The noise feels far away.
It becomes a distant hum in the background of everything else; because he holds her like he doesn’t mean to let her go. And his wings are casting shadows along the planes of her cheeks where veils of daylight fracture, and even though she should not, even though she must not, she cannot help but imagine him touching her skin – that they are flesh to flesh, that he is fire and she is ice, and he is melting away all of her reserves. Because he’s holding her, because he’s shutting Cordis out with the blackbirds, because she had felt that she was sewn together with the memories of sunsets and rivers, and without those it had felt like her insides were outside, but it wasn’t true.
This is not the end of everything.
Because he holds her like he doesn’t mean to let her go.
‘Is that why you run? To get away from something wicked?’
And when she doesn’t answer him, it will not be for a lack of words. When she doesn’t answer him, it will be because she cannot find the right ones when millions fall against her tongue. She is running from love, and love has been wicked to her. She is running from guilt. She is running from history. She is running from her lips, and her eyes, and the way her skin felt pressed against her own. She is running from sunsets. She is running from water, like water. She is running because she doesn’t know where she starts and Cordis ends, and she thinks that she might run forever.
But he holds her like he doesn’t mean to let her go.
But he’s in her veins.
‘I can’t promise it won’t find you, but I will.’
And something changes. It isn’t wicked, but it feels strong like that. It feels like waves. It feels like drowning. He breathes deep, as though he means to take her into his lungs, as though he means to make her a part of his cells. She wishes for a second that he could.
‘I will always find you.’
And then her eyes fall to the earth, because there is something inside of her (deep inside her bones, hidden in the marrow) that knows what is happening in these moments and is ashamed for it. And then her eyes fall to the earth, because maybe not so much has changed in her after all. And then finally, when she meets his eyes, when her dark eyes are stoic and her lips are drawn in a tight line, she says:
“I’ll pray that you do.”
And then she turns on her heels.
And she leaves, as simply as she came.
spyndle
you are the prettiest thing that I will ever know