maybe we were, too.”
She had not meant to startle him when she had jumped, and she can feel herself growing increasingly flustered with the situation.
She doesn’t think she had always been like this; always on edge, and wound so tight that the slightest unexpected sound or movement triggered a reaction. Her memories of being alive feel like they are trapped behind a veil, one that is almost transparent enough that she can see them but not quite touch them. They are there, fully within reach, but no matter how hard she tries to clear the fog, she can’t escape it.
But this version of herself doesn’t feel right – she knows this, even without being able to remember everything.
It makes her feel uneasy in her own skin, but she blames it on being alive. It’s been so long since she last heard another’s voice, since she last felt a heart beating inside of her chest – since she last felt fear ignite in her veins.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…” She trails off, not even entirely sure what she was trying to say, or even what she was sorry for. Instead she inhales, and though her pulse feels steadier the breath still trembles when it passes through her lips. She looks back at him, and again there is confusion lingering in the shadows of her eyes when he starts questioning her. “I mean, I guess so. I knew the gate had been opened, so I walked through. I don’t remember anything about a river, though.” She’s looking at him warily now, afraid that she had maybe answered his questions wrong.
He offers his name, and this time when she smiles, it feels real. There is a light that reaches her eyes when she tilts her head to look at him, and an almost lilt to her words when she says, “Do you want to change your name? Is there anyone alive that would know one way or the other?” The laugh that she exhales feel like life being breathed back into her, a sudden realization washing over her – no one knows who she is.
She barely knows who she is.
She is a blank canvas and the pen all rolled into one, and she isn’t sure why that hadn’t dawned on her earlier. “I bet we could be anything and anyone that we wanted to be, and no one would know the difference.”
anonya.