glad you liked it!
i have the pics now! i'll try my hardest to upload them before i have to leave, k? (going to school's state tournament in an hour...it's a 6 hour drive! i hope my mp3 will last long enough to get me through...)
here's the next chappie - i feel like i owe it to you guys to put another one up while i can. so, here it is! oh, & it's SUPER long! think of it as a 'sorry for the constant chappie delay' present. (though i didn't plan it like that; the chappie just turned out really long & i didn't think it should've been cut in half.)
Chapter 84
Anna walked into the stone street. She looked around, but didn’t see Riku anywhere. “Riku?” She said loud enough for someone close by to hear. No one answered. She looked further down the street and saw a figure standing there. It looked like Riku. She started walking in his direction, but stopped when she saw a large, black portal appear in front of him. She panicked. He was leaving. Leaving for a little while, leaving for a long time, or leaving forever, she didn’t know. She didn’t know if he was just going back to the islands, or if he was leaving for good. Fear struck her heart that he was going to do the latter of the two options she thought of.
“Riku! Riku, stop! Don’t go!” Anna called out to him, panicking. Riku, almost to the end of the street, turned around upon hearing her voice. He didn’t want her to see him after having acted like he did, and he especially didn’t want her seeing him try to leave. He didn’t want to have to face her, but he knew it would only hurt her more if he tried to brush it off. He walked up to her shamefully as she ran towards him. Behind him, the portal closed. “Anna, I…” He didn’t know what to say next. “Riku, please…please tell me that you weren’t leaving. Please tell me you’re okay.” She breathed once they were close enough for him to hear her. Her eyes looked watery. “Anna, what’s wrong?” “No, Riku, answer me right now. Please – are you okay or not? Were you leaving?” She begged. “I’m fine…I just don’t know what happened to me in there. I…” He left his sentence trailing when he saw a tear form under her eye. “I was leaving, Anna, but it’s just because I was mad. I wanted to go somewhere and calm down. I’m not leaving you.” She seemed slightly relieved, but a tear fell down to the brick street beneath them. “Anna, tell me if you’re okay.”
“I, I thought…that maybe…something happened…to you, since you never…really act like that...get that mad…” He tilted her chin up with his fingers and looked her in the eyes. “Anna…that isn’t it, is it?” He knew she was trying to hide the real reason she was upset. She didn’t say anything, but more tears rolled down her face. “Anna…tell me the truth. Please?” She gave up. She knew she couldn’t mask what she felt around him right now; he saw right through the mask. “This is all my fault.” She breathed, trying not to cry. “What are you talking about?” He was confused.
“If I had never…if I had never come here…if I had stayed on Earth…” “Anna, don’t -” Riku was cut off. “You know it’s true! If I had never come, you guys wouldn’t have been separated; you wouldn’t have had to go through half of what you did go through; Tidus might not have left; Shadow wouldn’t have ever hurt me, so you wouldn’t act like you just did; my parents and friends would have whole memories; Earth would be safe; and my parents and friends wouldn’t have their lives put in danger because of me! My family and friends! It’s probably best if I just go back to Earth before I make things worse! Even if they don’t remember me…” She said as she cried. She pulled back from him some, making his fingers leave her chin, and she covered her face in her hands. “Anna, please…please don’t say things like that.” “You know they’re true! I feel so selfish; I get a happy life and look at what it’s cost everyone else!” She refuted. “Tidus’s leaving had nothing to do with you. Trust me, you are not the reason he left. It would not be best if you left. It would make me miserable. And you are not selfish; not in the least. If you were selfish, you wouldn’t have risked your life so many times just to save others. You’re not selfish at all; you deserve a happy life, Anna. And, even if the rest are true…I don’t care. If you never came here…I’m not sure I’d still be living. And I know…that if you left…” He paused to move closer to her, pull her hands away from her face, and gently hold her head up in his hands so that he could look her in the eyes. “…I wouldn’t be whole anymore.”
He kissed her on the forehead and then wrapped his arms around her. “I don’t want you to say things like that ever again, okay?” He whispered in her ear. She nodded slightly after burying her face in his chest. “Promise me you’ll never leave me. Please. I need you.” He begged. For some reason, he felt needy. At that moment, he realized that he didn’t just want her there; he needed her there. He needed her. “I won’t leave you, Riku. I just…I miss them so much. My own mom…dad…brothers…they don’t even remember my name…my face…my voice…me. They don’t know me anymore. I lost them. If they saw me…I’d be a stranger to them. I’m a stranger to my family! I just...I miss them so much! So much…it hurts!” Her muffled voice gave indication that she was starting to cry harder. She took a sharp breath and a short, desperate cry escaped her mouth. Riku felt hot tears soak through his shirt onto his skin. Anna broke into sobs. Her knees gave out on her; Riku’s arms around her were all that kept her from collapsing onto the street.
She gripped his shirt with both fists and buried her face into his chest again. Despite the fact that she was sobbing so hard that she had to inhale large, quick breaths, her crying was quiet. In fact, the loudest thing was her sharp intake of air. It sounded painful to Riku. He could almost feel her pain; as if it were soaking into him. Her pain…hurt him also. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t even know if he could find the voice to say anything. If he opened his mouth, he didn’t know what would gush out. He didn’t want her to hurt so badly. He wanted her to be happy; happy were she was. He didn’t want her to mourn over her family’s forgetting her. He wanted her to be happy without them; to not need them. He was jealous. Entirely jealous of her family; the one last thing that might persuade her to leave him and go to Earth forever. She had only promised not to leave him. She never said that she wouldn’t leave him later on. He couldn’t stand for her to go.
“It’s okay, Anna. I’m right here…right her for you. Always. I’ll always be here.” He whispered to her softly. “You don’t need your family. You’ve got me now. Please…need me. Need me.” Her sobs kept coming. He knew he couldn’t stop her from crying, but he wished she didn’t have a reason to cry. Her family was the reason she was crying. All the more reason for Riku to dislike them. “It’s okay. I’m here for you. It’s okay to cry.” “R-Riku?” “Yes?” “D-Do, do you think…they’ll ever remember…me?” She asked in a near silent voice, pausing to gasp for air. “I…I’m not sure. But even if they don’t, you’ll be okay.” She let out another short, hopeless cry. “You…you will be okay…right?” He asked nervously. “I…don’t know. Don’t…think so.” She answered.
Her quiet words hit Riku hard. “But…why now? You’ve been fine all this time…and now…you suddenly miss them so badly?” “Anna…how long…have you felt like this? How long…have you hurt like this?” She didn’t answer. “Anna…c’mon. Answer me, please?” “Disney Castle.” She muttered. “What?” “Disney Castle? Does she mean…that long ago?” “Since Disney Castle. But…it’s sorta…built up…to being this painful.” “Anna…you…you’ve been…” “…You’ve been suffering…so long…and I never even knew. Suffering…because I stole you away…from them…” “Why…why didn’t you tell me, Anna? Why didn’t you tell me that you missed them this much?” “You…I thought…you’d be…upset…at me for…missing them so much…” “Anna…what have I done to you? Did I…did I cause all you pain?” “You thought I would be mad at you for missing your family.” She nodded slightly. Her sobs had died down back to just crying.
“You never…never…have to keep anything from me. Never. And if I’m mad because I think you’re wrong, I’ll know what you’re probably the one who’s right, and I’ll try my hardest to change. I couldn’t stay mad at you for long, anyway…not even if I wanted to. I don’t want…” He stopped to put his mouth right by her ear before finishing, “…us to think we can’t tell each other everything…no matter what it is.” “Okay…” She whispered. He looked down and noticed her legs were hanging limp, with her feet just resting on the ground. She couldn’t even stand on her own. He carefully picked her up and started walking down the street in the direction he had originally been going.
She didn’t resist. She didn’t say anything. All she did was stop crying. She didn’t know where they were going, or why they were going, or when they would come back. But she didn’t care. All she could think about was her family…and Riku. “He said he didn’t want us to keep secrets from each other…and he meant it, right? So…why do I feel like he’s not telling me something about how he regards my family?” “Riku?” “Yes?” “Are…you mad at me for missing my family?” She asked quietly, still sniffing some. He was silent for a moment, which vexed her. “I’m not mad at you, Anna. I’m…I’m mad at myself, actually.” “Mm? Why is that?” She asked as she looked up at him. “I..um…listen, I’ll try my hardest to change, okay?” He answered as he glanced down at her. She didn’t smile, yet she didn’t frown. She simply put her head back against his shoulder and said, “Okay.”
Riku hated himself for what he’d done to Anna, for how he was so jealous of her family. He’d let Anna suffer for so long, all because deep down, he never wanted her to wish she could be with her family. She was painfully aware of that jealousy, even though for the longest time, he wasn’t. It made her afraid to let him know how much she was hurting. He had let his jealousy worsen over time; it’d been eating away at him, growing more and more every day. He wanted Anna all to himself; he didn’t want to lose her to her family, or even to have to share her with them. He’d been so jealous, so selfish, and he hadn’t realized it until it caused the person most precious to him to break. “I’m going to change. I mean it. It may take a while, but I’ll change. I will, Anna.”
“Riku?” “Yes?” “You don’t have to love my family. You don’t even have to like them. I’m not asking that of you. All I ask is that, eventually, you’ll learn to tolerate them. I know you think they’ve caused me so much pain, but that’s only because I love them that I miss them so much.” “And you wish that they loved you back?” “Yea.” “They do love you, Anna. Deep down, in their hearts. They my not remember it, but that love is still there, in their hearts. All they need to remember is their memories of you. And even if they never get those memories back, I’m sure that if you somehow spent time with them again, that feeling would start to emerge. I know that they love you, Anna. Love that strong doesn’t just fade away as fast as memories do.”
Anna thought about it. “How do you know that they still love me?” “It’s practically impossible to know you and not love you in some way.” “I wonder if he realizes what that sounds like…coming from a guy holding me…I hope I’m not blushing.” “I know you wish you had confirmation that your family loves you…but…would it be enough for now if I told you that I love you?” Anna was stunned. “…Yes…” “Anna…I love you.”
Anna’s heart pounded. Riku had mentioned a few times before that he liked her, but this was the first time he’d ever told her that he loved her. She could hear his heart beating rapidly; the rhythmic noise melted away her past worries. It made her smile. But then a new thought entered her mind. “He…loves me. Not just likes, but loves me. This…the way he feels…it’s real. The way I feel…when did I start loving him? How long have I felt this way? Now…all of the sudden…it feels so real. So…alive.”
“I guess you’re wondering how long I’ve felt this way – how long I’ve loved you.” Riku mentioned, seeing her look off into the distance as if she could see her thoughts in the air; the way she looked when she thought deeply about something. “I wasn’t, but I am now, since you mentioned it.”
“If I knew how to keep my mouth shut around her…if only I could do that simple task…I wouldn’t have to spill about all my feelings. Why is it that guys completely lose their cool around the girls that they love? Why can’t girls do the same?! Then we could look stupid together. That would be so much better than me looking like an idiot by myself! Wait – could she even do that? Could Anna even be an idiot? Sure, she has her blonde moments, and she’s really random, and she laughs even more than Sora does…but those traits aren’t stupid. They couldn’t be stupid – they belong to Anna. They’re cute. So…I’ll just have to be an idiot by myself while she’s perfect, since she can’t be anything but that.”
“Riku?” “Huh? Oh, sorry. I was just…thinking. Um…so, when I fell in love with you. Well, I don’t really know how it happened. It happened so silently…so slowly, but so fast at the same time. It was like one day, you were my friend, and then you were more than a friend. Then, you were much more than a friend, and before I knew what was going on, I realized that I loved you. I don’t really know when I fell in love with you, but ever since Atlantica, it became real to me. I guess I’ve loved you for quite a while now. It’s just that now, it feels so…I don’t even know if there’s a word for it. My feelings for you…how I love you…now it’s so…alive. Does that make sense?” He looked down at her and saw glistening tears rolling down her face. “What?! I made her cry?! What did I say wrong?!” Then he noticed her mouth was in a little smile.
She nodded, showing that she understood what he meant when he said his feelings were alive. She understood because she felt the exact same. Riku didn’t know why she was tearing up. “Anna, are you…” He couldn’t finish; she looked up at him and gazed into his eyes, which caused him to lose all train of thought. All he could do was gaze back into her eyes, and he slowed walking until he had stopped in the middle of the streets dimly lit by the street lights. The dusk sky was slowly getting darker.
“Riku, I…I love you too.” She said softly. He melted. His heart was beating erratically, and he was sure she could hear, since her head was leaning against his chest now. “You hear that, don’t you?” He asked with a smile. “Mm?” She asked innocently; but her tiny smile was growing. “My heartbeat…it’s pretty crazy right now, isn’t it?” She didn’t say anything; she just broke into a large smile and laughed a little. Riku grinned. “It’s just great how I look like a nervous, stupid little kid each time I talk to you like this.” He mentioned. Anna laughed again. “You really think you look like that right now?” “Pretty much.” “Well, if it helps any, I think nervous, stupid little kids are cute.” Anna was still smiling at him. “Really…So I do look like a dorky little boy. Great. I’m sure that’s attractive.” Anna laughed again. “You’re not dorky, Riku!” “So you’re saying that I’m not attractive because I’m not dorky.” He teased. “I didn’t say that! And you can put me down now; I can walk.” “What if I don’t want to put you down?” “Don’t say that too loud! People might think you’re a perv!” “I don’t care what they think. Only what you think.” “I don’t think you’re a perv. But I do want to walk.” Riku looked down at her again and stopped walking. “What’s so bad about me holding you?”
“Nothing, but I just want to walk.” “So you have no other objections besides that?” She grinned. “Actually, I’m tired of listening to your erratic heartbeat.” “What was that for?!” He acted like he was about to drop her and she instantly clenched her eyes shut and flung her arms around his neck. Riku laughed. “Riku!” “Revenge is as sweet as they say it is.” He grinned. “Just put me down already!” She said as she glared at him. He moved his arms to where he was holding her waist and let her legs fall. She stood up and started to walk forward, but she forgot that Riku’s arms were still holding her waist. She jerked forward, and then Riku pulled her back.
“Ack! Riku! Stop it!” She said with laughter in her voice as she struggled to get out of his hold. “Ugh! I give up.” She slunk back and slouched. Riku was still laughing. “Sorry, you can’t run away from me like that.” He grinned. “Whatever…” She muttered as she kept slouching in defeat. “C’mon, at least smile.” He begged. She kept slouching, still. He lifted her chin up with his hand to make her look at him. She looked at him with pitiful eyes. “Anna…what…” She grinned. She quickly freed herself from his other hand on her waist and started running down the street. “Catch me if you can!” She laughed. “What?! Anna!” He instantly ran after her. He could still hear her laughing. After running down many different streets, she slowed down and stopped. Riku caught up to her and turned her around. She was still laughing. “You are a devious little girl, Anna. Y’know that?” He smiled. “I know!” She smiled back. “Why’d you stop running?” “I can’t run fast when I’m laughing. I run out of breath too quickly.” She explained as her laughter died down.
“Ooh. Riku?” “Yea?” “I’m hungry.” “Didn’t you eat just a few hours ago?!” “It was too long ago! Three hours! I need food; I’m starving!” Riku couldn’t help but smile at her. “You’re a hopeless, devious little girl, Anna.” “Guess I am.” “What are you craving?” “Ice cream!” Riku laughed. “You sound like a little kid.” “Really?” She asked him with big, playful eyes. “Yea. Like a devious, hungry little kid who can barely stop laughing.” Anna smiled. “It’s cute.” He told her softly. She blushed.
“And I love that devious, hungry, little girl so much.” He wrapped one arm around hr waist and pulled her closer to him slowly. He brushed the side of her face with his other hand as he gazed into her eyes tenderly. Her expression changed; she took on the look of complete innocence. The one word that entered Riku’s mind when he looked at her, the one word that embodied her, was “beautiful”. The way she looked, her smile, her eyes, her laugh, her personality; everything about her was beautiful to him. Inside and out, she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.
Riku moved his hand on her cheek to the back of her neck. His fingers tingled on her warm skin, and the feeling spread throughout his body. He gently pulled her in and kissed her. She unconsciously put her hands on his chest. When they pulled apart, they were both blushing, but neither of them noticed. They simply hugged each other for a little while. Anna was so happy she almost couldn’t stand it. Then she felt something different. It took her a moment to identify what it was, since she was a little dazed. It was hunger.
“Um, Riku?” “Let’s go find some ice cream.” He smiled, knowing what she was thinking. She returned a bright smile and took his hand. They walked down the street in hopes of finding a place that sold ice cream that was still open. It had become nighttime while they were roaming the streets, and they hadn’t noticed until they started walking again. “So, what kind of ice cream do you want?” He asked her. “I dunno. Maybe sea salt. How about you?” “Whatever you’re getting.” “Why?” “Because it takes me an hour to decide what kind of ice cream I want, and no one wants to wait that long.” Anna laughed. “Is ice cream very expensive here?” She asked just as Riku spotted an ice cream shop that still appeared to be open. “I don’t know. But if it is, you’re buying.” He grinned. Anna did the same and replied, “Sorry. I seem to be broke, so you’ll just be forced to be a gentleman and buy me all the ice cream I want.” She stuck out her tongue at him a little and kept walking. He laughed, and then leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “I’ll buy the devious, hungry little girl all the sea salt ice cream she wants.”