[private] who am i to complain, sleaze

[isakov]

i finally got sewed up
Set a time and i showed up

Years have passed.
Decades, perhaps.

And yet Isakov remains, has always remained, quiet in the way he has lurked. A thing made for love, not from it, he has understood that his place is in the shadows. He’s known it in the way he has only hurt the things he himself loved. Sigrid, darling girl, has gone. She had always been more fond of Sleaze, as though she’d understood that there had been something dark about Isakov.

Has he changed all that much? He has not fashioned himself into anything more fanciful than a star-touched bastard in so long he is not certain he’d be able to if he tried. The illusion had come so naturally to him, once.

But it had not all been an illusion, had it? No, he had known what it felt like to love something honestly. It had not all been for show. It couldn’t have. He’d loved desperately and he’d let it destroy him. He’d let it chase him into the shadows.

He emerges now only because that color, that deep purple, it is as familiar to him as his own skin. He catches only a glimpse at first and thinks it must be Sigrid. But it is not Sigrid.

It is Sleaze.

And Isakov, old Isakov, he smiles, relieved. Sleaze, he calls, only to find that no sound has left his mouth. He has only thought it. He does not rush in his approach, only walks purposefully until their strides match and he settles into an amble.

“Sleaze,” he finally says and the shape of the name on his tongue alone is enough to relax muscles that have been tensed for decades.

isakov

@sleaze