Author: Gypsie1201
Pairings: 1x2
Warnings: Post-EW, POV, Sap
Rating: PG
Archive: Debs-Dragon - GW Diaries, Akira_1x2, Moments of Rapture
Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing or any of its characters, nor will I make any money from the creation of this story.
Feedback: All is welcome and very much appreciated.
Written for skylark92's request: GW, Heero/Duo, "You make me want to be a better person."
Summary: At the yearly celebration in remembrance of the Eve Wars, one man gives thanks for the most important person in his life.
Find My Peace In You
Looking out over the fields covered in pure white snow, I allow my thoughts to drift back over the past years. There's so much to remember that, at first, the sights and sounds crowd my mind and I feel overwhelmed by their intensity. Then, just as in the past, I think of your face and it all fades to a more manageable level. Even from the very beginning, when you were trying your damnedest to kill me on that pier in order to save Relena's life, you could always bring clarity to my mind. It's still hard to believe that you risked your own life only a few days later to save me from the alliance hospital that you put me in in the first place. If only I'd known then just how much you'd come to mean to me.
But I wouldn't trade or change anything in my life. So much has happened. Some of it bad, like my childhood and the wars, but most of it's been good. And I like to think that that's because of you and your presence in it. As I stand here listening to the celebration still taking place behind me, I give my own thanks to the fact that you chose to stay by my side through all these years, even despite everything I put you through.
When the second war ended, I wasn't prepared for the sudden lack of fighting. I don't think any of us were. Not even the tense year following the first war had held the sense of completion that came over us following Barton's defeat, which is why it was so easy for us to all go our separate ways. We reminded each other so much of what we'd gone through that staying together just hadn't been possible and not even best friends were immune. So I'd watched you go, returning to L2 and the scrape yard, wondering if I'd ever see you again.
It took a few years, five actually, before you were brought back into my life at the annual Peace Celebration held at Relena's palace. It was your first year with the Preventers and since you were living on the Earth instead of L2, you'd been able attend. I'll never forget how my heart had nearly stopped in my chest when I saw you walk through the ballroom doors with Wufei and Sally. It'd taken me exactly six months after watching you walk away from me back then to realize that my feelings for you went far beyond mere friendship. But my inexperience with life, and emotions in general, had kept me from acting on them. Only Relena knows exactly what I went through during those five years and she will always hold a very special place in my heart for helping me learn to accept them.
But even then, it wasn't easy. We spent another year skirting around each other before we finally took the plunge and tried giving a relationship a try. That's when I really learned how much love could hurt. We fought almost constantly. Being in such close quarters with someone infringed on my training that I still had a hard time turning loose of and you just couldn't seem to let your independence go enough to compromise. By the end of our first year, I was certain that we weren't going to make it. Then came the assignment that showed me just how much I had to lose and made me rethink everything about our life together.
You and Wufei were being sent in to deal with an insurgent group who'd been causing trouble and were believed to have the capability of producing mobile suits. It was a long-term mission, supposed to take nearly three months to complete, including infiltration and gathering the needed information. Three months of no communications, because it was far too risky, and it still makes me sick at me stomach when I think of how relieved I'd been, thinking that we needed a break and that was exactly what we were being given. But nothing could've prepared me for the day when Quatre showed up at our apartment, just barely two months into it. The words 'missing-in-action' and 'position unknown' turned my life upside down in the space of two seconds. I don't remember how I ended up on the floor with him wrapped around me and whispering reassurances in my ear as he cried along with me but I'll never forget just how empty I'd felt at that moment.
The month that followed was pure hell; not knowing whether you or Wufei were dead or alive and I just couldn't keep from feeling that I'd been just a little bit responsible. I'd wanted it after all, hadn't I? And it really made me take a long hard look at myself and what I wanted from my life. And it didn't take long for me to realize just where we'd gone wrong.
We'd started our relationship with the expectation that things wouldn't change from how they'd always been between us. But moving from best friends to lovers was a big step and a change in itself. We hadn't been ready for the responsibility we had to each other at that point and in the end, we'd resented each other for it. We started blaming each other for every little thing and every little hurt until it became normal for us. Until neither of us could see the truth anymore. But losing you for that month made me see it, bright and glaring in its ugliness. And I knew that things had to change, that I had to change, if I planned to keep you in my life. And that was the one thing I was absolutely sure of; I just couldn't imagine living the rest of my life without you. Of course, you had to come back to me first.
I should've never doubted either you or Wufei though. The two of you were soldiers, just as I was during the wars, and the both of you were considered the very best that the Preventers had to offer. So the day your communication came through giving your location and status shouldn't have been a surprise. You'd managed to carry through your mission, the information was good, and the Preventers were able to round up the group with no problems once they knew where to look. But not without a price.
I arrived at the hospital only a few minutes after you both had been brought in and it was another three hours before we were giving any information about your status. The doctor didn't even try to list all the injuries individually, just said you were both damn lucky to be alive at all. And I had to agree when I'd finally been allowed back to see you. Bruises, cuts, and scrapes marred every inch of pale skin that wasn't covered in white bandages or casts. Your right arm was broken in two places while your left leg was broken in one. The worse though was your right hip. Crushed. How the hell you managed to drag yourself out of the hole they'd been keeping you in I'll probably never fathom and Wufei, with his concussion and dislocated shoulder, couldn't have been much help at the time.
But make it back to me you did, in more or less one piece, and things between us got better. Once you'd woken up and were lucid enough to talk, that's what we did. We talked about all those things that we should've talked about at the beginning of our relationship and by the time you'd been allowed to come home a couple of weeks later, we'd worked out most of our problems. Not that they all just disappeared of course, but we really started working at it and now, nearly six years later, we're still together.
"Heero?" your soft voice pulls me from my contemplation of the past and the glistening fields in front of me and I turn to find you standing in the balcony doorway, watching me with those beautiful violet eyes that, even after all these years, can still make me weak in the knees. "Don't you think it's a bit cold to be out here without your coat?"
"It's not so bad." I smile back and you push away from the door and walk toward me. With the cold weather, the limp left behind by your injuries from that mission has gotten worse. 'Old Arthur coming to visit.' you always joke, but it's always a reminder to me of just how close I came to losing you to our combined stubbornness. And with the memories so close to the surface at that moment, I can't stand to watch and turn back to the snow.
When you're close enough, you wrap your arms around my waist, pressing close to my back, before burying your cold nose against my neck and drawing a quick shiver from me. "Penny for your thoughts?" you whisper and I can tell you're staring out at the pristine, white lawn just as I am.
"Just thinking about how we got here."
"Cab." you laugh softly and I join you before turning back around so I can wrap my own arms around you, pulling you as close as I can so I can give you some of my warmth. The cold may not bother me that much, but I know how much you hate it.
"No, smart ass." I chide softly, the smile in my voice taking any real sting from my words. "About how we got here, the peace."
"I know, 'Ro." you breathe while burrowing deeper into my arms, seeking more warmth and I'm more than happy to oblige. "It's kinda hard not to think about it at times like this. But I don't want you getting down about it either."
I can't help but smile at your words and I quickly bury it in the silky hair on the top of your head. You've always been so good at reading me; at knowing when my mood is slipping and you're always the first to try and pull me back up. I've accused you of being psychic in the past and you'd just smile that smile I love before kissing me softly on the lips, which, more than anything else, can always bring a smile back to my own lips.
"And I was thinking about you." I tell you before sliding one hand up to tangle in the base of your braid, pulling your head back enough that I can look you in the eye.
"What about me?" you ask before placing one of those soft kisses on my lips.
"About how you make me want to be a better person." I say then swoop down for a much longer and deeper kiss, only pulling back once I've thoroughly devoured your sweet lips. "About how you make my life complete."
You don't answer me, only continue to smile that smile I love. We've come so far from the two, messed up teenagers we were when we first met and words, although nice to hear, aren't always needed between us. The small sparkle I can plainly see in your eyes and the way your face seems to open up to me in that moment, tells me more than any words could've.
Pulling you close once again, I turn us so we can both stare out over the snow-covered fields. In this moment, in this time, with the sounds of the Peace Celebration still going on behind us, I can't imagine my life any other way.
OWARI
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