezed his good eye shut. He had saved her – one of the most important people in his new life – and yet he wasn't happy. Holding her, ascertaining her safety, meant nothing to him now.
She wasn't the same. She wasn't the Ami he had painted her to be.
Truth be told, he wasn't sure now he knew her at all.
A/N: All characters and events are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not meant by the author. (Because Langley is such a pretty name...)
And the secrets are out! Ami has unconsciously (pardon the pun) bared her soul and Chichiri is about to give me another headache (damn angsty monk). All the same, this chapter, flashbacks especially, were fun to write, though I must have changed Ami's mom's lines a dozen times. Tasuki and Lolita weren't originally meant to be in this chapter, but I had a sudden hankering to write fluff, and well...one good couple seems like such an achievement when put side by side the broken one. (ahem...Chichiri...ahem) Whether or not monk-man finds true love is still a mystery...just like that one last little secret I've got up my sleeve. ...Eh? There's one more? I would've supposed you guys have guessed it by now, but if I'm such a terrible foreshadow-er and events suggest-er, then I guess minna-san will have to hang on just a wee bit longer. (peace!)
My, my, this has gotten pretty long again. Gomen, but I've missed everyone. I'm on break now, but I can't promise fast chapters since I'm gearing up for a con and am currently tied up with the finishing touches on my costume (read: a lot of work left). Anyhow, I hope you guys enjoyed this little bit. Drop me a line! Say hi or give me a little push. Whatever. Ja mata ne! ;D