08-25-2019, 01:01 PM
 I can remember a time when I was so afraid when even my shadow wouldn't follow me She knows this now, she knows it and she hates to admit it. They had been silly, foolish, naive, ignorant, simple children. There, sitting in the grass staring up at the clouds making meaningful shapes from meaningless tufts of white against a cerulean sky. They had thought themselves so untouchable, that danger could never brush its wretched hand against their soft, young, supple skin. Each of them so believed that they were safe within the walls of their valley home. Tragedy, it had already reached each of the girls, and that had to have been enough, in their lives, there had to be no more. They had held hands and whispered secrets in each other’s ears, shared a handshake meant only for the other, daisy chains strewn up in the valley. Nothing could touch them, the orphan girl and the child from a family torn apart by war. They were free. They had been so wrong, just neither of them had been able to see it. Blinded by the sound of thundering falls, the smell of fresh pine, and the feeling of grass tickling against their crimson and gold skin. And Elaina knows now, even as she stands with Lilli, how easy it is to slide those rose tinted glasses once more over her eyes. The cruelty of life, of her past, of her future, she grows blind to it all in the sight of the red haired cousin before her. How easy it is to slip into that childhood role she so often played, the maiden that saved herself from the vicious dragon, the one who could conquer mountains and tame wild beasts, and soothe aching hearts, if only she had her best friend beside her. She is reminded of all of this, the sunflower child. Lilli’s presence causes the growing politician, Hyaline member, to become that little girl in Paraiso that asked if Lilli if she thought they would best friends forever. The answer was yes, always yes, and Elaina knows this to be true. It is so beautiful, having her beside her once more. She should have known better than to give up on finding her, for Lilli and Elaina always came together in the end. They were more than two perfectly fitting puzzle pieces, or two halves of the same whole, they were entirely one. She laughs, a laugh she shares with Lilli and Lilli alone, as she speaks. It was true, the crimson girl had often had difficulties navigating, but Elaina hardly considered this a weakness. When she pulls away those eyes of amber meet glacial blue. “It’s because you blaze the path,” she says with a note of seriousness in her voice towards her cousin. “If the plants could talk in that bend,” she says with a note of laughing lilting on her tongue. The secrets they had shared then, the important promises they had made (joint weddings, friends forever, their kids would be best friends just as they were.) “Did you ever think of going back there? Paraiso?” She asks. There had been the option, they were legacy children, if anyone could find Paraiso in the mists, it would be them, Legado would guide them, of that Elaina was certain. “I miss them, all of them,” she says, imagining all of their faces. “It feels like some place far away, not a place we actually lived and breathed,” she says, thinking, dreaming, out loud to an ear she always knows will listen to her words, no matter how ridiculous they sound. She knows the feeling Lilli voices. In the end, of all these thing, they had outgrown Beyond, or maybe, Beyond had outgrown them. “Waiting,” she begins, looking to Lilli with something that has been broken and never quite fixed in the way it was before in her eyes, “can be the hardest thing.” Elaina does not miss how much Lilli looks like Valerio, the godfather that had sworn to protect her and his family (a promise that, in the end, he should have never given.) “It is not easy, I imagine,” she says, dropping her gaze for a moment. “What would you choose?” She then suddenly asks. Her crimson cousin should be used to this by now, Elaina always asked those bold, daring question, but with the warm confidence of her mother that allowed anyone to answer what they wish. There was no judgment in the shine to her amber eyes, or the tilt of her head. “If you had to Lilli, what would you choose? Duty? Or love?” It is not so easily answered, this Elaina knows. But she asks it all the same. Because Elaina is Elaina and she never changes. As always, from the time they were children, the golden girl is so grateful to the presence the crimson mare provides her. To have had another to grow up with, to face similar struggles, to place their hands within the others and promise for an eternity to love each other and all their beauty and their flaws. Not many have such a thing in their lives. She breathes, because with Lilli here is all feels so much easier. She knows this is a lie, something she tells herself, but for now, tonight, Elaina is content to be fooled into thinking it. Tomorrow, with the light of morning, it will return to its hardened state and Elaina will be left to climb another mountain threatening to block her path to who only knows where. They laugh, because they know their lives are going to be anything but quiet. Oh, how they like to think so. “I fear we will never get to be as boring as we may wish,” she says jokingly. “I will have to come visit you in Taiga,” she offers before speaking again, knowing this land held many trees within its grasp. “Do you think, you could find a spot for us, like in Paraiso?” She asks then, trying to catch Lilli’s eyes to let them memories of those times flow through each of them. Memories that have snuggled close to Elaina’s heart and have been there to fill even the smallest corner’s of her life with happiness even when all she wanted to do was cry her heart out. Her lips pull into a smile at Lilli’s humor, something she never tired of. “I think that’s why we have each other, we cant be lost when we are together,” she says, looking up then at the stars. “It’s impossible.” benjamin and beylani's sunflower-girl |
@[lilliana]