you're paralyzing me, any

[isakov]

throw me in the water, don’t think about the splash i will create
leave me at the altar, knowing all the things you just escaped

There is something that lurks beneath the surface of his reflection.
He can’t see it, but he can feel it. Something that calls gentle.

Something of a siren, luring him. He takes a step deeper into the river, dips his nose into the current. He almost lets it draw him into the depths. And perhaps he would have, if a voice had not arrested his attention.

He does not look up sharp, Isakov. No, he blinks at the water’s surface, catching one last glance at his mottled reflection before he turns his gaze to the shore. It is a stranger that greets him and he recognizes the stranger’s dark purple as something that lives in his skin, too. He smiles but there is something in it that is not exactly friendly.

He swings his body around, still half-submerged in the river, as he studies the stranger. He can feel that same strange something when he looks at the dark stallion. The thing that calls to him, ripples just beneath the surface. But he does not move any closer.

“Hello,” he echoes. “I’m Isakov,” he tells the stranger, though the stranger hadn’t asked. He takes a short step toward the shore and the stallion that stands upon it and tilts his head, the gold eyes curious.

“Do you want to join me?”

isakov