Everyday you can see changes in her hair and smile [closed]
Characters: Anthy Himemiya and Utena Tenjou
Content: Anthy is worried and needs to talk to Utena
Setting: Utena's cabin
Time: After the Doma news, after the conversation on Anko's journal
Warnings: emotional turmoil, princes
( I can wait a million days while her smile goes away )
Content: Anthy is worried and needs to talk to Utena
Setting: Utena's cabin
Time: After the Doma news, after the conversation on Anko's journal
Warnings: emotional turmoil, princes
( I can wait a million days while her smile goes away )
Her hands tensed in her lap. For a moment she looked down at them. That was easier. It was so strange to talk to someone you used to be engaged to, someone you used to share a room with, in their new room, that they slept in all by themselves. Even if it hadn't been a normal engagement.
She had spent a lot of time thinking about Utena, and imagining her in her cabin, hating the bleakness of coming home to an empty room. But now that she was here, Utena seemed perfectly content in her own room, by herself, doing her own things, as if all that time had been a dream after all. Perhaps that would make things easier in the future, Anthy didn't know. What would Shinji or anyone else think of the two of them double bunking? But now it was not a question. She just had to deal with the one ahead of her.
"Doma," she said, after a moment. "They're going to be asking questions." She paused again. It was very hard. "I know we haven't talked...but..." There really wasn't a good way to finish that. "We don't know what happened. We don't know...who could still be looking for us." She took a breath and looked up. "We need to make sure no one recognizes us," she said, hoping Utena would understand her meaning.
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"Who's going to recognize us?" she asked. It wasn't like they were anywhere near where they'd come from... Or like she was even sure that place had existed, in the strictest sense of the term. She didn't have family, and didn't think she'd ever heard Anthy mention family besides her brother...
And it wasn't like they were that notable in a crowd.... Right?
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Anthy wondered if Utena knew how many people had died to open the Rose Gate, what sort of magic had been involved. People willing to use blood magic that required death as part of the process were unlikely to balk at minor things like kidnapping, and they were also unlikely to be shaken from their goals.
"A short, uncommonly dark girl with a marked forehead and purple hair traveling with a tall pink haired girl in boy's clothing...That can hardly be a common sight. Do you think there would be any second such pair on Reial? If someone has people keeping their eyes open, we'd be hard to miss." She tried not to let her expression change. "That is why I have brought some dye," she said calmly. She was not expecting Utena to like it.
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Even if they were, it wasn't going to change Utena's stance that easily. "I'm not going to hide," she said, her dislike of the very idea plain. "I fought them before, and if they come looking for it, I'll do it again. Why should I have to cover up who I am?"
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Anthy didn't understand what was going through Utena's mind. She didn't understand any of it. Maybe once she thought she had, but now she was unsure. Could she have been so wrong?
Why had Utena stayed so close before, only to seem so distant now? Had that simply been to protect her physically? If that was the case, Anthy did not think she could live with a return of that situation, knowing that was the only reason Utena was with her. Surely that had not been the case!
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It wasn't the way she was, never had been, and could never be. She didn't run from problems, no matter how big they were or how much easier it would be to just turn around and pretend it had never happened. She just didn't have it in her to bend to someone else's will. "I'm not scared," she said, quietly but certainly. Then, looking over into Anthy's eyes, she gave a small, reassuring smile. "I'm not scared, and you don't have to be, either. We have each other again, right? I'll protect you. We can take care of each other." Maybe it wasn't quite that simple, but they'd work things out! They'd get through!
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She raised her chin haughtily, a defense against hurt. "Then listen to me," she said fiercely. "To ME, Miss Utena," she continued, trying to be more gentle. Suddenly she felt her eyes start to burn. "We are together again. You and me." She felt the tears start to roll down her cheeks, and she felt the weakness inside her again that threatened to consume her.
Instead she reached out, aggressive again, and grabbed Utena's hands. She missed her so much. "Please...?" she started, and hating her voice, broke off, turning her head to the side for a split second while slamming shut the iron door that could seal all her emotions away. When she turned back her face was the calm, blank mask that must be more familiar to Utena.
"If we're going to take care of each other, then you'll have to listen to me too. And I..." She looked down for a moment. She didn't know how to communicate with Utena.
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She didn't have time to feel bad about it for long, though, before Anthy was flinging more emotion at her--angry, at first, then...were those tears? She didn't think she'd ever seen such a range of emotion from her companion in so short a time, and even when Anthy clamped down on the display and put her walls up again, there were small, wet trails lingering on her cheeks...
"Anthy..."
Utena wondered how she'd gone so long thinking Anthy was doing just fine, and not really talking to her. It was hopeful, that she'd found the strength to be so assertive even just for a little while, but Utena could see now that she was still lonely, still in need of someone to help her now and then. They'd been around each other without getting close for so many days now, but surely it wasn't too late for Utena to just reach out...
Taking one of her hands firmly but gently away from Anthy's grasp, she reached out and stroked the tears from her face. "Of course I'll listen. As long as you'll talk to me, I'll listen..." Moving from her spot on the bed, she pulled the other girl into an embrace. She wasn't quite sure what to say, but she wanted to be there for her friend...
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She didn't know how to tell her what it was like. She didn't know how to tell her what she felt or what she wanted, and the feelings she did know seemed so grandiose and melodramatic. I love you, Miss Utena, my Utena, even when I hated you I loved you, even when I stabbed you I wanted to hold you close as I eased your poor body to the ground.
"I hated being the Rose Bride," she said finally, apropos of nothing, voice a little blurry through the tears. It was just the first thing that came out of her mouth. "I hated being bound to anyone, forced to obey them. I hated you too, at first. Because." She started to sniff a little, tears starting to come back. "But now...I want us to be together, Utena," she said, using the name a little shyly. That is why I was so mad at you, she thought silently, you could be away from me and you looked so happy...while I starved for you, jealous in the shadows. "I want...I want us to be friends. Real friends..."
Close friends...
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But she didn't, and Anthy was still in her arms, calling her by name without being mad at her or fawning over her, saying words that Utena had wanted so badly to hear her say for so long...
"We are real friends," she whispered, clutching Anthy to herself like she would disappear again. She had never offered Anthy anything else but honest friendship, even when thing went bad, and if Anthy wanted to return that, she would accept it happily.
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"You know things will be different now," she said a little tentatively, but there was hope in her voice. She was a free person now. She knew Utena might not like the real Anthy- a creature much more petty and small than Utena's dreams of nobility- ambiguous, uncertain, sometimes selfish and manipulative. But also something else, other things, other things she didn't fully understand herself.
She didn't loosen her arms too much, but she moved her hand, catching a lock of Utena's pretty pink hair behind her back and running it through her fingers. "I may not be who you thought I was...but I think that I've come to know you, at least a little." She paused. "And I want you to know me too, the real me..."
It was a scary thought, but the only option was forward, forging new ground. She wanted to keep Utena close to her, with her, like this.
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Of course things would be different. They were free now, both of them--free to find their own way, to grow and change and flourish, to make mistakes, and crash and burn, and rise again from the ashes. Things would be different, but on some level, they were always the same, had nowhere to go but up. "Of course they will be," she said aloud, with none of Anthy's trepidation. Whatever they faced, from the world or their own selves, she had every bit of confidence that they could deal with it together.
She closed her eyes, just listening to Anthy's smooth, calming voice and feeling her closeness, and she couldn't imagine that the real Anthy was someone she would care about any less than the one she had known, because she had accepted her without condition a long time ago.
"I want to get to know you more, too, then," she said. That was another thing she was completely sure of--being close to Anthy felt right to her, and deepening their trust and friendship could only be more right. "We've got plenty of time for that now..."
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She knew it was not a dream, and yet it felt like a dream, that floating, wish-fulfilled feeling. The world seemed to soaked in a soft haze of light, but no, that was just her feelings. She had imagined moments like this so many times before, and when she did, they were always happening in a far off place, surrounded by light that made up the fabric of reality around them. Secret dreamlets hidden far far away behind veils of falling pink rose petals...
All that mattered was that Utena wanted more moments like this too, that she agreed this was the way things should be. Another click of that strange internal kaleidoscope turned over and it seemed to rest in a familiar place, where palatial glass doors opened and the vistas were of endless skies.
Oh, it's so hard for me to know who I am, or what I feel, she thought. But I know that I've missed this, missed this so much. And I was so terribly afraid that things would never be like this again. But now..."We have all the time the world," she murmured.
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