Author's Note

This is highly unusual for me, I know. I almost never do songfics at all, and yet here I am making an entire story that is nothing but them. I didn't even expect to be doing this until I found a particularly addicting song by Fall Out Boy released in 2006 or 2007 that made me think, "Let's write a fic about this!"

Let's real quick go over the rules of this challenge I'm issuing myself so you guys know what to expect.

First off, the obvious: every story in this collection must be based on a song. There may be multiple installments based on a single song, but generally those will all be a single arc. Every separate arc will have a different song as its basis.

Second, every story in this collection must be self-contained. In other words, they can't start right from where a previous installment left off, and they have to provide some sense of closure at the end.

Third, every story in this collection must take place in the same AU. If it were just creating stories based on songs, and they didn't have to be at all related to one another, it wouldn't really be a challenge for me… so this is here to spice it up and make it worth doing. That said, though every story will take place in the same AU, there might not always be a sense of progression – sometimes I might go back in time, so to speak, to cover a particular part of a song.

That's about it. Pairings will vary from arc to arc, but ones to expect in the immediate future include female Kirito/Sinon, Asuna/Yuuki, Liz/Silica (maybe, if you're lucky anyway), and whatever else I come up with along the way. Go ahead and read, this author's note is already too long to be justifiable.

Yuri Songfic AU Challenge

Story One: Painful Reminder - GINASFS

"I'm sorry!"

Shouting a desperate apology, my eyes snapped open as I awoke in a cold sweat. I bolted upright in bed, almost sending the covers flying off of me. My pulse raced so hard I thought I'd have a heart attack, and my mind barely registered my surroundings, which seemed to be spinning too much to follow anyway, not to mention how blurry they were from unshed tears. My chest ached with the kind of intense emotional pain that only one experience could do to me.

I felt so queasy and disoriented that I couldn't even remember my own age. As a matter of course and long-established habit, as soon as my vision stabilized, I blinked the tears away and looked over at my mahogany nightstand, reaching a trembling hand over to tap a button on my digital alarm clock to make it display the date instead of the early morning time. The dim red lights showed me a collection of numbers and slashes that, in my current state, didn't make sense to me – in my mind, I was only eighteen, but when I subtracted my birthday from the current month and year, I came up with just a few months over twenty years.

Around that point, reality started to set in for my confused brain. Unlike back then, I could feel my hair brushing against my mid back through the old, white t-shirt I'd worn to bed. Clearly, that must have taken at least two years to grow back out… so there was no way I could have been eighteen or even nineteen.

It's really been… that long…

"… Kimiko? You okay?" a voice I almost didn't recognize called out as the bed shifted under me to accommodate someone else's movements.

I looked over at the person who'd called out to me as my shaky hand pressed the button on my clock to return it to normal before sliding under the covers once more. As my eyes began to adjust to the darkness of the room, I half expected to see the familiar set of chestnut irises that plagued my dreams staring up at me. But instead, the eyes that greeted mine were black.

Instead of light brown, waist-length hair with a very faint reddish tint, I saw a mop of thin, turquoise blue-dyed locks that were almost as short as I'd cut my own black tresses on my eighteenth birthday. And rather than looking somewhat annoyed at being woken up, she just seemed concerned for me, and also tired, as she should have been, given the time I'd woken her up.

At this point, it finally hit me that the girl lying down beside me definitely wasn't the person in my night terror. This wasn't my first love… it – no, she – was my second, and current, girlfriend. The one for whom I didn't need to pretend to be someone I was not.

Memories of the past two years rapidly began flowing into my conscious mind as it slowly caught up to the present. I gradually slid back down onto the bed until my steely-gray irises were level with the ones peering into them worriedly. My heartbeat returned to its normal rhythm and I offered what I knew must have been a weak smile.

"I'll be fine," I whispered, turning onto my side and draping an arm around her waist, a gesture which could have been mistaken for affection, though it served purely for my own comfort. "It was just… just a dream."

She stared at me with obvious uncertainty before casting a look to the arm I'd put over her side. It must have seemed unusual for her, considering I was almost never the one to initiate contact of any kind between us, even after a solid three months of dating. It was beyond rare, to say the least.

"More like a nightmare…" she assessed, looking back to me with that kind concern that, only four months ago, I never would have expected to see from her.

A nightmare was a kind way of putting the trip to hell I'd just experienced. It was my permanent reminder of everything that I'd done wrong in my last relationship. Of everything I'd lost. Of everything a big part of me still really wished I hadn't left behind without even a glance back. Of everything I loved about her, and everything I hated about myself.

But admitting any of that was no easy task. Especially to the girl in front of me, whom I knew should have been far more important to me than some old ex by this point. So I just nodded, as if she'd guessed correctly, and gave her an apologetic smile that also said, in no uncertain terms, 'I told you so.'

"In all fairness, I did warn you that I'd be hard to sleep with…" I pointed out, my voice intentionally kept as devoid of emotion as possible. "You were the one who insisted on staying over and sleeping in my bed."

Her response was almost immediate. She seemed to be waking up a bit, at least enough to be as quick-witted as usual. "I thought you meant you'd hog the blankets or take up a lot of space, not this." A beat hung silently in the air between us before she continued. "So this happens enough that you don't see it as a fluke?"

After she finished, I almost wished she had stayed tired. That would have been far easier to deal with than what I could sense was coming… and I couldn't exactly run away at this point. Or at least, not physically. No one ever said I couldn't just turn on my other side and end the conversation if it became too much to handle. Fortunately, my second girlfriend actually respected my boundaries a lot more than my first did, so I could actually get away with that.

I shrugged my shoulders, intentionally trying to look coy. "Only about five to seven times a week. Why, is that weird?"

Actually, if I were being honest, they happened every night, without fail. But I didn't exactly want to admit that to anyone. To acknowledge that would be to acknowledge my complete failure to move on from something I'd tried my damnedest to leave behind forever for two whole years.

She frowned slightly, her expression changing to one of sympathy right away. Or was it one of pity…? In the dark, it was a bit hard to differentiate between the two. Either way, it triggered my guilt complex. This wasn't even something I wanted her to know about, and here she was, feeling bad for me. This was why I'd avoided either of us staying over at the other's house during our time dating.

"That much, huh…? It must be hard to deal with," she acknowledged, putting a comforting hand over the arm draped around her. "Can you tell me about it? I want to help."

At those last four words, I almost broke and told her everything. But at the last second, the maintenance men of my mind showed up, busted out some spackle and patched the cracks at lightning speed before adding another foot to the top of my mental walls and telling me to fuck off for the effort they spent on it.

"It's about my past…" I decided to admit at least this much, figuring it'd be better that way. "But that's all I'm able to say right now. The memories are still too raw… let's just go back to sleep, okay?"

Before she had a chance to respond, I retracted my arm and turned onto my other side. I'd wait until she fell back asleep before going about my usual routine: getting up, fixing myself some coffee and taking care of any chores I'd left undone the night before. I could never actually get any good sleep after waking up from one of these, so I never bothered to try anymore.

This plan went right out window the moment I felt a pair of arms circle around my waist, and a by then familiar body press against my back. As I began to worry about how the hell I was going to get out of this after she fell back asleep without waking her up again, she whispered something loud enough for only me to hear.

"I'm here for you. Whenever you're ready to talk, I'll be ready to help you work through it, okay?" Her voice was soft and kind in a way I was still unaccustomed to hearing from her.

Right at that moment, I felt deeply grateful that she was the one by my side. That she was the person who took the spot closest to me, even if my heart still stubbornly refused to reflect it after all this time. The fact that she not only wanted to help me, but was also willing to wait until I was ready to move forward meant a lot to me in ways I'd probably never admit aloud.

I smiled playfully, even though I knew she couldn't see it. "Don't get upset when I decide to talk at either the worst or the weirdest time."

"You're ready whenever you are," she replied, tightening her hold on my waist a smidge. "I'll be here to listen and do what I can no matter what timing you throw at me."

I put a hand on both of hers, squeezing with affection and uncertainty. "All right… thanks, Sinon."

That morning, for the first time since I'd started having the night terrors, I managed to fall back asleep and have normal, even happy dreams.

Author's Note

Thus concludes story one of the GINAFSIS arc. This arc is based on the song of that name by Fall Out Boy. The name is an acronym for "Gay is Not a Synonym for Shitty," which I somehow managed to deeply resonate with many of the lyrics of despite being as ace as a fucking snail and knowing full well that it was a gay breakup song. FOB is remarkable at producing powerful, relatable lyrics… I think they were better at it before their image change.

Should have another story for this arc ready soon. See you then!