If You Feel Better

Chapter 24

Time heals all wounds, so they say. But Bakura was hurting just as much now as when Aya was returned to her family. Days, weeks, and eventually months passed without her. Bakura still felt her absence heavily, hating the abnormal feeling of emptiness it gave him.

He had been trying not to think about her. He had been truly trying.

Every day and night blended into one another. He was in his bed, finding himself unable to sleep yet again. He was flip-flopping every few minutes, trying to find a comfortable position, but he could not do so. Insomnia had been consuming him as of late, leaving him more and more fatigued and ill-tempered as time went on. He stared up at the chipped ceiling, arms resting behind his head. Forcing his eyes closed did not help. It did not make him feel tired or relaxed. It only added to his annoyance.

He sighed in irritation, rolling over onto his side. His hand landed flat in the empty space next to him, its former occupant long gone. He fanned out his hand and stroked the spot where her body used to lay. He imagined if she were still there. He could feel her soft, smooth skin beneath his fingertips and traced her curves from memory.

He had never had sleeping troubles before Aya, but he hadn't had a decent night's sleep since she left. He had successfully controlled his thoughts for most of the day, but he still couldn't feel normal. He was growing increasingly maddened as the days wore on, snapping at anyone who tried to say a word to him.

After spending months lying next to the princess, he had her sleeping face engrained into his mind. She was always so peaceful, even after the most violent of days. Her breaths were soft, calm, and even. Her eyelids gently touched. Sometimes she would press herself of her own volition against Bakura as she slept. Perhaps it was a subconscious desire of all humans to feel someone close to them as they slept. Protection was an innate yearning for all living beings.

Bakura pretended, just for a moment, that she was there beside him. He stroked her rosy cheek with his thumb and pushed a strand of her hair back in place. Although he fantasized that she was still there, it was painfully clear that there was no skin beneath his fingertips, no serene face to gaze upon.

He balled his hand into a fist, pushing his distracting thoughts to the back of his mind. How dare any woman occupy his thoughts to such an incapacitating degree. How had this happened? What could he do about it now? All questions with no answers.

Finding no solution, he smacked his fist on the mattress and rolled to his other side, turning his back to his imagined Princess Aya.

~

Aya pulled the string back, arrow lined up perfectly. She stared down the sight window, praying that her shot would aim true. She released the string, sending the arrow over the top of the target, embedding into the dirt far beyond.

Dejected, she limped her body and released the breath she was holding. Arrows littered the ground and the edges of the target, none of them making it anywhere near the center. She had been at it all day, but was not seeming to get any better.

"Keep your arm as relaxed as possible when you draw the bowstring," Chief Advisor Shimon instructed.

"Well, which is it? Do you want me to relax my arm or draw the bowstring?" Aya asked, getting frustrated. Shimon had been spewing the same directions at her since they began training that morning, but it seemed archery was something Aya was not naturally picking up.

"Use the muscles in your back to pull the string," he lectured for possibly the tenth time. "Take your arm completely out of the equation."

"I kind of need my arm muscles to, you know, hold onto the string." She wasn't trying to be short with Shimon. She knew he was trying his best to teach her, but hours upon hours of no progress was testing her patience.

"You hold onto the string using the muscles in your hand," he continued. "You don't use the ones in your arm itself."

Aya gazed defeatedly at the sky above. The sun was starting to set and the bugs were starting to come out. They would have to wrap up soon, an entire day wasted accomplishing nothing.

She took a deep breath to mentally reset herself and took another arrow from the adorned quiver beside her. She drew her bow as far back as she could. She stared down the line directly to the target, its big, red painted circle taunting her. She opened her fingers, releasing the arrow, and as she did, the string snapped excruciatingly against the inside of her elbow.

"Ah!" she cried out in pain, dropping to her knees as the held her stinging welt. This was the millionth time the bowstring had gotten her. Part of Shimon's instructions were to keep the arm that held the bow as straight as possible. Unfortunately for Aya, she was able to hyperextend her left arm enough where it bent ever so slightly inwards, causing the string to crack against her skin in the same exact spot every time she forgot.

It seemed an endless cycle: she focused on her stance, she forgot about her aim. She focused on her aim, she forgot about standing up straight. She focused on standing up straight, she forgot not to hyperextend her arm. She focused on not hyperextending her arm, she forgot about her stance. Rinse and repeat.

She examined her swelling lump, watching it get bigger and darker, the blood rising to the surface. She sucked in a sharp breath and stood back up, rubbing the spot as gently as she could. She looked out to her arrow where it hit the target halfway between the edge and the center, still very far away from where it should've been.

This is starting to look hopeless, she thought, inwardly sighing. If I can't master archery, I hope I never need it.