Parachutes

Title – Parachutes

Author – Rainbase

Pairing: Wally/Kuki

Words: 1,141

Summary:

- "And soon I'm going to fall, but I never see it coming."

- Her ability to have just the right answer

is, once again, his downfall. –

- Rather touching. -

- Wally/Kuki –

*EDIT: I changed the ending =]*

________________________________________

In a haze, a stormy haze,
I'll be around, I'll be loving you always, always,
Here I am and I'll take my time,
Here I am and I'll wait in line always, always

- 'Parachutes', the Fray

________________________________________

--

For Wallabee Beetles, admitting his feelings had never been easy.

But, admittedly, when she initiated, it wasn't quite so bad.

--

"Wally?"

He looked up. They'd been on opposite sides of the treehouse for a while now, not saying a word, preoccupied elsewhere. But there was a nagging little voice in the back of his head, the one that always knew where she was, and never let him forget that she was there. "Eh?" He was promptly taken by surprise. He was Numbuh Four in this clubhouse, and real names were rarely spoken.

She was sitting in 'her corner', green sleeves pulled over her hands and an ever-present Rainbow Monkey perched next to her. For once, she wasn't holding it. She was poking the stuffing out of the hole in its neck. She didn't answer.

He shrugged to himself. Girls.

A moment later, she spoke. "Numbuh Four, what do you think about me?"

--

He sat forward in his chair, fussing needlessly with the hem of his sweatshirt. "I dunno. You're…Numbuh Three, aren't you? What else is there to it?"

She sat back on her haunches. "Nothing. I as testing you. There's more to me, then, I guess, you know about."

He leaned forward, curious. "What do you mean?"

She pulled her Rainbow Monkey into her lap and flapped its arms up and down. He never had understood her obsession with those god-forsaken things, but he decided not to say anything. "I mean…well, what words would you use to describe me, then?"

He wrinkled his nose, standing up and shaking his head so as to stylishly upset his blond hair. "I don't feel like playing your game."

"What game? I asked you a question, Numbuh Four." She stretched out her legs and looked at him expectantly.

"Oh—fine." He sat back down and ran a hand across his hand, making his hair stick up straight. "Um. You're…loud, right? And girly, really girly. And you're kinda dense. You never seem to actually listen to anyone or pay attention to what anyone's saying…right?"

Her expression seemed to turn a little cold, but she nodded. "Go on."

"Okay…well. You always seem to be happy, you're always really lucky. You're…annoying."

She raised an eyebrow.

He winced. "Well. It's true."

She sighed and toyed with the Rainbow Monkey's stuffing in her hand. "It's not so much that that's the part that bothers me. It's…what you said before."

He was confused. He never had been very smart. "What did I say?"

She bit her lip. "It was the part when you said…you said, 'You never seem to actually listen to anyone or pay attention to what anyone's saying'. That bothered me."

He almost laughed. "But wait…that was the most true thing I said! I was just making the other stuff up."

--

She widened her eyes at him so as to give him that wise look he never seemed to see anymore. "Would you like it? If I said that to you?"

He shifted in his seat, uncomfortable. Her unwavering gaze was unnerving. "No…I s'pose not."

"But if it had been true?" she prodded.

"Then…it would have been better, because it's true. But it is true. For you."

She shook her head. "No it's not."

He sat forward, chin on his hand. "How do you mean?"

--

"It's all a cover-up." She looked at him plainly, waiting for his response.

"A cover-up? For what? Wait…so you're just pretending to be a dumb girly-girl?" This was a bit of news Wally hadn't expected at all, and he sat forward so far forward he toppled out of his chair.

"Well, dumb. I'm still a girly-girl." She cracked a smile at that.

--

"Do you ever wonder why that is?" She leaned back and looked at the ceiling.

"Why you're covering up? Um. No. I mean, I never did. I do now." Struggling to regain his composure, he sat back up in his chair and ruffled his hair again, red in the face.

"I know what's going on. I always have. I mean, pretending I'm stupid and all protects me from me."

"You from you?" he parroted, uncomprehending.

"You've met my family, Wally," she said, startling him again with the use of his real name. "You know what they're like! If I didn't pretend, then I'd have to face it. My parents, they're not nice people, Numbuh Four."

"Well—I mean, yeah. I know." His voice sounded thick in his Australian accent. "I'm…sorry."

"Why?"

"You seem sad, and I'm sorry for that." He shook his shaggy blond head over his eyes.

She was across the room with her arms flung around him in what seemed like a second. "Thanks, Numbuh Four." Her hugs weren't annoying this time. They felt almost just right. Awkwardly he extracted his arm from between them and draped it over her shoulder.

"Um…it's…okay…" he comforted unceremoniously, patting her on the shoulder clumsily.

"I don't know, Wally," she said, using his name again much to his discomfort. "It's like I'm in a parachute, you know?"

"Uh." Truth was… "No. I don't."

"It's like I'm going down really slow, but I don't know it. And soon I'm going to fall, but I never see it coming."

He thought about it, and decided. "That doesn't sound like you. You don't seem like you right now."

They were both twelve, almost thirteen, but for a moment, it felt like they were adults. "Here's the thing, Wally. Have I ever really been me?"

He shrugged noncommittally, never one to be sentimental. She climbed off of him and sat next to him with a loud sniff. This was the moment. They were alone— "Hey, Numbuh Three, there's something I want to, uh, tell you."

She looked up at him, eyes big. "Yes?"

"That is, I mean, I think. Remember the hospital?"

"Yes."

"Well, 'you stink' wasn't what I was going to say. And your shoe…wasn't really untied."

She looked faintly amused. "Yes, I know. Go on."

"Well, what I wanted to say was, I think I li—" He dug his heel into the carpet--

--

He kissed her.

He knew he would.

Well, maybe not. It was more like, she leaned forward with that expectant look in her eyes, and he knew what to do, for once in his life.

It was just a touch of his mouth to her cheek, for a second, and then she turned her head and…

He kissed her.

--

He couldn't say it. He just couldn't. "Can you guess what I was going to say?" He went red, rubbing his mouth with his fist, looking slightly dazed.

She didn't look excited anymore, just happy. "I think I can. But could you say it, just for me?"

"Don't push it." She smiled at him in response, and he kissed her again.

End Parachutes