***
Eventually, Yuu divorces his wife and it hits him harder than he ever expected. At first, he is worse than ever. Months later, he is better than ever. Years later, he marries Krahe.
She loves him. She loves him more than anything. The city is alive because she is alive.
And she has a child with him. A boy. A boy neither human nor god. He has no eyes. Yuu loves him to death. Krahe loves what she sees of Yuu in him, but she hates that he has no eyes. It is not aesthetically pleasing. Yuu is extremely excited and happy when she shows up with the baby one day. She tells him that baby gods spring from different places in the world. Gods wake up with a feeling of where to find them. Krahe plucks hers from the mountain outside the city she likes to sit on.
"How...?" He asks.
"When gods have great affections for each other, a child springs to life." She explains.
"But I'm not--"
"I know. I don't know what this means." She interrupts with a shrug.
***
Krahe feels like she is losing Jacen. He doesn’t want to see her very much. Too busy writing new music, he says. Has appointments with friends, he says. Studying for class, he says. She wants more time with him, regardless.
She can use her normal form to frighten him. Eventually, he may get so scared of her that he can’t stand to make music any longer and he won't be so busy. It was for the best anyway, she decided. He might get killed if he continued to make music, after all.
***
In crow form, she watches him at his friend’s house.
“I see her everywhere I go! I’m terrified.” He admits to his friend. “I think she may know where I live."
He sounds paranoid to his friend, Joseph; but his friend understands the danger of being a singer, and how Jacen might have genuine concerns.
But the more Jacen talks, the more crazy he sounds. "She's on top of buildings--in the streets. She watches me while I eat in the morning."
"Jacen... You sound paranoid. How could she be everywhere? Maybe you should talk to a therapist."
He feels entirely alone in his paranoia. He is sick with worry.
In time, he alienates his friends. He stops singing and stops going to school. He becomes a nervous wreck and dives into the arms of Kerry, who seems to be his only friend in the world.
"I don't know what to do anymore... I feel like I'm crazy. She's going to shoot me..." He says, burying his face in his hands while they sit on the floor in his apartment. "She's been watching me for years."
"You're not crazy... I'm sure she's real." She assures him. "You're being rational. I'll be on the lookout when we go out together."
He looks at her with love written all over his face.
"Why would she do this?" He wonders.
"Perhaps she's harmless..." Kerry suggests. "Perhaps she wants your affections."
He looks at her like she's crazy. "What if she does? You think I should return her affections? That… creature that follows me around? Who may want to kill me?"
Krahe looks at him with lovesick eyes. You are my darling. I would never kill you.
***
Yuu puts a hand on her cheek. "Dearest. Where would I be without you?"
He embraces her and leans his head on her shoulder, and then he disappears. Krahe is absolutely alone on the mountain outside of the neon city. She's hugging her knees and pressing her cheek against them. It is as cold and lonely as she feels--lost in regret and terrible memories.
He is gone and her baby gone with him.
The lead god, Sky, who she had not seen since childhood, found her one day, grabbed her arm, and blinked her somewhere else far outside the city, in a deserted green meadow.
"You've been looking after the humans like I asked but you broke the rules." He says. "A child was born of your unnatural affections."
"Unnatural? I’m in love--how is that unnatural. You’re the one told me to hang around humans--you said it would open my eyes. You’re the one who told me to look after them and the city. And anyway, you told me of no such rule."
“It’s not necessary. Gods aren’t naturally attracted to humans. You’re the only case. Now we must take your abomination and we must decide what’s to be done about the man who tempted you." Sky says cruelly.
Krahe feels the life drain from her cheeks. Krahe throws herself on the ground before Sky, imploring him. If she had eyes, she would be crying. “Please, let me keep the child. Let me love this man. I beg of you.”
“Gods cannot interfere so abrasively in human lives.” Sky replies. “You have blessed this man—we had seen his destiny. He was meant to kill himself. You stepped in and changed that destiny. Our decision will probably be to kill him.”
Krahe is in wallowing in despair--hot with fear and disbelief. “You wouldn’t…”
Sky puts a hand on her shoulder as she rises to a sitting position. She grabs his robes and weeps bitterly. “I didn’t know. Please, let him live. I will never see him again. Just let him live!”
“It’s not set in stone yet. I’m only telling you what we’ll most likely choose to do. We must, at least, take your child for now.” Sky snaps his fingers and the baby appears in his arms. He disappears then—supposedly gone to speak with the other gods.
***
“There you are! I don’t know how, but Schuyler disappeared when I went into the other room…” At the look on Krahe’s face, Yuu’s own face falls. He knew something had gone terribly wrong.
Krahe throws her arms around him and sobs in his ear. “You’re probably going to die. I don’t know what they did with Schuyler.”
He doesn’t know what she’s talking about, but he knows she must be telling the truth. He hugs her close and strokes her hair. “Why?”
“I’ve made a mistake. It’s all my fault. I’m so sorry. I was never meant to love you. They said it wasn't natural...” She says miserably. And just then, her eyes open for the first time. She grows eyes so she can cry. She recognizes, then, that it could not have been a mistake. Being with him has opened her eyes. It has made her more human.
He holds her at arms length and sweeps the hair out of her eyes. He breathes in with a downward smile and tears in his own eyes--staring into her eyes. He hugs her again and leans his head on her shoulder. "Dearest..."
The warmth is drained from her body and he disappears.
The gods never told her what happened to her son. She only knew that they made Yuu disappear like he never existed. Nobody remembers he existed, and all his albums and related items disappeared with him. She has him, and his songs forever in her memory, however. She also still has one of his CDs. The gods could not touch it because it was around her neck at all times as a necklace. Yuu gave it to her as a charming gift, saying he always wants her to have something of his. The chain was silver.
She can only stand to listen to the CD every now and again. Hearing his voice brings her to tears.
The gods killed most of her crows but they let her keep her role as goddess of the city.
***
To say that Krahe has forgotten proper social norms and to deny that she has lost sleep and sanity over Yuu would be an understatement. She did not, and would not have ever even noticed this fact, if she hadn't kissed Jacen on the cheek. She kisses his cheek and he tries to enjoy it, but he pulls away and says with a laugh, "you're getting spit on my cheek..."
That's when she realizes a hard truth. She can never love him in the way she loved Yuu. That didn't mean she loved him any less, but her affections for him were based more on compassion than passion. He is not Yuu. She sees semblances of Yuu in him, but he is not him. In her sick, demented, mind, she contorted him into Yuu because she couldn't stand to live without him any longer. But in truth, they were really not similar at all, other than their occupations.
Jacen is all sweetness and innocence; Yuu was a more worldly individual who was laden and familiar with the troubles of life. It wasn't necessarily that Jacen wasn't familiar with them--it was the way he dealt with troubles that separated him from Yuu. Jacen had an ill-founded trust and love of all people who want to be his friend. He trusts them and defends them and has trouble conceiving any nefarious hidden purposes they might have.
And she feels sick to her stomach about how she has taken advantage of his trust. She should have let him be happy with his pretty wife.
Jacen wipes his cheek with his hand, even though there really is no spit on it. "Hey... You won't leave me if I never want to kiss or make love to you, will you?" He asks with tired eyes.
She is silent for a moment, and then she shakes her head.
He leans his head on her shoulder with a vacant expression. He trusts her completely, and he loves her genuinely.
Krahe bites her lip with sadness seizing her heart. She is a monster. She must make things right. She stands up and faces him. She lets the mud melt off of her, and she is revealed as her true self.
Krahe had lost her eyes again years after she lost Yuu. Now, she regrew them, and she was crying again.
Jacen scrambles away from her in shock. "Oh my god... You... You've been stalking me this whole time. Just who are you?"
"I’m a goddess. And you... You reminded me of someone." She says honestly, looking at him with her lovesick eyes.
He looks like he's going to be sick. "You've watched me all this time... Are you crazy?"
Krahe says honestly. "I am. I alienated you from your friends all because I wanted you all to myself. I loved you so much I destroyed all your relationships. Including your relationship with your wife. I'm sorry."
"What?" He is in disbelief. Unbelievably disgusted out of his mind. His face moves from fear to rage. He shoves her and she stumbles backwards "Get the fuck out of my life!"
She wants to throw her arms around him and keep him forever. She wants to spoil him and love him and give him whatever it is that is missing from his life.
But there was nothing he was missing from his life--until Krahe came along and began interfering with it. He was happy singing. He was happy with his wife and his friends. Krahe had to let him go. She had to let him get on with his life; and more importantly, she had to get on with hers. They both had become far too dependent on each other. She wanted him to be Yuu, but he never would be. Human differences were more vast than she ever could have imagined.
She cries bitter tears and lets both him and Yuu go.
***
The city is alive again. Krahe can see again. Crime is down and Jacen is singing once more. Krahe still sits in on his concerts from time to time. Particularly for Dearest.
Krahe has accepted that some things, even for gods, should be left beyond reach. Obsession had gripped her very soul. She had become a lustful creature in her pursuit of love. She was happy to have the experience, however. She had learned another valuable lesson, and had luckily broke off the relationship before any of the gods had noticed what she was doing. While she was with Jacen, she never would have even considered that the gods would have found out about what she was doing. Now that she had her senses back, she realized the gods would have found out eventually somehow.
She will always have her memories of Yuu. She will always remember how he made her a better person--how he made her understand and love humans.
In the future, in his mid-thirties, Krahe appears before Jacen again. She feels the need to apologize to him again.
He has done well for himself. He hasn't stopped singing, and he has a degree and a job in engineering. For humans, that was quite impressive. It's night and she's leaning against a lamppost while snow falls.
Jacen has his hands in his pockets. His face is adorned by a flat expression when he sees her. "You again?"
"I have to apologize. I feel guilty." Krahe looks down ashamedly.
Jacen shakes his head. "You really didn't understand humans, did you? What you did--that's not how humans romance each other. Why were you so obsessed with me?"
Krahe still gets butterflies in her stomach when she looks at him. He's older now, but he still looks as stunning as ever. "You reminded me of someone I loved. But obsession was not the right way to honor him. You're really quite different from him. Not in a bad way... I have to ask--why did you never remarry?"
Krahe nervously claws at her long hair with her hand. He watches her with a blank, unamused face. In a moment, he is half-smiling. "I was mad at you for a long time... Because of you, I ended up alone but for a few close friends... But people like me--we don't belong with or to anyone. I can have friends, but... It's too hard to be in romantic relationships. I would have ended up on my own anyway. With or without you."
He is silent for a moment. Bright lights are reflected in his brown eyes."The way you're looking at me... Do you still have a crush on me?"
Krahe nods nervously, looking down.
"Why? You can't kiss me and you can't have sex with me. What do you want?"
She thinks about when he leaned his head on her shoulder and she feels warm inside.
"I just... Wanted your affections..." She explains to him.
He closes his eyes and then laughs. "If you had just come to me as you were, I would have fallen in love with you. You didn't have to manipulate me. I really did like you."
"I was sick, inside and out. And--it was against the rules of the other gods." She says honestly. "I shouldn't have done what I did. I could have gotten you into trouble."
He is a little surprised when she mentions the gods. He may not think she is actually a goddess, but he definitely knows she is something otherworldly.
He looks at his feet. "I know what it's like to be obsessed. I would have died long ago if I wasn't obsessed with singing. Would you have died if you weren't obsessed?"
Krahe thinks about it. Without Yuu, she was a walking, lifeless, corpse. Her obsession with Jacen kept her alive, even when Yuu was gone--but her acceptance of him being gone made her mature. Made her mature like a human would mature. All of this would not have been possible without humans.
Krahe nods silently. "Anyway--I just wanted to apologize again. There was no excuse for what I did to you. I wish you all the best."
Krahe is about to shift into a crow, but Jacen says, "hey wait, come hold my hand. I miss your company. It's harmless, right?"
She has tears in her eyes, and she nods. She grabs his hand.
The gods won't give her child back--but they finally tell her he is alive and well under the other god's tutelage. And they say letting her hold this man's hand is okay.
She can live with that. Sometimes, living was enough.
Comments (0)
See all