a/u: hi i'm back- hope to be working on new stories soon. i the meantime, enjoy! reviews are welcome.
There are days when I think he is winter.
Pale hair and pale eyes, his skin like fresh snow on the half-dead grass- lifelessly full of life. I don't know how he does it.
I have never kissed him. I have not wanted to- not yet.
It's sunset, and he hasn't spoken all day. I wonder what his voice is buried beneath; the morbid bodies or his own musings. Thoughts loom over his head like a hatchet.
Almost-daylight falls over his skin like water. I watch him. Always, always watch him.
His voice has gone somewhere else; I know it hasn't fallen behind his teeth again, like it usually does. The words have left. His eyes flicker up towards the sky, tongue darting out to wet his lips, and for a moment I think that maybe he will speak.
He doesn't.
It's like he wants the sky to speak for him.
(I would, if I knew what to say.)
My fingers dig holes inside the soft skin of my palm- little graves for my guilt, and he doesn't move. The moon pulls itself up until it's suspended above our heads. I try to remember where we are. (I can't.)
Wind stirs the leaves around my ankles. He shivers; should have brought a coat. Too much of a hurry.
We hurried here.
He wanted to see the sunset.
I want to see it. I need to see it.
His words had pulled at my skin like bitter winds. Now he's deflated, sitting down on the crest of the hill with his forehead balanced on his knees, as if he's folded himself up. I don't know why he's sad. Or maybe I just don't understand.
I wish I did.
It's like little bits of the war still hang off his sleepless skin. Sand still filling up his shoes when he leaves for work. Screams when he wakes. And then he sees something (anything) and it's like pulling the trigger of a gun, and suddenly he's jittery and shaking and I can't fix that. He's filled up with memories and sometimes they just spill right over the top of him.
His skin get cold; chilled from the 'should have been's. (or 'shouldn't have been's.)
When he finally speaks, he says my name- but it comes out quiet and gingerly and almost broken, and I know that what it is that's wrong with him has a certain name and a somewhat-certain almost-cure, but I don't care, because that's for someone else. Not him. I sit down. Our legs almost touch.
I don't tell him that's it's over, because it's not. It will never be over, and it will never be okay, either.
"Sometimes bad things happen to good people."
The stars are stringent and ludic above us. He drops his gaze from them and instead lets his gaze wonder over the grass; his hands look cold.
He looks like winter again.
I have never kissed him before- but I think I want to, right then.