Summary: "Tell me," she says, one night, after another brush from Death Himself, "why."
Disclaimer: Think this goes without saying, but I don't own Sleepy Hollow. If I did, I would not be writing fanfiction. I'd be loading up fans with so many cutesy Ichabbie scenes they get toothaches.
seems millenniums ago, love,
we were nothing more than stardust,
just the galaxy beneath us,
we found weight. -past lives, kesha
"Tell me," she says, one night, after another brush from Death Himself, "why."
He looks at her curiously, from where he's sitting on her couch. It's been six weeks since he began staying with her, since he'd claimed her living room couch as his own. "Why?" he echoes, his eyes, tired and ancient, ghosting up her body.
She sighs and bends to pick up his legs, plopping down on the spot they used to occupy and settling his feet on her lap. A month ago, the casual touch would have made him uncomfortable, but he's grown so used to this century's brazenness in regards to physical contact that he doesn't even bat an eyelash anymore—less so when it comes from her.
The glow from the television set lights up her features in the near-darkness of her living room. Her eyes are bright and rimmed by dark circles, a testament to the many sleepless nights she's spent poring over Corbin's files. Watching the exhausted lines on her face, painting her ten years older than he actually is, he is suddenly painfully aware of how hard she's been working. He's been sleeping regularly, and she's been none the wiser, evenencouraging it, claiming he might be able to obtain information from Katrina. It's only now he realizes that may not be the case, that she's only letting him sleep because she doesn't want him seeing that she hasn't been.
"Why us," she says after a moment, head turning slightly, eyes flickering over to his. "Why me? Why you? Out of all the people, throughout all of history — what makes you and me so special?"
He closes his eyes, unsure of how to respond. There could be a million answers to that question, and he's not quite sure which one he wants to settle on. It's a question he's wondered since day one. Later (years later), he will realize that it had always meant to be them. That they had been chosen since the dawn of it all, that they themselves had coined the term soul mate. That they had been circling each other since the very beginning, tied by a single string through the ages. That she had lost him in the Crusades; that he had seen her be torn away by another man; that she had died too young, two and a half centuries ago, so he'd slept and waited with the help of a woman who always knew how the story would end.
Later.
For now, though, he opens his eyes and gives his companion a helpless shrug.
For now, he really doesn't know.
A/N: you may or may not recognize this from Tumblr. Don't worry, I'm not plagiarizing, this is my own stuff. I'm reposting it here upon request.