It was the biggest dance of the year for the posh prep school. Everyone had been in great anticipation for it. Everyone was there, dressed in their best. The dance was being held in the huge dinning room of the school and was decorated with dark blue and silver banners hung all over the walls. There were flowers here and there that held the banners together and gave the room a sweet and intoxicating aroma. The room was mostly dim with crystal chandlers that hung and offered a soft lighting effect that just seemed to complement the entire place. There was a walkway that led out through the doors to the balcony and over looked the school grounds. It was lit up and an all-together breath taking view. Tables were set on the far side of the room for people to sit. While the dance floor took up most of the room and was currently crowded with dancing couples. It was just perfect.
Sitting at one of the many empty tables was a young girl. She was leaning against the table on her elbows and resting her head in her hands. She had long honey blond hair with two braids that came from the sides of her head to join together in the back. Her turquoise eyes held a sad look to them despite the romantic evening this girl seemed incredibly down. Her pretty face was lined with a soft frown that did not suite it. She was dressed in a light sky-blue dress and had on small diamond earrings and a teardrop diamond necklace to compliment the outfit.
Though, she was alone at the table it was because she chose to be alone.
She had been asked many times if she wanted to dance but each time she had politely refused saying that she was not in the mood to dance anymore. She had been dancing for the first hour of the dance and was now tired. Tired of all the guys that had asked her and had went on and on about her ravishing beauty and how nice she looked and basically the same thing that she had been hearing since she had arrived. There was only one person that she ever really wanted to hear anything like that from but he wasn't there. In fact, she hadn't seen him in awhile. Not since he had left on some sort of mission. Though, he was never there so she wondered why she even cared. He didn't feel anything for her and she knew it, but she just couldn't seem to get that through her head. Why couldn't she just forget him?
But she knew the answer to that; it was because she truly cared for him.
It wasn't a crush and she knew it. She had had crushes before and none of them ever made her feel this way before. None of them had ever had her heart pounding so fast that she thought it was going to leap out of her chest and actually make her nervous and weak in the knees.
*I wonder if this is what love is?* Releena thought to herself. As the realization hit her she felt a hand on her shoulder.
Turning around, with her heart beating a mile a minute she was hoping that it was him, that it was Heero. She was sadly disappointed. For it was only a school comrade of hers. One that she had heard had a crush on her but was also a big slimball.
"Releena, may I have this dance?" He asked her politely.
"Oh I don't know, I was just sitting here resting and..."
"Oh come on Releena," the boy interrupted her, "you can sit and rest at anytime. It's the biggest dance of the year. You should be having fun and enjoying yourself," he finished smiling at her.
*I would be having fun, if Heero were here* she thought silently to herself.
"Come on, please," the boy asked giving her what she supposed was supposed to be a cute and pleading look.
"Well, I guess one more couldn't hurt," she said and before she knew it she was again being lead into the dancing crowd of people.
"Did you know that you look extremely lovely tonight?" the boy asked her.
*Oh no, not this again* Releena thought silently to herself.
"Thank you," she replied mechanically.
"And your eyes are positively radiating. Now aren't you glad you decided to join me?" he asked with a smirk.
"Yeah, I'm excited beyond belief," she said a little sarcastically. But the guy didn't seem to notice. He was looking over to a group of guys in the far corner of the room and shaking his head in her direction. His buddies started to send him silent applause at getting the school's prettiest and most eligible girl to dance with him. *Great, now not only am I some object with a pretty face and a nice disposition but I'm also an object to be possessed.* Releena thought a little vehemently.
Then with out her knowing it the guy's hands traveled down from her waisther grab her butt.
"Excuse me!!" she yelled at the guy above the music.
"What?" he asked innocently moving his hands back to her waist.
*The nerve of this guy,* Releena thought angrily.
She tried to get away from the guy but he had a strong hold on her.
"Where do you think your going, baby?" he asked her with a sickenly sweet smile on his face.
Releena was just about to give him a piece of her mind but before she was able to utter a word a deep voice interrupted her.
"Excuse me, but I think she doesn't want to dance with you anymore," came the deep voice from behind her. Releena couldn't see behind her, to see who her savior was but she was glad he was there. His voice also seemed vaguely familiar but she just chalked it up to belonging to one of her schoolmates.
"Well, she's dancing with me bud so back off," the guy holding Releena said.
"No, I don't want to dance with you anymore," she added in while she could.
"Sure you do," she added tightening his hold on her enough to hurt and make her cry out a little.
"Let her go now," said the guy from behind Releena with a deadly calm and a tone that said not to mess with him.
"Why should I?"
"Because one I'm her date and two if you don't I'm going to knock your lights out, got it?" the guy behind Releena said.
The boy holding Releena took a quick once over of the guy standing behind the girl in his arms and decided that he was definitely not someone he wanted to mess around with.
Especially not by himself.
"Okay bud, why didn't you just say she was your date in the first place," he said backing off with his hands held in the defensive position.
"Oh thank you so much," Releena said turning around to face her savoir.
She was deeply shocked to see who it was.
"No problem," the guy said in his deep voice that sent chills up her spine.
*I knew his voice sounded familiar,* Releena thought to herself.
"Heero."
"May I have this dance?" Heero asked extending his hand in Releena's direction.
"Heero I..." but Releena was unable to finish what she was going to say as Heero took her into his arms and started to dance around the floor with her.
They danced in silence for a few minutes; neither one daring to talk and both waiting for the other to start. Finally Releena couldn't stand the silence anymore and she wanted some answers.
"Heero, why are you here, I thought you were off on some mission," Releena stated rather than asked.
"I was," Heero answered simply, avoiding her eyes.
"So why did you come back?" Releena asked seeking his eyes but he just looked over her head.
"Because I have a mission to do here," he stated simply as if he didn't even notice that she was there with him.
"You aren't going to try and kill me again are you?" Releena asked afraid.
She had thought that they were all past that.
Heero looked down suddenly into her eyes and she gasped. They were a deep indigo purple, some called them a Prussian blue color, but it wasn't the color she was noticing at the moment. She usually wasn't able to get a close enough look at them before and when she they were always guarded but when looked at them now she was struck senseless at the shear intensity that she saw in them.
"No Releena, I'm not here to kill you," he said in a dark voice laden with a heavy emotion like it had hurt him for her to think that he was there to kill her.
Though he had told her many times that that was the only reason he had for being around her.
"Then why are you here?" Releena asked looking up into his eye's fearlessly.
"I..." suddenly Heero was interrupted by the loudspeaker with the DJ's voice on it.
"For all you love birds out there here is one of the songs that you have been waiting to hear for a long time. I hope you enjoy it for it is the last song for tonight.
This is AJ your DJ signing off," as he finished a soft melody began to play from the speaker and the lights dimmed even more so. Couples all over the dance floor began to draw even closer together as the first line of the lyrics began to play.
"I can feel the magic floatin' in the air
Being with you gets me that way"
"Heero I,"
"Just dance Releena," Heero said softly as he tighten his embrace on her and looked down at her.
"I watch the sunlight dance across your face and I, oh I've
Never been this swept away"
Heero looked down onto Releena's upturned face and his breath caught. He had always thought she was beautiful but now with the soft glow of the light that hit her face just right and made her eyes sparkle even more than they usually did. Those eyes. Those eyes had been the first thing he had seen when he had landed on earth and he had grown to love them. He could see straight into her soul with those eyes and could read her like an open book and right now all he could see from her eyes was confusion.
"All my thoughts just seem to settle on the breeze
When I'm lying wrapped up in your arms
The whole world just fades away, the only thing I hear
Is the beating of your heart"
Well he was confused too. He thought as he rested his head atop of hers.
Confused with all these feelings that she seemed to elicit from him. He hadn't understood in the beginning, the strong feelings that connected him with her but he could tell what it was now. And through all the times he had been away from her it had just seemed to grow and that is what usually made him mad when he was around her. Mad at himself,that he could let these feelings overcome him and jeopardize his mission. He suddenly looked down at the small slip of a girl he held in his arms and his heart seemed to speed up.
She was just so warm.
"And I can feel you breathe, it's washing over me
Suddenly I'm melting into you There's nothing left to prove, baby all we need is just to be
Caught up in the touch, the slow and steady rush
And baby, isn't that the way that love's supposed to be
I can feel you breathe
Just breathe"
Releena could feel Heero's breath on the top of her head as he looked down at her. She turned her face up to look at him and felt like melting right then and there. He was looking down at her with this look in his eyes they made her knees weak and she was sure that if he wasn't holding her at the moment she would have fallen, unable to support herself.
Suddenly she could read everything in his eyes. Everything was displayed in his eyes as he was looking down on her.
*Is this what love is like?* she couldn't help but ask herself the same question she had asked earlier. She continued to look up into his slightly tanned face unconsciously stepping closer to him.
"In a way I know my heart is waking up
As all the walls come tumblin' down"
Heero stared into Releen's eyes and could feel the same small ache and longing in his chest that he always felt when she was around. He had always pushed her away then and had tried to deny what he was feeling for her. He had just built up the walls surrounding his heart even higher. But now as he stared down at her he felt them all tumbling away.
"Closer than I've ever felt before an I know and you know
There's no need for words right now"
Releena couldn't believe what was happening. Heero was there, dancing with her and hadn't even threatened to kill her, push her away, or anything. And he was even holding her close to him and as she looked in his eyes she could finally see an emotion in them that she had been dyeing to see for so long.
She saw love, and for one of the first times she was at a lost for words.
"And I can feel you breathe, it's washing over me
Suddenly I'm melting into you
There's nothing left to prove, baby all we need is just to be
Caught up in the touch, the slow and steady rush
And baby, isn't that the way that love's supposed to be"
As the song came to a close Heero dipped Releena back over his arm and as he brought her back up he held her close to his body. He could feel her every curve press against him and feel her breathing hard against the thin fabric of his cotton tuxedo shirt.
"I can feel you breathe
Just breathe"
*Just breathe Releena, just breath, * Releena kept saying to herself as she tried to calm her rapidly beating heart. She pressed her face against his chest and could hear his heart and smiled at knowing that it was beating just as fast as hers was.
Gently, she felt his fingers go under her chin and gently lift her face up towards his to look at him.
Suddenly her heart was beating even faster than it was before and she tightened her grip on him.
Heero smiled down knowingly at her. He could feel her tremble slightly and at that moment knew that no matter what he could not deny his love for the small yet powerful and courageous girl he held in his arms. In fact it seemed that his feelings had doubled for her at seeing her so vulnerable. Waiting for him to make the first move.
To either except her or to push her away.
Releena waited for him to push her away at any moment. He had never held her this close before and she was starting to shake with the bottled up emotions inside her.
"Heero, I wanted to say..." Releena started but was quickly cut off.
"Shh..." Heero said gently putting his finger on her lips.
Then slowly he lowered his lips onto hers and both could feel the electric shocks of their first kiss coarse through them. Slowly, they gently pressed their lips together silently declaring their feelings for each other and both knowing that somehow, even though the future might be tough and may hold many obstacles they would have each other and would always try to protect the other.
"I can feel the magic floatin' in the air
Being with you gets me that way"
As their kiss ended and they heard the last lines of the song, they slowly pulled away from each other and opened their eyes. Releena's eyes were watering and tears were coursing down her cheeks. Suddenly Heero was worried that he had done something wrong.
" Releena, what's the matter? Did I do something wrong," he asked while gently wiping her tears away with his fingers, like he had when he first met her..
" No of course not, I'm just so happy," Releena said throwing herself into his arms.
Heero couldn't help but smile down at her as he gently stroked her back and laid his head softly on her soft hair.
"Aishiteru Releena"
"Aishiteru Heero"
With that said the new happy couple stood in the center of the dance floor holding each other as everyone else left. For the first time Heero was genuinely happy as he continued to hold Releena safely in a world of their own.