Forgive – Forget = Love

Chapter One: Past Demons

Author's Note

This was originally intended to be the tenth chapter of Shoot to Thrill, Swing to Kill. Honestly, it was up until about six-hundred words in. But then, while talking to a family member, I came up with an idea that turned this into its own story, with someone else as the main character.

Never fear, however, for the Kimiko/Shino pairing that I crafted in Shoot to Thrill will still have a major role in the story. I just decided to make Asuna the main character from this point on, while labeling the other story as complete.

Speaking of pairings, the true main pairing of this story will be quite rare – the only other fic featuring it that I know of is an unfinished Christmas story, with a title about cake, no less. If you can find it, check it out; though unfinished, it's still pretty good.

Unfortunately, this continuation/companion story puts off the idea to make a sequel on one-shots and short stories for a little longer. I hope you can forgive me for that, but I think a new drama fic with a different main pairing and a light, fluffy, happy, fluffy Kimiko/Shino on the side makes up for it regardless.

Well, I'd say that's it for now! See you at the bottom!

It was an average day. Nothing special had happened, leaving three girls to eat lunch on the roof without a care in the world.

Correction: two girls. A girl with waist-length chestnut hair seemed the most calm, eating her packed lunch with a soft smile on her face. Another girl, one with raven hair of a similar length, happily chowed down on her own meal with a certain joyous energy that only she could exude.

However, the third girl, one with ear-length black hair and a pair of rimless glasses with ovoid lenses, seemed quite nervous. Her posture was rigid, and she looked like she would jump three feet if anyone dared to touch her.

"Um, Asuna-san? Can I talk to you alone for a second?"

Finally, the bespectacled girl known as Shino Asada spoke. However, what she said caught the chestnut-haired girl off guard. Shino didn't use honorifics with her unless she was nervous, and the tone of her voice suggested that she needed help with something.

"All right," Asuna set her lunch box, which she had yet to open, down on the rooftop flooring. She then followed the bespectacled girl, turning back first and telling their raven-haired friend, Kimiko Kirigaya, that they may be a minute.

After they were no longer within the hearing range of the peppy city girl, Shino turned around, a nervous look in her dark eyes. For a few seconds, she said nothing, too scared that Kimiko might somehow hear them.

"What's up?" Asuna finally asked, getting slightly impatient.

"W-well…" the glasses-wearing noirette was struggling to find her words, as usual. "It's just… you know that I confessed… right?"

"Um, yeah," the chestnut-haired girl answered, though it sounded more like a question. "Why?"

"It's just that…" Shino's inability to articulate her point was really getting on her friend's nerves. "Even though I told her a week ago, she's never the one to initiate any physical contact. I'm always the one. It's been making me worry… is there something wrong with me? Do I not live up to her expectations?"

It was almost too much for Asuna. She almost burst out laughing. "Once again, you fail to see things from her side," she explained, putting a hand to her mouth to conceal the smile growing on her face. "Remember your first reaction to finding out about her preferences?"

"Y-yeah…" Shino whispered, looking down with a regretful expression.

"Well, she's probably afraid of you getting scared or mad because she tried something when you didn't want her to."

"Are you sure?" the bespectacled girl queried. She looked as if she didn't know how to feel about this revelation.

Asuna smiled at this; she might have a chance to see some adorable interactions between Shino and the girl she loved. Really, it was a double-edged sword that she was so close with her ridiculously cute first love's new lover. She couldn't even think about wanting Kimiko all to herself anymore, something she had felt ever since she met the bespectacled girl.

Maybe she had just gotten so used to hiding her feelings that were uncomfortably akin to jealousy that she couldn't even feel them anymore. But somehow, she didn't think that this was the case.

I'm probably just really getting into my new role as the parent figure. It would explain why I have more fun looking at their interactions than actually interacting with them.

Whatever the case, Asuna decided she didn't want to think too much about it. She had never fancied seriously contemplating about the deeper, more depressing aspects of life, and she knew that overthinking things usually led to that.

Finally, the chestnut-haired girl decided that an answer was in order. The girl before her had waited long enough, although she wouldn't like the answer forthcoming.

"Not one-hundred percent, no," she said, smiling as she pointed over to where Kimiko sat in wait. "But that's to be expected. I'm not her."

The bespectacled girl sighed, finally realizing that she would never get a straight answer from the girl in front of her. "Well, what do I do, then?" she asked without thinking.

"Isn't that obvious?" for once, Asuna spoke in a serious, yet not sharp, manner. "You have to talk to her. She's the only one who knows for sure what she's thinking. And, as much as I hate to admit it as her best friend and ex-lover, there are times when she's a complete mystery to me."

"I see," Shino looked slightly demoralized by this information.

With a sigh, the chestnut-haired beauty put a hand on her friend's shoulder. When Shino looked into her eyes, Asuna gave her a gentle, almost motherly smile. "Let me tell you something that I think will make things easier for you in the long run."

"What is it?"

"Just because you love someone, it doesn't mean you understand everything about them," as she spoke, Asuna looked over her friend's shoulder at Kimiko. "But that's exactly what makes it exciting. You want to know them better, so you learn more about them, and you find whole new things to love."

After removing her hand from Shino's shoulder, she used her rarely-seen, almost superhuman strength to swivel the bespectacled girl around and push her back towards their raven-haired loved one all in one fluid motion.

"You can't solve anything without talking to her," she advised. "So go."

Asuna was glad that Shino didn't turn back as she walked over to her lover. After all, she didn't want the bespectacled girl to ask why she was crying.

The past couple of days had been hard for the chestnut-haired girl.

She was their friend. She thought she had come to peace with her new role as a motherly side character in their beautiful love story. She thought she could feel happy, just seeing the happiness of her old lover and new friend.

So why, then, did she always find herself close to tears when she saw them holding hands, or hugging, or kissing, or anything of the sort?

She wondered if she was too adept at hiding her own emotions for her own good. Her friends never noticed her sadness, though that could partially be attributed to the fact that they were dense as all get out.

But she had no right to complain. She had played a huge part in the shaping of their relationship, and she had been the one to give the final push to make them what they were. If anything, this was just the natural consequence of her not realizing the strength of her own feelings until it was far, far too late.

In the end, however, that was to be expected. Asuna had never been one to put her own selfish desires above the wants and needs of her loved ones, and this was no exception. This outcome was inevitable; even if she hadn't pushed Shino to the point of realizing her own feelings, the chestnut-haired girl believed that they would have somehow ended up together anyway.

I wonder… she thought as she walked through the pedestrian traffic at a leisurely pace, aiming to reach the train station soon and escape her worries by heading for who knows where. She would decide where to go when she got to the station.

Will I ever move on?

"Come on, Shinocchi!" a voice shouted from behind her. "Let's get to the train station before the one we're trying to get on leaves!"

"I'm coming!" was the exasperated reply that rose above the noise of all the people around them. "But you don't have to yank my arm off, jeez!"

It seems that Asuna should have walked faster. Once again, she felt her heart tighten, as it had done so painfully often these past few days.

Let's just hope they don't notice me.

"Ah! It's Asu-nyan!"

Of course.

She pretended not to have noticed them before as she turned around, walking backwards to face them. "Hey, didn't expect to see you two here!" her cheer sounded perfectly genuine, much to her dismay and relief. "You on a date?"

Shino's face looked ready to combust at any moment, while Kimiko's shone with pure happiness. A radiant joy she had never seen when they were together. The sight both warmed her heart and crushed it to pieces, as if it were set alight and thrown into a trash compactor.

"Yup!" the positively glowing girl known as Kimiko Kirigaya affirmed. "We're going to hit the beach!"

"Good for you!" Asuna's cheerful tone sickened her; her dishonesty couldn't be broken when she was around her raven-haired angel. "Have fun, you two!"

But of course, she could at least tease them a little. "But don't ruin yourselves for marriage, you hear?"

It had seemed impossible before, but Shino's face got even redder. Kimiko just donned a mock-serious expression. "I don't need marriage if I've got Shinocchi!"

"Just make sure you're both mentally prepared, then," Asuna had almost had her fill of teasing, but not quite. "And please, be gentle with each other. I don't want to see any marks when you get back."

With a forced giggle that sounded for too real, she turned around just as she saw Kimiko's face show that she finally understood what her ex had been talking about.

"H-has Asuna always had such a p-perverted side?" the subject of this question heard Shino stutter it just before she was out of hearing range.

I wonder what'll happen between those two? Were the last thoughts that Asuna had before she let them be.

When she was sure she was far enough ahead of the two, she broke into a run, tears warring with her eyes.

Upon arriving at the train station, Asuna quickly found a bench out of direct view of the public, where she lay in wait for her two friends to come by. She wouldn't bother them; she just wanted to know what train they were headed to…

So I can take one going the opposite direction.

As she waited, she noticed a train make a stop a fair distance away. The doors opened soon after, and amongst the crowd of people exiting the front car she saw a flash of violet hair.

No… it couldn't be…

The chestnut-haired girl closed her eyes for only a second. When she opened them, having fully composed herself, what she thought she saw had disappeared in the crowd.

I must be so tired that I'm hallucinating, Asuna thought as she noticed Shino and Kimiko hurriedly make their way onto a separate train. Her eyes stayed trained on them until the door closed behind them not a second too soon.

A moment or two later, the train began to move south of the station. Well, Asuna supposed, there was a beach in that direction, though it took a while to get to. The girls were lucky that the day was Saturday.

The chestnut-haired girl planned to get up in a few minutes and take a train north. After all, she couldn't really walk in a functional manner when her legs felt like Jell-O.

But, of course, this only gave her more time to think about what had been getting her down. She felt like she would cry at any moment; when had she become such an emotional wreck?

She heard the wooden bench creak slightly as someone sat next to her. She didn't look up to meet them, since they would probably just be gone on another train soon anyway. However, things did not go in the way she envisioned.

Just as she finally started regaining control – she didn't want to look so unstable in front of a perfect stranger, even if they would probably never meet again – she heard them say something.

"You know that it's bad to hold it in. You can cry if you need to; I won't judge."

"But… I'm in front of so many people," Asuna replied to this stranger, identified as a girl by her voice. "Everyone will thing I'm weird."

"So what?" was the soft reply of the girl next to her. "You've never seen them before, and you'll probably never see them again."

Her words made sense the chestnut-haired girl. She could feel her emotions slipping again, and another unexpected action was the final straw.

"All of us need a little comfort sometimes."

Those words and a comforting arm around her shoulder were all it took for the tears in her eyes to start falling once more. Against her better judgment, she buried her head into this stranger's shoulder as she sobbed; something about this girl made her seem like she wouldn't take advantage of the fragile girl.

Asuna had no idea how long she stayed there, wrapped in this perfect stranger's comforting embrace as she cried and cried, as if her tears were without limit. When she finally began to calm down, she withdrew herself from the girl's embrace with reluctance.

"Thank you…" Asuna said without looking at the girl who helped her. She got up, preparing to just go home after this exhausting ordeal. "You don't even know me, and you were still so nice to me, and you still comforted me."

"Who said anything about that?"

Huh?

The chestnut-haired girl couldn't fathom why, but that tone sounded familiar somehow. She turned around to finally see the girl who helped her in her time of grief.

Familiar violet hair came down to her waist, the bangs of which framed a perfect face and its magenta eyes. Her figure seemed quite nice, though it was a bit hard to tell with the unfashionable violet t-shirt covering it up for the most part.

She wore indigo denim jeans, the legs of which went all the way down to her black running shoes with a navy-blue trim. However, one thing stood out above all else.

The silver necklace hung around her neck. It had no decorations, but an amethyst crystal surrounded by two sapphires really caught one's eye. The necklace looked to have cost a lot of money, but to Asuna, it had more than just a materialistic value.

That necklace… there's no mistaking it. It's the one that Kimicchi gave to…

"Yuu-chan?"

Author's Note

Wow, twenty-three-hundred words of story! Nice one, inspiration! I owe ya!

Inspiration: "No you don't. I had nothing to do with this one."

Anyway…

This was started on 11/22/14, but I only got past the first six-hundred words a few days ago, when the change in plans for this storyline came into being. I thought I would be done with it by yesterday, but it turned out to be longer than I foresaw. I guess that's a good thing, though.

If the new main pairing isn't obvious enough by now, what with the pairing settings and the actual chapter content, we're going the Yuuki Asuna/Konno Yuuki route this time around. As I said and wrote above, the main pairing of Shoot to Thrill will still play a large role in the story, it just won't be the whole focus anymore.

Teaser: Yuuki has already been mentioned once in the Original Shoot to Thrill. Virtual Cookie goes out to anyone who can find the original reference!

The beginning of this story will likely be very depressing, in case you didn't catch the hints. I plan for some eventual lighthearted, sickeningly sweet fluff for the main pairing, but that'll be a while. Apologies to those of you who wanted something different from this, but I will have a seriously hard time coming up with literally anything else to do with this whole storyline until the second part, namely this story, is complete.

I suppose I should get to working on chapter two, but I must remind you that, with things in real life finally getting busy, I won't be able to "update soon" as so many people will undoubtedly request as the only content of their review.

All right, see you later!