"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
How strange it is to be something fully formed.
She had been a child and then, quite suddenly, she was not.
And it felt as if it had really been that fast. Like she’d closed her eyes and when she’d opened them again, the child’s soft edges were gone. She had rather abruptly grown into the plains and angles of sharp features and long limbs that had always felt slightly awkward until the singular moment where they were not.
She moves easily, lost to daydreams, listening intently to the heart beating earnestly in the cage of her chest. A strong heart, another of the things she had inherited from her father. The glow, too, though that flickers and fades as she moves through the dappled sunlight.
The lilac eyes are still soft as she surveys the landscape, moving easily across rolling hills and knee-high sweetgrass. While her body has lost its softness, her spirit has not. She is kind, just as her mother and father are kind.
She spots him from some great distance and does not allow herself to entertain the possibility that it might really be him. An old friend lost to time. But the closer she gets, the more certain she is that it is him. And then there is absolutely no denying it and a smile surges across her face as she comes to rest a few feet away.
“Aureus,” she says, her tone warm, “it’s been so long.” So long indeed.
oh, these wings, they flicker and my feathers stir 'til I'm an ancient soul in a cascade world
She is one of two who has nestled into his heart.
One of two that he carries with him—the memory of them something both fond and gentle, something terrifying because of the power that it wields over him already. He does not trust the way that they have wormed into his heart. Does not trust the way that from the very beginning that he thought of them so often, holding them close, turning the memory over in the palm of his hands as though to be revered.
But he cannot avoid her forever, it seems, because he opens his eyes and suddenly she is there.
His heart thumps painfully against his ribcage but he says nothing for a moment.
Just takes a deep breath to steady himself, grateful that it is not night and Astrum is not there to let her opinions on the matter known. It is just the two of them, as it had been that day in the Playground.
“It has been,” he admits, not trusting himself to say her name—not trusting himself to let the conversation go any deeper than it has already. “How have the years been treating you?” He swallows, wondering if it was a mistake to inquire further—wondering if perhaps he should have taken his leave or pretended that he had not heard her or some other cowardly attempt to hide away. But it’s too late now.
Too late and there’s only the two of them.
Nowhere for him to hide.
and I'm quick with the bullet when it comes undone I got a head like a turret with a mouth for a gun
She is oblivious to the tumult that exists just beneath the surface.
She has aged, certainly, but she has not gotten any wises in the years that have separated them. He had seemed plagued by so much, even in the earliest days of their youth, that perhaps she might have been troubled to find him in any other condition.
To know that she was the cause of his discomfort now, though, would certainly eat her alive. She would have no choice but to leave him, to spare him whatever unease she has unwittingly thrust upon him.
And yet, she remains oblivious.
Even as he speaks and she remembers so plainly how easily they had fallen into step that day. How they had wandered without any destination in mind, how happy she had been to be so aimless.
The years. The years. It’s strange to think how much time has passed when it feels as if it was just yesterday that they’d met in the Playground and he had saved her from her loneliness. She rolls her shoulders in a kind of shrug, the smile remaining steadfast as she considers all the way things have changed.
“They haven’t been unkind,” she tells him, which isn’t a lie. She tilts her head then, the smile slipping just barely as she studies his face. Just as handsome now as he had been then, she thinks. Just as troubled.
“And you, Aureus?” she asks him, swallowing down the impulse to reach out and touch him, “are you all right?”
oh, these wings, they flicker and my feathers stir 'til I'm an ancient soul in a cascade world
Looking at her now, he cannot help but think of the way Hourglass had looked at him the last time that he had seen her. The way that she had called out his cowardice, been able to pinpoint the most vulnerable parts of him, and he wonders if Bas will do the same. If she will lash out and he will be forced to live the rest of his days in the softness of his memories of the two of them—cradled by his kind recollection.
She doesn’t though, at least not immediately, and he can’t decide whether he is wary that it is coming soon or relieved or certain that he should leave her. But he doesn’t. He is drawn to the innate warmth, to the way that she doesn’t shun him, and there is a momentary desperate need to cling to it further.
Later, he will hate himself for this weakness, but no more than he normally does.
“You look well,” he says with his same somber mouth, with his purple eyes intense beneath the swath of his pale forelock. “You always look well,” he says, stumbling over the words a little. “Beautiful, that is,” he tries to correct, “not just well.” He opens his mouth to say further and then shuts it quickly.
A pause, a slight exhale that he had not realized he had been holding.
“I have been,” he struggles to find the right word to explain how he is. Well loved by his family. Fed. Healthy. Crippled by self-doubt and self-loathing. Burdened by a weight he cannot name. Anxious in even the moments of solitude and rest. An outsider in a world that was designed to love someone just like him.
The loss for words flashes across his features and he says nothing else.
He just looks up, that same puzzled expression on his face as he studies her as if for the answer.
and I'm quick with the bullet when it comes undone I got a head like a turret with a mouth for a gun
“Oh,” she sighs, a soft sound she had not meant to make. But it had sprung up her throat before she even knew it was there, crawled out her mouth before she could stop it.
She could not have anticipated it, the compliment he pays her. Heat pools in her cheeks and she has to avert her gaze as if her lilac eyes might betray the storm of uncertainty brewing beneath the surface. Her grandmother had called her beautiful the first time she’d met her, as had her father, but this is almost certainly the first time anyone has said it without being forced by some sort of familiar obligation. It makes her heart beat funny.
And because she is still young, she will dwell on it long after they part ways again. She will lose sleep wondering what it meant for him to say it.
Her pulse slides sideways through her veins as she drags in a long breath in some attempt to steady herself. Right herself. Kick herself back to center like his calling her beautiful had somehow compromised her equilibrium.
But he gives her something else to focus on and she is grateful for it. She searches his face as the last of the heat drains from her cheeks, searches it for any clue as to what he could have meant. Had he meant that he’d been all right? Or had he simply started a thought and then been unable to finish it?
She swallows thickly and takes one small, shuffling step toward him. She almost reaches for him but stops herself short. “You have been…” she echoes, prompting, with a soft, expectant expression. A brief pause before she asks, “did something happen?”
oh, these wings, they flicker and my feathers stir 'til I'm an ancient soul in a cascade world
It feels utterly vulnerable to be before her like this and he hates himself for not being able to hide his own emotions better from her. Hates that he has not yet learned the art of tucking things away, of putting up a faux smile and pretending that the world is fine. Instead his breath stutters and his sentences collapse on themselves and he is left standing before her with empty palms and a hollow mouth.
“I’ve been great,” he answers this time, a little more forcefully, wondering if she would believe it if he sounded more convinced or if she would see right through his ruse. It doesn’t matter though because he has already said it—already committed to the answer—and he can’t do anything but see it through.
He smiles, feeling the edges stretch just a little too tight, and rolls his shoulders. “So they haven’t been unkind?” He picks up her last sentence again, wondering if perhaps he could backtrack the conversation and focus on her again—before he had stumbled dangerously close to his feelings and then his truth.
His purple eyes search her face, trying to pick apart whatever details he can find and then, when he realizes that it’s a little too difficult to look her in the eye, he averts his gaze to the horizon again.
For not the first time, he wishes he had Astrum with him—she always was a good distraction.
“What has made them not unkind?”
and I'm quick with the bullet when it comes undone I got a head like a turret with a mouth for a gun
She is not the most intelligent. She is no empath. She perhaps does not know him well enough to truly speculate. But she thinks there is something amiss. Something wrong. And she goes on studying him intently long after he has assured her (quite forcefully) that he is fine. It does not sit right in the cavern of her chest where the oversized heart lives.
She tries to swallow down the feeling that something has gone sideways but it lodges itself into the narrow space at the base of her throat. It swells when he forces that smile but she does not feel like it is her place to press him. If he considered her a friend, surely he would tell her if there was something bothering him. So she must choose between believing that there truly is nothing wrong and believing that they are not truly friends.
She is quiet a long time even after he turns the focus back on her. Her heart beats out something troubled and she glances down at the ground between them a beat before she meets his soft gaze again. “Nothing in particular,” she tells him and then rolls her shoulder. “I have been learning to live apart from my mother, which is a challenge.” She tries for a self-conscious smile and averts her gaze again. She does not allow herself to think about her mother, though it would be a welcome reprieve from the notion that they are not the friends she thought they were.
“Would you tell me?” she asks quietly without looking at him. “Would you tell me if there was something wrong?”
oh, these wings, they flicker and my feathers stir 'til I'm an ancient soul in a cascade world
He had always been a kind boy—even in his youth. He had been perhaps too soft for this world, but he had been gentle. Sweet and good mannered. He had been the kind of boy who would have gladly grown up to fall in love with someone just like her. Someone who was equally as good. Someone that he could nurture and whisper kind things to at night. Who he could cherish and hold close.
And yet—
And yet, there was something deep within him that prevented that.
Something dark that lurked in his shyness. Something that had grown from his fear and then hardened from Hourglass’ rejection. Something cowardly and fearful that grew as the days went on. Something that would overtake him, if he was not careful, and something that he had no idea how to fight off.
He listens intently to her story and that softens him again, enough that he nearly reaches for her to comfort her, to ask why she had been living apart, but her question catches him off-guard. He stiffens and his deep purple gaze grows a little colder. Everything about him shifting into a more protective stance.
“What if the something wrong is with me?” he questions, his voice a little tighter. “How could I possibly explain to you how I am the something wrong?” The words are filled with self-loathing, but the way that he speaks them is cruel enough to sound like an insult to her, sharp enough to hold her at bay.
“How could I expect you to understand all the ways that I am wrong?”
and I'm quick with the bullet when it comes undone I got a head like a turret with a mouth for a gun
She knows immediately that she has said the wrong thing.
As he stiffens she withdraws, shrinking in on herself.
He steels himself but she cannot. The heart is too big, she cannot protect herself from it. It twinges and spasms as her brow furrows in confusion.
They had been friends, she had been certain of it. He had been one of her only friends. They had walked for hours and she had convinced herself that he had taken as much comfort in her company as she had taken in his. But she does not recognize the boy stood before her now. She cannot reconcile these hard edges with the softness she had known.
Her heart beats sideways and she swallows thickly, taking a small step backward, away from him. She is not frightened, she simply does not understand.
How could he be the something wrong? How could she understand? Her brow does not soften, she does not know how to laugh off this sharpness. Perhaps if she were stronger or bolder or brighter she might have gone to him, rolled her eyes, insisted that there was nothing in the world she could not understand. Insisted that he was being ridiculous in insisting that there was anything wrong with him at all.
But this feels like an accusation and she doesn’t understand what she’s done wrong.
Her frown deepens until the edges of her mouth are pulled down with it.
“I thought…”
She pauses, shakes her head, finally averts her gaze as if in surrender.
“I thought we were friends.”
She hates how miserable it sounds coming out of her mouth but she can’t make it sound any different.
“Friends tell each other things. Friends help each other.”
oh, these wings, they flicker and my feathers stir 'til I'm an ancient soul in a cascade world
There is no small part of him that wishes he had stayed away from her. That wishes that he had been able to spare her from the enormity of his own ugliness—that he had listened to his gut and kept to himself. But he hadn’t. Of course he hadn’t. Instead he had thrown himself into these relationships with women who were incredible—so kind and selfless and loving—and he was a wrecking ball for them.
He aches looking at her now, seeing the pain register on her face.
But that doesn’t soften him, even though it should. Even though the answer out of this is right before him.
“I am incapable of being friends,” and he nearly groans the words because he hates having to admit it. Hates having to look at her and push the knife in her chest in further. But he does. He keeps his gaze steady on her and doesn’t relent. Even when he wishes with every fiber of his being that he could just pull her close and press a kiss to the softest part of her forehead. That he could push the hair from her eyes and tell her that it’s going to be okay—that this is going to be okay.
He swallows, hard, and stands still, not closing the space between them that she creates. It would be better if she left, he knows. Would be better if he left too, but he isn’t capable of that—not yet.
“I can’t help you,” his voice is quieter now, “and you certainly can’t help me.”
He would consume her if she tried. Would greedily lock her away in his heart and never let her leave. He would hoard her like Astrum has taught him and that isn’t love. That isn’t friendship.
That’s dark, desperate need and he will shield her from it if it’s the last thing he does.
and I'm quick with the bullet when it comes undone I got a head like a turret with a mouth for a gun
