Title: Deceit

Author: Lisa

Rating: G

Author's Notes:

Hi minna, hope you had a good Labor Day weekend! I'm on vacation this week and felt like whipping up a quick Usa/Mamo angst one-shot, so…here you go! This ficlet takes place during the infamous R season break-up. Let me know what you think at the end! :)

Disclaimer: Sailor Moon and the others don't belong to me, but this story does.

Two weeks had already crawled by since I had mustered enough courage to carry out the single most gut-wrenching decision of my life, but that didn't stop her from returning to my door each evening with the same plea in those sky blue eyes that I loved so much. Had I more strength, I would've forced myself to stop opening the door. Yet part of me wanted to see her, needed to see her to help me cling onto whatever threads of sanity that still remained. It was undeniably selfish; I was completely aware of that. Then again, she had always been the selfless one in our ill-fated relationship, always giving from her endless bounty of affection and understanding.

Usagi stood there by my doorway with her shoulders slumped and shuffled her feet, suddenly at a loss for words even though she had no trouble demanding that I open the door and face her just moments before. Her eyes darted almost frightfully to my face before she lowered her head, her gaze falling to her shoes once more. In that quick movement, I caught a whiff of her vanilla shampoo and swallowed the lump that had traitorously formed at the base of my throat at the familiar scent. She was tantalizing, intoxicating, maddening—but none of that mattered in the face of her death if she stayed with me. I had to be strong for the both of us somehow and keep spinning the web of lies and deceit to convince her of my indifference. At least I was a master at appearing apathetic, a skill that I had gradually developed over the years.

"Usagi," I half-choked on the word and watched in dismay as her bottom lip trembled, "is there something you need?"

"Mamo-chan…" She sniffled and looked up at me with eyes brimming with unshed tears. I was mesmerized by the brilliancy of her blue orbs that were made almost transparent by the tears that continued to gather. Gazing into that endless, glassy blue was like peering into her very core, and I shuddered involuntarily at her continued willingness to give me unfettered access into the depths of her soul. "Since you asked," she continued shakily, "I need you."

I almost laughed out loud at the irony, as if someone like her could need someone like me. What could she have possibly ever seen in me to inspire such devotion? From our first meeting, the one thing I seemed to be consistently good at was making her cry.

"Usagi, please," I began. Please what? Please stop coming by and saying such wonderfully awful things to me and forcing me to test the bounds of my resolve over and over? Please stop being so beautiful and open and offering me everything I've always wanted? "Please don't do this," I mumbled pathetically, unable to face her piercing, pleading eyes. "It's over. Just…move on with your life, okay? Please…"

She shook her head with such ferocity that I was concerned for the state of her neck afterward. She grasped my clammy hands before I had enough warning to pull away, and I felt my knees weaken at the rush of warmth that travelled up my arms and diffused through my body with startling intensity. I had missed her touch and her softness more than I could've ever imagined.

"Iie, Mamo-chan. Don't you see?" Usagi tightened her grip on my hands to the point of discomfort but I didn't—couldn't—pull away. Her voice reached a pitch higher than usual in its panic, and I half-wondered whether my neighbors would come out and break up this tragic drama like they had a couple times already. At least that would be an easy out. My eyes scanned the halls, but all doors were firmly closed, as if silently forcing me to end this once and for all. "I can't move on..." She was crying opening now, two constant streams of tears leaving salty trails on her porcelain cheeks. "I can't move on because you never even gave me a reason why. All you said was, 'it's over.' But how can we be over just like that? A thousand years, and all you can say is 'it's over?'" Anger sparked like blue fire in her eyes, and I silently rejoiced. I wanted her to hate me as much as I hated myself.

I had nothing else to say because I had no conceivable reason to leave behind the best gift that had suddenly dropped (or perhaps more accurately, crashed) into my life. I had nothing else to say other than that I loved her enough to leave her.

"Can you please just say something? Anything…" The fight left her body as quickly as it had come, and I watched helplessly as she shrank into herself again.

"Gomen," I breathed quietly. "I never wanted to cause you any pain."

"Well, it's a bit too late for that now, isn't it?" I welcomed her second surge of anger, but I would be lying if I said if her words didn't slice into me like a thousand daggers.

"Gomen," I repeated hollowly. I would happily apologize into infinity if that could ease her hurt and feelings of betrayal in the slightest.

"What did I do wrong?" She sounded tired, so tired, as if the past two weeks had been a youma that slowly drained away her life energy. "It must've been something I did or said…or didn't do or didn't say."

"You did nothing wrong." I wanted to bang my head against frame of the doorway—anything to distract myself from the increasing tightness in my chest. "You were perfect." The words slipped out before I could stop them, and I watched the confusion cloud her eyes. The silence was deafening in the minutes that passed as she processed my careless slip of the tongue.

"No," she said slowly, "no, she was perfect."

It took me a few seconds to understand which "she" that Usagi was referring to before it hit me. She was talking about her past self, the princess from a millennium ago who had embarked on the previous iteration of this tragic journey.

"Usagi, that's not…"

"I'm nothing like her, am I?" She was shaking visibly now. "And eventually, it didn't even matter that we were destined to be together. You couldn't stand how I was the complete opposite of Serenity."

Usagi had it completely wrong. I wanted to hold her and let her know how I had fallen for her, Tsukino Usagi, long before I even knew she was the reincarnation of some long-dead princess. She was my clumsy yet endearing bunny, always so full of light and happiness. She was the reason I had changed my daily routine just to catch a glimpse of her at the arcade, where she merrily spent away her weekly allowance with her friends. She was the reason that I went to sleep most nights with a smile of my face, imagining future encounters where I'd be graced with those sparkling eyes and that carefree laugh again. It had always been her, my Usako, but I stupidly never told her any of that. And now it was far too late.

"Mamo-chan, did you know?" I was frozen in place by her sad, yearning gaze. "I think I've been in love with you ever since that day…that day when I threw that pathetically bad exam paper at your head." She laughed a little despite herself. "What was it, an English test?"

"It was a math test," I whispered, wanting so badly to brush away a strand of golden hair that had managed to escape her expertly twisted right odango. "You had only gotten 30 marks on it. That was also the day I first learned your name." I was afraid I had revealed too much, yet she only smiled ruefully with a look at defeat that frightened me even more. Could it be that today…today was finally the day that she had chosen to say goodbye?

"I'm sorry I couldn't be that girl for you, Mamo-chan. The girl of your dreams."

She was gone as quickly as she had come, leaving me breathless. I closed the door mechanically, and as I leaned heavily against it for support, my mind raced at the thought that I would never see those beautiful eyes again, bask in the warmth of her smile, or feel the silkiness of her blond tresses…

For the briefest second, my resolve crumbled and my emotions rushed through the prison walls of rationality in one mad swoop. I burst open the door with desperate force and scanned the hallway for her unmistakable pigtails.

"Usako…"

My deceit had worked, but now I was left to live with the loneliness that resulted.

Well, hope you enjoyed my attempt to pass a couple hours of my Tuesday afternoon! Depending on how bored I get this week, you may see another ficlet posted and/or a chapter of "Shipwrecked." If you want to read more angst by yours truly, please check out my fic "In the Dark." Until then, please leave a quick review, and take care!

This story was written and posted September 2015.