a/n: For LiveJournal's 1sentence community.
Paper Delicacies
1 – Comfort
There was no comfort left for him, but he still had breath and that jump-jolted frantically, grasping, inside his lungs.
2 – Kiss
He kissed her gentle and sweet, and left an aftertaste sharp, cold like metal.
3 – Soft
Anna brushed her hair religiously ever night, brushed away the feeling he left snaking through the threads.
4 – Pain
Pain came just like everything else: At the most unexpected (and portentous) moment and left the person shuddering for a long-long time, barren.
5 – Potatoes
"Like potato sacks," Anna said, "Like she was an animal to be butchered."
6 – Rain
Rain fell, rain wept, rain swept up London and held it in her watery love—drops spilling precariously from her lap.
7 – Chocolate
Nikolai never sent chocolate; she would not approve (she'd be terrified).
8 – Happiness
Happiness was just over the moon, can't reach, can't touch, best leave it where it was—just over the moon.
9 – Telephone
The phone rang, and Anna answered, and no one was there (odd, that was how most things were now).
10 – Ears
Dangling from her ears were two small diamonds, two miniatures of stars and starlight dancing.
11 – Name
"Nikolai Luzhin, please," the name plummeted through hell and out of her mouth.
12 – Sensual
Flowers bloom, and flowers bleed, and leave scarlet hues soaked through sheets.
13 – Death
Kirill's death felt like a savage slap, smarting across his face before the final blow actually hit, and Anna sighed (thinking she understood perfectly).
14 – Sex
Sex and lies were one and the same (so were women and whores).
15 – Touch
She hated his touch, inside-bolted when his hand reached for her cheek (felt like the world was slipping away, dank and black).
16 – Weakness
There was a weakness in Nikolai's bones, and along she came driving the needle home.
17 – Tears
Crying does nothing, she had learned, if only the tears turned to bullets, that would have done something.
18 – Speed
"A need for speed?" she joked, and Nikolai never smiled (English humor was very bizarre).
19 – Wind
Is wind, is gone, is riding along cloud nine—gone with the wind—or something like that.
20 – Freedom
When Semyon went to prison, Nikolai was liberated and was incarcerated and this time, someone else held the key.
21 – Life
Life goes by when no one's watching, evaporated in a second with hungering hands and frozen feet shuffling behind.
22 – Jealousy
She's not jealous, she told herself, it's natural (him and that fourteen-year-old girl kissing).
23 – Hands
Hands came down to her neck like two large vises, clasped around her throat and whispered: I Love You.
24 – Taste
The flavor goes sour after the first night, and on the second, it's just bland.
25 – Devotion
Devotion to family, devotion to The Family, he explained, there was a crucial difference.
26 – Forever
Forever danced along in chains, bruised and matted, a prisoner's tale because forever fastened them together like two animals to be slaughtered.
27 – Blood
Cold blood, sang-froid, was on her hands from the moment they met, and now, she's responsible too—and now, she's going insane too.
28 – Sickness
In London, there are whores and queers, and a sickness half-loose restrained and cutting (jagged) fingers off.
29 – Melody
Russians appreciate good music, and a sweeter melody cuts chasms into heart, and so, when Nikolai asked her to play something (eyeing the piano expectedly) Anna blushed and said, "I'm only half Russian."
30 – Star
A star is only bright when the sky is dim, otherwise, it's no star at all.
31 – Home
"Home is sacred," she said, "If you say so," he said and left (her standing alone).
32 – Confusion
Anna was never confused; Anna lived as a chameleon, shape-shifted and thrived and tucked understanding down.
33 – Fear
"I'm afraid," she confessed, to which he replied, "I know, isn't that funny?"
34 – Lightning & Thunder
Thunder came after because it was slower, Anna came first because she was faster, and Nikolai laughed—as was expected, and second.
35 – Bonds
Bonds shatter asunder and there's no repairing them whole, and so, they parted and left no rue in the wake, left with good intentions and blank and erased.
36 – Market
"They sell dead fingers in that market, souvenirs; would you like one?" and she shuddered in the sultry heat.
37 – Technology
Technology was a curse, like their love, left to die and plucked off (ephemeral), left to wait for a better version coming.
38 – Gift
They were a gift, her hair and head, for him and he cringed.
39 – Smile
Smile for the baby, smile for the world, bear up, face up, grin and laugh everything off (even when infinity hurts).
40 – Innocence
She was innocent once, or something like that; he was always not-innocent too, and together (somehow) it worked.
41 – Completion
Sine is to cosine, as old is to new, as her to him—and dead to alive.
42 – Clouds
The clouds gathered overhead, cast down shadows running finger-thin and bruised in black and bluish-gray, dusty and ashy, they looked up and fire rained down.
43 – Sky
You can stretch your arms and hug the world, anyone can, she once said, but only if you have nothing else to lose.
44 – Heaven
Heaven bleeds, heaven dies, Anna learns: There is no heaven after all, made fake-take lies and rouge (like that on a prostitute).
45 – Hell
Hell was real, and fun, and hell was being with him.
46 – Sun
The sun flared and quelled and flared again, and this time she could feel the solar insurrection coming down to engulf and take her away.
47 – Moon
Moon and Selene are two names the same, too bad, Anna sat under them forever and more and never discovered what was so great (about him).
48 – Waves
Magnetic fields came in waves, attraction and repulsion, one after the other—this, she knew all too well, this she experienced with Nikolai's kisses tearing her skin.
49 – Hair
Strands are falling, strands are burning, wispy and intangible like a child.
50 – Supernova
"I can make you anything you like, any delicacy at all, like a supernova—that good" (out of impossible, paper, empty, and nil, like her plus him divided by zero).