Written for the burnthe_city challenge community on livejournal.
Challenge 001
LIKE A FOOL IN LIFE
When did her life become such a complex maze? When did he equate something that ached and yet hurt within?
They're the same, the two of them.
She likes to tell herself they're nothing alike, the two of them, but she always realises she's fooling herself a half second after she mistakenly denies their likeness.
She knows, she always knows they shouldn't ever be within ten miles of each other, because, as it happens, they always end up tied together somehow, sooner or later. And it's easy, it's fun, he gets her, but then she catches him looking at her like he sees another Serena, a past Serena, and... her hackles come up. She's not her anymore.
But she's inevitably drawn to him, to this kindred spirit she sees in him that makes her dream of what, who she wishes she could be.
Problem is, she doesn't even know her own dreams.
Sometimes she wishes life weren't such a tragic labyrinth... that she remembered what she dreamt of at night so she'd have a traced path before her... that he wouldn't continually muddle her mind whenever he comes back into her life.
... That she could be strong enough that he wouldn't always immerse himself so effortlessly into her life.