Summary: He needs the courage to tell her.

Disclaimer: 5D's isn't mine. Sadly, nor is Jack. Sniff.

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It's hard to have a love like this, so strong that you can feel it pulling at your heartstrings every second a minute, every minute of an hour, any hour in a day, all the days in a week, the weeks in a month, and then there are the countless months. I can never wait to see those soft bountiful grey eyes boring into my skull like a never-ending x-ray every time we meet at the café, but her inspection isn't painful, it's pleasant and smooth, the petal of an orchid, the surface of glass. When she finishes looking through you, she looks at you in the most satisfied way, just saying with her eyes, "you're good."

She doesn't seem so beautiful to all those people that see her. Her clothes are mismatching and not in the least bit fashionable, but that's just who she is. She's a fighter, who doesn't care what other people will say to her while scoffing. She'll be proud, and she'll pull of that blue and orange vest. She just can.

Those glasses can be there all she wants, hiding her face from the world. She can't even see with them on, and I remember the time when they were broken but not completely, parts of them having been destroyed by the Arcadia Movement's destruction. But they're all better. They'd been fixed to hide all the damage that was a memoir of the past, fixed to hide their importance in Jack Atlus's life. Maybe, if you looked closer, you could see how worn the glasses were- used for so many years, so much that it was hard for her to be without them. Without them she was beautiful. With them she could hide.

She can never hide from Jack Atlus, she can never hide from those relentless purple eyes. But no, she doesn't squirm in pain and discomfort from these scans. She accepts them gracefully, gladly to have my attention for a short while. And all is well when I'm with her.

There's something missing, however. Feelings untouched on; unexplained looks; embarrassed glances and steaming blushes. She can't remember what I need her to, and it's damn frustrating. Kalin can remember the past, Misty can remember parts, but all she recalls is fallings out of the window, having been pushed out by that bastard's psychic powers. Having dueled Sayer a second time isn't that important. But her memory of dueling me is gone. She can't remember a thing, and it hurts me inside to know that she doesn't remember that sacred moment we shared, where we were both vulnerable, even me. Scary and exciting and passionate.

Can we move on without this information? New adventures have yet to be written, and I fear they never will. There are times when we just peer at each other, trying to figure each other out. It's odd; we treat each other like puzzles, even though we both aren't. Both of us are more complicated than we should be, and we two know that. I aspire for greatness and have gone through great lengths to do so; yet I treat the friends I once betrayed with mostly respect. She's the opposite; her goal is to make other people happy and give herself happiness second. I am selfish, she is selfless. But I know I am changing, and so is she. She's giving him kindness, he's giving her edge.

But even though she's been robbed of her memories during the dark signer period, she still has her other memories intact. When she and him were there on that tower, and she spoke to him in a soft, reassuring tone, giving him new inspiration, letting him become not the Jack Atlus everyone knew, but a renewed version, a better one. Those days where I thrust out my arm stubbornly while looking away, and she still gently rolled the bandage around my healing arm, happy and optimistic. I was literally forced to like her. Her smile… those eyes… and that personality, bright and hopeful as a shooting star. I'll never forget those days after that fateful duel with Yusei and the vision of the future. My blasted pride was just smithereens, but Carly just fixed it back up until my ego was bright and shiny as it always was.

But is it possible, to still move on, without that ever so important article of the past? I said I loved her, and my heart froze when she said she loved me also. Would I ever have the courage to say those damn words again? I wasn't an intimate person, and being so was so odd. At that moment of time, it was perfect. Now, I wasn't sure. I longed to hold her in my arms and let her be my world, and let me be hers. Do I have the strength to start over? Do I have the will to tell her the events of the past, and tell her what I truly desire? Can I? Or is it yet another impossible feat that will bother me until I crumble away into dust?

Perhaps it's just best to wait and let destiny roll me on its course. I can always change it whenever I feel the need, but now I feel like it's going to help me. Right now, destiny is a gentle, caressing current, subtly bending me to its will and letting it take over. Someday, I will find the courage to face Carly. I'll face up to what I've done… how I forced her to become a Dark Signer, just because I was so protective that I pushed her away. I can do it.

I'm Jack Atlus, after all.

~(-)~

Oh, he's so spiffing awesome.

Please review, as always~!