Eyes of Azure | Assassination Classroom

:: Attempt 25 | Breakeven ::

Aoi is smiling, so brightly, so happily, like she used to—and it's not because of him.

He feels that same ache inside him, growing stronger and stronger by the second—a gaping, agony-inducing hole where his notoriously dubbed 'cold' heart used to be. And he takes a second to compose himself, pinching the bridge of his nose.

It hurts. He realizes with a sharp intake of breath, and he straightens. He can tell what he's feeling—he's not that oblivious to the pain he feels right now, and he can pinpoint what emotions are coursing through him.

Hurt. Nostalgia. Longing. Anger. They coalesce into one poisonous, dangerous mix which churns somewhere inside him, wrapping tight around his chest, creeping up his throat and locking his airways. He closes his eyes, before they flutter open once again, and all he can see is red, red, red.

He understands what he's feeling; he's felt this before, so he's no stranger to this corruptive emotion.

Jealousy.

She's smiling, and it's not because of him, not at him. She's happy, but not with him.

He can remember her false smiles, can remember her trying her best to maintain the metaphorical distance that is so tangible between them even when they're physically close together. He can remember the pain, the hurt, the anger and betrayal in her eyes whenever she looks at him, whenever he can see those eyes of azure.

But he also remembers the days when she had looked at him with joy, with the blatant happiness she always displayed—with the love she had admitted that she once had for him. But that was it, wasn't it? She had 'loved' him—but it was all in the past.

It isn't there any longer.

She no longer loves him like she used to, because there is already someone else in her heart. Someone else who can make her smile so happily, so freely, like she used to. Someone else who makes her happy the way he no longer can. Someone else she looks upon with those beautiful blue eyes the way she looked at him once.

Someone else whom she loves even more than she used to love him.

And oh, does it hurt him so much. Because even if she's moved on, he hasn't.

He can't move on when he desperately wishes that he can bring back what used to be their reality. He can't move on when he remembers their past so vividly, when he's still trapped in his 'what if's, his 'maybe's and his 'could have been's. He can't move on when he wishes that he can change the mistakes he made.

That he can reverse time, that he can bring back those days beneath the sakura tree. That he can take back the words—those horribly unjustified accusations, those crude insults, those lies—he had shouted, had mercilessly thrown at her that stormy night nearly four years ago.

But they are over, they are done with, they are all in the past, and everyone save from him has already moved on—but he hasn't been forgiven, nor has it been forgotten.

And it hurts, because hearts don't break even.

Gakushu turns towards the window once again, watching her smile and nod along to what the male's apparently saying. She's grinning, covering her mouth behind a hand as she shakes her head in amusement and starts to laugh.