Ask the Sinners

I need to tell you.....

  The door was closed. He stared at it, trying to summon the courage he would need to do this. With a deep breath, he twisted the knob. Iari was inside, playing a game.

  "Hey, hon," she said. "I'm almost done. Just give me a few minutes. Okay?"

  Sati nodded and sat down on her bed, twisting with his rings. He watched her play for another ten minutes. That wasn't a big deal. He knew how long this level lasted.

  "I can always come back later," he managed to say awkwardly. Iari shook her head and got up to join him.

  "What did you want to tell me?" she asked curiously.

  'This is it,' Sait thought. 'This is how I lose my girlfriend. I don't want it to end. But it'll have to.'

  "I-I don't know how to begin," he muttered. Iari placed her hand on his and looked him in the eye. "Well....to begin, I was a horrible person in my past life."

  She stretched. "There you go, talking about your past life again. Look, that was then, this is now. There's differences. I love you." She wrapped her arms around him.

  He got choked up. Then, he slowly pushed her off of him. "You don't get it. I was awful. I made...I made a contract with a demon. I took my brother's appearance; I killed my family; I killed Gumina's family; I abducted a bunch of women. I'm not a good person. Why can't you see that?" he cried out.

  Iari stood up.

  'I've done it. I should have never done this. But then I would have felt guilty. I don't know what's better.'

  "Didn't you say that Riliane became sorry for what she did? You're doing the same. I bet she felt this guilt just as strongly as you do." Those words shocked him. Iari was staring at him, with something that wasn't quite kindness, but it wasn't hatred. That was all he cared about.

  "Well, yes, but that was different. She-"

  "You were both possessed. I don't see how it was so different." She smiled at him.

  Even though they had been together for quite some time, he still expected her to sneer like Gumina had all those years ago. But she never did.

  Even so, he shook his head again. "I chose to make that contract. Riliane didn't. Someone else made it for her. That wasn't her fault, it couldn't have been." He sighed.

  Iari sat down next to him again. "Tell me what else you did."

  And so, he did. He told her about the demon, Lolan, Mikulia, IR, Gumina, Maylis, Lukana....all of it. What he had done to them. How he felt no guilt at the time.

  He told her about Yufina and Karchess.

  He told her about dying.

  Every single thing.

  Once he was done, she had her hand over her mouth, eyes wide. "Oh...my....god," she whispered.

  Sati hung his head in defeat, then stood up. "I'll go. I'll understand if you don't want to talk to me. I'll give you some money, y'know, for therapy."

  As he made to leave, her arm shot out to grip his wrist. "I think you misinterpreted my words for hatred. Look, Sati, I don't hate you. I understand that you had a literal demon in you. That's difficult to explain, but I'm so glad you did. It was only a matter of time before someone else did. I'm glad it was you."

  And then she leaned against him. In that moment, Sati felt safe.

~*~

  "Wait, she literally heard everything he did....and was fine with that?! OW! KAYO!"

  Kayo carefully returned her hand to its position as Gallerian turned around.

  "You don't have proof that it was me, right?" she inquired innocently as he glared at her.

  Nemesis laughed quietly. "Well, she decided that that mother f'er was worth her time, for some reason. We'll never know why, but that's fine."

  Someone hit her too.

  "MARGARITA!"