Moments

chapter 2: lick

It was the silence that welcomed him, as he stepped over the threshold of bar and home, silence that blanketed over the premises like a thick woolen blanket. It was still and warm, with air still smelling faintly with cheap cigarette smoke and sweat. It was nothing new, nothing surprising, but still it unnerved him.

There was something else, something was off on this very night, and it gnawed slowly on his burned out nerves from the very moment the door closed gently behind him.

Tiredness giving way to anxiety, muscles that began to relax as soon as he slipped off the comfortable leather of Fenrir's seat once again stiffened. His vision once again sharp, as he looked around carefully, blurry shadows regaining the all familiar shapes. Tables clean, chairs neatly placed on them, the wooden floors still bearing the traces of mopping.

This was everything he expected to return to…

Upstairs, the silence grew bigger, it's soundless bells ringing in his ears right along his shaking breath. The children were sleeping, completely and blissfully unaware of the fact that something was wrong, so wrong … Even if the sight of both of the young ones deep in slumber, both covered with their quilts almost to the tip of the small noses, brought the much needed feeling of tranquility every single time he checked on them, tonight it seemed it was not that easy… Strange, unexplainable worry tugged at his heart with small, sharp claws.

And it continued to grow, continued to spread through his body with his freezing blood and the sudden sense of something vital slipping through his fingers. But it all came to a sudden halt, his heart seemed to take one last beat as tired lungs gave one last exhale. Every little thing he felt in the short, yet long span of just a few minutes was wiped away, replaced by a void, an emptiness of solid black.

And all it took was opening his own door.

Maybe he really shouldn't be surprised that it was her who was the cause of this strange disharmony he felt. After all, she held all of their worlds, be it broken or small, in her hands.

Maybe he should have known it was something connected with her from the very beginning, because it was a dark night, with the winds howling like wounded wolves in the vast desserts. And he knew what demons awakened on nights like that… After all, he battled the same ones more than one time.

Still the void pulsed, threatening to grow and consume more, as his eyes, both bright and dark, traced the outlines of the small figure seated on the window sill. The room around faded, leaving nothing but her outlines on the dirty canvas of the world outside the cold glass.

The bag slid of his shoulder, a small thud reaching his ears as it fell to the floor, grazing his leg on its way. But all he saw was the messy brown locks, soft tufts falling into claret eyes that were looking somewhere into the darkness of the night, but as unseeing as those of a blind. Alabaster skin gone under the cheap fabric of grey, legs hidden by the ugly brown pants he never liked, old from wear and with small feet peeking from under the frayed rim. One leg bent, willowy arm resting on the curve of her knee, and she'd rest her chin on top of it. The other limb dangling towards the floor, her left palm resting on the flat surface of a strong thigh.

Despite her even breaths, despite the lack of even one muscle moving upon his entry, he somehow knew that she was fully aware of his presence.

Not one word slipped pass those lips he loved to see stretched in a heartwarming smile, as he moved around quietly, always keeping her in his sight, not once turning his back on her fully. Feeling the all too familiar darkness wrapping its haunted arms around her strong frame.

"Your room has a nice view"

Those words came in a soft sigh only after he was finished, bills and new orders neatly placed on the small surface of his desk and the pitch dark of the room was broken by the faint light of a small lamp.

Fair brows wandered up, and his fingers brushed against the soft skin on her foot, as he slipped into the vacant spot on the sill, as he turned to see what was so eye-catching in the view outside.

Over the rooftops of the few nearby buildings, inches above the steel, he could see the vast wastelands formed of stone and sand. They reached towards the far horizon, where the hills begun… Where life began and where life ended.

She sighed again, lifting her head from its comfortable resting place on the softness of her own arm, letting it lean back, lean onto the cold metal of the frame. Slim fingers tightened on the worn out cotton of her shirt, as the wind cried in the distance.

How long they sat like that, in this disturbed silence that brought comfort and unease at the same time, soothing and picking at his skin? How many short moments passed with her unseeing eyes trying to reach over the dirty beige of the sands, and his watching her with thousands of thoughts and not even a single word?

"I feel like still burning" her hand rubbed gently her stomach and lips twisted in a half stopped grimace.

He saw with his own eyes, traced with his own fingers the sickingly pale waves of healed scars marring her abdomen one time too many not to know. To pretend he didn't realize why she was pressed up against the cold glass, as deep down inside she was a sunny person who enjoyed the kisses sun would spill over her skin.

Her hand was small and strong and solid in his, as always she has been in his life. Not once did he mind she wasn't all velvet and silk, and the feel of the hardened skin under his lips was as overwhelming now as it was for the first time. His kiss pressed to the inside of her palm brought relief and a flash of pain, but the dark around her dissolved into the grey shades with every breath.

And her fingers curled around the tired lines of his face.