It was the last hour of the trip that he finally lost the reigns on his curiosity. He knew it was his own jealousy, and inviting speculation, but he couldn't help but stare miserably out at the world passing beyond their window, and ask, "You miss them, don't you?"
Aya lifted her head curiously, the strawberry Pocky she was nibbling on still caught between her teeth. She bit down, chewing slowly. He could never understand why she took bites. He much preferred to lick the soft coating, enjoying its sweetness for as long as he could.
The question was too broad, and he knew it.
"Who?"
He felt like he was speaking in slow motion. "Yuuhi and Touya."
Crack. The long, thin stick broke in her hand. She looked at him with wide eyes. They were in a new car, and there were others, but for the moment they were completely alone.
Strangely enough she looked confused for a long moment. "I miss Yuuhi. I'm worried that he hates me..."
He wasn't expecting that, he turned to her slowly, furrowing his eyebrows. "Why would he hate you?" Aya, all of this has really shaken her up. She usually doesn't bother with the deeper thoughts of how people felt about her. Her consideration clearly revealed how much Yuuhi had come to mean to her. He'd be lying if he didn't say that part of him resented it.
She shrugged indifferently, but it was never an act that she was particularly good at. She was far too passionate for that word to ever stick to her. "I left. I ran away. I didn't even tell him goodbye." She gave him a quick, self-depreciating smile. "And Yuuhi's not the type to see the bigger picture all at once."
"I think you're wrong."
She gave him a dubious look at that, clearly disbelieving.
"Okay, I'll admit, from the little I know of him-yes, he probably was mad at you." At her wry look, he conceded that she was likely right, and amended his statement. "Is mad at you. But I seriously doubt that he could ever hate you. Under his anger, he probably realizes your reasons, and sometime in the future I am sure he will see that this was for the best."
"He's gonna see it as me not trusting him. Not believing that he can protect me. But," she shook her head stubbornly. "That wasn't it at all. Protecting me shouldn't be his job. I couldn't stand for him to get hurt because of me..."
Well, he couldn't deny her suspicions on that front, even though he really wanted to. It wasn't as if he knew Yuuhi very well, but he did know that the human heart seemed to take things personal. Even when it had no reason to.
He wasn't sure what to say to that, so he sat there in silence for several moments.
Aya sighed. "As for Touya..."
He went completely still, not even daring to breathe. This was going to hurt.
She turned her eyes away from him, but that strangely confused air returned to her. She fidgeted a moment, then shook her head once. "It's really strange, but to be honest...I haven't really thought of Touya since I left..."
His eyes widened.
"I mean, I have. But...it's different somehow." She shook her head again, as if something within it was out of order. "I miss him, of course, but...I think I miss Yuuhi more. The feelings are still there, they're just...not so intense anymore..."
He stared at her, wanting to quash the sense of relief that was welling up so fast in him. Aya was upset, Aya was sad, he had no right to feel happiness.
But he felt lighter.
He relaxed slightly back into the seat.
"It's strange, you know. Like," she closed her hand into a fist, then pressed that fist down over her heart. "Like something has shifted. Not just Ceres, but something in 'me'. I can see why I liked Touya. He's strong, he's attractive. But..."
Aki stared at the seat in front of him, his spine coiling tighter and tighter with each positive word she spoke about the older man.
"But I can also see it from another angle now." She lifted her hand from her heart and ruffled it once, lightly through her bangs. "Like a veil has been lifted from my eyes." Then she shrugged, and that confusion was back. And he was looking at her again, because he couldn't seem to help himself.
"I don't really know him. And...and it's strange, but I feel like part of that draw...just isn't there anymore. Like, when we silenced Ceres," her hand, back to her heart, open now and resting gently, wonderingly. "Something...shifted."
He didn't understand. She wasn't really making sense.
"Do you think..." Just say it, he stressed. He was already hoping it. "Do you think part of your feelings for him were...somehow being filtered through Ceres?"
But why? Ceres didn't even seem to like him.
A startled look, but one strangely enough lined with relief. "Yes! That's it! That's exactly what I'm trying to say!" Then she frowned. "But why? Ceres didn't seem to like him at all..."
A shot of ice through his lower stomach at hearing his own thoughts fall from her lips. "I don't know," he said, hoping she didn't notice the slight roughness around the edges of his voice. "I mean, we don't know enough about the...'Tennyo situation' to really know, you know."
"That's a lot of 'knowing'," she teased wryly, clearly speaking on auto-pilot as her eyes seemed trained somewhere on the inside of her own head. Then a hard breath, with a subtle air of acceptance. "Maybe I am just that fickle."
"You're not fickle, Aya," he commented, leaning back in the seat, feeling the tension slowly spilling out of his spine. "You're just young." Eyes half-closed, a lazy, open sprawl to his fingers on the armrest. Funny how he could go from steel to softness in only seconds. The consistent motion of the train, the hush of the night and the more distance they gained from their broken world...he felt sleepy.
"And there's a difference?" she continued in that same wry voice. "Besides, you're just as young as I am."
"Older by seven minutes," he muttered.
She stuck her tongue out at him, he didn't have to look at her to know that. "Oh, that's right, Niichan. And seven minutes is such a looooong time."
"It can be."
A long pause as she seemed to turn that over. "That's true," she agreed. "But I still say it was because you were scared."
"Scared," he sputtered, rousing just enough to look at her through one open eye as if she was insane.
Finger to her chin, she gave a nod of mock-seriousness. Her nap had clearly refreshed her, and now she was ready to play.
About the time he was actually starting to feel sleepy, of course. "I was not scared."
"How do you know," she asked smugly. "It's not as if you can remember."
"Well, it's not like you can remember either."
"Aki," she said, now sticking that finger straight up in the air. "Law of averages."
"You're insane," he muttered disgruntledly, as if the previous look hadn't been enough. He wasn't going to argue something so stupid with her.
She smacked his arm. Hard. It was going to be a long trip.
TBC...