Authors Note: I wrote this as a supposed response piece, and I'm honestly not entirely happy with it, but rather than falling prey to my obsessive need to highlight the entire thing and press the delete button I figured I'd offer it up to your eyes for viewing and hope that it's alright. I write angst, it's who I am, it's what I do. I make no apologies for it; I only offer you a Kleenex and a virtual hug to go along with it.
Peace, Love and Frowny Brownies
XX . Magically Challenged XX
Kaleidoscope
Bo's P.O.V.
She doesn't have to say it, but she doesn't have to. I can see how much I'm hurting her. It's like looking at an unfinished jigsaw and wondering where all the pieces went. Instead of completing her, I'm stealing piece after piece until I'm staring at her and all I can see is a basic outline of a beauty I never really witnessed, with a heaviness in my heart and a pocket full of odd angles.
It's wrong of me to do this, to ask her, to expect her to be okay with this. With me…
She knows what I am, she's always known, she knew before even I did and yet she looks at me sometimes and I have a hard time dealing with her gaze. I've been afraid of my own reflection since the day I ran away, mirrors have a way of telling you a truth you don't want to hear, and showing you sometimes a little more than you wish to. I've spent years biting my tongue and trying to come to terms with what I am, with what I knew about myself. I've walked hand in hand with shame, my dignity sometimes hanging by the smallest thread. I can't honestly say I like what I see when I pause to reflect but when she looks at me. When she stares, her eyes laced with surprise and adoration, and an excitement I'd bottle up and collect its more precious than gold dust. It's dangerous, because for a split second I begin to feel normal, capable of normality.
The frightening part is that it's not her insatiable curiosity that causes her eyes to glisten crystalline perfection… its love. Real, unconditional, dare I even say it… true… love. To those around us it looks like nothing different than other couples, prolonged stares from heavy lidded eyes, soft whispers shared between pressing lips, hands entwined in a bond neither of us wants to break. But it's more than that, she is pure and she is light, when I look at her, I'm amazed. No, I'm enthralled by her, by her wonderous beauty, by her kindness, by her unwavering love. A love I'm not entirely sure I'm worthy of, I'm not entirely sure I can offer her even a fragment of that love back. Not in the degree she deserves, because God does she deserve it.
I've watched her move through our relationship in various colours of the spectrum. From the lightened glow, soft azure of curious adoration, to the soft blush of first attraction, flirtation and the heated passion of a love I've often described as epic, but there are times when she looks at me and all I see is a kaleidoscope, and I'm mesmerised. To me, its magical… she's magical and she's not even Fae.
I'm asking too much. I know this. I know that any other person, in any other relationship would have walked away. Would have yelled, screamed at the top of their breaking voice and told me what a mess this is, what a mess I am. As I watched her lips tremble, felt her heartbreak in front of me, I completely expected her to do so. She remained stoic, remained in her seat. She didn't walk away, she didn't leave. Not her, she did something that rendered me amazed, heartbroken… but amazed. She blamed herself.
She shouldn't have to feel that way, she should be comfortable in our love but who am I to reassure her when I can't reassure myself, when I can't control myself. I'm trying, I'm doing the best I can but when my hunger controls me, I betray her. I know it's who I am, but it's not who I want to be. Not what I want to be… for her. But she is amazing because she doesn't make me feel guilty, or like a monster. She embraced my true nature and with what little control she had over her shattering heart she managed to overthrow her instincts and reassure me. She told me she loved me and I knew it before she said it, I could see the colours spilling into each other, pushing through the sad greys of her heartache.
She has patience in spades and her heart must have been made by the most delicate of hands because its love knows no bounds. She is my dream and I didn't realise until I felt the possibility of her slipping away from me. We've talked about my dreams, my hopes before I knew I was Fae. Of how I dreamt of normality, a house with a picket fence, the soft giggles of children, about having the option to just…live. I want that, more than anything now, I want that with her. I see that possibility with her, every time I wake and she's still curled into my side. Every time her eyes flutter open and she whispers my name, I see my life with her and it's everything I've dreamt of and more. It's worth the fight…we are worth the fight.
I won't ask her to forgive me, and I won't beg her to forget but I'll hope beyond all hope that she'll remain strong enough to stay because I need her around, to help me make sense of it all. The old ways I'm still learning, the new I'm trying hard to figure out. I need her to come home to when my days have been hard. I need the acceptance she offers in abundance despite the fact that I hurt her each time the clock ticks overtime and I'm late.
I need her arms around me to ground me, to remind me of what it is I'm fighting for and I'll need her beside me when the time finally comes to show what I'm made of because she's a huge part of me. I can't do this without her, she doesn't know it… but everything I do, every fight I fight is for her, for us…for a future that's so full of uncertainty, and I'll do it all for her, because of one thing I'm certain.
I found forever in her kaleidoscope love.
