Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ Death Do Us Part ❯ True Love ( Chapter 9 )

The end is in sight!
Disclaimer: Yeah, the usual.

Enjoy!

 

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I love you no matter what.

 

She woke abruptly and realized she had fallen asleep on the small table. The divorce papers clung to her cheek before fluttering back down to the hard surface, slightly tear stained. The abominable black ink was slightly smudged, but she could clearly make out Satoru's signature by the blank slot that was meant for hers. She assessed her surroundings and saw that she was still in his mother's hospital room.

 

“So you're finally awake.”

 

Rei's head snapped to her mother-in-law, looking frail in the hospital patient clothing. She quickly wiped any residual tears and forced a smile.

 

“How are you feeling?”

 

“Much better,” Her brown eyes sparkled. “I'm glad you visited me.”

 

“Satoru was her for a while, too.” She tried to keep her voice normal.

 

“Ah. So that's why you were crying.” Rei's eyes went wide and she looked down with a solemn expression, nodding lightly. “I can tell with these things.” Rei looked away from the graceful woman.

 

“I'm sorry; I shouldn't trouble you with my problems...”

 

“If anyone can help you, wouldn't it be someone who has gone through the same thing?” Michiko's voice was kind, the voice of someone who truly cares for others before herself.

 

“I...” Rei was hesitant. She tried her best to hold the tears in, tried her best to bottle everything up. She couldn't bring herself to open up to the woman, what would she think when Rei told her about what she had told him? What about Zack? She didn't expect her mother-in-law to be on her side. She didn't want her mother-in-law to be on her side.

 

They were given so many reasons not to be together, and only one stood up against them.

 

“You found his diary.” Rei was caught off guard. His mother knew how he was feeling? She looked at her hands, lying flat on the table, and then focused on the papers underneath them.

 

“He's not happy being with me...” Michiko gave her time, encouraging the young woman with a kind face. “I thought that I helped his depression...made it maybe go away...” Her voice cracked, she turned her head away from her mother-in-law's gaze and looked at the curtain. “I was so wrong.”

 

“You do help him, Rei. You know that.” Rei turned her face swiftly, tears streaming down an expression full of pain.

 

“Then why does he want to kill himself?!”

 

“He won't do that if he has you.” It was like she was stating a fact, but she stayed neutral, letting Rei get the words out of her system.

 

“It's just not fair! You can't be with someone just because they'll commit suicide if you leave! I can't handle seeing him so sad all the time... I'm just not strong enough...”

 

“I thought you were together because you love each other.”

 

Silence. Rei cracked, curling into a ball on her chair, sobbing into her folded arms. Michiko looked on with a solemn expression. How much pain was Rei feeling, while she was worrying about her son? The girl was so broken, her sobs turned to cries, agony spilling out. All the guilt she felt about Zack went with it. Her raw voice made it through the tears, muffled though by her arms.

 

“He saw me kissing another man.” Rei waited for the verbal beating. The `how dare you?!' and the `are you stupid?!' They never came.

 

“What does the other man mean to you?”

 

“Nothing! He's nothing!” She replied hastily. “I just wanted so badly to feel...special...wanted. I ended up feeling like- like-” She broke into sobs again. “I'm so pathetic.”

 

“I remember, not so long ago, a time when the both of you would kill to be together. People saw young teenagers with a huge crush, few saw the strong love.”

 

“I had been having a dream about it...the past. About the night he left.” She had told the older woman this much, may as well tell her everything.

 

“Then do you remember how, even after two years apart and with so many obstacles, you still loved each other?”

 

They were in love.

 

“Yes...I remember.” She sighed. “I screwed up so badly, kaa-san...” She lifted the papers, and Satoru's signature, into clear view. “I wanted him not to need me...and now that he doesn't, I figured how much I need him. I need him so much.”

 

“So go get him. From the sounds of things, the two of you haven't really talked about it much. Rei, you need to understand that he can't help it. The depression, I mean. The pain he feels. You need to know that it will always be there, as long as you two don't understand each other.”

 

“I think I understand very clearly. He doesn't want me anymore. I betrayed him, kaa-san. I left him, I gave up. I swore to myself I would never do that, and I did.”

 

“If you had given up on him, you would have already signed those papers.”

 

Realization dawned.

 

“Come here,” Rei looked up, her eyes puffy and her nose pink. Michiko was rubbing a spot on the bed, asking Rei to sit by her. She hesitantly made her way to the bed and it sank under her weight. Michiko put a soft, weak hand on Rei's in her lap and looked the girl in the eye. “I want you to know something,” Rei tilted her head in question, sniffing cutely.

 

 

“You're the only one that has ever made him smile.”

 

 

*

 

 

What if we were just never meant to be?

 

The pills had stopped working.

 

He just couldn't sleep. He'd be exhausted, and lying in bed with his eyes closed for the whole night, but he never fell asleep. He had run out of the pills the doctor gave him. No matter how many he swallowed down his parched throat, they just didn't work. He didn't look in the mirror anymore, the last time he had, he had come face to face with a ghost.

 

Do I still exist?

 

Can I really exist without her? He shook his head softly. He needed to stay strong. He couldn't go crawling back to Rei, he wouldn't. But...

 

What if she doesn't come back?

 

He didn't know how he had brought himself to sign the damn papers. Was it before he had seen her with that other man, or after? He didn't know. But then, he remembered the feeling he got when he saw the man's wet tongue in her mouth, sliding over her lips, wetting her with his saliva. What had he felt, when he saw a real picture of her with someone else?

 

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

 

The vision drove him numb. Too much of everything welled up inside him at once, that they collided somehow and cancelled each other out. The knife in his heart was still, the ache in his chest lay dormant. It's as if his eyes hadn't fully registered what he had seen. The message mustn't have gone to his brain. It was sent straight to his heart. So she didn't want to belong to him anymore. It made sense. She never really did in the first place, did she? He knew she had always secretly wanted him to be more possessive of her, but he just couldn't bring himself to do it. It wasn't right. If she found something in someone else, he would let her be. It made her happy, right?

 

Were we destined to be together?

 

These were the weak rationalizations that ran through his restless mind as he lay in bed for the umpteenth time, trying to get some sleep. His eyes felt like they would burn into his brain; melt through the material that held them in their sockets. It hurt to blink. It hurt to move. It hurt to drink, to eat. It hurt to breathe. He was hurting so much. But he didn't feel sorry for himself. He was hurting from the guilt.

 

He had fucked someone else.

 

Or were we destined to be together, just to be torn apart?

 

Just some woman that had found him at a bar. Yeah, a bar. He didn't go to them often, only once or twice every few months for drinks with friends. She had sauntered over to him and touched him on the arm. Asked him if he wanted to have a good time. He didn't think she was a whore, just someone secretly seeking tenderness with another human.

 

Tenderness.

 

His moments with Rei were always tender. Even if they got rough in bed, there was always tenderness in it afterwards. He basked in it each time, her softness, the warmth of her smile. He felt so much when he was with Rei. Was it happiness? `Who's Rei?' That's what the other woman had asked him once they were done. Who is Rei?

 

My love, my soul mate, my wife.

 

“I don't want you to leave!”

 

Then why am I screwing someone else? Why was she screwing someone else? In truth, they had never been with anyone else other than each other. They had no other experiences with which to compare. He felt like that was what he had been craving, when he silently agreed to the woman at the bar. She would be something different. He'd be able to see if Rei truly was the one for him, if she really was that amazing in bed. He needed to see if he could find that tenderness in someone else. What did he find?

 

Rei had flooded his thoughts. The woman from the bar was blonde, had blue eyes and light skin. She looked nothing like Rei. Except maybe for her figure, that luscious hourglass shape belted with a thin waist. He had called out for Rei at his climax. He didn't know the other woman's name, so he couldn't have called hers, right?

 

Or was the experience so bad that he had to replace her with Rei to enjoy it?

 

A knock at the door had him bolted upright in bed and had his neck snapped towards the opening to his room. Was it his imagination? Had he taken the wrong pills? A dream? Maybe he had finally fallen asleep but didn't notice. Then he heard the knocking again. He rose slowly from his bed; fighting the inevitable head spin induced by his change in latitude, and had his hand on the cold doorknob before he even noticed he had made it across the lounge. As if in slow motion, the knob twisted and the door opened with a small creak.

 

“Please don't forget me...”

 

“'Toru...”

 

She looked breathless, her cheeks were flushed and a light sheen of rain clung to her from the drizzle outside. Her eyes were big and pleading, juicy with rich colour and tears. Her lips were parted a little in exertion, and her hair clung to the sides of her face.

 

Fucking beautiful.

 

But he had to get back to business. She left you and screwed around with that pretty boy, remember?

 

“You signed the papers?” He kept his voice passive, pushed down the emotions that were rising to his throat, begging to be released. She didn't answer. He watched her as she just stood there, panting. She was searching his eyes with a hurt expression. He hid what it was she was looking for. He fought it away as it desperately tried to reach out to her. “Well...?”

 

“I...” She lowered her eyes, masking her inner turmoil as much as she could. He really wanted a divorce? She thought that maybe he had signed the papers to...maybe-

 

“Wait for me.”

 

“Have you signed them or not?” His voice held and irritated edge. Unbeknownst to her, the hostility he held was toward himself. He didn't want to feel this way. He didn't want to drop to his knees and beg for forgiveness. He didn't want her to accept him, take him into her arms like no other has, to love him unconditionally, to give herself to him...No. He didn't want that...

 

God...I want it so much, Rei.

 

Her pained expression crushed him. She actually believed he wanted a divorce. She didn't want one? Hope fluttered through the torrent of pain; she still wanted to be with him. If she hadn't signed the papers. So, had she?

 

“Zack...that man you saw me with, nothing happened.” Their eyes met, and he finally let the feelings push though to his eyes. He noticed her own eyes glitter when she saw them. “He means nothing...I don't want him.” She pleaded with her voice and her eyes, and her heart welled up as she saw him succumb, his hands reaching for her arms, lightly touching her forearms. “And that kiss...I didn't want it.”

 

He fixed a light grip on her arms and guided her inside as he stepped backwards to give her space. She threw herself suddenly into his arms and he accepted her, his heart soaring as their mutual apologies ran between them without being spoken. He wound his arms around her waist as tightly as he could, his grip fatigued from his lack of sleep. She pulled away slightly and tilted her face up to his. She cupped his cheek with a soft hand and ran her thumb over his beauty spot, then his trembling lips.

 

“I want your kisses...I want you.” He claimed her lips, giving her the kiss she wanted and they both moaned with pleasure and relief. They parted, panting.

 

“Forever. For you.”

 

“I love you.” His voice sounded foreign as he said it, and he realized with regret that he hadn't said it in a long time. But now he had, and she was in his arms, forgiving him, accepting him. The world around them shattered and disappeared, no longer existed now that they were back together. Everything was right again.

 

Rei violently wrenched herself away from him and before he saw it, she backhanded him across the face. He was frowning when he looked at her, hurt and confused, his cheek fast turning red. Her eyes were furious and pained, and the sight of them broke his heart another ten times. His eyes widened and his pupils shrank to pinpricks when he heard the noise behind him.

 

 

The sound of soft footsteps emerging from his room.

 

 

“Hm. You must be Rei.”

 

 

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To be continued...

 

A/N: The jig is up! Now, what happens next...?
Will she sign the papers?! Will they get a divorce?! Will he kill himself?! Will they have a threesome with the blonde?!
Tune in next week on Days of Our Hives!

Thanks for the reviews, lovelies ^^