AN: Because I'm crazy and my brain farted onto my fingers that danced across the keyboard that produced this story. My god, don't you just love brain-not-engaged moments? Make what you will of it, but I'm telling you, it makes no sense. Review after you read, too. wink
She supposed it didn't matter. She supposed it never should. But, as always, whatever she supposed always turned out wrong, and then she'd have to suppose all over again.
It never made any sense and it always made her so mad. So mad. At first it was the eye patch. And then the hair. And then her speech. And then her body, mind, soul, clothes, accent, attitude. The list could go on forever and she wouldn't be done. They wouldn't be done. With making fun of her, poking fun at her, poking fun at her with a stick through the patch in the cage... She hated it and she hated it and they knew she hated it and that's why they did it. They just loved to see her face contort in anger, to hear her bark out "RAGE!", to have her hop around and yell and scream until she'd lie down and shake in fetal position, hacking wetly and wiping blood off her chin. It was just fun. Making fun of Fujin was always just fun.
So she learned to cope. She used her voice sparingly. She developed a look that guarded her by turning others away. And she learned to kick her brother. It was all learned, all adapted. No-one would have believed that underneath it all, Fujin wasn't a one-eyed monster. They wouldn't have believed that she was capable of smiling. Or whispering. Just like they wouldn't have believed if someone had said that Quistis Trepe wasn't perfect.
But then, she wasn't. And that was what Fujin found so fun. It was fun to run her fingers through Quistis' hair and watch the blonde tremble. Because perfect women did not tremble when another woman ran her fingers through their hair. They would either purr that they needed another inch trimmed off at the bottom, or a catfight would have ensued. But Quistis trembled. And Quistis purred. And moaned. And giggled softly in the dark while trying to make Fujin do the same. It was fun to watch the perfection melt away, because perfection didn't melt away, it etched and strained and pulled but never came off. Fujin found it fun to be able to simply burn away the perfection and hear the moans of her name, all through running her fingertips along in the dark.
But then when she thought about it, and she took time away from her not-so-busy schedule to suppose about things again, she realized that really, it wasn't about the fun and the enjoyment. It was about the comfort that Quistis gave. The comfort that Quistis offered so easily when Fujin needed it most. The kind of thing that Quistis was capable of doing when Fujin wanted to cry but couldn't because the Fujins of the world didn't cry. They stared angrily at the wall and made their tears go away through sheer willpower. This Fujin, the Balamb Garden Fujin, the Quistis Trepe Fujin, was very capable of doing that. But it hurt too much to keep up, and after so many years, it hurt too much to even think about. This was the Quistis Trepe Fujin, though, so there was no need for sheer willpower willing, there was only a need for a warm and soft and loving Quistis Trepe who could take away everything with a soft, slightly coffee tainted whisper and a soft, slightly coffee tainted kiss. Fujin learned to love coffee through Quistis. Not because she loved drinking it, but because Quistis tasted like coffee. Quistis was a teacher, and teachers drank coffee like there was no tomorrow. Or at least, Quistis did.
Fujin also learned to love the word love. She loved it because she would always hear it whispered to her at night, when Quistis finished her marking and slipped in under the warm covers to envelope Fujin in a warm hug. She loved it because she would hear it in the morning again when Quistis had to slip out early to get ready for first period class. She loved it because it was what Quistis would whisper when Fujin brushed her teeth early Saturday morning, and Quistis found her prey in front of the mirror with foam all around her mouth. And Fujin loved love because it was what Quistis would moan over and over again, the words "I love you" would become a mantra that ended with Fujin's own name shrilly sung, and Quistis would sigh contentedly after arching up to meet Fujin's slippery wet fingers, and whisper love again then too.
And then there were the times when Fujin would do the hugging and kissing, and she realized that that too, was an acquired skill. When it was just too much, or there was just too little, or if it all become too big and Quistis couldn't contain it all, Fujin's shoulder would get a good wetting of the salt water leaking from Quistis' eyes, and Fujin would have an opportunity to practice her sultry whispers and softening looks. She sharpened her skills and Quistis called her the Master, because no-one knew how to comfort Quistis better than Fujin, contrary to what Rinoa and Selphie might have wanted to believe.
What came out of it all though, was a very dependant relationship between two very independent beings who needed one another more than they needed the air between them. Quistis tried to ignore the pain in her chest whenever she saw Fujin being made fun of in class. Fujin tried to ignore the flash of anger when foolish boys tried to make a pass on their Instructor. Quistis tried to ignore the stab of need that she felt when she looked at Fujin's softened ruby eye and spotted those delicate lips during one of her lectures to her class. Fujin tried to ignore the instinctive want when Quistis brushed past and wafted the smell of coffee and Quistis and whatever happened last night. They learned to ignore, so really, in the end, they learned to ignore the whole world, as well as their impulses and strange wants and needs and crazy desires.
When Quistis, out of the blue, attacked Fujin that day, pressing her up against the bathroom wall and crushing her with her own body, Fujin never said anything. She never did anything, just let the wave of need and want wash over her lover and hopefully fade away. But it didn't. And Fujin was brought up to dizzying heights that only ended when she managed to hoarsely whisper her lover's name as it ebbed and flowed in her, and then Quistis woke up from her red-blooded daze and began to apologize profusely. That had been the week of exams, when Quistis had been much to busy to sleep, let alone feel Fujin's soft skin against hers, and Fujin understood. But Quistis hadn't. And for the next month or so, public interactions were so limited, they in fact became the next hot topic for the gossipy Balamb Trepies.
So their private interactions began to become limited. Quistis began returning to her previously not-hers dorm room, where a proper Instructor slept. And Fujin slept by herself with a cup of hot coffee always by her bedside, because Quistis smelled and tasted like coffee and Fujin couldn't sleep without it, and she'd have nightmares that she knew there would be no Quistis to save her from. Slowly, things spiraled into marking papers and obsessive amounts of coffee, and then into blank stares and hopeless tears and staring matches with the walls to make sure they never came out, and then it became desperation and depression.
Fujin knew it when she got there. Quistis didn't. So they both wandered around aimlessly, parallel in every way, hoping to intersect but never making it, and Quistis would have to smile and laugh, just like always. It hurt, and somewhere across the Garden, Fujin hurt too, but Quistis didn't know that and never would. That's what made Fujin hurt. Fujin, because she thought and realized and supposed a lot more than others did, knew when she'd reached it. She pondered calling her brother to tell him she finally arrived. She pondered calling Quistis and telling her the symptoms, to warn her past lover that it was coming up soon, but she couldn't, because she'd gotten there. Rock bottom had a way of stopping someone from living. Quistis, of course, found out soon enough for herself.
So they became residents of the Rock Bottom. Fujin's eye began to adapt, and her walk changed to accommodate the sudden lurches and obstacles that often inhabited the dark Rock Bottom. Quistis used the bright golden glow of hair to help her see, but she often found herself wishing for a bit of silver light from someone else's hair, because she was so sure it would have worked better. The both of them often found themselves stuffing on hot dogs to help with the cold temperatures normal to Rock Bottom. They always burned it off though, the moment Fujin aimed at the Grat, the moment Quistis cracked her whip.
It was half a year later that the tide ebbed in and washed them up, and Fujin was graduating. A simple dark tuxedo, blood red tie to match her eye, she looked dazzling. She needed it to see a couple of metres in front of her, because Rock Bottom was particularly dark that night, but the dazzle also attracted another source of light. A soft golden glow that Fujin found she had an undying love for, accompanied by a soft pale blue that swathed whatever lithe form was underneath that golden halo, and Fujin suddenly found herself in the arms of her long lost lover, her long lost companion, her suddenly found former resident of Rock Bottom.
Oh Hyne, words can't possibly sketch the things between Quistis and her suddenly recovered life. She went from blind to covered, from lost to loved, it was too much, too fast, too good. But Fujin was there, and true to her rank as Master of the Art of Quistis Comforting, everything was alright, and Quistis was okay, and their lips were glued together in a way that even Rinoa found impossible. They swirled round and round and round until they landed outside on the balcony where Quistis mewled and Fujin whispered and they both tried to contain themselves but with little success. It was lucky then that the thing fell from the sky and hit the ballroom and shattered the party. And in a way it was also lucky that both Fujin and Quistis were ready for it.
The hits and groans and grunts of effort were almost the whole thing. Quistis cracked her whip, Fujin readied her summon, they both dove in with only the other on their mind. It was relatively easy, to fight the thing off, because each knew they had to protect the other, and each only fought to protect the other. It ended not long after it started, and though Squall was bleeding heavily and Irvine was out cold, Quistis and Fujin remained unscathed and happy, and they hurried off to their shared room, where Quistis actually belonged. The time they spent together that night is too scandalous to write about here.
And so the story of Fujin's supposing ends. She supposed, and she supposed, and I supposed too. I guess in supposing, we supposed wrong, but then it supposed right, so it equaled out and Quistis equaled in. And now Quistis protects Fujin and wipes away the blood dribbling down her chin and breaks her out of her cage and wraps her up in her arms, and it's okay. Fujin said so, and Fujin knows. Until then, I suppose she'll just suppose, and Quistis will make it alright again.