***
In another year, Jacen is married to Melanie. She is genuinely in love with him. But there is no passion to the relationship for her, and she still has children on her mind.
"Do you want children, Jacen?" Melanie asks on the way to their car one day after class.
Jacen stops in the parking lot and asks with a laugh, "why do you ask?"
"I would like a child... I mean, we're twenty-five. It's best to have them early."
Jacen scratches his head, wishing to change the subject. "I don't know if I want them, but..."
Melanie interrupts, "we can take it slow..."
The thought makes him feel ill. He just shakes his head. "I don't know..."
"It's pretty important to me..." She continues.
He's silent--not knowing what to tell her. He doesn't want to at all, but he doesn't want to lose her. "Okay..."
***
Krahe knows it’s over before the marriage can even take off. Now that the idea has taken root in Melanie's head, they will break up.
Until then, Krahe will rest in peaceful previous memories. Krahe feels a little guilty about breaking them up--but he is like a blessing sent to her from another world. To find someone so much like Yuu again was a miracle.
He is so much like him in so many ways. His passion for singing, his sense of humor, and most of all, his song, Dearest.
***
"Dearest," Yuu says to her the next time they meet by chance. Krahe is hanging out at a local bookstore, watching various people pass by, picking human literature to read. She is shocked to see him.
"Dearest?" She asks.
"I can't remember your name. I seem to remember embarrassing myself in front of you the other day though. Can't get you out of my head. I was hoping I'd run into you again."
She faces him, hands clasped behind her back. "What about your wife?"
"What about her?" He asks with a wink.
"Aren't you supposed to be with her?" Krahe reminds him.
He narrows his eyes. "I don't want to be with her any longer. The marriage is a sham."
Krahe doesn't understand humans. She thought when they married they were in love for life. "I thought you were supposed to love her forever. Why is it a sham?"
"I already told you. She just married me for my money and now she sleeps around like crazy." He explains.
"Why not get a..." She scrambles for the word. "Divorce?"
"Come on, I don't want to talk about her. I want to go out with you." He changes the subject.
Krahe doesn't know if she should. Among humans, she knows it's looked down upon to go out with someone's husband--but she likes him. He said she was pretty.
Krahe smiles. "Okay."
***
He takes her to a movie, something she's never been to before, and she watches in wonder.
Yuu looks at her facial expressions in the dark and laughs under his breath.
Later, as he drives, he says to her, "you’re so weird. I love it. You looked like you'd never seen a movie before."
"I haven't. It was interesting."
"Really?" He's surprised. "That's strange. Why not?"
"I don't know. Humans scare me, so I try to avoid crowded places like those." She says with a sigh.
"Humans? You're a human, too." He replies with a grin.
"Actually I'm a Goddess." She corrects him, not caring if the other gods have some rule against her telling. They had left her alone all this time, after all.
He glances over at her silently--thinking she's crazy and that he made a big mistake. "You're joking, right?"
Krahe shakes her head. "I can show you once we arrive--wherever we’re going."
"I suppose I should take you home." He suggests.
"I don't have one."
He stops at a red light and says, "Oh... How about I get you a hotel?"
"You can drop me off anywhere. I'll be fine."
He raises an eyebrow and makes a sudden turn into a neighborhood up ahead. He parks the car by a sidewalk and gets out. Krahe follows him.
It's night, and she blends in with the darkness but for her pale skin.
Yuu plants his hands in his pockets and waits--leaning against his car.
Krahe takes a moment and then she shifts slowly into a crow before his eyes. He's stunned.
She shifts back into a human. "I usually just tuck myself into an egg and go to sleep. I'm the Goddess of crows and the city.."
He looks at her intently. "I believe you..." He looks down. "Is it okay for me to take you out?"
Krahe shrugs. "I don't know. It's--fun. I want to. Most Gods live up above--at least the higher-up ones. Lower gods like me are left on earth among humans. They told me a lot of rules before they left me, and I don't remember them saying anything about not being allowed to go out with humans..."
"Why did they pick you as a lower god?" Yuu questions.
Krahe is silent. "I'd rather not say."
He shrugs and then he smiles excitedly. "It is fun going out with you. The most fun I've had in a long time. So why are you hanging around with us humans?"
"I’m dead. Bored to my very soul. I've watched humans and toyed with their lives for years but I’ve never met them. That’s why the city is also dead. The Gods are angry about that. I must discover a passion for humans for myself." She tries to explain.
"I can make you passionate." He says flirtatiously.
Krahe blushes.
In the past, Krahe had an affinity for playing with human lives. She is a mischievous goddess. She has broken human couples up, she has brought them together, she has made humans hate one another for the silliest reasons. This was the only way for her to entertain herself. But eventually, she got bored of that, too.
This man was exciting though. She has always been a fan of his music, too.
***
Jacen and his wife divorce a year later. He is devastated. He could not give her children like she wanted him to. He could not even let her undress him.
He still has friends and his career, but he feels like he has failed at a very important relationship. He convinces himself he will never find someone to love ever again.
That's when he meets a girl named Kerry. She's a black haired girl with silky skin. She recognizes him and approaches him shyly at his university.
"Hey, aren't you the lead singer of Jolt?" She asks.
The girl is, of course, Krahe in disguise. She is using Deanna's mud to change her shape into a pretty young lady. Krahe is legitimately shy around him. She doesn't remember how to talk to humans.
Jacen debates lying to her, but he's in the mood for company. He answers, "That’s right. But I'd prefer it if you didn't go saying that to everyone else here."
Krahe looks down shyly and promises, "I won't."
She can barely resist hugging him. It would be like hugging her beloved again for the first time in ages.
Jacen looks at her with a flat, unenthused expression--which hurts her. "Is there something you wanted? Like an autograph?"
"No, I just thought it would be fun to study with you." Krahe tells him hopefully.
"For English? I'm not much help there. I find it pretty boring." He replies honestly. At her fallen expression he adds, "but sure, why not?"
Krahe jumps up excitedly and almost grabs his arm like she used to with Yuu, but stops herself. "My name's Kerry, by the way."
"You already know mine." He says with a smile.
***
It is easy to get him to love her. She knows his habits, she knows his hobbies, she knows his likes and dislikes. He is so much like Yuu. He doesn't like to go out as much as Yuu did, and seems to enjoy time alone a lot more, but otherwise, in her mind, he is Yuu. In months, he tells her he loves her. She is extremely happy.
And she is sad. Sad because he doesn't like to kiss or be kissed.
Krahe never thought she would be able to touch Yuu again; it was like torture to be able to touch him and yet never be able to kiss him. She chastises herself. But he is not Yuu. He is different from Yuu. She might tell herself that, but her mind doesn't let her believe it.
Jacen seems very distant, and he does not change expressions much. Krahe can sense he is still very unhappy about his failed marriage.
"I really did love her..." He explains to her with a blank expression as they have dinner together in his apartment one night.
Krahe searches for the right thing to say. "Why did she mean so much to you?"
"She understood me really well. She knew who I really was..." He tries to explain.
Krahe looks at him searchingly and eats a spoonful of spaghetti. She knows who he really is. "You don't need her. You have me."
He laughs a little bit. "You're great and all, but she was my wife. She always said she was fine without children, and then she just changed her mind. You know what she said? She said she felt unloved because I didn't want to make love to her. I failed her."
Krahe looks down. "But why didn’t you...?"
"Because I'm messed up." He leans on his cheek miserably. He looks at her curiously. "I assume you have no issues with it?"
Krahe blushes at her memories. "No, I don't."
***
Yuu pushes her down playfully and lies on top of her, naked. He gets tangled in her massive amounts of hair and they both laugh.
He cups her cheeks with both hands. "Not that I don't like your hair, but it would be nice to see your eyes..."
Yuu tries to sweep the hair away from her eyes, but she catches his wrist. "You might not want me anymore..."
He grins, "How could I not want you..." He kisses her neck to convince her. She allows him to move the hair away from her eyes.
Yuu is genuinely shocked for a moment. She has no eyes at all. He almost sits up in surprise and disgust. She's afraid he might leave altogether.
"How... can you see?" He asks.
"I see through my crows. There's always one around. The reason why the other gods left me down here as a lower goddess--it's because I have no eyes. They said I was without wisdom of the gods and lacked the beauty of the gods." She explains. She adds, "are you disgusted?"
He shakes his head. "I would be lying if I said it was beautiful, but I'm mostly disappointed. I looked forward to kissing your eyes."
She smiles at that and pulls him close.
***
Jacen's hands tremble at her response. He drops his fork and says to her, "it's not normal to find it disgusting..."
Tears spring to his eyes and he throws his head on the table in fear mixed with frustration.
Krahe watches him, not remembering how to soothe. Not knowing what to say. Not understanding the complexities of human emotions. She can't stand to look at him when he's crying. It reminds her too much of Yuu crying. "Please don't cry, dearest."
***
"Why were you at the bookstore that night? That never seemed like a place you would like to go. No offense." Krahe asks Yuu.
He sweeps her hair aside and smiles at the fact that she does not have eyes. They're just an inch apart. He laughs a little. "I was looking for a self help book. You may not know this, but I'm pretty screwed up. I'm a little addicted to prescription drugs."
Krahe is quiet, waiting for him to continue. Not understanding what precisely prescription drugs are.
Yuu shrugs with a pained look. "Depressed people take them... You know--I used to love my wife. We always had issues, but I never thought I could end up hating her so completely. She was always jealous of me; she wanted my fame. She always thought I was cheating on her with my fans. I can't blame her. It was over for us completely when our daughter died." He relates with pain on his face.
She is overcome with sadness, even though she can't grasp completely what a child means to a human. "How...?"
He bites back tears. "She got hit by a car while I was on tour. My wife called me in tears and told me something I'll never forget. You weren't there and she missed you, she said. You killed my daughter, she said."
Krahe feels a mass of emotions she doesn't understand. Mostly sadness.
"It's so hard to divorce her; to let her go. I don't care about paying for her after the divorce; I just want her to be like how she was when I first met her. I just want to love her again somehow. I want to stop hating her. But how are you supposed to love somebody who says that to you?" He asks. "How can I feel anything but hatred when I look at her? Really... She was right. I should have been more involved. I put my ego over my family."
Krahe is visibly uncomfortable. She wonders just what she's gotten herself into. She feels sorry for the both of them. She feels like a disgusting interloper. She feels like she has played unjustly with both their lives. Just like how she has played with so many human lives before.
He seems to read her troubled expression. "It's not your fault. It was over between us long before you came along."
***
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