Urban Hymns

Trowa/Midii, Trowa/Quatre. G.
Trowa meets someone he hasn’t seen in a long time and tries to make her understand.
1999 | 2280 words

-

I haven’t seen your face around since I was a kid.
You’re bringing back those memories of the things that we did.
You’re hanging round and climbing trees, pretending to fly
D’yer wanna be a spaceman and life in the sky?
You got how many bills to pay and how many kids? And you forgot about the things that we did
The town where we’re living has made you a man, all of your dreams are washed in the sand
Well, it’s alright. Who are you and me to say what’s wrong and what’s right?
Do you still feel like me? We sit down here and we shall see.
We could talk and find common ground.
Or we could just forget about feeling down, and we could just forget about life in this town
It’s funny how your dreams change as you’re growing old
You don’t wanna be no spaceman, you just want gold
Dream stealers are lying in wait but, if you wanna be a spaceman,
it’s still not too late.
(Oasis, D’yer Wanna be a Spaceman?)

Trowa looked around, a little worried. There was still no sign of the man he was waiting for. Why was he always late? Well, it wasn’t the other’s fault, anyway. It was Trowa who always came too early, so he couldn’t complain about having to wait. He closed his eyes and sat back again, letting his mind flow. He could feel the cold wind on his face, and it felt good to be outside. Somewhere else than inside those Preventer uniforms. Yeah, Trowa definitely loved the winter and all it’s grey shades, it’s dead leaves and white snow.

Something hit his shin, cutting off his thoughts, and he looked down. It was a pink plastic ball. He picked it up and looked around to find the ball’s owner. A blonde young girl waved and ran to him.

“Sorry, sir. Did I hurt you?”

He smiled a little. “No. But watch out these people walking around, they might get hurt.” He kneeled in front of her and watched as she cleaned the snow from the pink bubble. Her face seemed familiar… those bright blue eyes and that yellow-nearly-white hair. Where had he seen that before? She seemed almost like…

“What is your name, dear?” he heard himself asking, not really sure why.

She looked up at him and frowned, not certain if it was right to just tell her name to this complete stranger. But there was something in his peaceful eyes which told her that he wasn’t dangerous. Probably had never killed a fly…

“My name is-”

“Muriel! Where are you?” a female voice shouted.

She looked back an waved to the blonde woman looking for her. “Here, mom!”

The woman came close, looking obviously relieved. She took the girl in her arms and turned to the tall man behind her. Her mouth dropped open, but no sound came out. Trowa just sat there, watching the scene, silently shocked as well. They stayed like that, staring at each other in search of an answer. She analysed the figure in front of her: the long brown bangs seemed familiar. Could it be…? No, it couldn’t. She brushed his hair aside with a hand, just to see how he seemed to be in the same state of shock. When she saw those emerald orbs staring right down her own aquamarine eyes, she was sure. And so was he.

“Midii?” he asked, reluctantly.

She closed her mouth and nodded very slowly. “Nanashi.”

Muriel shifted in her position to look at two apparently very surprised adults, staring at each other with something in their eyes that she couldn’t describe. “Do you know him, mother?”

Midii rolled her eyes until she reached the girl in her arms, taking the time to listen to the question again. Her mind was really away from that park, and it took her some seconds to pull it back into reality. She managed to nod.

Muriel smiled. “Nice! But hey, what kind of name ‘Nanashi’ is? Isn’t that, like, Japanese?”

Trowa was slowly recovering from his shock, and tried hard to smile at her. ‘It means ‘no name’ in Japanese.”

She frowned. “No name? How can your name be ‘no name’? Isn’t that a little contradictory?”

Midii put the girl on the floor again. “Now listen, little girl. Where have you learned these manners? What if he likes his name? It wouldn’t be nice to tease about it, don’t you think?” The girl bowed her head. “I’m sorry, mom. I didn’t mean to offend Nanashi.” Then she turned to him. “Forgive me please.”

He patted her head. “It’s okay, Muriel. I’m not offended.”

She smiled. “Great!” Then she picked the pink ball and cleaned it again. “Mom, I’m going to play near those trees.”

The woman nodded in approval and the girl left, whistling some song. Man and woman looked at each other again, and Trowa headed to the bench. “Have a sit?”

He glanced at the woman sitting by his side. She seemed to be lost in her own thoughts, as he tried to think of something to say. Who could have guessed that after all these years they would have nothing to tell each other? No, they had lots to tell each other, they had years of stories to tell. They were just too afraid to start. So Trowa looked at Muriel, who was trying to climb a tree and kept falling from it. Just like her mother, in every possible sense. Unstoppable, too smart for her young age, and too pretty to be true. Trowa couldn’t hide a smile that crossed his face as he remembered the pleasant moments he had shared with his blonde friend. It was a shame that he hadn’t been aware of how much he liked those moments until they were gone long ago.

» » »
“Midii! Get out of there, you’re gonna fall!” he shouted at the girl up the high tree. She only laughed.

“Will you catch me if I fall?”

He growled. Damn girl, always distracting him from his work. “No.”

The big smile on her face faded. “Then I guess I’ll have to learn how to fly.”

He didn’t answer.

She turned her face to him. “Wouldn’t you like to fly?”

“I do fly.”

She sighed. “No, not with those machines. I mean, really fly.” With this, she got up and opened her arms, pretending to fly. “Like, spread your wings and fly away from everything… until you find a place where peace leaves.”

He took a step ahead. She was dangerously bouncing up there. “I don’t care about peace.”

She started to walk back and forth, standing on her toes and closing her eyes. “You don’t care about anything. But I do. And if I had wings, I would fly away, and I would take you away with… ops, with meeee–!!!” She screamed as the tree disappeared from her feet.

Nanashi didn’t flicker. He extended his arms and caught the girl from her free fall. Then he helped her on her feet and turned away, muttering coldly “If you don’t get yourself dead before.”
« « «

So, maybe he should have told her. Yeah, he should have told her that he would have liked to fly away with her. But he could never, because she was the enemy. Everyone was the enemy back there. And he had flied away, farther than she’d ever dreamed of going, and had found out a lot of beautiful things to see. But he couldn’t have flied away with her. Because she was the enemy. And because space needed him more than she did. Or so he would like to believe, had he not seen the pain in her eyes when he left years ago, and the pain in her eyes when they met again, minutes ago.

She closed her eyes, trying to make those feelings vanish. But it was in vain, and she knew it. That childish infatuation had grown into a deep love as she had grown old and found that he wouldn’t come back. Not to her. When the idea that he was possibly dead for a long time had finally hit her, she had buried those feelings and begun a new life. The life she had dreamed of living with him.

» » »
“In space, they’re waiting for me.”

“Don’t you see that someone down here is waiting for you too?”

He glared blankly, as usual. “You don’t expect me to trust you after this, do you?”

“Forgive me… please! I had no other option…” “I have to go.”

“Nanashi… please stay. Stay here with me.”

“I have to go. In space I will find what I need.”
« « «

He had gone. And now he was back. Now that she was married and had had a daughter, he was back, with his beautiful eyes and his beautiful voice and his beautiful self.

She noticed each detail about him, each little thing that hadn’t been there the last time they met. From the scar on the neck to the centimetres his legs had gained. From the calm look in his eyes to… the wedding ring in his finger.

“So, you got married.”

He looked up, awakening from whatever dream had drowned him. He looked at his hand and then at her. “Yes, I have.”

She didn’t say anything, but deep inside she heard something breaking. Again.

“Disappointed?”

She sighed, then faked a smile. “Not really. It’s not like I’m loosing you, since you’ve never been mine at all.” He blushed ever so slightly and stared at the floor. She held back a sad giggle.

“Still, it’s weird to imagine someone like you getting married.”

“Everyone changes. Even I have.”

“Yeah, I can see that.”

They kept silent for a minute, looking down and thinking of something to say.

“She must be must be really special to make you change so much.”

He chuckled, and stared at her, smiling. “Yes, *he* is really special.”

She blinked for a second, capturing the information. Then she smiled too. “It’s good to see that you can love something else, other than your precious space.”

He shook his head. “You never understood, did you?”

“What?”

“Space. What it meant to me.”

She thought for a while. “I’m afraid I didn’t.”

He remained silent, thinking of the right words to say. “Remember that night, when you fell off that tree?”

She nodded. How could she ever forget?

“You said you wanted to fly, so you’d be able to run away and find peace… Well, that’s space meant to me: a place where I would find the peace of mind that I so desperately needed. But instead, I found more blood and more pain. Peace was all I never had when in space.”
“You could have taken me with you.” She said, her voice a little shaky.

He stared at her again. “Why? To watch you die like so many others?”

“I wouldn’t mind dying if it was by your side.” She whispered, head bowed. A lonely tear ran down her face.

He ran a hand along her face, wiping the tear away. “Don’t do this to yourself. Don’t hurt yourself like this.”

She nodded, and blinked away the tears. What could she do? It wasn’t meant to be, so there was no use in suffering even more. Right?

“Did you ever even care about me?”

He smiled slightly. “I did trust you, remember? Enough to get my whole team dead.”

Her face darkened, and he kept caressing her cheek. “I know. You had no other option.”

Midii sighed again. “Maybe in another lifetime…”

He nodded. “When we don’t get ourselves in our way.”

Trowa pulled her face closer and lightly kissed her lips. His kiss wasn’t demanding, or passionate. It was exactly what it was meant to be: a good-bye. She held back her tears again and answered the kiss, depositing in it all the love she had kept buried down for so long, and knowing that this was her last chance to get all she could take from him, so that she could also get *over* him and go on with her own life.

Heartbreaking moments later, they broke the kiss.

They stared at each other for several minutes, looking deeply in each other’s eyes, until a kind voice called out from nowhere.

“Trowa!”

He looked back and smiled, his face getting lighter to the sight of that pretty man walking to them.

She stared for a moment and whispered to him: “Trowa?”

He glanced at her. “I couldn’t be Nanashi forever.”

At the same time the man reached them, another man came, with Muriel in his arms. “Honey, can we go now? Muriel is asleep already.”

She nodded and turned to the one by her side. “Trowa, this is my husband, Nubem, and my daughter, Muriel. Nubem, this is Trowa, an old friend I haven’t met in… many years.”

Trowa looked at the man and shook his hand. He looked familiar too. “Well, Midii and Nubem, this is Quatre Winner, my husband.”

Trowa and Midii stared at each other again, not noticing the look on the faces of their husbands as both shook hands. Quatre was stunned and somewhat uneasy about the fact that the other man seemed to be an alternative version of Trowa: brown hair, long bangs, green eyes, only shorter and older. Nubem was also stunned and very uneasy when he noticed that this Winner seemed to be his wife with the wrong gender. Same yellow-white hair, same aquamarine eyes, same gentle smile. But in a male body. They exchanged glances and looked down to the two still sit on the bench, to find that they were a few steps away, whispering something that looked like a goodbye.

“I guess that’s it.”

“Hn… it was good to see you again.”

“Yeah. Bye then, I guess…. Trowa.”

“Bye.” Trowa waved and started walking back to the blonde man. He took Quatre’s hand and they started to walk out.

“Nanashi!”

He stopped and turned.

“Did you ever forgive me?”

He stared at her a little confused, not more than the clueless man by his side. Then he looked at the brown-haired man and the white-haired girl. “You’ve got your wings Midii. Learn to fly.”

She stared at him and smiled, looking at Quatre. “You’ve reached space. Enjoy your peace.”

He smiled and watched his friend and her family leave.

Then he looked at Quatre, who held the funniest expression ever in his face and gave him a reassuring kiss, brushing away the questions that seemed to form on those pinkish lips. “So, my spaceboy…. what took you so long?”

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