Through Rose-Colored Glass
Title: Through Rose-Colored Glass
Part: 6/?
Rating: PG-13 (subject to change in future)
Pairings: Aeris/Sephiroth, Aeris/Zack
Summary: Time is constantly moving and Aeris is keenly aware of this fact as Zack asks her the one question she hoped he never would....
Time never stands still - it is constantly in movement. And while we hurry and rush about our day because we don't have the time, time itself never rushes. It progresses steadily and it is only our humanness that makes us believe time has passed by quickly or slowly. And part of Aeris wanted to say that time had flown by quickly while another part of her, the less human side, had noticed no change in the progression of time.
Zack was funny.
Zack was sweet.
Zack was fun.
Zack was unpredictably predictable.
Zack was friendly.
Zack was understanding.
But Zack didn't understand her, not the way she wanted him too. Bless his heart, he tried, and it touched Aeris to know that he cared so much about her. Aeris tingled with excitement at the sweet kisses they shared and the very, inappropriate groping that took place in her little church, away from the watchful eyes of her mother. With Zack, she felt a little less lonely. Unfortunately, Zack was a SOLDIER and Zack was under the command of Sephiroth and thus Zack had many assignments that kept him away. So, while she delighted in her child-like romance with Zack, she still felt so utterly alone.
And these thoughts crossed her mind as she stared up into his warm, brown eyes. “Lemme guess,” he chuckled, watching her expressionless face, “You're bored!”
“I've never been outside Midgar.” Aeris was laying stretched out in her little garden, like she always did, when she was bored or just wanted to feel a closer connection to the Planet. She sat up and tucked her legs underneath her body. Her eyes, the exact same color of the Lifestream, bored into him. Zack was a good person; a really good person. He was a friend to the friendless and the Planet hummed happiness in his presence. The Planet liked Zack and that was definitely a good thing.
She must have been staring at him too long and too intensively because Aeris noticed the way Zack was starting to squirm. Aeris sighed before letting an apologetic smile ghost her lips, hoping it would make Zack more comfortable. He had admitted to her on more than one occasion that she freaked him out sometimes when she stared so intensively at him, like she was trying to peer into his soul. “Tell me about Wutai,” she demanded though really, her soft voice hardly made it sound like a demand.
“Again?” Zack laughed, stooping to kiss her forehead. “Don't you ever get tired of my stories?”
“I've never been outside Midgar,” she repeated, as if that explained everything.
“One day, Aeris, I promise to take you on a tour of the world.”
A look of alarm quickly crossed her face. She shook her head, “What? No... I don't want to leave Midgar. I can't possibly...”
Zack sighed, not really sure what to do. He thought Aeris wanted to escape Midgar, with the way she always talked about never having seen the world outside of Midgar. Had she been trapped inside of Midgar's metal walls so long that she was afraid to leave? “I thought you wanted to leave, Midgar.”
Time was a funny thing in that it wasn't just one dimensional but rather a complicated entity. People would say that time stops for some but that wasn't true. Time never stopped its movement but merely waited. And for her, time was waiting. Aeris was too afraid to step outside of Midgar but she knew time would not wait forever; it would enlist the help of its dear friend, Destiny. Time, Destiny, Fate, Death... Aeris trembled slightly at their names. People called them without thought, without reverence but Aeris knew these ancient gods existed, had always existed, and would continue to do until the last breath of life had been collected by Death itself.
“Don't worry about it,” Aeris replied sweetly. She wanted to be normal and she could at least pretend she had some degree of normalcy around Zack. “I'm just being weird again.”
“What!? Someone as cute as you? Weird!? No way,” Zack joked, coaxing laughter from her. He liked to hear Aeris laugh because her laughter always reminded him of an eternal springtime. It was weird image and one he couldn't explain but he could think of no other description to describe her laughter: eternal spring.
Aeris lazily stood up, with the help of Zack. She stretched a bit before following Zack over to one of the pews. She sat next to him and touched his face, which alarmed Zack somewhat. Aeris was hardly ever that forward but he didn't say anything. And why would he? It wasn't every a day a pretty girl touched him as gently and delicately as Aeris, his girlfriend. Zack smiled. He liked the way that sounded. “Damn, I'm lucky.”
Aeris was a petite thing. She had a heart-shape face with long chestnut brown hair that she kept braided, and the most enchanting forest green eyes he'd ever seen. Her smile could start wars, he once told his friends, because she was truly that beautiful. Otherworldly; it was the only word he could think to accurately describe Aeris. She was completely out of place in the slums and Zack, from the moment he first saw her, wanted to put her in a glass cage and protect her. Zack had never been in love before but he was pretty sure what he felt for Aeris came damn close to it.
Aeris inched closer to Zack's lips, her own parted slightly. The warmth of her breath held Zack captivated. “Tseng came to see me the other day.”
“And ruin the moment with talk of another man,” Zack whined, pulling back from Aeris.
Aeris giggled feeling only slightly bad about bringing up Tseng. She hadn't really meant to talk about Tseng; it was just that he crossed her mind at that particular moment. “He says that Shinra has lost interest in me for now because of Sephiroth. So things are safe for me for awhile anyway.”
“Shit,” he cursed. It took him some time to get Aeris to open up to him but when she did... boy, did she lay a whammy on him when she confessed she was wanted by Shinra. Zack was determined, come hell or high water, that Aeris was not going to be captured by his employer. It put him in a rather delicate situation but Aeris was the worth the risk. “Shit. The executives are scared shitless because of his attack on Scarlet. I heard through the grapevine that Hojo has placed blame on the President for keeping Sephiroth stuck at the Shinra HQ when his talents should be put to better use. But funny thing is: no one punished Sephiroth and I don't think he's going to get punished at all. Too many people are scared of him, except for Hojo, which makes me wonder about that quack's sanity.”
“How is Scarlet?” Aeris asked. Zack had told her stories of Shinra employees but these people were all faceless to her.
“Pretty bad, I hear,” Zack told her, putting his arm around her shoulder and pulling her close. “But she'll survive. Sephiroth has been given a lot of missions lately. They want to put him on the battlefield where his anger would be put to better use. And I've gotten to work with him on some. Cool, huh?”
“Yeah. What's he like?” Aeris asked, her eyes closed as she leaned against Zack. He smelled nice and was soft. She could get used to that feeling, she thought to herself.
“Like you.” The words slipped out of his mouth before he could stop them.
Aeris immediately tensed up and pulled away from him. “There's no one like me, Zack.”
“Damn straight!” he replied just as quickly. The topic of Aeris's heritage was sensitive to her and Zack tried to remedy the situation quickly. “But Sephiroth always seems so lonely, so apart from everything. When I look at him, I can't help but wonder what he sees through his eyes. The same with you sometimes. I want to see the world through your eyes.”
Aeris wasn't so sure if Zack really wanted to see the world through her eyes; she didn't want him too. She was a sweet and cheerful girl, most of the time, anyway, and she didn't want Zack to know about the bitterness festering inside her chest. “It's okay. I'm not being very pleasant company, am I?”
She wrapped her arms around Zack and pulled him towards her, crushing her lips against his. She loved being Zack, loved the way she would slip her tongue inside his mouth. She loved the way her body pressed against his hard chest and the way she could feel his excitement poking her. Aeris loved the way her nipples hardened and she could the first tingles of wetness between her legs. Indeed, Aeris loved feeling like she was wanted and normal.
With Zack, she could pretend she didn't hear voices in her head and that she didn't feel the Planet coursing through every vein in her body. Aeris could pretend she was a normal girl living a normal life, or as normal a life one could have living in the slums. With Zack, she was just another girl... and she wanted it to stay that way...
But then he had to go and ask her that one question, that one question that would change everything.
“Would you like to meet Sephiroth?”
And for the millionth god damned time, Aeris cursed destiny.