Okay, I'm not sure if this is okay for the site. If it isn't someone let me know and I will take it down. I just had a strange rush of Noir ideas, and wanted to post it somewhere instead of letting it sit on my hard drive and rot like the rest.

Kirika sometimes felt as if she hadn't known her body at all. And to a large extent she hadn't. She didn't know where the red so deep in her eyes came from, whether it was a family trait, or just a genetic fluke. There is cross shaped scar on her thigh, and for several days upon waking Kirika had traced against it, thinking of every possible scenario it could have come into being.

Then the memories came back, and they brought her nothing. The scar was a training accident, and that says everything important and nothing at all in the same hazy moment. Kirika can't recall anyone in the flood of memories Chloe had shot back into her that had the same red black eyes she sees in the mirror every morning, but then again she hadn't expected to. Not really.

Kirika had always known she wasn't meant for this world, the world Mireille blends so effortlessly in, the world of cheery cafes, and easy conversations, and pictures of past friends and lovers. Kirika knew it in every conversation she couldn't follow, in every emotion she failed to feel, and every sardonic tilt of Mireille's lips which Kirika knew meant she hadn't said the correct thing.

But she fits in Mireille's world, and that's enough.

Even when she walks down Parisian streets filled of laughing faces, and giggling school girls whispering and jeering at each other in secret codes that she knows she will never, ever be able to understand, it's enough. Even when she catches her reflection in the mirror, and is faced with black-brown eyes which came nowhere. Even when Mireille's own eyes appear next to her, wide with concern, and dark with questions and all Kirika can remember is Odette's eyes pleading, begging. Even then it enough.

That was what she told herself when Mireille's arms were wrapped around her. Mireille has curves that Kirika lacks and at first it had felt awkward to place her own stiff body under Mireille's fluid, moving one.

She learned quickly though, and now they melt into each other in one constant stream of skin, breasts, and hair. It no longer matters so much what belongs to who because the orgasms shake them both loose, and lying so close to Mireille, Kirika's body forgets to be what it is.

Mireille gave Kirika back herself. Chloe had, with one deft, perilous crack of a bullet told her everything, but given her nothing but pieces. Mireille had fit them all back together, and filled Kirika with everything she hadn't, couldn't, know was missing.

It's not a debt that can be repaid, but Kirika doesn't mind trying, and as she moves down Mireille's stomach, tongue pressing against tender flesh, she whispers "Thank you," again and again into the fragile skin until Mireille twists and moans and crashes and flies, and Kirika wonders any amount of pleasure could possibly compare to the look in Mireille's eyes at that moment.

Sometimes if Mireille is already teetering off the edge of anticipation, she pulls Kirika back up because they both like to be eye to eye for the orgasms. Even as they're fingers hurriedly rush to try to time it right, it rarely matters because Mireille's orgasm induces Kirika's own and then they will collapse together in a relaxed, steaming heap of exhausted limbs and sated skin.

She thinks Mireille might let her lie entwined against her forever.

Of course one of them eventually always gets up: to shower, to boil of pot of tea, to sling a purse over one should and breeze out the door following the trail of spring in the air. But Mireille always returns, accepting Kirika's embraces when they're offered, encircling Kirika's body with her own when they aren't.

Kirika is aware of the danger inherent in believing Mireille will always be there for her, but she does anyway.

And Mireille's always there: smiling, laughing waiting. She has her mother's eyes, and that is important to remember, and Kirika does even as the heat spreads from her fingertips and the burning glows from her smile.

Sometimes she almost remembers all the way through. Remembers all the things she's too afraid, too unworthy to forget. Almost keeps the picture of eyes frozen in death, of cold steel against icy flesh, of heavy corpses hitting dead ground.

It might not be fair to Mireille, but forgetting seems more unfair, so she struggles to keep those images, and holds her breath so she won't lose them, rocking, twisting, turning against them.

But Mireille's there, and her fingers know all of Kirika's soft places, and she's so warm as she leans over Kirika like a blanket of life, loose hair and lit skin running in a river of sunlight down, and Kirika's body is coming to pieces in her hands.

Then everything else falls apart around her until there is nothing left except Mireille's smile hanging above her. She thinks that maybe being damned wouldn't be so bad as long as she could keep that memory.

Mireille saved her, after all. Lying in bed together, sheets kicked off because wisps of heat are still rising from their bodies, Mireille never seems to mind as Kirika clings to her, maybe to reassure herself that Mireille is real, maybe to assure her that she is. Mireille talks to her then. Low reassuring tones vibrating through the room, and even if Kirika doesn't understand it all she listens. Her partners face is beautiful then, calm and golden, hair cascading against the pillows. They're moments that Kirika doesn't understand, and could never have hoped for, but moments that she would fade away rather than lose.

The kisses they share afterwards are the most vivid part of the experience for Kirika. Mireille seems to always taste fresh, like fruit almost bursting with ripeness. It changes from day to day, but generally if she thinks to compare it, Kirika decides she tastes like grapes with just enough fermented sourness to match the bursting sweetness.

She wouldn't have thought of the association if Mireille hadn't spent two nights away on a piece of business Kirika couldn't attend. It was the first night since the manor that Mireille had left Kirika alone for any length of time, and missing Mireille felt like missing herself.

Kirika ate grape after grape those two nights, crushing them with her tongue and rolling them around her taste buds. Then, her eyes closed tight, she slipped her hand under her shirt and against her breast, and licked the juice of her own chapped lips and tried to dissuade the loneliness.

When Mireille did return they were frozen for several minutes, staring smiling at each other, before Mireille reached in, her hands and her lips meeting Kirika in the same fluid gesture. They spent the rest of the morning against the dining room floor making up for the two previous nights.

Only when trained limbs finally became exhausted enough to give out completely, did they stop, crashed side by side. She was too tired to stand, too tired to even speak, but there was just enough strength left for Kirika too push her lips against Mireille's swollen lips, so she did, even though Mireille flavor had already been seared into her memory in those golden places reserved just for her partner.

She knows her own taste as well. She notices herself on Mireille's kisses and when she licks her fingers clean. It's different from kisses which are just Mireille, complicated, and rich. Smooth as cream, but with plenty of spice underneath.

Mireille's lips are scarlet. Kirika knows it's lipstick, but it looks like blood, and once they are pressed against her they taste solid as the earth, and sweet as blackberries on a summer day. Kirika adds salt as harsh as the sea breeze, and a tang of metallic sharpness to the equation, and it changes the dynamic completely.

Somehow there's always a touch of bitterness mixed in, and Kirika can't help but wonder if that's what Mireille tastes every time she takes her.