"The Darkest Reflection"

Written By: Impish

Rating: strong R

Pairings: main 1+2+1, background 2+3, OFC+5 and 4+3

Category: Duo POV with angst, action, drama and politics.

Warnings: creepiness, more graphic images and gore

Summery: The earth sphere has moved on into an age of peace, but Duo is fighting battles of his own. He has reluctantly joined the Preventers, and is surprised to see Heero sign up as well. With an assassin on the loose and an increase in suspicious activity, he’s beginning to realize the fine line between genius and insanity, and how easily it can be erased.

Disclaimer: I don’t own Gundam Wing. Surprise! And none of the songs or titles belong to me, either.

Notes: Yeah, I meant for this whole thing to be Duo POV, but Heero kind of took over the first part of this chapter. Only the evil pixies in my head know why.

"The Darkest Reflection"

Chapter 2: All of this Past

“A man from hell is not afraid of hot ashes.”
-Dorothy Gilman

Change.

People seem to fear it more than anything else. Humans are innately abhorrent of the unfamiliar. Philosophies, theories, and entire religions have been created just to answer questions we don’t have answers for, the unknown.

You can think you know the things you’ve been told your whole life, but you only truly know what you’ve experienced. It’s your past that defines you, because it’s your experiences that define you. Not everybody has a future, but we all have a past.

Sometimes, we have several of them.

***

(Heero POV)

The landscape rumbled by as we pretended to observe it. Finally, Duo spoke out of the silence.

“So, what’s your back story?”

I turned my head from the window to look at Duo, who still watched something beyond the scenery. It had only been about two years since I last saw him, but that’s a lot of time to grow for people our age. He was still very slender, almost too slim, and long-limbed, but more graceful than awkward. Even under the dark navy t-shirt he sported supporting some Spanish fúbol team, I could tell his body was nothing more than lean muscle wired tightly around bone. Not short, but of medium height, appearing taller because of the way he carried himself, and because of his slight frame. His features had been honed and fine-tuned, and the results were rather remarkable.

He had always been good-looking, but now… there was an air of danger about him, that colored his complexion and pared away the softness from his face to leave a sharpened version of the boy I remembered. The same darkness was reflected in his eyes, beautiful and violent. There was a faint other-worldness about him; like he was listening to something no one else could hear. It wasn’t a look of evil, but rather a look that said he could look into, had looked into the eyes of Death itself and not flinched.

I allowed the air to swallow my gaze for a moment before relenting and asking what he wanted me to. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, what are you letting people know? You’ve got to have learned by now that that ‘mysterious’ thing you had going during the war only provoked curiosity. Especially in the form of idealistic young royalty with a bad habit of attracting attention.”

“Relena was more fascinated by the fact that I didn’t fawn over her because of her status than any mysterious qualities I might have possessed.” I hedged, more to figure out where Duo was headed than to actually avoid the question.

“You’re forgetting your other two social stalkers. Does the name Dorothy ring any little bells? I don’t think she had people taking pictures of you for her scrapbook-”

Pictures?

“-And I don’t recall Zechs sneaking around to rebuild anybody else’s Gundam for them.” With that out of the way, he returned smoothly to the subject he had chosen. “Come on man, you know what I’m talking about.”

Of course I did. Duo had anyone and everyone beat on conversational dances anyway. “I’m not going to hide anything, if that’s what you mean. I was a Gundam pilot. I was 01. I trained the President and a few other representative’s security staffs before joining the Preventers.” I shrugged a shoulder. “That’s it. You and Chang seem to have been accepted despite your rolls in the war, so I-”

“Wufei was.” Duo interrupted, almost softly, almost harshly. His dark lashes fluttered against his cheek. “No one knows I piloted, and I’d like to keep it that way.” There was a subtle request in the statement, which was interesting in itself. Duo had never asked me for anything.

“You once told me you never lied.”

“It’s not a lie. I worked with the Sweepers during the war, and I was on the same side as Wu Fei, for the most part. That’s all people need to know. How they fill in the blanks is up to them.”

I wondered at his reasons for taking such care with his past, but, not wanting to risk any more coldness entering his voice, I didn’t insert any points dealing with the words “lie by omission.”

Instead, I asked, “So you went to training and worked up from the bottom. I wondered why you didn’t have a partner yet.”

Duo finally turned from the window, tilting his head slightly, and propped his boots up next to me. “I was offered promotions before this-”

Right next to me.

“-I just didn’t like my choice of partners. For some reason, a few of the agents have decided they hate me.”

Touching my leg.

I blinked, and raised an eyebrow ever so slightly. Duo crossed his feet, casually. “And here I was under the impression you could make friends with a fencepost.”

Duo’s boot was touching my thigh.

He smirked. “Apparently not with this crowd.”

He had decided the serious discussion was over. He chattered on about our coworkers, “saving me the labor pains and giving me the child” as he put it.

“…oh, and then there’s Luke Miller. He’s got a thing for his partner, so he hates me for being friends with the girl.”

“Is that allowed? Office romances, I mean?” I asked, not working any of the surprise I felt into my question.

“Oh, yeah, Preventers love to get involved in romances with coworkers. We’re like Noah’s Ark… we go off in pairs.” He grinned wickedly.

“You don’t come back in three’s do you?” I asked, studying my hands.

His grin froze, and he blinked at me, twice, before bursting out into laughter. “Well, hell, Yuy, you steal that sense of humor, or did you buy it off the black market?”

“I’ll have you know they’re very expensive these days. I spent years saving up for a decent one.” I said, seriously. It was odd, making him laugh. If I had ever done that before, it was only because my stoic demeanor amused him.

I was never ignorant of the intricacies of human nature, as might have been supposed by those who had any sort of brief contact with me. But we had been in the middle of a war. I had no need to express myself, to make friends, to be sociable. It was unnecessary. But after… I suppose I felt some need to identify with the people I had killed, and those that I had saved. I was a soldier and a pilot, but I was also a human being; a small part in an infinite universe. That didn’t mean I had suddenly transformed into another person, just that keeping such strict control over myself now was as unnecessary as expression had been before.

I can imagine that my freedom of expression, limited as it was, was still disquieting to Duo, and it was interesting to observe his reaction. I had been pleased when Une told me that he was in need of a partner; it was part of the reason I had accepted a place with the Preventers instead of the security positions that I had been offered. I had not wanted to end up with some ex-Oz official with a grudge as a partner, and could identify with Duo’s reasons for not wanting to work with just anyone.

It did come as something of a surprise, though, that Duo had not found someone before me to partner with. He seemed to get along with his team, and from the sound of it, quite a few other agents. Duo had always possessed an outgoing ease of personality that attracted people no matter who they were. Even though he had spoken of a few of the agents that had not been up to his standards, I still felt as though there were other reasons he had not wanted a partner. The thought darkened my reflections, and I hoped that this assignment would shed light on the situation.

We met up with the skinny French agent, Le Fevre, in Bergerac. She held a sign with our fake names as we exited the station, and introduced herself in heavily accented Spanish as our guide. I thanked her and explained that we would like to practice our French. Which was both convenient and ironic, because it was the language I spoke better. Smiling politely at us, she began a spiel about the lovely inn we were staying in and its history. For the low-level this mission was, we were probably going far overboard with the undercover acting, but I think that was mostly an introductory practice for my sake.

Duo pulled off the gawking tourist look well. He pointed at plants and signs, translating them from French, and engaged Agent Le Fevre in a conversation about a new French film as she led us to a van parked on the curb. The front was a bench seat, supporting my theory that the back was full of equipment.

Colette took the wheel, and began talking as she edged into traffic.

“We are to begin the first stage of the operation tonight. Are you up to it?”

“Of course.” Duo said easily, before I even opened my mouth. Apparently his worries concerning me had dissipated.

“Good. The base of operations is very close, but we have to wait until the shift change at seventeen hundred before we move in. I scouted the area out earlier, and found a good place to park while we wait.”

“Sounds cool to me.” Duo said lightly.

We turned onto a side road, and I noted that the area was much less populated than it had been close to the station. A left onto a dirt road took us into the shade of the trees. We rode in relative silence, Le Fevre tapping the steering wheel to some song in her head, and Duo lazily sitting halfway-slumped down in his seat, one leg on the dash. I watched him in the reflection of the glass, looking almost asleep with his eyes half-closed, his almost-black eyelashes resting dark against his cheek. It took me a second to realize that he wasn’t.

Le Fevre put the car into park off the road. We were at the top of a small overlook with a full view of the building Duo and I were to enter. The angle of the road to the land below was such that no one beneath the drop could see us.

“Nice spot.” Duo complimented.

Colette winked and crawled over the bench seat into the back, narrowly missing Duo’s head with her boot. He turned to me and smiled, then followed her, much more gracefully than she’d managed. I carefully climbed over behind them. Sure enough, there was a limited array of surveillance equipment. Le Fevre sat in front of the board, and began getting us set up. Duo sat behind her, fiddling with the ear chips. I sat next to Le Fevre and pulled out my gun, checking it over.

“You had a gun on you?” the girl yelped.

I gave her a strange look. “Yes. Of course.”

“But you must have gone through three security checkpoints!” Her eyes were wide.

“Yes, it was very annoying. They patted me down at two of them.”

Her eyes bugged out even more. “What the hell is that thing made of? And where were you keeping it?!”

Duo and I exchanged a glance, and he snickered.

Collette looked back and forth between us, then shook her head. “You know, I really don’t want to know.” She sighed. “This should be a pretty easy run, boys, if we watch out for that communication black out. You have five minutes to extract those files where I can’t hear you, but it shouldn’t be a problem. We might even make it home before morning.”

“Fuck, don’t do that, Colette. Now everything’s going to go wrong.”

“Come, now, Duo! Can’t you ever even try to look at things in a reasonably optimistic light?” Colette scolded. “I’m a glass-half full kind of person.” she added for my benefit.

“Yeah, of arsenic.” Duo said sarcastically as he reached over her shoulder and flipped a couple switches.

She laughed. “What about you, Agent Yuy? Are you like Duo, who thinks the glass is half-empty?”

“And cracked.” He added pointedly, still fiddling with the wires.

I gave her a small half-grin. “Not only is the glass half empty and cracked, I'm starting to think that the glass doesn't exist at all. Duo’s just a pessimist; I tend to be more existentialist.”

Duo did his best to look insulted. “Just a pessimist? Right, like a Gundam is just a mobile suit.” He leaned toward Le Fevre and quipped, “You should talk to this guy Heero and I know, Colette. His glass was an overflowing bathtub whose faucet was left on during a long vacation.” He tapped on a receiver. God, that reminded me, I really needed to give Quatre a call sometime.

I gave Duo a wider smile at the reference to our old team-mate. I wondered when the last time he saw any of the others was. Besides Wu Fei, that is. I knew him to be a Special Agent, although I hadn’t run into him at HQ yet, and Quatre was in charge of the family business on L4. I had visited him briefly a month ago.

The only one of us who’s whereabouts I was ignorant of was Trowa. As far as I knew, he had gone back to the circus just after the war’s conclusion.

I needed to ask Duo if he’d heard from him.

***

(Duo POV)

Heero slid into the front of the van and I hopped in behind him, slamming the door behind me.

Colette wasted no time in taking off. “How’d it go?”

“Smooth as silk.” I answered.

“Perfect. I’ll radio Unit B.”

I didn’t bother with a seatbelt, tucking one leg under me and leaning heavily into the door. I rested my head on the window, and just focused on not letting the vibration of the van knock it too hard. Or tried to focus, anyway.

Heero’s presence next to me was incredibly distracting. I had yet to decide if partnering with him was a good or a bad thing. On the one hand, we did work fucking good together. On the other… well, it was just like being back in the war days, and I didn’t really want that messing me up. I had enough nightmares as it was without being continuously reminded of quite a few of my blood-spattered memories. I guess it didn’t matter anyway. Us working together was inevitable at this point.

It didn’t take long to get to the scene of the second stage of the operation, a pretty damn nice house in a pretty damn nice neighborhood. Heero and I changed in the back into our uniforms, while Collette communicated with the other units. The radio contact was brief, and once permission was attained, we moved in.

Protocol required us to attempt to arrest the subject peacefully, so Colette rang the doorbell and did the cop-knock thing with warrant in hand. I stood out of view to the side, my back to the wall, my gun drawn. Heero was at Colette’s back on her other side, a half step behind her. The door opened almost immediately, and without further warning, Heero and I were in motion.

Heero had grabbed Colette’s collar and had pulled her off the steps onto the lawn before the gun went off where her head had been. He grabbed the gunman’s hand and simultaneously delivered a kick to his head.

“Get the backdoor!” I flung at Colette and ducked by Heero into the house, trusting both of them to move in the proper directions. The second I entered, gunfire erupted from my right, in what seemed to be the kitchen. Crouching low, I ran through the doorway, keeping cover behind the counter, and letting the thought cross my mind that this was a rather odd setting for a firefight. I was vaguely aware that Heero was running in.

“I’m ok, clear the upstairs!” I exchanged. He complied, and I refocused on the situation at hand.

Deciding that this guy, who was most likely some kind of hired gun for the occasion, just might be intimidated by some kind of slick Hollywood-type moves, I slid out from behind the counter on my side, gun locked out in front in both hands, and took a single well-aimed shot. The gunman’s weapon clattered to the expensive hardwood floor, and I rolled to my feet, wasting no time in retrieving it. My opponent scuttled back on his ass like a crab against the kitchen cabinets. His eyes were wide and wild. He panted heavily, staring at me and clutching at his bleeding right hand. His trigger finger had been shot off.

“Where is Olivier Merdian?” I demanded in French, my voice cold and my gun level.

He looked at me like he could see Death itself in my eyes. I think the intimidation thing was working.

“Fucking… Jeez… m-mother…” His legs still kicked at the floorboards as if he could propel himself further away from me.

“Where the bloody fuck is Olivier Merdian!”

“In the fu-fucking tool shed.”

He wasn’t in much of a state to fight me now, but I didn’t want him running away, so I cuffed him to the drawer and ran back out of the kitchen. Gunfire resonated upstairs, and followed the sound, trusting Colette to be all right making sure no one fled the shed since she was out back.

“Heero!” I yelled, taking the steps two at a time.

“Clear!” I received, and let out a breath of relief. The tone of Heero’s voice had flatlined, and the return of the old, “mission” Heero was somehow relieving.

Gun ready, I reached the top of the stairs and entered the first room on my right. Just as I did, a man appeared from a room across the hall. I whipped around and trained my gun on him. The second his pointedly unruffled eyes saw me, he lifted his gun and fired, then turned tail and ran to the stairs, presumably to make sure Merdian got away. A part of me grumbled that it was rather poor form not to check and make sure your shot took out the target. I ignored the bullet that whizzed past my ear and darted out into the corridor after him, catching him just before he made it to the first landing. I instinctively grabbed him from behind, and using the momentum I had gained, pulled him down, hard, and the both of us fell down the stairs in a tangle.

I had the brief thought flash through my mind that it would really suck if I broke my neck.

We bounced a few times before the middle of my back landed on the corner of the bottom stair with his extra weight on top of me. I felt the painful crack of a rib giving way, barely keeping my head from splitting open on the floor.

I rolled us over painfully, and cuffed him to the railing. Cursing, I rose to my knees, and looked up, where Heero emerged at the top of the stairs. He ran down them towards me, his gun drawn.

“Out back.” I managed as I stood. Our eyes made contact for a millisecond, then he nodded.

We went outside together, the dark completely blinding in contrast with the light of the house. Colette came from around the corner of the shed, and I saved Heero from shooting her with a hand to his shoulder. I gestured with my gun to the shed and a finger to my lips. The three of us crept through the grass and impressive display of flowers and took position around the door to the little stone shed.

Fucking shed. I could have lived in something that nice.

Heero kicked the door open, and our surprised quarry started from his position on the floor. From the looks of it, he’d been preparing to open a trap door in the floorboards. The man was honestly surprised to have been discovered. He wildly looked around and, in what may have been the dumbest move of his life, pulled a rusted saw from the wall. What he was planning on doing with it against three armed Preventers, I have no idea.

Heero didn’t wait for him to brandish it or make threatening speech, and just moved in to disarm the man. Which was good, because my finger had been halfway down on the trigger. He took him down quicker than a blink, and had him on his stomach and cuffed within seconds. Colette and I just stood and watched the dust settle, our guns lowered. As Heero read Merdian his rights as we were granted the sound of sirens, I turned to Colette and scratched my head with my gun.

“Well, that was much more fucked up than it should have been.”

She let out a strangled laugh. “No shit. That was, by any account, excessive gunplay for the level this was supposed to be. Your friend can move, though.” She said, slipping her gun back into its holster.

“Yeah.” I grinned. “He can, can’t he?”

Heero and I were sitting in the van in silence while Colette detailed the events of the arrest to the locals, when I noticed the blood matting the end of his shirtsleeve. I grabbed his hand and pulled the material up before he could figure out what I was up to.

He looked me in the eyes in surprise, and then at the point of contact of our skin.

“Shit, Yuy, we need to get that stitched up!” I said, breaking the air between us.

The jagged wound on his forearm was fairly long, but not that deep. It wasn’t quite a quarter inch, but it would be better to stay on the safe side. Especially since that saw that had made it was serrated. And lets not forget rusted.

“You should go to Dr. Hilbert as soon as we get back. She can medicate you.” I paused thoughtfully for a moment. “Or be perfectly useless… which is much more likely.”

“Duo, it’s not that bad.”

“Last time you said that you had two gaping bullet wounds, and passed out shortly after making the statement.”

He glared at me. “Well this is a shallow cut. I’m hardly at risk for major blood loss.”

“Like I care. You’re going to let me bandage it just to keep me happy.”

“Am I?” He raised a brow.

“Of course you are. You do know how I get when I’m not happy, after all.” I said impishly, wondering if I was going to get to stick him with a needle because of that rust.

“Oh.” He blinked. “Oh, yeah. In that case, bandage away.”

Pleased that I’d won that battle, I twisted around to reach the gauze and a serious amount of hydrogen peroxide, but came up short. Ok, that had to be a broken rib. I was careful not to let my expression change, but Heero was on to me the second I tensed up.

“What’s wrong?’

Shit.

Well, he wasn’t going to believe “nothing” if he’d already asked. He probably already figured out exactly what was wrong just from my posture. I forced myself to relax and answer.

“I… I think I cracked a rib.” I said delicately, and leaned into the back of the seat behind me.

Hissing at the contact, I amended, “Ow… maybe two.”

“Duo-” he started heavily. But before he could respond further, Colette arrived with one of the locals in tow. He was a short man, the half-balding type who probably drove an expensive car to make up for his lack of physical looks and poor personality.

“They have to check your weapons for rounds fired.” She stated, sounding tired. “Duo, two taken down right? Three for Agent Yuy?”

I held my gun out without hesitation and nodded in affirmation of her statement. Heero looked reluctant to hand over his firearm to anyone, but gave his up a moment later. I could practically see him mentally listing protocol. I hadn’t like giving mine over any more than he did, which is why I now carried a small arsenal on my person as back up. Not exactly by the book, but then again… I don’t really play by the rules.

“I had two in the yard. Six guns seems a bit excessive doesn’t it?” Colette leaned into the door as the little man checked our clips, not-too-subtly checking out her ass at the same time. “Our bust turned out ok compared to Team B’s.” She said wearily. “Garret took a shot to the leg, Alfons took one to the arm and one to the shoulder, and Marcos just woke up from a concussion. Luckily, a local officer managed to get François Chanier before he escaped.”

“And the other?” I asked.

“Huh?” she looked confused.

“The bust the locals ran, how’d it go?”

“Oh. I think it went fine. Peaceful capture.” She glared at the little man, who was clearing his throat obnoxiously to get her attention. She glanced apologetically at us before turning away to deal with him.

I looked past them at the men in the background, who were putting the gunmen into cars to get sent off to holding cells.

“I wonder,” I said quietly to Heero, “That their bust went so well, when the two that the Preventers were involved in went to hell so thoroughly.”

“You think they were involved somehow?” His voice was absent of any feeling on the subject.

“I don’t think anything but how weird it is that the shits seemed to know we were coming for them, even if the notice was short.” My eyes narrowed in thought.

Heero shook his head pensively. “If they were warned, then were they tipped off about the data we collected from the building?”

“That’s the million dollar question, I’d say. And something we can dwell on back at headquarters tomorrow.” I sighed softly and leaned back again, drumming my fingers on the floor of the van.

“What are you going to do about your ribs?”

Fuck a duck.

“What, you want to set them for me?” I said sarcastically.

“Whatever happened to Dr. Hilbert?” He said, crossing his arms.

“I told you she was useless.” I griped, attempting to restrain myself from crossing my own arms protectively.

“Well are you going to a hospital then?”

“Hospital?” I exclaimed. “I’d need something sewn back on before wasting a hospital’s time.” Hell, it still blew my mind that if I got hurt on a mission, I could go to a real hospital. With real doctors, instead of one of the other pilots performing minor surgery without anesthetic out of a textbook in the back of a moving transport vehicle…yeah, you get the point.

“Well, let me set them, then.” He said, his voice enormously exasperated. I tend to have that effect on people.

“Right, like your fucking leg. Yeah, that’s never going to happen.” I shifted uncomfortably. “I’ll just see the night nurse if we get back soon enough.”

Hopefully, he’d forget about it by then.

Heero, of course, did not forget about it.

He went with me to the nurse under the pretense of getting his arm checked out, after we’d both filed our reports.

I knew he just didn’t trust me to go on my own, but I didn’t get mad, because he was wise not to. If he hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have gone.

The night nurse was a short, round, country-type girl. Her name was Tami Pearson, and I saw her as often as possible when avoiding Dr. Hilbert. She tended to our wounds in a friendly fashion that had me half-expecting a lollipop when she finished.

We soon found ourselves in the foyer of the building, with my waist and his arm bandaged. I shivered and rubbed at my arms. We stood in silence for a while, just looking through the glass doors at the empty world outside.

“Where are you staying, you have a place yet?” I asked.

“Yes. I got an apartment as soon as I accepted a position. It’s not as close to HQ as I might have liked, but other than that, it’s convenient.” He tilted his head at me. “Do you have an apartment near headquarters?”

“Apartment? Yeah, I guess you could call it that.” I laughed, the sound shaded with sarcasm. “I live in an ice-box masquerading as a mental institution; only it has fire alarms go off as often as Senator Wood takes a vacation. So, every ten minutes or so. And my room smells like cigarettes thanks to the smokers who insist on standing directly below my window... the bastards.”

“Oh.” He said, his profile washed in the blue of the light. “Sounds cozy.”

“If you’re a deaf penguin.” I said amiably, and we went outside.

The street was quiet as we walked side by side, my arms tucked tightly to my body, despite the discomfort such a posture afforded my bound ribs. Heero turned to go into the parking garage, and I stopped. He looked back at me in question. Or at least, that’s what I took the very slight tilt of his head to be.

“I walked to work yesterday.” I shrugged lightly.

“You want a ride, then?” His posture was comfortable and far too inviting.

I thought about it for a second. Part of me stubbornly held onto the idea of going home the way I had come, if only to prove that I could. But the other part… I might as well; it was freaking cold out. And my ribs hurt. And he was offering.

“Ok.” I nodded, my mind made up.

I followed him to his car, a dark blue Cabrio. I looked across the roof of the car at him, an eyebrow raised.

He shrugged and told me, “Foreclosed.”

Typical.

I got in the little car, which was difficult, because getting down that low was a bitch to my ribs. I managed it without a sound, and shut the door. I just hoped the thing heated up quickly.

Heero got in and pulled out of the garage, taking quickly to the street. After I gave him directions, the rest of the drive was quiet. I watched the city spin by in a blur of streetlamps and neon signs. The car smelled good, and I wondered how long he’d had it.

It had rained in our absence, and the wheels of the car rolling over the wet road made a sound like a sticker being pulled away from its sheet. When we got to my apartment, we parted in silence. I watched the car drive off and took in the smell of the city. I looked up, imagining smoke coming from the rooftops, then back down at my reflection in the puddle I stood in, then in the direction his car had taken off in. I turned and walked inside.

My apartment was on the third floor, and as I had told Heero, was in about the same conditions as the Gulag. I took the stairs, because I didn’t trust the elevator not to stall, nor the super to do something about it if it did. I unlocked the bolt while pulling the door toward me, and then jiggled the handle. It would jam if you tried any other combination. I dumped the keys on the table by the door, locking it behind me out of habit more than the hope that it would actually keep someone out.

I had been looking forward to a nice steamy shower, but the hot water was out again. I had to be at work in a couple hours anyway, so I set a pot of coffee and took a hurried cold shower. Toweling off quickly, I re-bandaged my ribs with the supplies provided. Tami said they were probably just fractured, and I didn’t intend to go back for the x-rays to be certain. I dressed for work again, braiding my wet hair deftly and then winding it up in a towel so that it wouldn’t get my shirt wet. Last thing I needed was to be cold, wet and sleep deprived. Grabbing a chipped mug out of the sink, I poured myself some coffee and sat at the kitchen counter staring at the floor.

I rested my head on the countertop facing the small, dirty window that sat in the wall bare of any curtains. The view was just the building across the street, but it seemed better than watching the floor. Views like that never change.

But life never stopped changing, from moment to moment, sunrise after sunset. Life was change, and someday… all the new things in life just became memories. Everything was just a memory.

I watched the building not move for an hour before heading back to work.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“All of this Past” by Sarah Bettens

~ Here I go again, slipping further away
Letting go again of what keeps me in place
I like it here, but it scares me to death
There is nothing here
The light is beautiful, but I’m darker than light
And you are wonderful, but this moment is mine
All of this dust
All of this past
All of this over and gone and never coming back
All of this forgotten
Not by me
I find comfort here, ‘cos I know what is lost
Hope is always fear for the pain it may cost
And I have searched for the reason to go on
I’ve tried and I’ve tried
But it’s taking me so long
I might be better off closing my eyes
And god will come looking for me
In time
I can see myself
I look peaceful and pale
But underneath I can barely inhale
I can hear myself singing that song
Over and over until it belongs to me~

~ * ~

Chapter 3

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