Love and the Time Travel Paradox

03:44PM

She closed and opened her mouth like a goldfish.

It was unbelievable.

He'd confessed to her... just like that. Out of nowhere. In her living room. With her ex-husband in the guest bedroom, who was most likely still awake.

And he wanted to marry her.

"...Why are you surprised? You knew this was coming, right?"

His gentle teasing jerked her back to the present.

Nervous laughter bubbled up her throat.

"I was expecting something like this, but you still caught me off-guard..."

Her words trailed off as two strong arms found their way around her frame once more. As if unable to help himself, he buried his face into her shoulder.

03:47PM

He was holding her as if she were the most precious treasure in the world.

And all too soon, it was over.

"I'll get us dinner now."

She felt strangely empty, watching him step away from her and head towards the front door.

In this moment, she felt that her next action would decide the path she was going to take in the future.

She could stay here and watch over her ex-husband as he recovered from the surgery while the younger man bought their dinner. The air between the past tense couple wasn't as awkward as before; it was replaced with an age-old feeling of mutual understanding.

Perhaps even the first tentative hints of trust.

If she stayed, then there was hope that the painful rift that was separating them would mend, even just a little. And then, she could finally close that chapter of her life for good.

Or, she could protest against the diplomat's suggestion and leave the apartment alongside him so they could pick up something for dinner together, like a continuation of their date. The surgery was a complete success so monitoring the older man's vitals wasn't strictly necessary, and with the painkillers it was unlikely that her ex would be going anywhere.

There was still so much she wanted to learn about the mysterious foreigner whom she'd come to care about deeply, the man who had helped her pull herself back together and so much more.

The redhead opened the front door.

03:48PM

Without thinking, she reached out and grabbed his arm, preventing him from moving any further.

"I changed my mind. I'd like to go with you."

A pause.

"Are you sure? What about you ex-husband?"

She smiled faintly.

"I'm sure, and all he needs to do is sleep for a while. If we're quick, we can come back as soon as possible. Just let me get my wallet..."

Without waiting for his response, she turned around and ran towards her bedroom.

She was going to do it. She was going to continue her original plan of spending the day with him.

He had yet to receive an answer regarding his earlier question, though. She knew that she couldn't put it off even though he didn't press her for a response.

The wallet was safely tucked into her hidden pocket and she was quickly walking back to where she left him.

Her heart leaped when he touched her hand and threaded his fingers through hers.

04:20PM

As they left her apartment, he asked her what her son's name was.

It wasn't a question she ever expected to hear from him, but he appeared to be honestly curious about it.

With a fond smile on her face, she told him her son's name. She proudly added that she was the one who thought of the name.

He nodded in approval.

"Hn. A strong name. What is he like?"

"Ah. Well."

Her grin slipped.

...How could she answer that? The last time she'd seen her son, they'd had a nasty argument, and she hadn't yet talked to him to this day. How could she tell him that this happened so often, it was almost clockwork? To the point that she was falling completely out of her son's life? That her standing in her son's eyes had fallen so low, her son didn't even give her an invitation to his Academy graduation?

The kid used to loved her, to really love her. Whenever she came home from work he would run up to her with arms stretched wide open, begging to be hugged and carried around.

What happened?

"My son is ashamed of me."

Th admission tasted very bitter.

Any last traces of her good cheer crumbled away.

She could feel his eyes on her as she lowered her head. She felt a strong urge to drink again.

It felt as if she were disgraced in one of the worst possible ways. Showing this boy who'd admired her since he was a kid, the man who wanted to marry her today, that she was a horrible parent and wife.

04:29PM

The sun was beginning to set, and the sky was becoming a brilliant shade of yellow and red. Days were shorter in the springtime in these parts of the world.

As they walked side by side, she had a sudden memory of her son when he was still a baby, so tiny and yet so full of hope, as he slept in her arms. He had been small enough to cradle with one arm, and his skin had smelled like the baby powder that her ex-husband had carefully selected.

Then she had a vision of herself as the depressed, filthy drunk woman she was not too long ago, bursting into the school during graduation day, everybody staring at her horrified, her son the most horrified of all.

Her heart sunk in her chest. She would not be missed.

04:35PM

Her head was pounding.

They took a few more steps before he clamped his hands onto her shoulders and gently stopped her from walking any further.

His face hovered close to hers, concerned.

"What happened? Where are you hurting?"

The question was so simple, it was impossible to answer.

Pain.

"Ever since I first met you in that playground, I always wondered why you kept drinking so much. Why you always looked so... pained. And even if it was only for a little while, I wanted to distract you from those burdens. I wanted- no, I want to help you. Talk to me, please."

Where could she even begin to explain it to him?

The suicide attempt?

The loss of her student and betrayal of the third student?

The death of her parents?

Her marriage? The divorce? Those dark months after her divorce?

The bender? The depression? The last decade?

When was she ever not in pain and not wishing to just bury herself alive?

She trembled in his hands.

Her voice was weak and toneless.

"I haven't been so good these past seven years."

No.

It was still too hard to talk about, even with him.

With this revelation, she began to fall into despair.

She stifled her sob with a hand.

Jade eyes narrowed.

04:50PM

Without meaning to, they'd returned to the abandoned playground.

This was their beginning, in more ways than one.

And so maybe it wasn't surprising that they always ended up coming back to this place, the place where everything was alright and there was no more hurting, only a little world full of magic and wonder. All the mysteries of the universe, at their fingertips.

He guided her to her usual swing, the steel metal framework groaning its warning before he also sat down in the swing next to hers.

Without prompting, he began to speak to her.

"When I was but six years old, my uncle tried to kill me."

"What?"

She was momentarily snapped out of her depression by those words. Her head whipped up to face him, but he was looking down at the ground.

"He said it was because I was a liability to the safety of Suna and its citizens. He claimed that I would never be loved, and that he was only pretending to care about me in order to get close enough to kill. He chose to accept the mission from the Kazekage, my father, to kill me."

He sighed.

"Right before he sacrificed his own life to kill me with an explosion, he told me that your kindness towards me was also a lie."

She blurted out without thinking.

"That's not true!"

"I know that now. But when I was still a child, I had no way of knowing for sure. All I could do was cling to those happy memories and pray from the bottom of my heart that somewhere in the world outside the village walls, you still cared about my existence. I had given up on ever being loved by the people around me. All I wanted was... to not be alone anymore."

He stopped, as if unable to go on. He swallowed audibly and tried a different angle.

"More than anything, I wanted to leave the village. I couldn't stay there without going mad, I knew. I had to become a strong shinobi as soon as possible, so I could gain independence to do as I pleased. Simply striking out on my own was too hard... I learned that first hand, when I tried to find you in Tenshu a year after meeting you."

"But I thought you said that you were considered an important asset and military weapon?"

"In my father's eyes, I was a failed experiment. In the eyes of the citizens, I was a monster. And as years passed, and I grew up, I had begun to believe that I was already insane from loneliness, and I'd imagined our meetings together. And one morning..."

Jade eyes met emerald.

"One morning, the feeling of wanting something, the feeling that was motivating me to keep living, to keep working as a diplomat, was just gone. In fact, it had been slowly dying inside of me ever since I was thirteen. And I discovered the true reason why I tried so hard to become a diplomat and leave the village. Do you know what it was?"

She couldn't speak. Her throat seized from all of these tumultuous emotions that she only trusted herself to shake her head 'no'.

The look in his eyes became impossibly tender.

"It wasn't because I wanted to find acceptance in the world like I believed. It was because I wanted to be by your side. Then, now, and forevermore... I only wanted you to acknowledge me. I didn't care whether you loved me or not, I just wanted to spend time with you again, just like before. You, the one that I hold dear in my heart, even now..."

She didn't realize she was crying until he stood up from his swing to kneel in front of her, his fingers brushing away the tears from her cheeks.

His large hands framed her face.

And he leaned forwards, velvety eyelids shuttering closed.

His lips gently brushed her forehead.

TBC...