stilldontgotit | 39 - voice/action;

Man. It's been two years since I first got here... Kind of hard to believe.

It's pretty crazy to think about. I've seen people leave on a daily basis. Even I did, but it was just a week.

[He sighs.]

Heck, I remember when this place didn't have electricity or a battle dome. It really has changed a lot.

[But he's just getting off track. He pauses for about a minute before he tosses up a quick filter:]

Filtered from Xion, Axel, and Roxas//100%

But there's something else I want to talk about. Anyway...

[Ugh.]

What do you do if someone forgives you, but you don't want that forgiveness? What are you supposed to say to that?

[Or... he hesitates--]

Or better yet... how do you just let go?

[He won't mention who he's talking about, but those who know him should be able to guess.

Anyway, once that's done, Riku's going to hang out at the bridge around house 14. Just because it's close and away from the business in the center of town. And that's good right about now because he's got a lot on his mind. He has for a while now, it's just gotten more complicated lately.]

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[Luke's a little tense, too, but only because he feels as if he's walking on eggshells. One wrong word and he might just cause an argument to flare up. That's probably the last thing Riku needs right now.]

I think you just... have to accept that they forgive you. You can't just throw it back in their face. [...] I didn't think I wanted forgiveness, for a while.

[Just have to accept it? Hah... Luke's probably right. It's not like he can control the feelings of others.]

Oh yeah?

[Yeah, Luke's not about to tell Riku just what he'd done at home. But he can at least tell him this:]

... I did something terrible once. I didn't think I deserved forgiveness at all. So... it was really kind of weird, once I finally did get it. I didn't know what to do...

But it was still worth it. I don't think I could've really forgiven myself if I didn't get it from the others.

[He did something terrible? With an attitude like this?

Riku finds that a little hard to believe, but he'll keep on listening.

And, heck. Might as well open the can of worms now, rather than later.]

So what about jealousy?

[He thinks about Asch, how he's been jealous and resentful of Luke for years, before he'd even met him.

He thinks about himself, how he'd been so envious of Asch and the security of being real.

The both of them... How their negative feelings have slowly, gradually decreased the more they got to know each other. Luke is no stranger to jealousy, though this kind is different. He at least knows exactly what Riku means.

It wasn't too long ago that Luke was jealous of Riku, after all, for the very same reason.]

I think everyone feels jealous of someone sometime in their life...

]"You took everything from me!"

"You can call yourself a person!"]

There isn't anything wrong with it. You can't control it... But you can work on it. Sometimes you can get over it pretty easily, and sometimes it can take forever. [Asch. He's sure there'll always be some form of resentment between them...]

I think... forgiveness is the first step. Of yourself and that other person.

[He expected Luke to reprimand him, or to at least take offense to his jealousy. So why is he being so accepting? Doesn't it bother him that Riku's still jealous after all this time?

But his advice is sound. He'll never get over this unless he stops holding a grudge against Luke. If only it wasn't so difficult to move beyond that...]

Problem is, sometimes it's hard, even if you know you should get over it.

Heh, don't I know it.

[All the times that he'd felt jealous... He'd always felt justified at first, only to realize that he was wrong, yet stubbornly cling to it.]

You'd tell yourself over and over that you're okay with it, but you're really not. It's hard to just tell yourself that kind of thing.

There's some steps to take... I mean, that's how I'm doing it.

Steps, huh?

[Now he's curious. About Luke's approach, anyway.]

Well... You've already gotten past the first few of them. You know you're jealous and you want to get past it, and you're talking to me. That's pretty much how I do it.

You just dive head first, huh?

[He gives a little chuckle at that.] I guess you could say that.

[... And then his somber mood is broken by the fact that oh god he's talking to RIKU, so he backpedals just a bit.] Uh... You don't have to do it like that, though.

I don't even know what to do at this point.

[So many mixed feelings, and that's his problem.]

[Luke is quiet as he glances away from the journal for a moment. He really does want to help... No one should live in resentment for so long. Asch did... And look where that got him.

But what can Luke do? He's part of the problem, after all. Still...

He can't help thinking of Guy. How he helped him admit that he had a crush on Xion, how he let him see that he wasn't a bad person for feeling the way he did. By then, Riku and Xion had officially broken up, so there wasn't so much jealousy on Luke's end. But...]

I don't really know about this kind of thing, but...

Don't rush it, okay? There's no deadline or anything. You can't just make yourself stop feeling the way you do.

And you aren't wrong for it, either. Feelings aren't wrong, they just are. So... don't beat yourself up for something you can't control.

[After all this time, he still remembers what Guy said to him... heh.]

Maybe the feelings aren't wrong, but jealousy's what got me into this mess in the first place. It's just made things worse.

[Jealousy about something else, but it still caused things to get so nasty.]

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