Ingénue-n. 1. unsophisticated girl or young woman: a girl or young woman who is naive and lacks experience or understanding of life
2. naive character in drama: a character in a play or a movie who is a naive inexperienced young woman
Good girl. Nice girl. Ever symbolic of purity, sweetness, and light. She is the innocent one- Little Red, always the silent victim of circumstances beyond her control.
She cradles a bloody red flower, standing in respect of a ceremony which will never touch this cold marble chamber, and it's almost obscenely beautiful, unblemished, unnatural. Genetic perfection at its most pristine hideousness. Still, she drops it onto her mother's casket, ever the dutiful daughter.
And it is as empty as it has always been.
Nothing has changed, not really, even though everything has. She's no more alone now that she was before- her father a stranger in her house, addicted to a death he couldn't heal from, to blood, to power, to his own despair.
The icy clack of her heels echoes in a sharp, skittering staccato to parody the two heartbeats she's sure she could hear if only she listens a little harder; whispers that brush across her borrowed hair, disturbing the strands like the wings of an invisible bird. She stops, eyes falling shut, praying that she may stay here forever, in the arms of her parents, warm and secure, and she holds onto it with all her might, but it is her mortal sin; trying to cage them inside her heart rips that peace from her in a single instant, leaving her empty, like a swollen corpse.
She is used to this.
Her eyes open, but her eyelids feel like weights that she is simply too tired to lift. She wants to sleep, wants it badly. She sways on her feet, but somehow she has reached the heavy door, feels all the warmth leech from her skin at the contact with the icy metal. Suddenly the touch, that single moment of physical sensation hits her so hard her knees nearly buckle. Her ears buzz, her blood seems electric, and she half expects her watch to begin its shrill, tinny beep any moment.
It won't.
Breathe. It's so simple, Shilo. Without it, you die. Breathe.
Her lungs fill, and icy, stale tomb-air has never tasted so sweet. It's as if she's in a dream, every sensation simultaneously removed, surreal, and horribly, wonderfully acute. It almost drowns out the low rustling outside, the sound of her blood pulsating and pushing its valiant way through her veins.
She pushes open the door, and is singularly unsurprised to find him lazing atop cold marble with a long limbed, haphazard grace; all masculine planes and hard angles in a way she's positive belongs to him alone.
Wondering when she'd become so attuned to the lines of his body would be as pointless as denying him when he beckons her toward him, lips curled into an obsidian smirk. It's a terrifying expression, promising her things she's never even wanted to imagine. Never until now, because she can feel- the blood rushing through her veins, the vague prickle of fear and something else she's never needed to identify before, all coming together in a blasphemous harmony that says she is fucking alive. And that's when she realizes.
She doesn't want to be an ingénue.
She doesn't want to be a symbol.
She is Shilo, goddammit, and she wants this… whatever it is that his painted lips are offering her as they curve into a lazy smile, his heavily lidded eyes daring her to want what she is not allowed to have. And suddenly, she does. She wants more of the heat she can feel coming off of his large frame like gentle hellfire as he steps closer to her, more of the dark, musky smell of earth and sweat and blood. She wants to taste the salt on his skin, wants to know if those cruel lips are as talented as he seems to think. Her breathing has sped to near hyper-ventilation, but she raises her eyes back to his, and they're inky- nearly black, his pupils dilated. She's suddenly so close that she can feel his sharp intake of his breath when his eyes meet hers and they pierce her for a moment, painful and wonderful all at once, fearsome and full of liquid heat. And a beat passes, the air between them tight enough to shatter, then his head is tilting back to display the long column of his throat, and his deep, resonant laugh echoes into the night, sending shudders through her that mean everything and nothing at all.
He dips his head, and they breathe the same air, his lips so close to her ear that she imagines he can taste her anticipation, the combined warmth of their breaths sending clouds of vapor into the air.
"What do you want, kid?" he asks, eyes full of something like mocking, but his voice is a low purr, and it feels like her entire body flushes, skin too tight and the scratch of his dreadlocks against her bare collarbone an unbearable tease as images flash behind her eyes, images of what she wants that mouth to be doing to her.
That's a good fucking question. She doesn't know, but his smell, proximity, the elated buzzing of her blood, and the answer is out of her mouth before she even has a chance to think about it.
"Proof that I'm not her." She gasps, the words spilling out over her lips, and she's suddenly disgusted by the wig on her head, a constant reminder that she's supposed to be her mother's doppelganger, and without thinking she reaches up and rips it from her head, throwing it aside, not even watching as it disappears into the half frozen mud. She feels a moment of hesitation when she realizes that her head is covered by nothing but the ugly boyish bristles that have been growing in for the past few months, slow, even without the poison her father forced upon her. But she pushes it back, because she can think of nothing but his closeness, particularly when he brings a large hand up and runs it across her temple, in a gesture that would've been tender if it not for the dark, predatory amusement in his eyes, the blatant invitation in the sensual curve of his lips.
"Proof that you're alive." He murmurs, the sound just a low curl of a thing, neutral as he ever is, but she sees a spark of something in that dark gaze, something that sends a bolt of… whatever it is… through her again, and she nods like a bobble head, unable to stop herself.
This is dangerous, little Shi. You have no idea what you're getting yourself into. This man will break you and make you and you will never be the same.
'…Good.'