Disclaimer: I don't own Skins.
A/N: This is something I wrote over a year to go, and was unsure if I should post it. So, readers please acknowledge that this is merely a thought process of sorts.
"That quick her train caught up over her arm she ran out of the mirror like a cloud, her veil swirling in long glints her heels brittle and fast clutching her dress onto her shoulder with the other hand, running out of the mirror the smells roses roses the voice that breathed o'er Eden." – The Sound and the Fury, William Faulkner
Bark, brown and rich, brought out the color of deep green leaves that caressed the crimson flesh of sweet scented apples. They were heavy with the knowledge as well as the destruction. It was forbidden, but oh so tempting in its clinging to the branch among the green leaves.
She sighed, her chest quivering with the swallowing, deflation of lungs releasing carbon air. The sound was of utter contentment, the giving in of one soul to contained desires. One set of lips brushed against another, the second resisting, hesitating, trying desperately not to respond before letting go.
The apple was cupped in the palm of a hand, resting against young, unwrinkled flesh. It shone in the sun, catching the light causing the shadowed face of a woman to be mirrored on its polished surface. She reached out, stroking smooth, red skin with a fingers pad.
It was tempting.
She tasted the comfort, the wholeness, upon her lips. Her lips felt the soft, unique texture grazing together, pressing, and parting. She smelt the other girl's apple scent and something uniquely her flutter to life at her nose. Her mind supplied this was wrong, yet it felt too right.
She held the apple in her hand. It was innocent in its looks. Something looking of innocence could hardly be anything other than it seemed? But it was a wolf in sheep's clothing.
The apple it was good and evil. And Eve. Eve had bitten the apple. She damned us all.
She held the apple, gripped between her fingers. Its flesh was marred; bitten and chewed, delicious nectar running like blood from the apple's wound. She had sinned. And sin was sweet.
Her tongue traced along the bottom of her partner's lips. It brushed against the dark pink flesh asking silently for entrance. Lips parted allowing the two muscles to touch, tentatively at first, before the exploration of unfamiliar terrain. Arms wrapped themselves naturally around a neck, while a second set snaked around a waist, pulling the other closer.
Eve had sinned. But did that make her evil? If sin determined goodness and evilness within a person, did that make feeling and emotion a route to sin? Was I a sinner because of love?
She had bitten the apple. She took the bite from the apple of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Her choice wrought upon all human kind, a ban from the peace of Eden. That bite, lost us our innocence. In our innocence lost, we became the sinners.
If we were already sinners, then how could I still sin? My life must be nothing, but further driven into the depths of sin. To have the choice between this or that leaves room to distance myself from God by the evils and goods that build our world. By saying this I could lead a life of good, yet still be consumed in sin. Free will is more than just a gift it is our curse.
Hands ran through red hair, tugging at its roots. A moan escaped a throat as a hand slithered beneath fabric to stroke a lower back. Tongues danced in mouths in an endless tango.
In our free will, we are allotted to choose our own destiny. Yet, by our choices we break our innocence at some point to sin. Factor in emotion and the response of the body. Do they cause us to sin unintentionally by desire?
Do I choose to be gay? Is this the work of free will?
Naomi. Naomi. I know my body pulled towards her like a magnet. The flutter in my heart and flipping of the stomach clued me into my body's desire. My eyes would lock with hers from across the room and I was frozen. I couldn't move. I couldn't breath. She captured me in a way no one ever had.
My sin is Naomi. Naomi is my sin because I am not attracted to men.
Is my attraction steeped in only lust and curiosity? Have I unconsciously made the choice to love Naomi by my own free will? If I have, then that would suggest that feeling and emotion are of equal partners in sin; one married to the other, bound to the human body to enslave us from reaching the purity need to be worthy of heaven.
Tingles of electricity ran up and down spines, rendering thoughts speechless in minds. Eyes lay closed; sleeping as feeling took notice over the momentarily blind. Sensation guided sight, while touch awoke dormant bodies.
Yet, shouldn't feeling and emotion be innocent? Likewise should it not be the same for action, as long as it does not cause harm?
Eve bit the apple. She didn't know the consequences of her actions. How could she have known that she would doom us all with the bite of a fruit? All she knew was not to bite the apple; it was God's only rule.
Would that leave God at fault for not explaining to Adam and Eve that every action has a reaction?
If Eve had no knowledge of consequence, then wouldn't that erase her of her crime? To bite the apple is one thing, to make the choice of biting it another, but to be able to comprehend the reaction behind the action and accept it is a separate choice.
Then what did that make me?
Hands loosened from hair, allowing one to slip to cupping a cheek. An almost silent moan escaped from a throat, while fingers traced lightly down towards the ridge of a shoulder.
I am Emily, but I was Eve. And Naomi. Naomi was the apple.
Unlike Eve, I knew the consequences of my action. But who was harmed because of my action? I wanted to kiss her. It wasn't a choice; it was a desire- a need, hunger, from my body, my heart, and my mind. If the three have betrayed me, have I sinned?
What deemed choice? Was it the ability to think about all outcomes? Or was it the action a person took? Have I sinned if I have no control over the faster beat of my heart at the sight of her form? Have I sinned because I could no longer resist my own soul's desire?
Fingers carefully mapped every ridge and curve of a face, taking gentle care to feel the softness of warm skin. A hand brushed back blonde locks behind an ear. There lips stayed pressed, moving as one, fitting perfectly together.
The hardest part about this is that I know who I am is not a choice. Maybe if it was a choice I could take it back, stop it, causing myself to no longer sin. I have bitten the apple, but I'm unsure of where this leaves me in God's eyes.
If my sexuality is a choice, then I should be able to change it. Yet, I know it is not choice. Simply, I was born this way. It is not a fault or imperfection at birth. God made me; He made me who I am.
To me, loving Naomi isn't unnatural. I just need to have faith, that who I am is okay- right.
Two sets of lungs breathed together, forcing air in and out, they breathed as one. Hearts beat in sync together, denying that they took shelter in separate bodies. They were consumed in hunger, one for the other and the other for the one.
For all of the questions that beg for answers, there is none. I am absolutely sure of this above all things. Only God holds the answers to our most broad of quandaries. But I do believe that in our faith we hold the knowledge to, hope, at some point we may solve the mysteries of life. And this is what makes us human.
To have faith is both a gift as it is a burden, but something more intricate and delicate, special, in how we comprehend it. Each of us looks and displays our faith in different manners; in one way it is what makes us human, it is what gives us soul to be made in God's image.
And in my faith, I reconcile my sins with God. I reconcile my fate.
God gave us free will. He gave us innocence to lose. He gave us love in the hopes that we could coexist in harmony. He made us human.
He gave me love. He gave Naomi life. And let us lose upon the world with our free will, our innocence. By chance we met. By something more than choice, we fell to love.
Eve had sinned, but she was human. I am Emily, but I am Eve. I have sinned. And sin is sweet. Naomi is my sin.
Our lips parted, with a small sound. Brown eyes looked into blue. And I knew everything would be okay.