Digimon Fan Fiction ❯ There's No Such Thing As Good-Bye ❯ There's No Such Thing As Good-Bye ( One-Shot )

Note from Ides: I don't own Digimon and for those of you who don't like shoujo-ai pairings, don't read this. If you do, this is for all you Juri/Ruki fans who melted when Ruki took Juri's hand and said "Hold on, kay?" at the beginning of today's episode. *melts*

I'm playing with a strand of my hair, twisting it absently around my finger as I stare out the window of my room to the streets below. Everyone looks as though they had somewhere to be, a life to get on with, a family to take care of. Do any of them have the time to watch out for a girl who was all alone out there?

I can remember so clearly the first day we met, the first time we talked. I remembered how she took my hand and led me through the path to the Digital World when it was too bright for me to see anything. Maybe it was symbolic…when I was blinded, she was always there for me to guide me through.

I trusted her with my life, and now look at me. Alone, staring out a window for hours, not eating, just waiting for her to come back like she said she would.

But where is she now? Will she keep her promise to me? Or will she leave me alone here to grieve forever like I thought I would do with Leomon. I'm sure I would have spent forever grieving for him, had it not been for her. She pulled me out of it, she helped me.

I loved her for it.

Why am I using past tense? I still love her, I'm sure of it. She's all I ever think of. In the brief moments where I sleep, her face, her voice, her rare and exquisitely beautiful smiles, they all haunt my dreams.

And to think that this all happened before, except with Takato being the object of my affection and obsession. But now it's only her. It will forever be her.

I've changed. I've changed so much that even I realize it. I'm not innocent anymore; everything I've seen has wiped that away. And since she left, I haven't been happy either. Takato and Jenrya and Hirokazu and Kenta have all visited me and tried to cheer me up. Guilmon brought me bread, Terriermon tried to dance for me, even Culumon showed up and sang me a song. I was touched by their kindness, so of course I felt bad when I couldn't even bring myself to smile for them.

And Hirokazu, being the hot-head that he is, lost his temper and demanded to know why she was so special to me. The others tried to shut him up, but he never listens. And, more to my own surprise than anyone else's, I didn't explode at him. I just shrugged. "She makes me feel like I can do anything."

He was going to say something else, I could see it in his eyes. But the others dragged him away before he could. And later on, he called me and apologized. I accepted. What else was I supposed to do? And besides, I wasn't mad at him. Since she left, I've been totally devoid of all emotion anyway.

Except for an utter loneliness that's been eating away at me.

She's a jaded girl. I realize. She had to get away from everything, her mother, the fame, the pressure. She just ran away.

Isn't that something she would do? Take Renamon and just run, just hide away from all of it for a little while before coming back? And good God, look at me, it's only been five days and I'm falling apart. She's done this before, but never this long. She's always come back before the day was done.

Where is she now? Some far away desert, some mountain, some ocean? Is she thinking of me or has she found someone new to love? Or forgotten me completely?

My thoughts drift back to the last time we saw one another. I didn't know it then, but she was dropping hints that I didn't pick up until afterwards that she'd be leaving. She had pushed a strand of hair out of my face and smiled at me. I smiled back. She asked if I believed in true love, and I said yes, then inquired if she felt the same. She only smiled. Then she asked if I believed in good-byes. I didn't understand. She shrugged and told me that she didn't think I would have understood anyway and that she was just asking to make sure.

I asked her what she meant. She just smiled again. I slapped her playfully on the arm and ordered her to explain it to me.

"You're so innocent, Juri-chan." She whispered, touching my cheek. "You don't understand because no one's ever said good-bye to you before, save Leomon, and he'll be back. You don't know the meaning of good-bye."

"Do you?" I asked quietly, touching the hand that lay on my cheek.

"No one does." She told me, and kissed me gently on my lips. When she pulled away, she was smiling. "Because there's no such thing as good-bye."

The next day, she was gone. I still don't understand what she meant by 'there's no such thing as good-bye'.

The door opens. I look over my shoulder, expecting to see the worried faces of my parents, expecting to hear their pleas.

Instead, I only see her. She closes the door behind her and steps forward.

"Miss me?" She asks in her usual tone.

And all at once, I start sobbing and fly into her arms. "Don't do that again, you had me so worried! I hate you, I hate you, how could you do something like that to me?"

Anguish I didn't even know I was feeling suddenly bubbled out of me and I was pounding her shoulders as she held me against her.

"Juri-chan, Juri-chan," she whispered, trying to get me to calm down. "Shhh, Juri-chan, listen to me."

"I don't want to!" I cried. "I hate you! You left me here all alone!"

Her arms fell away from me, her face contorted with shock. "You don't…mean that…"

I fell to my knees, sobbing uncontrollably. "You idiot, of course I don't! I love you too much to ever hate you for anything but dammit, why did you leave me here to worry about you? You've never been gone for so long! Where did you go?! Where?!"

She kneeled down beside me and held out a violet flower to me.

"It's a forget-me-not." She whispered. "I wanted to get it for you. All the flowers here are dead and no florist shop had them, so I went looking. I didn't think it would take as long as it did."

"What…?" I muttered stupidly in disbelief, taking the flower and staring at it.

"Christmas is coming soon, Juri-chan." She explained. "And I don't have anything on my list because there's nothing out there that can make me as happy as I already am. I love you so much it hurts sometimes. Please…if I had known you would have been so upset, I would have never gone…forgive me…"

"You don't even have to ask." I told her, grabbing the back of her head and catching her lips with mine.

"I love you so much…" I whispered as we pulled away.

She leaned her forehead against mine and smiled. "You mean the world to me."

"Ruki-chan," I said her name for the first time in days. "what did you mean when you said there's no such thing as good-bye?"

She kissed the tip of my nose. "When you love someone with everything in you, saying good-bye isn't an option because you're going to see that person again no matter what. So there's no such thing."

"Of course." I whispered as she took the flower from my hands and tucked it into my hair. "Just…don't leave me again."

"I promise I won't."