Then it is good
If that is the deal, then it is good. He says it louder than fear. It's good and the good reaches beyond the price to pay; the good overwrites him, like a stain, it spills all over the way his heart is screaming.
If that is the fee, then it is good. So much to keep, when the things that must go are almost nothing. What is Stan Pines, after all; what is this empty sack of air and failure, what is this torn scarecrow, to anyone. Stan Pines is trash held together by spit. Stan Pines is a shadow without a man, a story with no bound ends and no seams. If he can give way to something better, then it is good.
It is good to the soles of his feet, scorched by the flame, just as it is to the tips of his hair. If the deed must be done, make it worthwhile. All his life it's been late, the magical click to turn him into something, anything, other than this – solet it come. In the shape of a sacrifice, but hell, it's about damn time.
But if it is good, then how is it not? – was it? What was it that came before, if anything came at all? He is good and clean and empty, he just can't get it. How is it that the world all around is an ocean of tears?
When they tell him again, he barely understands. What he did, well, it sounds good. They say it was. It is now that they don't like. So he lets them grab him by his hand, baby steps in a collapsed house. He lets them sit and speak. He does like that.
They rebuild Stan Pines from scratch, in little shards of warmth. They fill the gaps in the fallen wood, they mend the walls, all the way guided by the architect care is. They make Stan Pines gaze on the shining pictures, his fingers on the page, and the texture so pink. So familiar.
They bring him back, from start to finish. Right at the beginning, the scam on two legs he believed to be. At the end, the end of it all, the deal. A fate reversed.
He may not believe. Not yet. It is only then, however, that he understands.
If what they say is true – if it is, then – he was still good enough to deserve love.