AN. Written for Galaxy Cauldron Forums' February writing contest. The theme is future incarnation.

The cover picture is from Thai artist, Kankasin Vindubrahmanakul. The picture is used with permission from the artist.

—

Cherry pie

"I'm so sorry, Makoto. I had an urgent work that I need to finish today. I'm sorry I can't make it to our picnic. I'll take you out some other time to make it up to you, ok?" and then he hung up without even waiting for my response.

I looked at all the food in the picnic basket, a variety of sandwiches, rice balls, salad, two cans of apple juice, and cookies. I spent the whole morning making them. I even made a cherry pie, which was something I usually didn't do on the first date. But I thought this guy was special. I guessed I would have to take it to the girls.

So this was the story of my life. Met a guy, asked him out and then got stood up, or worse got rejected before the date was over. Well, what did I expect? I was too tall. I was too strong, at least that's what others saw me. The girls always said I was sweet, but if others didn't see me like that, what's the point? I guessed just being good at cooking was not enough to erase my tough exterior in others' eyes.

But there was one person, one person outside the Moon Palace that saw me not only as a competent warrior, but as a kind-hearted woman.

Nephrite

Now that I thought about it. I always asked a guy out to a picnic for the first date. I thought it was because I wanted to show him that I could cook, that I was feminine enough to be someone's girlfriend, but it might be because of him.

It was different though. We always had our picnics at night as it was the only time we could meet.

—

Nephrite was looking at the sky, waiting.

"Good evening, my lady," he turned around and kissed me on the cheek.

"You always know the exact time I'm coming."

"The stars told me, love. They want us to be together."

"I miss you, Nephrite," I said as I put my hand and placed it along his cheek. He grabbed my hand and then gave me a kiss there.

"I miss you too, Jupiter. I know I should be grateful to see you every Thursday, but once a week is not nearly enough."

I looked at him fondly, and brought my lips to his.

"Let's just enjoy our time, general," I said with a smile.

"I made a lot of food for us. The usual, sandwiches, riceballs, salad and cookies, but I have a special today," I smirked.

"Don't give me that look. Spill it already, dear."

I opened the white box that I bought with me and opened it, "I present to you my first cherry pie."

"Wow! Are you sure this is your first one? It looks amazing!"

"Of course, it is my first one. You gave me cherries last week, and I liked them so much that I had to figure out how to make a dessert out of them. Just take this as a thank you for introducing me to my new favorite fruit." I kissed him on the cheek.

"Well, that's certainly a dessert worth looking forward to at the end of the meal.

We both sat down. I handed him his favorite sandwich.

"How are things, Nephrite? I hear it is a pretty tense situation you have lately," I asked.

"Unfortunately, yes. People are fearing the Silver Alliance. The negotiation between the Alliance and earth hasn't gone as well as we hope, and people fear that the Alliance will attack us." Nephrite said.

"That is an absolute nonsense. The Alliance will never attack anyone first," I said.

Nephrite continued, "I know, but there are Resistance leaders trying to spread the rumors that the Silver Alliance are planning a sneaky attack on us. They want to instill fears in people, so that they can control them." He started munching on the sandwich.

"That's a disturbing news," I said.

"Don't worry, love. Jadeite and I will lead the force to destroy the Resistance next week," he said.

"Be careful," I said while stroking his arm.

"It is not going to be difficult. We hear that there is this witch, Beryl, that are using dark energy to control people. We'll just have to take her down, and their number is presumably small. There shouldn't be any problem."

"I know how capable you are," I said, looking at his eyes. "Still I can't help but worry."

"That is sweet, love. But I assure you. I will be fine," he said while using his hand to lift my chin up and kiss me softly. "I will be back before you know it."

I wanted to enjoy our time together, so I dropped the subject. We spent our time as usual. We ate, then he laid his head on my lap. I kept stroking his silky hair as we talked. He told me stories about stars, I told him about my life in the Moon Kingdom, he told me about his works, we talked about how lucky we were to serve Serenity and Endymion, we made jokes about my fellow senshi and his shitennou, he told me how he loved working with animals, I told him how I loved working in the garden. Everything seemed right with the world, and the moon.

He held his head up from my lap, and kissed me.

"We have to get going soon," he said.

"Well, not before trying my cherry pie, general," I said.

"I have not forgotten that, love. I've been looking forward to it all night."

He took a spoon, cut a bite, and put it in his mouth.

"How is it?" I asked, fearing that my first attempt would be a disaster.

"Hmm," he looked troubled, making me feel nervous.

"I know it's bad, isn't it? I'm sorry. I will try better next time," I said, looking at my failed creation.

"I'm just kidding, love," he laughed. "It's delicious, like everything you make."

"Don't scare me like that! I really thought you hated it," I playfully punched his arm.

"How can I hate your food? Clearly you don't know me as well as you should have." He smiled.

"Let me try it too," I said while reaching for a spoon in his hand.

"Here I'll help you." He planted a kiss on my lips. I felt the sweet taste of the cherry pie with a lingering bitterness at the end.

"It's actually the right balance between sweetness and bitterness. I like it," I said.

"I think we have our new picnic food, cherry pie!" He said with a smile.

"I already used up all the cherries you gave me, so you will have to get me more."

"Anything for you, dear. I promise next time we see each other I will bring you as many cherries as I can carry." He smiled fondly at me.

—

That was our last picnic.

Yes, even in this life I always liked cherry pies. It was bitter and sweet. It reminded me of our time together. In Silver Millennium, we got to meet, but we never got to spend a lot of time together. Our picnics were the only time we could be alone together. Every time, it was sweet, but bitter as we said our goodbyes, knowing that it would be at least another week before we could see each other again. In this life, we spent most of our time fighting each other, not knowing that we were each other's halves. Then we got to taste a sweetness of remembering each other for a second before Metallia ripped him away from my life, leaving nothing but bitterness.

I sighed and as I was about to gather the food and leave, a large dog came running in and peeked his nose into my picnic basket.

"Hey! Don't do that!" I said as I tried to lift my basket up from the ground. But when I look at two large brown eyes, I caved immediately.

"Are you hungry?" I looked fondly at the dog. It was probably a Labrador, a chocolate one. It was quite rare to see such a large dog in Tokyo, so to see one was really quite shocking.

As I was about to break off one of my sandwiches to give to the dog, I heard a handsome voice shouted. "Thunder! Thunder! Where are you?"

I followed the voice and my gaze met with a familiar set of eyes of a tall, auburn-haired guy.

Nephrite

He ran up to the dog and hooked it back with the leash.

"I'm so sorry. He normally doesn't run off like this. I don't know what happened today," he bowed and apologized.

"Did he bother you? He didn't make any trouble, did he?" he said.

"No, not at all." I was still processing the familiar sight in front of me. I hadn't seen any of the shitennou after Metallia killed them in the cave in the Dark Kingdom. It had been four years since then, so I didn't expect to see Nephrite-look-alike here with me today.

"Miss, are you ok?" he asked and waved his hand in front of me. I must have spaced out.

"Oh, sorry." I snapped back out of my trance.

"I think he's just hungry. He's sniffing my food," I said while smiling at Thunder

"Well, bad boy," he told Thunder. "You don't beg strangers for food, ok?"

"I'm so sorry, Miss —

"Kino, Kino Makoto." I shook his hand.

"I'm Nathan Becker. Nice to meet you, Miss Kino. I normally feed him before our walk, but today I forgot. He must be really hungry now."

"Seems like you are going to have a picnic. We'll leave now. Enjoy your lunch," he pulled on Thunder's leash and prepared to leave. But being Salior Jupiter, there's no way I was going to let this look-a-lot-like-Nephrite guy get away without knowing what's going on.

"Actually, my friend just cancelled. If you don't mind, you and Thunder can have lunch with me," I offered.

He turned back and said, "Really? Are you sure we won't be intruding?"

"You'll actually be doing me a favor. I made a lot of food and I hate to see it go to waste."

"We'll take up your offer then," he said while sitting down beside me.

"I'm actually really hungry, so you're my lifesaver, Miss Kino," he said with a small laughter.

"Please call me Makoto."

"Only if you call me Nate."

I smiled and handed out one of my sandwiches to him and a small bite for him to give to Thunder.

"Wow! This is amazing. You made this?"

I blushed a little and looked down at the ground. I always did that when anyone complimented my cooking.

"I think you're just hungry. Everything tastes good when you're hungry, right?"

"I know a good food when I taste one, Makoto. And this is one of the best sandwiches I've had here."

"What do you mean 'here'?" I asked.

"Well, I just moved here from the U.S.," he said while munching on the another sandwich.

"That explains why your dog is so big."

"I know it's a bit tricky to keep him in a city like Tokyo, but I had him for so long, I had to bring him with me."

"So why did you move here?" I asked casually.

"I study veterinary science here at the university," he pointed at the nearby university.

"That's great, but if you don't mind me asking why this university? In Tokyo? Surely you didn't move here just for school," I asked.

"For the record, a lot of people moved to another country for school," he smirked. "But you are right, that wasn't the only reason I moved here."

He sighed and looked at the sky. This reminded me so much of Nephrite. He loved looking at the sky, although I'd only seen him looking at the sky at night because that was how we always met, at night, on earth.

He said, "It's weird but I just got the feeling that I had to be here. It's illogical really, but after my accident four years ago I feel that I want to follow my heart when I still have a chance."

"An accident? Four years ago?" I asked. My heart was beating fast while my head was full with speculations.

"Yeah, I had a car accident and was in a coma, for like, 6 months."

Four years ago. That was when we fought the Dark Kingdom. Could this guy actually be Nephrite?

"I'm sorry to hear about your accident," I said, still wondering what was going on.

"Yeah, I was lucky to be alive," he said. "So from then on, I've vowed to always follow my heart.

"You must think I'm silly." He chuckled.

"No, I think it's romantic," I said. "When I moved here, I didn't have a reason either. I just felt that the wind told me to be here."

He looked at me as if he's seeing a long lost friend. "I wouldn't say this to a person I just met, but since you said that about the wind, I guess I can tell you that the stars have been telling me to move here since I came out of the coma."

"The stars?" I asked. My heart was beating even faster.

He nodded, "Ever since I came out of that coma, every time I look at the sky, I always feel like the stars are talking to me."

He laughed, "But don't worry. I'm not crazy! I don't actually hear the sounds in my head. I just feel them."

I chuckled, "I didn't think you were crazy. I just think it's a special skill to have."

"You don't think I'm crazy? Everybody else does, well, everyone that I told anyway, even my closest friends. They think I might have been hit too hard or was in a coma for too long." He smiled.

I smiled at him. He looked so much like Nephrite. His eyes, his hair, his broad shoulders, the way he carried himself, how he talked about stars, how he treated his animal companions. Everything reminded me so much of him.

"Your girlfriend must be devastated that you moved here," I said. Well, I actually wanted to ask, but I really couldn't muster the courage to.

"I don't have a girlfriend." He looked at me.

"Really? A handsome guy like you is still single?" I tried to play it off as a joke.

He smiled at me."Why is that so surprising? What about you? Do you have a boyfriend?" he asked.

"No."

"See? I can make the same comment to you. I can't believe such a beautiful girl like you, and a good cook too, doesn't have a boyfriend yet." He said to me jokingly.

"Beautiful? Really? Most guys think I'm too tall," I said.

"What? Are they blind? You are tall, yes, but not too tall."

"You are the first guy who said that." If I didn't count what happened a lifetime ago.

We talked and finished almost all of my food. I still couldn't be sure if this guy was Nephrite. There's one more thing that might help.

"Would you like to try my cherry pie?" I opened the box, revealing my homemade cherry pie inside.

"That looks amazing," he said.

"Here's a spoon." I handed it to him.

He cut a chunk and ate it.

"That's so good, Makoto. Anything you cook is delicious!"

"Well, you haven't had that many of my dishes," I blushed and looked down at the ground.

He tilted his head to follow my eyes, "I look forward to trying more."

I blushed even more. I'm pretty sure my cheeks are as red as tomatoes right now.

I tried to change the subject, "So why did you name your dog 'Thunder'?"

"Hmm, I got him four years ago after I came out of the coma. I remember that when I was in the hospital, I kept having these dreams that I was fighting with roses and thunders. Weird, right? But it felt so real that I hardly believed they were just dreams."

I felt a pinch of guilt over me. Was he really Nephrite? The Dark Kingdom Nephrite that I fought against four years ago?

"So when I got him, he was a boy, so I named him Thunder. If it was a girl, I'd probably name her Rose," he chuckled.

"And I —

"What is it, Nate?"

"I also had recurring dreams about a girl," he said.

"A girl?"

"Yes, I can't see her face, but in my dreams, we were always on a picnic." He looked at me intensely.

"It's usually at night though. In my dreams, I mean." He looked away.

I looked at his profile. It was that look I had four years ago when I didn't know I was Sailor Jupiter, when I didn't remember my life purpose, when I didn't know my soulmate, but the feeling was there. I'd always felt my duty, my purpose and my other half.

"Sorry for babbling. Makoto," he said. "It's just so comfortable talking to you."

"Me too."

He looked at his watch, and said, "I'm sorry I have to run to class soon, but I had a really nice time."

"Me too." I muttered and nodded, didn't know what else to say.

He looked like he was mustering up his courage for something, and then he said, "Could we go on a picnic like this again some time?"

"Sure, I'd love that." I nodded and smiled at him.

We exchanged our numbers. He helped me gather utensils and leftover food and put them in my basket.

"This has turned out to be the perfect afternoon. Thank you very much, Makoto." He smiled.

"Stop it! You said thank you too many times already." I chuckled and waved my hand in front of him.

"I'll call you and we'll get together. Next time I'll bring some drinks."

"Apple juice," I said.

"Apple juice, got it," he said.

"See you, Nate."

"See you, Makoto." He gave me a small nod.

Just a few seconds later, as I was turning in the opposite direction to walk back to my place, Nate called out.

"Makoto!"

I turned back, "Yes."

"Are you open to have a picnic at night?"

"That sounds wonderful." I gave him the biggest smile I could.

He smiled back at me. The familiar smile that, for four years, I had been longing to see again.

Yes, my cherry pies would get a lot sweeter from now on.