The One that Loves You
Honestly, everything about you is so unexpected. When we first met I
never expected that you would become so important to me. That I would
spend my days and nights taking care of you, or that our lives would be
so inexplicably intertwined.
I never expected to fall in love with you.
How quickly and readily my life, my very being, moulded itself around
you. I didn't even notice it at the time, it felt like the most natural
thing in the world, being with you. We gravitate towards and around one
another, bound together with ties that go deeper than I think even we
ourselves can fully understand yet.
I have wondered sometimes what you are thinking and feeling about us. I
have never asked though. You are so young and we have time for you to
realise for yourself how we are all but lovers already... or so I used
to think. Perhaps I was just making excuses for not making my feelings
clear to you and risk rejection, maybe I was just afraid all along.
Don't you see me Sanya? I am the one that always stands next to you.
Until recently I thought that you needed me, that you sought me out,
sought my help, my care, my companionship. It seemed to me that you were
helpless without me, that you were so needy and required me to dote on
you just to get through everyday life. That you needed me to help you
with the mundane little things, washing, clothing, keeping you fed...
you even find your way into my bed at night, as if you can't stand to be
apart for even that long.
How wrong I was. It isn't you who are the needy one, the one that sought
me out, oh no. It was always the reverse.
I stay beside you because there is nowhere else in the world I would
rather be. Where you go I follow, like the ocean follows the moon. I
wonder, do you even notice me, trailing your steps?
Everything changed when she came. I didn't even pay that much attention
to her, she was just a new recruit, the new kid, young and cute and
terribly naïve. If anything I think I considered her the Major's girl,
seeing as how the two of them seemed to have gotten rather close pretty
fast. That was before she was put on night duty with the two of us.
Miyafuji is a sweet girl, I can't refute that, and she is very likeable
too. Somewhat dense about some things, I think, and for all her gifts
and her growing skill she's not a soldier. It might not always be very
apparent but I am every bit as much an ingrained soldier as Barkhorn or
Major Sakamoto herself, for all that I sometimes play the part of the
rogue – the military mindset and its discipline are imprinted into my
spine.
Of course you can always make me lose my cool.
Miyafuji reached out to you, and to my shock and horror, charmed you
completely. Do you think that I do not notice how you smile and blush in
response to her? That I do not see you following her with your gaze, or
how differently you react to her? Of course I do, I notice everything
about you.
Each time it cuts a little deeper into my heart, and I bleed a little
more.
I've struggled with it, but ultimately there is one thing that must
always be true: I am the one that loves you, that would do anything for
you. Even if that means seeing you find happiness with someone else.
So I've tried to make her pay attention to you when I can. I could sing
your praise for hours and it would not mean as much as a single
encouraging word from her, I realise that. It hurts, of course it does,
but at least I do what I can. She'll notice soon, you'll see.
You have rivals for her attention, amazingly enough. I'll never
understand how anyone can look at the wonder that is you and then see
anything else at all, but although it angers me a little, I suppose
Miyafuji can't help that she is that dense. With women throwing
themselves at her left and right – or rather yanking at her I suppose –
it might not be easy to notice your interest while you remain quiet and
unmoving.
I'll encourage you, if you can overcome just a little of your shyness
there is no way she or anyone else could avoid noticing you. Once she
sees you, truly sees you, she can't help but fall at your feet. Who can?
I'm a fool, of course. Just a fool would try to get the girl she loves
together with someone else. It is not like it didn't occur to me though,
that doing nothing, letting Miyafuji get yanked around by those other
girls until one of them made an honest claim, would mean that I did not
have to lose you. But you see, I could not bear for you to be in pain,
or worse, cry over her.
Should the day arrive that you came to me crying over her, I would
probably lose it altogether. I don't doubt that I would beat Miyafuji to
a bloody pulp for hurting you, regardless of the repercussions. Ha, I
wonder what would happen first, Sakamoto and Barkhorn beating me into a
pale smear on the runway, or the Commander having me drawn and
quartered? Not that it would matter.
What then would I do if things go your way and Miyafuji loves you? Would
I be able to take it, to watch you two together, to watch you with her
doing all the things we used to and more? All while I continue on, alone
and without you. Am I that strong?
No. I'm not, I know that. I would probably end up locking myself into my
room when not on duty, except that would only make me feel worse
wouldn't it? After all, your presence is in everything in here; that is
your mug, your chair... your side of the bed.
You always sneak into my bed at the end of your duty shift, and I've
always pretended to grumble and say that it was ‘only for today', though
never so that you could hear me. I still say that, though these days I
say it directed at myself; it is only for today that you are with me,
only for today that you are next to me, warm, beautiful and
breathtaking.
The thought that tomorrow you might be in someone else's bed, someone
else's arms, just kills me and I can't breathe. Nothing in this world
could ever hurt as much as losing you.
Except... it was just a dream, wasn't it? You were never mine. But you
know, Sanya? If ever you would look to me, if you could ever consider
me...
I would be yours. Completely.
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