Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Ingénue ❯ One-Shot

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

READ ALL AUTHOR'S NOTES BELOW. Break lines are not from song.
(All explanations follow.)

Originally written for the SMRFF lyric wheel challenge; ended up
being a lot more.

Set about a day after episode #132 (#125 in the dub), which is the
episode with Saori and Kobayashi.

Jessica Riddle - "Even Angels Fall"

You found hope, you found faith
Found out how fast she could take it away
Found true love, Lost your heart
Now you don't know who you are

She made it easy she made it free
Made you hurt 'til you couldn't see
Sometimes it stops; Sometimes it flows
But baby that is how love goes

You will fly and you will crawl
God knows even angels fall
No such thing as you lost it all
God knows even angels fall

It's a secret that know one tells
One day it's heaven, one day its hell;
And it's no fairytale, take it from me
That's the way its supposed to be

You will fly and you will crawl
God knows even angels fall
No such thing as you lost it all
God knows even angels fall

You laugh you cry no one knows why,
But oh the thrill of it all
You're on the ride; you might as well open your eyes

You will fly and you will crawl
God knows even angels fall
No such thing as you lost it all
God knows even angels fall

Even angels fall
Even angels fall


Ingénue (Even Angels Fall)
Author: Ai
~Inspired by Jessica Riddle's "Even Angels Fall"~
Rating: Questionable. Technically PG-13 for content, but not
recommended for readers under 15 due to themes.
E-mail: tennyo@attbi.com
Disclaimer: Don't sue me, don't threaten my life, and if ANYTHING
happens to my favorite shirt, you will so feel the full brunt of my wrath.

----------------------------------------------------------- ------------
in·gé·nue /'an-j&-"nü, 'än-; 'an-zh&-, 'än-/
Function: noun
Etymology: French ingénue, feminine of ingénu ingenuous, from Latin
ingenuus
Date: 1848
1: A naive girl or young woman
2: The stage role of an ingénue; also : an actress playing such a role
(And your parents told you you'd never learn anything from fanfiction.)
---------------------------------------------------------- -------------


"I can't believe they gave you two for the price of one."

Tsukino Chibiusa had a mildly disgusted look on her face, as if
the ice cream she was steadily devouring was flavored with broccoli
instead of strawberry. Taking another decisive lick, she glared, half-
envious, half-repulsed by her future mother's giddy expression and new
prizes.

Usagi smiled smugly, her nose wrinkling in amused disdain as they
walked along the unusually vacant streets of Juuban. She proudly
displayed her plunder, in the form of a comical stuffed horse and a
plump hippopotamus, for the few passing people to see. The sun was
starting to set, and a few people were already prowling the area for
nocturnal activity. "Say what you want, Chibiusa. *You're* just
jealous."

"That's right." The compacted girl made another face. "I'm
jealous of a 15-year-old girl who just spent four hours trying to decide
whether to buy a stuffed hippo-po-potamus--" the way her tongue
tripped over the last word belied her youth, "--and a horse. I want to
be just like you when I grow up!" Chibiusa snorted in a very horse-
like manner.

"Ungrateful snot," Usagi stuck out her tongue. "I still think
you're jealous."

Chibiusa was willing to let that one slide, especially in light
of the fact it was true. "So..." the conically-styled child began,
eager to change the subject, "how *did* you convince the store owner to
give you the horse for free?"

Usagi smirked. "Trade secret," she said with a sly wink.

"I didn't know you could keep a secret," Chibiusa mused
thoughtfully.

"Yeah, well--" Usagi was about to start her tirade when heavy
footsteps and what sounded like a man yelling interrupted her train of
thought. Chibiusa's eyes shifted about, searching for the source of
the confusion.

"What was that?" Chibiusa asked, growing concerned.

"I don't know," Usagi admitted with an uneasy glance in the
direction from which the sound had come. "Little early for Amazon Trio
to be trying again...they usually take a few days to regroup."

"But we should--"

"I didn't say we wouldn't," Usagi scowled, "I was making an
observation."

"Whatever," the younger girl said, inadvertently mimicking her
mother's tone and facial expression perfectly. "Let's go."

Usagi clutched her brooch as she and Chibiusa ran to the source,
but decided against transforming immediately. It was better to make
certain they were needed first than risk drawing attention to
themselves. Slowing to allow Chibiusa, with her significantly shorter
legs, to keep up with her, Usagi quietly prayed another attack hadn't
taken place already.

"Do you SEE this? I mean did you honestly take a good look at
it?" Usagi could hear a thin veneer of restraint in the man's voice.
Whoever he was, he sounded as if he were ready to take a machete and
commence hacking.

Chibiusa stopped dead in her tracks. Usagi had to brace herself
to keep from crashing into an acid-green bush. She gave the pink-
haired child a cheeky grin, so a note of her near-save would be made.

"I see it...so?"

She may not have recognized the first man, but Usagi would know
Chiba Mamoru's cool, unruffled voice until her dying day. Her
fantastic save was squandered as, in her shock, she went tumbling into
the semi-organic bush.

"Baka Usagi!" Chibiusa hissed, crouching down next to the fallen
Moon Princess. "You'll draw their attention!"

"Who *is* that?" Usagi hissed back, staring at the lighter-haired
man who was furiously waving a necktie in her beloved's face.

"Kobayashi-san," Chibiusa replied. "He likes Saori-san. Just
listen."

Usagi looked uneasy. "Are you sure we should be doing this?" she
murmured, her gaze distant.

"Do you realize who she wanted to give this to, Mamoru?"

Chibiusa felt Usagi's forehead. "Are you sure you're feeling all
right?"

"Since you have it, I would assume that you were the lucky
recipient," he replied in the same even voice, but Usagi could tell he
was growing nervous. There was that slight thread of tension
reverberating through each muscle she always noticed when he was
stressed, and his voice had steeled the tiniest amount.

"Yes!" Usagi snapped, suddenly desperate to get out of the area
and away from the conversation. "I just don't think we should be
listening to this and I--"

"She meant to give it to you, Mamoru."

Mamoru stilled, obviously trying to process the new information.
"I didn't know."

"You never do, do you?" Kobayashi snarled contemptuously. "You
just walk through life never caring about who you left in the
wreckage."

"What is he talking about?" Chibiusa squawked, but Usagi firmly
clamped her hand on the little girl's mouth.

It was a heavy accusation, and Mamoru reacted in kind. "Don't
say things you don't know anything about, Kobayashi," the man snarled
in a manner distinctly unlike Mamoru. He was getting defensive, Usagi
realized. And Mamoru never got defensive unless there was some truth
behind the statement.

"Saori really thought you cared, Mamoru. I tried to tell her not
to get her hopes up, but she actually thought that when you two slept
together it meant you CARED."

Chibiusa gasped into Usagi's mouth, her eyes boggling in shock.
Usagi, for her part, kept quiet, but there was a kind of quiet, cold
dread in her eyes Chibiusa didn't like.

The little pink-haired girl, for her part, was indignant,
snorting and scratching like a restrained bull that had just seen red.
When she looked up at Usagi's stark countenance, however, she calmed
down in sympathy.

"We were in high school, Kobayashi. Saori's not a stupid girl."
He turned to walk away, but Kobayashi caught his arm.

Chibiusa's face returned from rice paper-white to something more
normal, but Usagi's did not change. She stared intently at Mamoru's
frozen figure, as if trying to discern something.

"How many were there, Chiba? I heard the stories too. They
broke Saori's heart. How many women were there, anyways? I don't
think I ever saw you with the same one twice. Do you even *remember*?
And to watch her added to the list...she didn't deserve to be thrown
away like that." Kobayashi was practically shaking with suppressed
rage, but, amazingly, he held onto a sliver of his composure.

Chibiusa flushed cherry red and mumbled something behind Usagi's
hand. The comment was incoherent and useless at any rate. After
another moment of struggle, she watched Usagi in mute fascination, her
horror boiling over in her like an overfull cauldron. Usagi, for her
part, was perfectly still, and appeared to not be reacting to the news
that Kobayashi was delivering with inadvertent callousness.

"I can't change the past, Kobayashi. If I could..." For a
moment, Mamoru's face gained a remote, poignant quality that softened
Kobayashi's fury. The raven-haired man hung his head for a split
second, and Usagi could, for just one moment, see a lifetime of regret
weighing on his shoulders.

Then he snapped back. "I can't. The only thing I can affect is
the future." He sighed, a little weary.

Kobayashi looked searchingly at the closed planes of Mamoru's
face. "Fine then," the man denounced dully, "I'll leave you to your
regrets. But stay away from Saori. She's been hurt enough."
Kobayashi turned away, each step from Mamoru coming down like a little
earthquake. "You know Chiba, I don't know who I pity more--you, or
your poor girlfriend."

For a while Mamoru stood still as a statue, watching Kobayashi's
retreating back with disinterested eyes. Usagi was too far away to
read his gaze properly. When the other man was no more than a random
dot on the horizon, however, he abruptly rubbed at his eyes with the
back of his hand and turned to walk in the opposite direction.

Chibiusa, for her part, had the sense not to speak aloud until
Mamoru was safely out of hearing. "What was that about, Usagi-chan?"
she asked, genuinely concerned for both of them.

Usagi closed her eyes and bit her lip, quietly pressing down
until she felt a salty, metallic taste spread from the wound. It was
painful, and probably not a very healthy way of dealing with the
emotions rocketing through her nervous system, but couldn't bring
herself to care at the moment. She knew she was scaring Chibiusa, the
shuttered, frozen reaction she was forced to play at lest she reveal
too much to the child scared even her.

"Usagi-chan," Chibiusa managed with the wide-eyed half-innocence
a child of her age possessed, "what were they talking about?" There
was an urgency and insistence to her voice Usagi had heard before, and
Usagi wished she could answer the girl honestly.

Instead she finally lifted herself out of the bushes, dusted and
rearranged her lace-trimmed black tank top and ruffled pink skirt as
needed, and knelt down to speak to Chibiusa.

"Don't tell Mamo-chan that you heard what you did," Usagi
whispered fiercely, using the same commanding intensity Chibiusa
recalled from far away from here, in moments where collapse was
imminent and every word carried immense weight. It was a loaded,
difficult promise and they both knew it, but Chibiusa nodded dumbly in
acquiescence.

"All right." Usagi stood back up and again readjusted her skirt.
"I know you're curious," she murmured as she picked up the stuffed
animals tossed aside so carelessly from off the ground and brushed the
dirt away, "but until I know more, I can't explain very well."

Chibiusa nodded. She could accept that.

"I'll talk to him...can't promise much." Usagi lips turned
upwards in a bleak not-smile. She was lying; they both knew it. "He's
not really good at these things."

Memories of home flooded Chibiusa...whispers around court that
her beloved Papa was a cold, unfeeling man. She'd never understood how
they could believe that of the man who so deeply loved her Mama and her
until she'd met his past self. When she'd returned she could
understand a little better. Endymion was a reserved man, but
Mamoru...she didn't know what Mamoru was. Except...

'He reminds me of a broken toy sometimes.' Diana had said it,
not her, but in her heart of hearts she agreed with the kitten. 'Like a
clockwork doll instead of a person...'

"I won't tell." Chibiusa tried to match Usagi's solemnity,
perhaps read something besides slight horror in the girl's expression.
But today her face was blank, cautious to only express appropriate
emotions.

It was at times like these, the pink-haired girl realized that
her future mother was not what she seemed.

---------------------------------------------------------- -------------
What's the matter with the truth, did I offend your ears?
----------------------------------------------------------------- ------

Usagi performed every task set forth that afternoon with perfect,
pointed acuity. She made each step in front of her with weighed
deliberation, absolute certainty after flashing momentary debate, and
dead composure. Chibiusa didn't like it, not any of it, from the
subtle pallor of her cheeks to the subdued tones in which her future
mother spoke.

They'd walked home immediately, Usagi lost in a haze of thought.
The little pink-haired girl could practically see her thoughts churning
through her, rendering the blonde a glassy-eyed doll, marred only by
the furrow of her brow. Chibiusa sighed. Whatever Usagi was thinking
about, she clearly wasn't going to volunteer any information.

Now Usagi sat in her room, likely still thinking. Though the
door was slightly ajar, Chibiusa didn't want to disturb her. She was
sitting outside in the hall instead, puzzling over a math assignment
and fighting the impulse to call Mamoru and have him guide her through
the tedious algebra problems. Making a small, irritated noise, she
glanced at the slender crack in the door but, after a moment's
contemplation, returned to her assignment.

"Chibiusa?" Shingo was standing over her, concerned but
uncertain how to proceed. He was growing, Chibiusa realized suddenly,
granted almost everyone towered over her, but at that moment he seemed
gargantuan. She gave him a small, neutral smile as she craned her neck
to meet his eyes.

"What are you doing sitting in the hall?" Chibiusa saw his eyes
narrow at her for a moment, then trail over to the not-quite-closed
door, the questioning look lifting.

He understood, Chibiusa recognized. Somehow he knew what she was
doing: the twisted loyalty that demanded she keep vigil, the cowardice
that kept her from crossing the chasm and demanding answers.

"She used to do that a lot..." Shingo commented thoughtfully,
stroking his chin over the not-stubble on his face, "especially a
couple years ago. She was always happy after she came out, but...I
still worried." Shingo gave her a sheepish grin.

"Did you ever find out why?"

Shingo's eyes were far away, filled with some long-past sadness.
"I didn't need to ask. That was sort of a tough time for the family."
He shrugged laconically. "But we made it through. She was a lot
happier after that...and then she...I don't get her sometimes."
Another shrug. "Some things are better off left alone."

Shingo walked away, and Chibiusa looked down at the undone math
homework. She really wished she could call Mamoru.

Her tangential line of thinking broke when she heard a clatter in
the room. Without thinking, she leaped up from her spot and inched the
door open just enough so she could see.

On the floor, a marred porcelain doll was tossed down carelessly,
staring at the world through its lifeless, glassy gaze. The force of
the fall chipped away the china of her face, giving her a sickly
comical expression. Chibiusa wanted to shudder but suppressed the
desire.

Usagi took great care lifting a small stack of photos out of the
careworn shoe box on her bed, and started flipping through the set
gingerly. Her gaze lingered on particular pictures once in a while;
others she flipped past quickly.

The door's hinges needed oiling, so when Chibiusa cracked the
door again to try to get a better view of Usagi's pictures, the older
girl heard the noise and started. With a shaky expression, she looked
over at the red eye and tuft of pink hair peeking through the door.

"You might as well come in," Usagi told in a dry, amused voice.
Chibiusa entered with unusual timidity, shutting the door cautiously
behind her.

"What are you looking at?" Chibiusa half-asked, half-demanded.
Even when she was trying to be kind, Chibiusa could never quite banish
the brash, pushy tone she used with Usagi.

Surprisingly, the blonde gave her a dilute smile, but her eyes
sparkled with a thin, reedy sort of happiness. "Just looking through
some old memories," she murmured dreamily, almost forgetting Chibiusa
was there. Again her gaze touched upon the picture, her eyes dim and
misty.

Chibiusa looked over Usagi's shoulder. In the picture was Usagi,
a longer-haired Naru, one or two other girls Chibiusa didn't recognize,
and a slightly younger girl with bright eyes and a cheeky smile,
hugging Usagi tightly.

"Who are they?" she asked, pointing at the unknown girls.

"Old friends from grade school," she murmured, smiling softly.
"Those are Yumeko and Hitomi. They went to another middle school. We
lost touch after seventh grade..." Usagi smiled fondly as the memories
she so rarely permitted herself to think about rushed through her.
"Naru-chan gives me updates now and then. It's nice."

It was a little disturbing to Chibiusa to think about the fact
that, before she was a Sailor Senshi, Usagi had had other friends,
other concerns, other priorities...and though on the surface, nothing
had changed, it felt like a whole other world to her.

"Don't think about it too hard," Usagi cautioned with a real
smile. "I don't miss those days."

The bitter ring in her voice surprised Chibiusa. She couldn't
decide whether Usagi meant what she said.

"Those days were...harder then they seemed."

"Who's that one?" Chibiusa distracted Usagi by pointing at the
younger girl with her arms around Usagi's waist.

A tear fell, the salt water blurring the girl's image. "That
would be Kana. She's the daughter of my father's best friend from
college. She was a really sweet girl, but...she died a while back."

"Oh." Delicate subject, apparently. Chibiusa grimaced.

Usagi stared intently at Kana's joyful countenance, immortalized
in the photo. "Kana-chan was only year below us, even though she looks
younger. But I learned a lot from her. I learned from her to believe
in the future, no matter what." Usagi looked away.

"You found some hope," Chibiusa mused quietly.

"Well...it wasn't that simple," Usagi admitted. "When she died,
for a while I couldn't keep faith. It took becoming Sailormoon and
learning about my past to change my thinking back."

"Was that everything?" Chibiusa said slyly, looking at Usagi with
a wicked grim. "After all you found Mamo-chan...that must have helped
too."

There was a pained look on Usagi's face when Chibiusa said that.
"That...that helped too."

It was now or never, Chibiusa decided, to force the question.
"Usagi," Chibiusa asked suspiciously, "did you think that Mamo-chan..."

Usagi was so pale when Chibiusa began talking that the child cut
off her query mid-sentence. With shaky, pale lips, Usagi opened her
mouth to reply.

"I didn't ask," she whispered softly, "because I didn't want to
know the answer."

In other words, Chibiusa realized, Usagi had long suspected
that Mamoru was not forthcoming about his past. Usagi didn't seem
inclined to keep talking about it, so Chibiusa didn't ask any further.
From the shuttered expression on Usagi's face, however, Chibiusa could
tell that Usagi's feelings on the topic ran deep.

Usagi flipped to the next picture and began to talk freely about
the people and places captured on the 4-by-6 glossy paper: favorite
foods, funny stories, memories that were no longer dwelled upon but had
made her into who she was.

Chibiusa, for her part, was fascinated by Usagi's jovial stories
and the way she told them. Once the ball was rolling, Usagi was a
fantastic storyteller: her naturally expressive voice and genuine
fondness for the subjects of her pictures blended into an amusing,
interesting set of monologues. Chibiusa paid rapt attention, lost in
the familiarity of the moment--of the mother who, she bragged to all
her friends, told the best stories in the world.

As the stack dwindled, however, Kana's face appeared
increasingly, and the former cheer ebbed away from Usagi's voice.
Chibiusa placed a small, comforting hand on Usagi's arm, and the blonde
looked down, smiling at the girl who was so remarkably like her.

"The Tezuka family was in a car accident right before I started
the eighth grade," she explained without prompting. "Kana-chan and her
mother died."

"Ah." Chibiusa looked at the last picture, where Usagi and
Kana's hands were lightly touching. The only other occupant of the
space had his arm wrapped around Usagi's waist, hugging her to him, his
chin resting between her trademark odango. He had a cheeky grin on his
tanned, handsome face, much like Kana's genki expression only older and
more masculine, and Usagi's other hand clasped the arm around her
waist.

"And...who's that?" Chibiusa looked at the laughing gray-eyed boy
who held Usagi so possessively.

"Haruhiko..." Usagi's voice dropped, "...just someone I used to
know."

---------------------------------------------------- -------------------
and all my innocence is wasted on the dead and dreaming
-------------------------------------------------------------- ---------

Tsukino Chibiusa never knew what to make of the endless stream of
revelations in her life. Every day was a million bits of new
information to process, some things small, many more earth shaking.
But before today, she'd always known how to deal with those moments.

That's why she was sitting there, on a pillow in the middle of a
warm, wood-paneled room in the Hikawa Jinja while she waited for Mamoru
to come pick her up and help her study her math. As she watched, Rei
boredly tended the fire, Ami was playing with an "extra-curricular"
program on her laptop, and Makoto and Minako had raided Rei's enviable
manga collection. No one spoke, but the girls were simply enjoying
being in each other's presence without thinking about youma or entrance
exams.

*Haruhiko...just someone I used to know.*

The words didn't sit well with her. She may have been young, but
she certainly wasn't stupid. The tone in Usagi's voice was akin to the
one she used when she talked about Mamoru. After the scare with Saori,
Chibiusa didn't want to think about Usagi ever having been with someone
else. She remembered the obvious love between her parents in the
future, so thick and vibrant it hummed like a plucked guitar string,
versus the almost sickly relationship of the present. At times she
didn't know which one of her future parents she wanted to hit more.

Usagi was supposed to arrive in another half-hour, she'd had a
meeting of the manga drawing club she'd recently joined and had
cheekily pointed out to the other girls, "At least it isn't detention."
Luna grumbled, but everyone else, including Rei, capitulated quickly.

Now they were just waiting.

"Where are Luna and Artemis and Diana?" Chibiusa ventured,
uncertain of how to proceed with her conversation but certain that she
didn't want the two guardians to hear.

"Ami gave Luna a program that she's working on to detect people
with powerful dream mirrors before the Amazon Trio does," Makoto
explained, not even looking up at the pink-haired child. "They went to
hash out the details and run some preliminary tests of the sensors.
Why, is something the matter?"

"Nothing's wrong," she protested.

That was the mistake. Rei, hearing the force of the denial,
looked lazily up at Chibiusa. "Are you sure everything all right,
chibi? You look a little unnerved."

Chibiusa forced herself to inhale properly and decided now was a
better time than never. "Have any of you heard of a Tezuka Haruhiko?

The room came at a standstill. Manga fell, typing stopped, eyes
fixed upon the girl sitting in the center.

"How do you know him?" Minako broke the silence first, keeping
her expression neutral.

"Well..." Chibiusa bit her lip and mentally remembered Usagi had
only made her promise not to tell Mamo-chan. Technically telling the
girls was all right, even if Usagi squawked about it later. The girl
wouldn't have blamed her; this was a highly personal topic, after all.
"Usagi-chan was really upset because she heard this conversation
between Kobayashi-san and Mamo-chan about how he'd slept with all these
girls and..."

"What?"

Chiba Mamoru was standing the doorway, eyes blank. Minako
cringed, and Rei looked warily at the stricken raven-haired man.

Ami was the first to regain her composure, unsurprisingly. "Is
everything all right, Mamoru-san?"

"She...you...heard that?"

All four girls breathed a sigh of relief at Mamoru didn't catch.
The last thing they needed was Mamoru asking questions about Haruhiko
that they couldn't answer without betraying Usagi...

"She HEARD what he said?"

Chibiusa nodded gamely, tears forming in her eyes. "How could
you do all those things?" she asked, tone remarkably scarce of
accusation.

Mamoru dealt with this blow the only way he knew how after
nineteen years.

He bolted.

---------------------------------------------------------- -------------
dead actors, vacant lies--over and over and over again she cries
----------------------------------------------------------------- ------

She knew.

The words hit him like a punch to the gut. Mamoru struggled to
breathe in, trying to understand why, had she known, she hadn't
mentioned anything to him. He couldn't conceive of the idea she might
be all right with knowing the things he had done--there were times he
himself could barely tolerate it. He exhaled harshly and noisily,
trying to balance himself physically and collect his thoughts back
together.

*Fix this.* The order rang through his mind; somehow he knew
Usagi could NOT have just let this go. She must have been afraid to
confront him, he rationed immediately, feared upsetting him, perhaps?

He hated his past, the blank expanse of years that stretched
behind him, taunting him with their base activity and aimless purpose.
Finding Usagi, and his life with her, was one of the greatest things
that had ever happened in his life.

And yet the past always seemed to come back to haunt him.

"Mamoru-san, WAIT!" Hino Rei was running after him in an
unusually undignified manner, her long raven hair whipping around like
a sheet. She looked slightly panicked.

"Rei-chan...is something...?"

"Was it true?" the pushy priestess demanded, glaring him down
with her vibrant plum-colored eyes.

What was there to say? He remained silent, confirming what they
both knew.

Rei looked mildly scornful. "I always thought you were better
than that, Mamoru-san. Guess I was wrong."

"I don't need your condemnation, Rei."

"Too bad." Her mild scorn was rapidly evolving into full-on
revulsion. If she'd spat on the sidewalk at that moment, Mamoru could
not have brought himself to be surprised. "I'm sorry, Mamoru-san, but
the rest of us get tired of having to pick up the pieces every time you
break her heart. And this is definitely going that direction."

He looked away. "What if I told you I would come clean with
her?"

Rei's eyes flared momentarily before returning to her usual
violet. "Is that what you're planning to do?"

Mamoru paced away a few steps, lost in thought. "What if I told
you I was tired of secrets and just wanted to clear the air for once?"

"I wouldn't believe you," Rei said flatly.

He smiled, the expression thin and a little cold.

"And I'd also tell you to use a little discretion for once," Rei
snapped. "Follow her lead on this one. She'll feel a lot more
comfortable if you do that."

"I will," he mumbled, trying to get Rei's searing gaze off of
him. Mamoru half-stumbled away, trying to sort through the myriad
emotions rushing through his consciousness, make sense of Rei's cryptic
commentary.

As he walked away, Rei murmured, "Wish I could believe that."

----------------------------------------------------------- ------------
I'm all about denial, but can't denial let me believe?
-------------------------------------------------------------- ---------

When Usagi arrived the Crown Fruit Parlor at the appropriate time
that day, Mamoru was trying to shake his excessive nervousness by
slamming down a cup of coffee.

Mamoru was not very good at dealing with his nerves.

Motoki looked over at his longtime friend and simultaneous source
of frustration and amusement.

"Hot date?" he teased gently, flashing his trademark grin.

Mamoru turned to stone.

"Ah...never mind," Motoki sighed, going back to wiping the
tables. Sometimes, Motoki had learned, the best avenue was to not pry
at all.

Mamoru watched the door, gaze fixed, until the bell on the door
rang a certain way--she made it sound different, somehow--and Usagi
strode in, possessed with her usual artless grace. And it was
certainly artless. Streaming blond hair whisked cheerily around her
as she settled into the booth, she waved to Motoki, who was already
preparing a drink for her.

"You called?" She was having a difficult time keeping her
demeanor upbeat. Unazuki delivered a soda with a wink and a grin, and
Usagi sipped it happily, grateful for another focal point.

Mamoru clutched the coffee cup, ignoring the fact his hand was
burning. "Usa-ko...we need to talk."

She snapped to attention post-haste, dread pooling in her
stomach.

"I found out that yesterday you may have...heard some things."

Usagi made a face.

"I'm going to kill that pink-haired yamhead."

"It was an accident!" Mamoru protested, defending the girl. "I
walked in at the wrong time."

After making a mental note to ask one of the others for details
later, she smiled brightly and vowed, for once in her life, to lie
effectively.

She patted his scalded hands, eyes shining with love. "Mamo-
chan, I don't care about your past. As long as I know you love me,
then I'm happy. And I know you do."

This was what she got, after all the lies, the secrets, the
drama. She deserved an out just this once. And Mamoru *did* love her.
She had to protect him just as he always did her.

He wasn't going to be able to handle the truth.

"I understand," he murmured, touched by her 'sincere' love and
affection towards him. How was he so blessed to find someone who would
accept him unconditionally, love him despite all of his faults?

But he still had to do this. The weight he had carried for so
long still drove a chasm between them. Laying it down once and for all
was the only way he knew to bridge that gap. It would be his closure,
his chance to finally fall fully and wholly into the love they were
supposed to share.

"Since we've never been intimate before this," Mamoru said
quietly, "and it's hard to understand where I'm coming from unless
you've--"

Usagi pressed a finger to his lips. "I understand," she mumured,
"and I think it's better this way, Mamo-chan. Leave your past behind.
Aren't I your future?"

He gave her the quirky grin she loved so, his eyes alight. "Hai,
Usa-ko, you are."

"Then problem solved." She tried to match that same cheeky
grin. It would be worth it in the end to do this, Usagi decided, no
matter how painful it was for both of them. His feelings were her first
concern.

If only it were that simple, Mamoru wished grimly.
Unfortunately, the years of hopelessness and mindless activity had
taken their toll on him, and he was desperate, compelled to explain
away the filth that had accumulated inside him. He wanted to believe in
her, to have faith she could make all of this go away, that he would
be clean and whole and wonderful for her, and slag off the lingering
emotions that made it so difficult to be with her without a deep sense
of guilt.

"Usa-ko, I still..."

In a rather bold public display of affection, Usagi quickly
pressed her lips against his, effectively cutting off his monologue.
Mamoru sat there, gap-mouthed, as she pulled away from him.

"You don't understand," she explained levelly, as if to a small
child, "don't tell me this. I love you no matter what, and these
things are clearly painful for you. You don't have to tell me and hurt
yourself. I won't do that to you."

Before he could protest, she had skipped out the door.

When Usagi got outside, she wiped her mouth clean, not quite
certain whose taste she was so determined to rid herself of that day.
The hot tears falling down her cheeks did the rest.

------------------------------------------------------------ -----------
why if this is nothing, I'm finding it so hard to dismiss?
-------------------------------------------------------------- ---------

Three days had gone by, and nothing had changed about Usagi, at
least as far as Mamoru could tell. She didn't seem upset or angry
about the discovery, and treated him as if nothing had changed.

It bothered him to no end. Part of him was grateful for Usagi's
perfect acceptance of him, and yet...it struck him as very out of
character for her. To not be jealous, or insecure, or...anything.

He watched her, trying to find anything that might clue him into
how she was acting, but nothing came. With a sigh, he was about ready
to give up on the matter. Perhaps she truly WAS okay with his tainted
past. That would be wonderful, but Mamoru was a cynic by nature and
hard-pressed to believe in fairytales.

Then again, his entire relationship with Usagi was a sort of
fairytale--Prince and Princess tragically separated, only to be
reunited in another world. Even he doubted the plausibility of it
sometimes.

But he was here, sitting in an arcade, living the 'fairytale.'
A soiled and battered one, but a 'fairytale' nonetheless.

He barely noticed the bell ring and the excited chatter of three
girls, two of which were ready to flirt with Motoki until he broke down
'and gave them free food. Ami's nose was buried in a physics book, but
she occasionally popped up to make comments, trying to impede Makoto and
Minako in their quest for free nourishment.

"Usagi-chan was sort of quiet today, wasn't she?"

Mamoru's ears pricked.

"Hush, Mina-chan. We'll talk later." Makoto glanced over to
Mamoru's booth.

"Right," Minako laughed nervously. "We will."

When Usagi tromped in soon after, admittedly quieter than usual
but still cheery, Mamoru listened intently for *some* sign other than
her lack of bubbly chatter. She smiled and laughed as if nothing were
wrong.

Wanting to push the limit just a little, he approached her,
steadying himself before asking, "Usa-ko? How are you doing today?"

"Mamo-chan!" she bounded into his arms; he had to brace himself
to accept the embrace. Usagi snuggled closer before realizing people
were watching and wisely decided to pull away. She beamed brightly at
him, and he wondered why he'd ever believed anything could be wrong.
"I'm happy today! I think I might have passed my math test for once!"

Then for a fraction of a moment he saw a shadow skitter across
her eyes, and was reminded of his plan.

"That's great, Usa-ko," he said affectionately, honestly glad for
her. "I'm proud of you."

She gave him a sweet smile, and he felt the vein in his throat
flutter.

Minako looked at Usagi with raised eyebrows, Makoto coughed, and
Ami stayed with her book. Motoki was confused, but he kept his mouth
closed.

Mamoru leaned in, determined to capture a semblance of privacy.
"Are you sure everything's all right?"

Her smile was practically painted on her face. "Of course," she
whispered to him.

Minako's eyes narrowed.

"Are you really?" That smile chilled him to his bones. It
looked like something on a porcelain doll rather than a human.

"ACK! I just remembered! I have to go help my mom clean the
house! She's going to kiiiiiii--" Before the sentence was finished,
Usagi was out the door.

It was Ami, amazingly, who smirked at the slammed door, watching
the bells that still jingled violently in Usagi's wake, and said, "Well
it wasn't completely obvious that was going happen." Makoto stifled a
laugh at the unexpected sass from the blue-haired genius. Ami, for her
part, went back to her book, but her sharp eyes kept a subtle vigil.

Minako was worried, but she didn't say as much. Being the senshi
of love may have given her a knack for understanding relationships, but
Usagi's and Mamoru's was not one she enjoyed interfering in on a
regular basis. Too issue-laden for her taste, and she wanted to
respect their privacy.

Motoki shook his head, still bemused. "You two are quite the
roller-coaster, aren't you?" he commented to Mamoru.

Mamoru shrugged laconically. "She...found out about my past
activities." He put a casual spin on it, trying to hide the fact he
felt as if razors were slowly hacking his internal organs to pieces.

The blond man let out a low whistle. "Guess she wasn't
thrilled."

"Actually, she's weirdly fine with it," he commented, trying to
put the pieces together in his mind.

Motoki was pensive. "Well...it could be she doesn't feel like
she has the right to judge."

"The right to judge?" She certainly did. God knows he felt
sordid enough; she had every right to express digust at his actions.

"I don't know...but especially after Tezuka-san--AUUUGH!"

Minako had slapped Motoki upside the head with her purse while
Makoto had gone for the groin; both clearly derived some pleasure from the
act. Makoto was literally seething, and Motoki backed off immediately,
fearing further confrontations with their combined wrath.

But the mistake was already made. Mamoru looked at his best
friend, writhing in pain, then back at the three girls who were watching
him with wide eyes.

"Who's Tezuka-san?"

Makoto, Minako, and Ami all exchanged long glances, none certain
as to what they could say. "Ah, Mamoru-san...you'd better ask Usagi-
chan about that."

Mamoru's lightning-speed mind had already made the connection,
although his heart screamed a denial. He was already out the door, going
after Usagi, armed with the new information.

Makoto had her head in her hands. "Usagi hadn't told him yet?"

"No," Ami scowled. "She was looking for the right time.
Remember, it was hard enough for her just telling the four of us, and
we'd already assured her we wouldn't censure her."

"So much work, completely wasted..." Makoto lightly punched the
countertop.

Motoki paled visibly. "What just happened?"

"Motoki-san," Minako scowled melodramatically, "for such a smart
man, you can be damned stupid sometimes."

------------------------------------------------------ -----------------
and nothing fuels a good flirtation like need and anger and desperation
----------------------------------------------------------- ------------

"Usa-ko, WAIT!"

Usagi stopped when she heard Mamoru's voice behind her, his voice
slightly strangled with the stress of physical exertion and emotion.
The tone was a little rough, and somehow she knew what was coming. Her
stomach roiled like an earthquake in response.

Mamoru's eyes were narrowed, pointedly focused on Usagi's
flushed, anxious face. Her eyes were clouded yet intense, not allowing
him to see what she was thinking. Part of him screamed to turn back
here and now, before he delved too deeply, and simply let it go.

If he didn't however, he knew he would always be tormented with
prickling questions, and there was nothing Chiba Mamoru loathed more
than uncertainty. He had spent his life in a haze of doubt; Usagi and
everything she represented was the first concrete, tangible point in
his life. Losing his last bastion of stability could very well be his
undoing.

So, he foolishly opened his mouth.

"Are you certain that you're all right with what you heard?" he
murmured, moving closer into her personal space. She squirmed
appropriately, but her facial expression retained the poignant doll-
like glaze.

Seeing it was her turn to react, she smiled insincerely and
wrapped her arms around his lean waist. With her false expression she
nuzzled her cheek against his solid chest and closing her eyes. Usagi
inhaled deeply, languorously, absorbing his warmth, his scent, the feel
of his skin...right before she lied to him once again.

"Of course I'm all right, Mamo-chan," she murmured with a
saccharine voice and a charming lilt. "I know you love me more than
anything."

God help him, but for a fraction of an instant, he let himself
believe it. He reveled in the affectionate gesture, letting the
feeling of love and perfect acceptance rush over him for a singular
glorious expanse of time before shattering the spell.

"Who's Tezuka-san?"

Within an instant, he felt as if Usagi were a marble statue
wrapped around him, the heated fervor in her embrace draining
torturously away from him. With stiff, jerking motions, she pulled her
arms away and wrapped them about her stomach, refusing to look up at
him.

"Who told you about him?" she questioned in a low, slightly
dangerous voice.

"Motoki hinted at it," he replied coldly and humorlessly, arms
crossed against his chest. "He said you might think you had no right
to judge. Why would he say that?"

She closed her eyes and silently prayed he didn't say what
she knew had been long in coming.

"Did you sleep with him, Usa-ko?"

All of the color drained from Usagi's face as if someone had
punctured her melatonin-producing glands. Her eyes were china-blue
orbs, wide and frightened as she stared in horror at him.

Oh Gods, it was true. His heart slammed in his chest, but he
couldn't manage to reply. As much as he ached to cry, scream, force her
to take it back, nothing seemed to function properly. Even his tongue
felt like a block lodged in sawdust.

"How dare you accuse me," she snapped dangerously, sounding like
thrashing whipcord, "when you were with so many girls by your own
admission!"

"You could have at least told me!" he snarled, her anger causing
his to surface and pull him from his frozen stupor.

"And did you bother to say anything to me about YOUR past?"

Mamoru deflated like a balloon. Closing his eyes, he mumbled, "I
wanted to, so badly. But I didn't want to hurt you. I'm not the
person I was then and--" He couldn't continue. An overwhelming urge to
hold her close to him, reaffirm she was there with him rather than the
shadow starting to form in his mind, surfaced, and he was too mentally
displaced to do anything but submit to it.

"You can't protect me," she whispered furiously, nonetheless
letting him pull her into a loose hug. Usagi truly despised the constant
need for his comfort and love, particularly when she was upset, even if
he was the cause of her pain. "Not from everything. You should just tell
me the truth."

He rested his head between two odango. "It's not that easy."

She sighed once before pushing him vehemently away from her.
"Furthermore, he was before I ever met you!" she protested, still livid
but succumbing to tears. "I thought you'd be upset! And you ARE, so
don't act like I was wrong!"

Mamoru stared beyond her, into somewhere she did not understand.
"You're right." He looked her straight in the eye, determined to make
her understand once and for all. "I just...please let me tell you the
truth."

It was a more difficult request than he knew. Things she didn't
want to think about, obligations she would make if she let him speak,
motives she could sense lurking below the surface--

And the genuine suffering of the man she loved.

Usagi couldn't afford to be selfish. Two years ago she had been
selfish and held herself back the tiniest bit, even during her most
intimate moments. She couldn't let Mamoru fade into the distance,
needing her. She gave her love freely and openly to him, never
begrudging him the lack of recompense, because he was the one who made
the ache in her heart go away--the one that had threatened to consume
her with its constant, jarring agony.

If he needed this, then she would play along.

"Let's go to your apartment and talk, Mamo-chan."

------------------------------------------------------ -----------------
well, there's a reason it came to this tonight
--------------------------------------------------------------- --------

Chiba Mamoru went through life with a Jekyll-and-Hyde mentality
that could simultaneously fascinate and aggravate--at very least, he
gave the distinct impression that he only followed most rules because
it suited him. He was so perfectly refined, so utterly self-contained
that Usagi had long stopped expecting Mamoru to ever open up to her.
Low standards made love easier to bear; if she never demanded anything
of him then she was pleasantly surprised when he did toss her a bone
now and then. It was just enough to keep her there with him.

Sometimes she wondered why she bothered with Chiba Mamoru,
following him like a puppy and wagging her tail when he gave her an
occasional treat. Love was the obvious answer.

Love...

As the word echoed through her consciousness, she had to push the
dark thoughts that threatened to break the surface far out of reach.

He paced anxiously around the room, frantically searching for the
words to describe the years before he had met her and the heady weight
of mindless human interaction had lifted from him. He closed his eyes
and leaned his forehead on his fingers, still looking for a way.

Usagi sighed heavily, leaning back on the overstuffed cream
couch. "Do you want me to ask you?" she queried quietly, almost
harshly, trying to make this as comfortable for him as possible. Or
maybe she just wanted to get through the ordeal and move on with their
relationship?

Mamoru looked uncertainly at Usagi, biting his lip softly as he
reflected over the tone she'd used with him. Part of him begged to
turn back, to run away and hide, to act as if none of this had ever
happened and simply *move on*--but deep down, he longed to tell her.
He wanted to explain to her, maybe to himself, why he was the way he
had been and how when she had come along, everything completely changed.

No matter how unsettling having someone know these things about
him was, he needed this. The absolute intimacy he had longed for his
entire life would become possible if he could just clear the air. He
was so certain of that, he could taste it in his mouth--sweet, but a
little salty, maybe a bit bitter for all the time he had lost.

He took a deep breath. "Maybe it would be best if you asked me
something. I don't really know where to begin."

She looked away, wincing before asking, "How many were there?"

Mamoru was struck by the fact he didn't actually *know*. He hung
his head in defeat, waiting for the backlash.

Usagi groaned and smacked her forehead, forcing down her growing
disgust. "Rough estimate?"

He chewed his sore lip thoughtfully before replying, "Probably
more than twenty."

"More than TWENTY?" Usagi stared at him, mouth agape. She fought
a wave of nausea down at the thought. "You made love to over twenty
women?"

"Don't call it that!" he hissed fiercely, vehement in his
protest. Usagi's mouth closed in shock. "None of those women meant
anything to me, Usa-ko. I mean that." As if offering himself as a
token of amends, he sat down on the floor next to the sofa, almost
prostrate, clearly miserable at any rate.

Above him, she shook her head, but his angle made it impossible
to see. "You can't tell me that. I know you, Mamo-chan. You're too
practical. It had to mean something to you." She didn't want to
believe it hadn't. Usagi knew who really could have that many partners
and none of them would matter; they were the type of people Usagi
pitied above all others. "It always means something."

He nodded ever so faintly, agreeing with her assessment and
hating her knowledge of the matter. "What I meant to say was that I
didn't love any of them--unless you count what I felt for Saori as
love, I guess." He hung his head at that last statement.

"There's a whole other topic," Usagi muttered. "You could've
told me she was more than a 'friend,' Mamo-chan." What an idiot she had
been, innocently believing that Mamoru and Saori were 'just friends.'
It was easy to believe in Mamoru when she thought he was telling her the
truth, but he had deliberately told her 'an old friend' had visited, and
Usagi hated it when people lied to her.

Half the time it seemed like all Mamoru ever did was lie. It was
painful, but she tolerated it for reasons unfathomable.

With delicate motion, she reached out to stroke his head, itching
to run his fingers through his hair; when they touched, however, he
flinched and wrenched skittishly. Usagi pulled her hand back, wishing
he could simply stop this torture and let them drown in mindless kisses
and ecstasy.

It worked once before, in a whole other world.

"It started when I was sixteen," he murmured as he began his
story, "I'd just entered high school. I'd been out of the orphanage
for over two years, living on a stipend from a trust set up by a
relative before the accident." He sighed. "I was at the top of my
class, but it all felt so...empty."

There was a breaking, poignant tone to his voice that Usagi
recognized instinctively. Mamoru had no need to explain the emotion to
her because she herself had felt the chill.

How deep their connection went, yet they were still driven to do
this to themselves and to each other. If they weren't careful now,
they may very well spend their lives wallowing in their laments.

"I ignored it at first, just like everything else," he continued,
breaking her thoughts, dragging the words out himself, "but after a
while it just got to be too much. There were days I literally did not
want to get out of bed, I felt that hopeless. I...I needed you then."
He closed his eyes and fought back the familiar rush of pain the
memories of his past brought.

It was one of the most stunning admissions Usagi had ever heard
during the course of their relationship. She sat back, slightly
stunned, riddled with guilt at the longing in his tone. Though she
longed to wrap her arms around him and reassure him the past was behind
him and her future was with him and him alone, she restrained.

"There was a girl. Looking for someone to keep her company for a
night," he explained cynically. He wouldn't utter her name here; it
would taint the air Usagi breathed. "I wanted to touch someone that
night. I don't know what it was...this *need* for physical contact.
She was willing, and so we just...did it."

They just 'did it.' She had spent the past year and a half
wondering how Mamoru would react to the idea that she hadn't saved
herself for him, guilty at the fact she didn't regret what she had done
with Haruhiko, and he 'did it.' Oh, she was aware of a thousand double
standards and backwards mentalities, but hearing this cheapened him in
her eyes, and it echoed back to her.

"It was nice to be close to someone for once," he reflected
softly. "For a few minutes...the hole went away. I wanted that
feeling again. Blissful oblivion, I suppose. Even though it was
fleeting, I still wanted it. As often as I could get it."

Loneliness was a powerful motivator, Usagi supposed. Even
someone like Mamoru could throw caution to the wind and take refuge in
the human touch. Touch was lies, it was easy to convey false emotion
through touch, to make the other believe what you wanted them to
believe. Words were not so easy to falsify.

"It was at a high school graduation party that I was with
Saori...all through high school, people had been saying we'd make the
perfect couple. I was drinking...not much, just enough so that my
judgment was a little impaired. I really hurt her," he murmured
miserably. "After that I tried to limit things, and I haven't touched
a drop of alcohol since. But I couldn't stop...until I met you. I
wanted you, but I was afraid..."

He closed his eyes. "Because...you made me want to be better."

The statement was heartfelt and absolutely true. It was a
shocking, somewhat vulnerable admission, and Usagi realized at this
moment Mamoru was putting a great deal of trust in her--something she
had longed for for most of their relationship.

Usagi crossed her fingers and quietly hoped she didn't violate
that within the next twenty minutes.

When she looked at Mamoru, who had stood up and was walking
around the small area again, she knew he intrinsically understood what
she herself had been thinking, only his wish was far more fervent.

His approach was sudden and she was a little stunned when he
tilted her chin and kissed her ardently, his heated passion channeled
into the force of his lips on hers. Hungrily she responded, as anxious
for his touch as he was for hers.

After a minute, he reluctantly pulled back, leaving them both
gasping and tremulous.

"Feel that?" he demanded hoarsely. "That was more emotion than I
ever felt for any of those women at climax."

But Usagi still turned away.

------------------------------------------------------------ -----------
we tripped on the urge to feel alive, but now I'm struggling to survive
--------------------------------------------------------------- --------

Her eyes half-closed, shading their expression from him. "I
guess I should return the favor now, right?"

Mamoru gazed searchingly at her, noting the tiny droplets that
threatened to fall from her eyes, the way each of her hands clenched at
the other, the still, unblinking pose that locked her away from him.
Try as he might, he could not conquer the horrible feeling of loathing
for himself and for Usagi for letting these secrets lie buried in the
ground. With a shaking, painful intake of air, he nodded, affirming
her suspicions.

He wanted to hold her, to convince himself that she was still
here with him and that the spirit of the nameless, faceless lover in
the past did not still haunt her, haunt *them*, but she stood up and
went over towards the window, gazing at the graceful sliver of the
crescent moon.

"Haruhiko was the son of my father's college roommate," she began
in a deadpan, emotion only rising to caress the name gently, "I'd known
him since I was in diapers. He...he and I did everything together."
She wiped at her face with a fierce whipping motion, the force causing
the sleeve to leave a faint red mar. "Even though he was two years
older, he always played with me. Told me I was his favorite friend and
more special to him than anyone else. I...I'm insecure. I needed
that. Still do, I guess." She giggled nervously, blushing softly at
she looked over at Mamoru.

Already his heart was sinking, Mamoru realized. Had he ever said
any of those things to Usagi? The faceless ghost slowly morphed into a
daunting specter before his glazed eyes. He fought down the scorching
sense of jealousy and possessiveness that threatened to conquer his
ration.

"It was enough when I was younger to just be with him," she
murmured as her monologue took on a dreamy quality, "because all my
life there was this hole in my heart that could never be filled. I was
always looking for someone...I was looking for you, but I didn't know
it yet. But when I got older, it stopped being enough. Those were
rough times...I was so desperate to touch anyone, to fill that. Just
like you, I guess. We aren't so different."

"Yes we are," Mamoru hissed, ice and steel shot through his
system. "We are." He didn't want to believe that the motivations that
had brought him to wash his soul in filth were the ones Usagi shared.

The strange, strangled sound brought Usagi's attention back on
him for one moment. She reached out and placed delicate fingertips to
his jaw, lightly tracing the line. In unconscious appreciation, Mamoru
closed his eyes, raven locks falling over the fanned crescents, and
nuzzled her hand very faintly, silently reveling in the way her
most insignificant touch made his skin tingle as if it were a whole
other living organism, wondering why it couldn't always be like this
between them.

"We aren't," she assured him fiercely, "even if you deny it."

When she pulled back, it felt as if a chill mistral had blown
through his spirit. Wetting her lips, Usagi continued her tale. "And
then one day when I was 12, we were on vacation, the two families...and
Haru smiled and pulled me into this abandoned field. I remember it so
well...I can still smell the wildflowers if I try." She smiled
appreciatively and hugged herself, rocking with the force of the
memory. "And he told me...that he loved me, and asked me if maybe I
could kiss him?"

"What did you say?" Mamoru choked.

"Of course I said yes. And for a while, that was enough. He
filled the hole...his love was that strong and that pure. I was so
grateful for that. He wanted to be near me all time...it was so
wonderful...even after I started middle school with him, he and I were
always together. I loved to touch him, not just kisses," she started
excitedly, falling into the pattern of the long-lost story, "but just
little things like brushing his hand against mine, quick hugs, patting
his shoulder..." Her face darkened. "But one day, it wasn't enough
again."

Mamoru looked...dead. As if there were some doll-like replica of
himself rather than a breathing, existing human with Usagi. He was so
pallid he nearly blended in with the stark walls of his apartment. He
rubbed his temples, trying to force himself to feel again, to escape
the horrible self-made prison within which he now writhed.

"Haruhiko had been suggesting we take our relationship to the
next level for a while," Usagi told him, a little uncertain of the tact
necessary during this phase of the explanation. "Before I was
uncertain, but that day I was desperate to fill the hole. I said yes."

"And?"

"And for that moment, I think I forgot there'd ever been a void,"
she told him directly. "It was beautiful the first time, even with the
terrible pain. Neither of us really were sure, so it wasn't perfect...but
I felt *loved* like I never had before. That was the night of my
fourteenth birthday."

Her fourteenth birthday? No wonder she'd been so upset when
he thought he'd forgotten. After how special it had been the year
before...Mamoru was grateful that at least this time he had an excuse,
but that didn't really assauge the burgeoning guilt.

But the second time that night...the spell was broken." She sounded
bitter, mildly disillusioned. "And the time after that as well." Her
expression fell. "We started to drift from each other. He was still good
to me, but he wouldn't touch me like before...and he was always sad when
he looked at me. All sorts of stuff was happening at home; I came home
every day and cried...and then came the car accident. His sister and
her mother died. Tezuka-san changed jobs and took Haruhiko with him to
Hokkaido for a change of scenery." Usagi's eyes dimmed. "We just lost
touch. After everything we'd shared, I just...let him go."

He was shaking with a million pent-up emotions: fear, anxiety,
rage, desire, love...Mamoru turned away, embarrassed of his weakness,
terrified of his thoughts, more so of the potential courses of action
flooding his brain as Usagi watched him.

Because that was the moment he finally understood the real reason
she'd never told him about Tezuka Haruhiko.

"You loved him," he whispered painfully, the words pulled from
him like a needle sewing thread.

Usagi sat back down on the couch, suddenly thoughtful. "I did,"
she confessed, girlish and sweet. "I think a part of me always will.
But that doesn't mean you aren't the most important thing in my life,
Mamo-chan! YOU'RE the one who filled the void." She smiled a real
smile, happy to have the weighty secret from her chest, and stood up
again. Rushing to his side, she wrapped his arms around his waist,
holding him close as she leaned into his back. Mamoru stilled at the
tender, affectionate gesture, still paralyzed in shock and anguish.
"You're the one who I was waiting for all those years."

As long as she had Mamoru, Usagi knew, she could be happy.
Without him, she was nothing but a broken, empty half. Even if Haruhiko
had been able to make her happy for a while, deep down she knew the
feeling never would have lasted. Only Mamoru could compare, make her
dream to finally wake up without the dull searing sensation each morning
finally come true. She treasured him for that, even if it was entirely
unconscious on his part, and she was determined not to let him drift
away like she'd let Haruhiko do.

*I did...I think a part of me always will.* Inside his mind the
words beat a dull, heady rhythm, pounding on his head and heart until
his innards begged for emotional release--a scream, a tear, something
to liberate the misery building inside of him and let his weary spirit
rest for once.

She was supposed to be...after all the years of silent torment
she was supposed to fill the hole inside him, make him complete, love
him wholly and singlemindedly, the light at the end of the tunnel,
awakening after the long nightmare...

And this *hurt* like nothing ever had before.

For her part, Usagi wasn't aware of Mamoru's torturous inner
monologue, but she could still sense something terrible happening right
below the surface of the complex man she dared to love wholeheartedly.
"Mamo-chan?" she began into his back. "Is something wrong?"

"Nothing," he mumbled, and ripped out of her grasp. With a sigh
he flopped onto the couch, again rubbing his temples. When he closed
his eyes, all he saw was Usagi and the faceless wraith, laughing and
playing at love, reveling in emotion rather than letting it tear them
to ribbons. Things he didn't understand and could never share with
her. Love would always be something untrustworthy and painful to him;
even if Usagi was the finest of teachers, he could not lose himself in
love. That was his failure, but it had been a lot easier to accept
when he thought Usagi didn't know better.

"Mamo-chan..." She brushed stray bangs from his eyes, the simple
compassion of her actions nearly driving him to the brink of some
unwarranted, mindless fury. He shook off her gentle touch and nearly
leapt off the sofa in angry, disjointed motions, pacing furiously
towards the balcony, stopping instead to lean his forehead against the
glass. His left knuckles rapped lightly against the clear sheet while
he leaned more heavily; his eyes closed as if deep in thought.

Tears fell unabashedly down her cheeks as her private nightmare
played out in front of her. The years of guilt and regret poured over
her like an acid wash, eliciting a single broken sob as she crumpled to
the floor. Though she stifled her weeping against a delicate knuckle,
the soft, pained sounds still escaped.

"I'm not angry with you, Usa-ko," he said tonelessly, not even
bothering to feign sincerity. Mamoru didn't move; he remained
perfectly still against the glass. For the first time, he thought, he
hated his apartment, the blank, neutral tones, the immaculate décor,
the frigid lack of personality.

And he hated himself for creating it most of all. How could
Usagi, who was so full of life and love, love someone as empty as he was?
By all indications, he may as well have never existed.

Maybe he didn't understand, but he was still determined to hold
on to her with the full force of his will. And that meant bottling the
consuming aching within him before it spiraled out of control.

"Tell me what's wrong," she whispered, aching and raw with pure
emotion, still strewn in the pathetic heap on his drab gray carpet.
"For once, please."

Flesh and stone, blood and ice. Furious words bubbled in his
chest, but he refused to make the wholly selfish and unfair admission
to her. Ration argued vehemently against the firestorm of emotion
raging within him, but try as he might, he could not choke down the
horrid things that flooded his mind. He stayed stiff and still, as if
motion would release the malicious torrent upon the world.

Because Gods, he loved her beyond reason or understanding. She
was the one who'd saved him from himself, who had made him finally
complete, who had led him out of the shadow and into the Promised Land.
Her love was the drug that had replaced sex for him, and this viciously
ripped his fragile belief system apart.

Usagi's soft sobs vaguely permeated his consciousness, and two
slate slits appeared to look over at the wretched girl. She had her
head in her hands, and her golden pigtails pooled almost protectively
about their mistress. Though her eyes were bloodshot, they augmented
the clear blue of her eyes, giving them an unearthly glow. "Please,"
she pleaded one last time. "Just tell--"

"You were supposed to love ME!" Usagi yelped as the glass pane
exploded from within, shattering as the incensed Prince of Earth put
his hand through it, furious emotion, blood and sound and shards of
love and anger all mixing into a volatile cacophony. The debris
scattered carelessly around them, leaving them both with a deep sense
of ruin. She stared at him with wide, blinking doll's eyes, slowly
gathering herself off the floor and standing up on her two feet. "All
those years I was ALONE, Usa-ko, when I was waiting for you--those
girls meant nothing to me but this, THIS!" He snatched a towel hanging
off a chair and gently wrapped it around his bleeding appendage,
fighting back tears to reflect the ones silently dripping from Usagi's
cheeks. He closed his eyes and swallowed. "This is the worst betrayal
of all."

The room was so quiet that the beating of a moth's wing could
have been easily discerned.

Usagi was shaking too again, and while her tears ran steadily
down her cheeks the soft, broken cries accompanying them had flown away
with the breeze now circulating through the room.

"I told myself that for years after meeting you," she began in a
rasping, embittered voice, "that I had betrayed us by loving somebody
in the interim--by trying to be *happy*, as opposed to looking for
meaningless sex with nameless girls like you did," she said
acerbically, throwing his own words back in his face.

"That's not fair," he whispered, the rage that had consumed him
like a gasoline fire suddenly extinguished. All he was left with was a
growing guilt and the familiar self-loathing.

She sobbed softly. "It's not fair when *I* say it, you mean,"
she wept miserably. "Mamo-chan! You have to have EVERYTHING from me,
but I get nothing in return. Even this! Why do you have to be the
only one? YOU'RE the one...the one I always wanted. But you want
MORE?"

"I can't help how I feel," he protested miserably, feeling the
anger transform into bleak misery. "I need you and I . . . "

"And what about me? You take it all from me, Mamo-chan, take
it so there's nothing left and I'm just a shell. And I'm TIRED of it!
You're an emotional vampire!" She spat the last sentence. "Can't
we let this go and just be HAPPY for once?"

The truth rang through him as if it were a cathedral bell. "No."

Her sobs broke his heart, but as he stepped forward to comfort
her, bloodied hand and all, she shrieked violently, as if he were a
stranger trying to kidnap her, and ripped away from his grasp, dashing
to the other side to the room to escape him. "Don't touch me right
now," she ordered. "I can't think...when you touch me."

Mamoru struggled to find something, anything he could say to calm
her down. When his mind didn't come up with anything, he settled for
the truth. "I never said I was a perfect man, Usa-ko."

When he said that, Usagi's eyes took on a strange, glittering
quality he had never seen. "No, and that never changed the fact I love
you...and it never will...because, I love you so, so much," she sobbed
quietly. "So much," she repeatedly brokenly, "but..."

He felt his heart stop at the lingering last word. "But?" he
uttered through cracked, desperate lips.

Usagi stared him straight in the eye, mournful but determined.

"But you make me wish I didn't."

--------------------------------------------------------- --------------
I remember that time you said, "Love is touching souls--"
surely you've touched mine!
----------------------------------------------------------------- ------

Chiba Mamoru sat in the darkness, not bothering to get up and
turn on a light as the last rays of the sunlight faded from the sky.
Seconds, minutes, hours had passed--he'd lost track a long time ago,
not caring about useless marks on a clock at the moment.

The words were some sort of black curse; they pulsed through his
system, ripping things away like slow-acting cyanide. He didn't bother
to think, simply stared vacantly, absorbed in his shock and anguish,
too tired and destroyed to make sense of anything that had happened.

Tears ran down his face on and off; it wasn't worth the effort to
wipe them away. He felt dirty, as if he hadn't showered in a week (when
he just had this morning), and yet he did not feel the inclination to
stand and do something about it at that moment.

When his doorbell rang, he almost didn't bother getting it at
all. But after the third ring, accompanied by insistent knocking and
the rapidly speeding beat of his heart, he reluctantly stood up and
opened the door.

She practically launched herself into his arms, weeping softly
into the soft folds of his shirt. He retreated instantly, mamoreal to
her incarnadine fire, caustic and despondent and aimless in love and
yet unable to quite reach out and connect to her and the heat she could
provide.

"Will it always be like this between us, Mamo-chan, with one of
us constantly running after the other?"

He didn't want to show any weakness in front of her, but
his traitorous tear ducts had other plans. Hastily he wiped them away,
but not before Usagi could see. "I don't know."

Her weeping broke his heart, but he trembled at the thought of
a repeat performance of earlier. He couldn't deal with that level of
rejection at the moment.

Usagi had other ideas. Mamoru felt her sneak up on him, and
yet was startled when she wrapped his arms around his waist, her tears
hot and sticky on his back, unknowingly mimicking earlier that night
before everything they shared had been ripped and thrown away so
carelessly. Automatically he placed his hands over where hers clasped,
always determined to offer her his strength and warmth.

Was this really how they would spend their whole lives?

This endless dance, perpetual state of longing, the horrible
chasm that only holding her in his arms could fill?

It was an empty existence, living solely for another when each
conspired to destroy their happiness before ever meeting their intended.

"Make it go away," she pleaded in an aching whisper, "it hurts
too much...Mamo-chan, the only thing I ever wanted was to be with you."

He knew what she was asking him to do, to lose himself, him in
her and she in him, to throw caution to the wind for this singularly
aching, eternal moment and love her without any other thought behind
it. Usagi wanted to perpetuate the charade.

Usagi pulled away, and the too-familiar chill shook him from
within, already leaving him desperate for the warmth of her skin.

She cupped his face in her small, fragile hands, lighting
coursing over his lips over and over, drawing him in like a black
hole that led the way to the highest levels of Heaven. He dare
not pull away; the pain threatened to eat him alive otherwise.

"Please," she entreated one last time as she drew away from
him physically and spiritually. "Just stop it."

Mamoru felt the familiar sensation of ice running through his
veins, the deadly, systematic slicing of his insides, the sensation of
falling, always falling...

...this was life without her.

It was so much easier to pretend and make it go away for a
little bit, than face the truth.

And so he gladly obliged, taking her lips and body; he lost
himself in the feel of her skin, the sound of her cries, the taste of
her mouth...

...the bliss of forgetting.

But no ecstasy could erase the sharp sting of her words; no
matter the heights their lovemaking brought them to, Mamoru couldn't
quite forget that she still meant every word she had said earlier.

If he was indeed an emotional vampire, then he would gladly
take everything she gave.

------------------------------------------------------------ -----------
It's over now, I'm cold, alone; I'm just a person on my own
------------------------------------------------------------------- ----

She sat at the edge of the bed, arms wrapped around her stomach
tightly, wearing one of Mamoru's shirts. The buttons were off one and
her hair was loose, giving her a disheveled appearance. She was
looking out the window, off into the distance, her back to Mamoru.

He slowly returned to consciousness, reaching for the small girl
he had loved more deeply than anything in this world or the next and
yet could never find the words to tell her as much. He placed his hand
on her arm, and she could feel his eyes boring into her.

"Is something the matter, Usa-ko?"

"No," she whispered. "It was..."

...amazing.

...beautiful.

...wondrous.
...completely empty.

It shouldn't have been like this their first time, with all the
anger and hurt between them, but Usagi was too tired and lonely to care
about healthy relationships and communication. She just wanted to *feel*
him for a while.

She let him drag her back down to the bed, frantic to be lost
again, but even as she touched souls with him, let him take her to the
utmost heights of physical and emotional intimacy, one thought rang
through her mind like a siren's song.

Tomorrow they would reemerge in the world and pretend none of
this had ever happened. They would live the fairytale, follow the
dream, and forget this, forget that after the moonlight and the roses,
the Queens and the Kings and the worlds they transcended to be
together, when all that was stripped away, they were simply two
desperately lonely people searching for completion in another,
looking to lose oneself in heated touch and shocking kiss.

She didn't have the strength to make it any other way, and
neither did he. They would wait behind their carefully constructed
walls, replace the cold truths they'd learned with ordinary nuances,
act the part and live silently with their unnecessary solitude.

This was the price paid when one dreamed of and demanded castles
in the sky: to revert to the role of the ingénue.

Even with him by her side, there would be no happy ending.

And Tsukino Usagi swore she heard the sound of her heart
shattering like glass as she lay in his embrace.

--------------------------------------------------------- --------------
And I started dreaming that I wouldn't feel any of this again, again
----------------------------------------------------------------- ------

~Owari~


Ai: And that's a wrap, folks.
Readers: ...

Yeah, a LOT of ANs to write. Might as well get cracking.

#1) I'm relatively certain that there are people out there who did not
like what they just read. And they wouldn't have liked it even if I wrote
like Hermann Hesse, dammit. Allow me to explain how this idea, especially
in conjunction with the song, began to evolve:

Some of you may know Cyperian of Cyprus's "Turn Back Time." During one of
our many AM conversations, Emily (Cyperian) asked me for my unbiased
opinion of the fic. (And once I get started, I so pick.) After a long
hashing session, including a potential idea for a fanfic series based on
the TBT theme, THIS came up. Or more accurately, it had sort of
waiting to be hit upon. It comes on the heels of a rather shocking
confession from a close friend regarding her sex life...someone I never
would have expected to hear this from. And so Usagi (and to a lesser
extent, Mamoru, although he's not a young girl!) the ingénue was born.
Is it OOC? I think not; the story above is my only defense to that
claim however. Em and I literally discussed this for hours, how they
would react, when and how the revelation might come, guilt, hypocrisy,
anger, anguish--had a lot working for it.

All of this came on the heels of actually receiving Em's song for the
SMRFF lyric wheel challenge. She didn't pick the song with the idea in
mind, people. And while the lyrics were quite good, since there certainly
were some doozies on the wheel this time (*cough*RayeJohnsenandCori*cough*
^_~), I nevertheless struggled with them a great deal.

The lyrics are actually a little deceptive. They're very ambiguous
in that, had I the inclination (not that I would have), this could
have been WAFF. Hence my dilemma with them. You either went for the
positive (that it's okay to fall sometimes) or the negative
(that people fall and break) spin. There was sort of the middle
ground as well, which again went either way. I'm of the opinion that
this is about making what you will of what happens, whether it's good
or bad. In Usagi and Mamoru's case, they made the wrong one. Such
is life. The wheel's theme, "Chasing a Dream," reflected this darker
spin as well: the dream was to live the fairytale, even at the expense of
their happiness and comfort.

So I guess deep down I always knew this fic and this song were connected,
even though I was already using other song snippets as break lines.
Initially I was going to use a Makoto/Nephrite fic idea for this story,
but I decided the connection was too vague. So I had to make
Ingénue, which I kept being compelled to write despite finals and the
like, work. For a while, I planned to interject the lyrics into the
fic to "justify" it being my fic. Frankly, I don't think I need
to do that any longer. It would only be forced, and the song *did*
inspire the ending of the fic. (It would take me 24 hours for the
effect to take place and allow me to drop my original ending idea, but
nonetheless I do credit this song for it.) Call it BS, but I would
theorize that my lyrics sum up the spirit of the story (which some
would say wasn't very spirited, and I would concur).

Some of your aren't going to like this, as I stated above. If you
disagree with this story, I always encourage constructive criticism and
thoughtful response. Intelligent feedback is the best kind. I will
NOT tolerate idiot flamers. Should these appear I will officially
declare it "Flamer Hunting Season."

#2) Big thanks to Emily and Megs (DQBunny) for listening to my
random madness. I would appreciate and encourage honest feedback
regarding this story, especially considering its dubious topic.

#3) I apologize for liberal use of the Yamhead. I really hate her and
usually like to write her out of fics somehow, but this one required
her. Hopefully she wasn't butchered too badly?

#4) The break lines all used assorted song quotes. The songs they're
from are as follows:

#1 - Aimee Mann, "That's Just What You Are"
#2 - Counting Crows, "Angels of the Silences"
#3 - Fuel, "Hemorrhage in my Hands"
#4 & 5 - Aimee Mann, "Pavlov's Bell"
#6 - Aimee Mann, "The Moth"
#7 - Better than Ezra, "Falling Apart"
#8 - Third Eye Blind, "Semi-Charmed Life"
#9 - Joni Mitchell, "A Case of You"
#10 - K's Choice, "Not an Addict"
#11 - Boston, "More Than a Feeling" (But I VASTLY prefer the Sleater-
Kinney cover ^_~)

(Can you tell I've been on an Aimee Mann kick lately?)

The songs would, by the way, make up an excellent soundtrack for this
story as well, in addition to Riddle's.

#5) For once my no-sequel policy is NOT in effect! I won't promise
anything, but I do suspect I'll be compelled to resolve the issues the
fic presented. Usagi and Mamoru at this time in the timeline lack the
mental and emotional strength to overcome their problems, so they
preferred to bury them and go back to living as if none of this ever
happened. It's possible they could in the future; I daresay it's even
necessary.

So again, I might write a fic resolving them. I might not. Not really
sure at this point. Please don't ask for one; I'm sort of a freak
about that and might decide against it. Basically, no promises.

All right. I think that covers everything. Oh! Almost forgot!

Remember: feedback goes to tennyo@attbi.com!


--Ai-ko, 12/16/2002