ii.
This is not a love story.
She's had that, before. She's had lazy winter mornings in bed, and swaying to wine-softened jazz on nights lit by fireflies. She's had the warm afterglow that followed her through the day and comforted her, calmed her, grounded her, until it could no longer break through the frost.
She's had promises, and she has learned that promises cannot be kept, and no amount of wanting or love can change that.
Waking takes longer now; the fight through smoke and ash and burning earth more desperate, the wisps and shadows that threaten to tear her apart more wholly formed. She comes back between worlds, where the room is not a room, the bed is not a bed, and she is not a girl, not anymore. Her eyes burn and she can feel the lines that sear her face in waves and spirals, and the worried breathing in front of her registers and she sees his shadow in the dark, shrouded in the flames of her subconscious.
This is not a love story. But as the flames die down and he comes into view fully before her, she collapses against his chest and feels the darkness pulsing under his skin, and every beat brings her back to something almost human.
Rinoa closes her eyes and feels her tears turn to steam against the brilliant veins that crawl towards her cheeks, and wonders when her dreams will smother her entirely.