[ gone to waste. it strikes close to the heart an uglier truth, speaks to years dwindling away in their respective captivity. for the protection of her sanity, she doesn't oft linger on what-if hypotheticals, doesn't allow her mind to wander down untaken paths. such thoughts are only an exercise in self-torture, she's learned — what if she'd had the peace of a normal, loving life? what if shar's rot had never exposed itself, before shadowheart had festered in the dark further?
what if, what if, what if; in the end, every theoretical version of herself is an inconsequential phantom, intangible. only she lives, here in the present, no matter what she might have been; no matter how some sliver of herself mourns for some version of herself who remains a stranger. there is little need to dawdle on what cannot be changed, marks that cannot be erased. and yet —
that doesn't diminish the studious nature of her stare as it trips over the slope of his nose, his warm mouth (ironically bright, like the light of his laugh contains the sun). she can hardly claim she would relinquish this — all she is, all she's come to know, all she's come to have — for an opportunity to revise her past. still, it would seem a tragedy to ever contemplate losing ... this.
this impossible companionship. paths too rare to ever cross in any other iteration of their lifetimes, had their situations differed, like a contained lightning strike. rather than thicken the air with a solemn thought, she eases into a murmur of, ]
Don't worry your pretty head. Two centuries could have never prepared you for me, kitty.
[ for all the confidence of that tease, it fails to err into the same arrogant territory his usual remarks take. (overcompensation, she suspects, a veil designed to hide his self-loathing.) a quick, deliberate tilt of her head lands his next attempt on her chin, afterward, as her smile grows playfully dimpled. ]
In many ways, you've been my first. My only first worth remembering, at least. My standards are as exacting as they need to be.
[ the only one that truly feels as though it matters, now that she sits outside shar's complete control. the flat of her palm braces at his nape, as she shifts — a movement that brings him more readily hovering above her, his face eclipsing her view of the sun. sweetly, she tucks a stray, dislodged curl from the movement behind his ear, tracing the point of it with the tip of her nail. with a low, melodic hum, ]
A pity we'll have to stay here until you've gotten it perfectly right.
no subject
what if, what if, what if; in the end, every theoretical version of herself is an inconsequential phantom, intangible. only she lives, here in the present, no matter what she might have been; no matter how some sliver of herself mourns for some version of herself who remains a stranger. there is little need to dawdle on what cannot be changed, marks that cannot be erased. and yet —
that doesn't diminish the studious nature of her stare as it trips over the slope of his nose, his warm mouth (ironically bright, like the light of his laugh contains the sun). she can hardly claim she would relinquish this — all she is, all she's come to know, all she's come to have — for an opportunity to revise her past. still, it would seem a tragedy to ever contemplate losing ... this.
this impossible companionship. paths too rare to ever cross in any other iteration of their lifetimes, had their situations differed, like a contained lightning strike. rather than thicken the air with a solemn thought, she eases into a murmur of, ]
Don't worry your pretty head. Two centuries could have never prepared you for me, kitty.
[ for all the confidence of that tease, it fails to err into the same arrogant territory his usual remarks take. (overcompensation, she suspects, a veil designed to hide his self-loathing.) a quick, deliberate tilt of her head lands his next attempt on her chin, afterward, as her smile grows playfully dimpled. ]
In many ways, you've been my first. My only first worth remembering, at least. My standards are as exacting as they need to be.
[ the only one that truly feels as though it matters, now that she sits outside shar's complete control. the flat of her palm braces at his nape, as she shifts — a movement that brings him more readily hovering above her, his face eclipsing her view of the sun. sweetly, she tucks a stray, dislodged curl from the movement behind his ear, tracing the point of it with the tip of her nail. with a low, melodic hum, ]
A pity we'll have to stay here until you've gotten it perfectly right.