The Goddess who Defied Fate

Chapter 4

Shiro cast her narrowed eyes down, gnashing her teeth.
"You feel... warm. Hot, actually." She couldn't take it anymore. Hue chuckled and backed away from her. "Trying to seduce a god. You're awfully full of yourself for a goldfish." He turned his back on her.
Shiro took a deep breath. She narrowed her eyes as she looked up. "Huedhaut," she said seriously and waited for him to turn around before she continued. "I am not the goddess." Hue gasped, his eyes widening. "If you were friends or something, I get that it would feel weird being around me. But I'm a human girl named Shiro. I don't know this goddess. So..." She swallowed. "Please don't confuse the two of us. I'm me." Shiro turned her back and carefully made her way to the door. She rested her hand against the side of the door and looked back at him over her shoulder, a sad smile on her face. "You're tired, right? You should get some rest. Your mark has already begun fading. It won't be long until you can return to the heavens." Return home.
Hue's eyes widened. "How do you know?"
Shiro gave him a flat look. "Are you an idiot? That mark is totally exposed the way you look now. Anyway, you look like the dead. Get some sleep."
Hue sighed. "I've never met a human as bossy as you."
Shiro smiled wryly at his eyes boring into her back and left.

After returning to her apartment, Shiro couldn't calm down. She kept pacing and Hue just wouldn't leave her mind. His mark was fading. He would be able to return to the heavens soon and she'd have to say goodbye again. He was going somewhere she could never reach him again. They should never have crossed paths in this world. She knew that, and yet... She couldn't seem to leave him alone. 

Shiro found herself back in the mansion, a bowl of rice porridge in hand. What was she even doing? Hue was already awake by that time.
"You're awake? You haven't even been asleep for an hour," she said as she entered his room.
"I don't think you understand. Gods don't usually require sleep," he said. She put the bowl down on his bedside table. "We occasionally sleep for amusement... The same goes for eating."
"I know, but being on Earth is tiring for you, isn't it? You might as well use to it regain your strength. Eat that." As she walked out, she pointed to the porridge with her thumb over her shoulder.
"Look, you're not helping with my exhaustion in the least. On the contrary, you are the primary source of the problem. You're the one creating more opportunities for me to lose energy."
Shiro smiled self-deprecatingly, her back turned. "Yeah, I know," she whispered, unsure of whether he heard her or not.
"That being said... I'm feeling a little bit better." Shiro nodded. He spoke again before she could take another step. "So... I see you've even prepared food. Did you make it here?"
Shiro turned around. "No, I went back to my place."
"How spontaneous of you."
Shiro shrugged. "Yeah, well... Eat it, don't eat it. Do what you want."
"If I let food go to waste, the gods in the Department of Punishments will punish me."
Shiro smiled wryly. "Somehow, I doubt that. Kuro might, though."
"You two are pretty close, aren't you?" he asked.
"We're twins." Shiro walked back over to him and flopped down on his bed, sitting with one leg over the other. "You recover energy fairly quickly in the heavens since there aren't any impurities, but what about here?"
"I spend some time in an environment without any impurities. We don't usually get tired, though."
Shiro hummed in response. "You're different, though."
Hue sighed. "Leon said something to you, didn't he?"
"I know about your eye, if that's what you mean." She leaned back on her palms and looked up at the ceiling. "Leon was just being Leon, though." Shiro stayed until Hue finished the porridge.

***

"Huh? Thank me?" Shiro was surprised when Hue decided to bring her to the mansion's balcony one evening.
"I'm not in the habit of being indebted to people," he said.
Shiro sighed. "It's not like I did any of that to win your favour. You don't need to thank me," she replied as he handed her a glass. She didn't need to guess what it was.
"Here you are, some alcohol I made. It shouldn't taste too badly."
"A drink made by the god of Aquarius. I'm sure it must be delicious." She knew it was delicious.
"So long as your palate is reasonably refined, it should be."
"Mm. Thanks," Shiro muttered and turned her head away.
"Why are you looking away from me like that?" Hue asked.
Shiro turned her back to him. "Never mind me. It's nothing." She sat down with her drink, sampling it. Hue poured her another drink after she'd finished that one. She'd learned that, in human mythology, Aquarius was supposedly a beautiful youth who poured the wine of the gods. When she first heard it, she found it incredibly fitting.
The drink had a sweet, floral fragrance. The taste was even sweeter than its scent. "It's so smooth."
"I can make your next one a bit more acidic and citrusy if you'd like," Hue said.
"Combining alcohol with different things can create completely different flavours..." she mused quietly to herself. She smiled slightly at the nostalgia.
"Why are you crying?" Hue asked, surprised.
Shiro gasped, eyes wide. She touched a hand to her cheek and looked at it. Wet. "I, um..." she was at a loss for words. Why was she crying? "This just reminded me of something that happened a long time ago, when I was younger." Back then, she thought they would share forever together. It was almost ironic for her to miss it now. But it wasn't like she wanted to die...
Shiro looked up at the sky. "You can't see the stars in Tokyo. This is a wonderful experience," she said, changing the subject.
"The heavens are beautiful, but the gods who live there aren't as wonderful as you think. For better or for worse, everyone has their own personality."
"I know." Shiro nodded, not taking her eyes off the darkened sky. "You know... Humans associate a variety of different stories and traits with the constellations, too. For example, there's a constellation known to humans as Berenice's Hair." Shiro pointed at the constellation.
"Making hair into a constellation, humans really do have robust imaginations." Hue sounded amused.
"The legend goes that a queen named Berenice cut off her precious hair as an offering, praying for the safety of her husband, who was away at war."
"And then that became a constellation...?" Hue asked.
"Yes, because Berenice was so devoted. It's a nice story."
"You really are an odd girl."
"You think so?" She looked down at him.
"Yes. But it's not a bad thing." Shiro smiled and looked back up at the sky. She closed her eyes as she felt the cool night breeze brush against her flushed cheeks.
"Now that I think about it, there are a lot of myths about love, stories about the gods finding the ones they're destined to love. Humans search for that too." Shiro's smile faded.
"There's a fountain in the heavens where people wish for their love to last forever." Shiro's eyes widened. That fountain... She and Hue were supposed to go to that fountain together. But they never did. She couldn't meet his eyes. "I don't think there's such a thing as predetermined destiny. But I can understand how someone could feel comforted by the idea."
"I think you're probably right. It feels like destiny when you meet someone you love with everything you have and you think you have forever to spend with them." Shiro reached up at the sky as though she could touch the shining stars. "I still think about that couple whose wish we granted. I know you don't agree with me, but I meant what I said. It's not just the husband who will suffer, either. The wife will suffer her fair share as well." Hue gasped at her words. "But despite that, they chose to be together, so I believe they were as happy as they could be." They were happy too, weren't they? All the time they spent together wasn't for nothing, was it? Hue kept his eyes on the stars as he quietly listened to her speak.
"That's nothing but wishful thinking. You don't have any real reason to believe that." Shiro silently looked at him, her face stoic. "When hope and personal feelings get involved, people lose the ability to think about things rationally. And if people stop thinking logically, they lose control. That's why love can occasionally... make people do unpredictable things." His words angered her and she felt her heart grow cold. He continued, "Like... make an otherwise steadfastly logical person like myself... wish for eternal love at the fountain I mentioned before. Hypothetically speaking, of course."
"Is that so? But you don't actually know me." If he ever did.
"What?" Hue slowly looked at Shiro, surprise etched into his features.
Her eyes were cold as they bore into his. "You don't know anything about me. You don't understand a damn thing." She let her anger and frustration show, sick of listening to him disregard everything she ever felt. "Why are you a god, Huedhaut? What is your purpose? Isn't it to love humans? Isn't it to protect humans?" Hue looked away from her, unable to answer. Was she the only one who was happy? Or was Hue still so caught up in himself that he couldn't see the bigger picture? A light caught Shiro's peripheral. "Oh..." she looked up at the shooting star. Her emotions were so raw just now, she didn't even feel the presence of the dying star. Shiro closed her eyes and put her hands together to her chest.
"Shooting stars don't grant wishes. The gods in the Department of Wishes do," Hue suddenly said.
"Yeah, I know."
"What is your wish?" She wasn't expecting him to ask her that. It threw her off.
"I... don't have one." A lie. Hue's expression was surprisingly gentle as he looked at her, as though she hadn't just lashed out at him.
"Don't rush. Find your own wish at your own speed. That's one of your good points, your ability to find your very own version of beautiful in the limited time you have. I've always respected that about humans."
"You're a good person, Hue." Albeit a bit narrow-minded.
"Flatter me all you want, I won't change. You drank a little too much. Besides, I'm not a good 'person'. I'm a good 'god'."
"When have I ever asked you to change who you are?" No. No matter how much he pissed her off. This teasing, snarky god with all his dry humour, she wouldn't change for the world.