I'm wasted, losing time; I'm a foolish, fragile spine
I want all that is not mine; I want him but we're not right
Adaline was delicate, breakable, impossible.
She spent hours picking her way through the rocks to get to wherever she needed to go—her step always a question and not a statement. She lived each day with dreams thrumming in her heart that she was not sure she would ever fully embrace. It was difficult to dream of adventures and hunger for thrills when your body was not designed to carry them.
It left her hollowed out on more days then most, accepting her quiet fate.
So she would empathize with Fart if she could read his thoughts. She would understand the feeling of being an alien thing—unwanted in most situations. She would tell him of first interactions when the first look to flash on someone’s face was disgust, when they had to fight to hide it. She would tell him how that would sting, how it would drive a knife in her chest that she could not dislodge, could not breathe around.
She would tell him that her desire for him to stay was genuine.
But, of course, she does not know these things. Has no way of knowing his inner turmoil in the same way that neither stallion knows of hers. So instead she just continues to smile, following the conversation with a casual gaze, pale pink eyes flicking back and forth atop her head as they each spoke. It broke a piece of her heart to hear how the girls had treated him, but she didn’t speak just yet—instead watching Xylo.
There was something haunted about him, something she hadn’t noticed before. Perhaps none of them came to this conversation without their own ghosts and demons. It was somehow comforting to know that she was not alone in this. “Not luck then,” she said, perking up a little, “but something, and I am glad for it.” She glanced between the two of them, expectant. “So what should we do now? Surely, we should do something.” The sun was warming, the ground thawing. “It’s too pretty of a day to waste.”
in the darkness, I will meet my creators
and they will all agree that I'm a suffocator