true love's Kiss

by gatogirl1


It wasn't so much a kiss as it was a taste. A lick of a vanilla cone on a scorching day, when the ice cream has already melted and run down your fingers.

Nor was it a kiss as you would recognize it. Not the passionate dance of tongues upon that of one's equally fervent partner. How could it be equal when she felt like this? So broken, to have it hurt to even look into his face…

…the face of the one she loved?

Yes, there was love.

But such a love that has never graced the storybooks, entwined between the 'once upon a time' of Beauty and the Beast and the 'happily ever after'. All the proper elements were in place. The Dark One. His beautiful princess, savior. Monsters. Fencing. Fighting. True Love. Miracles…

But where was the miracle? The miracle that could make this fairy tale conclude in a way that wouldn't leave children clutching their covers close, burrowing deep into the bed sheets at the smallest creak for fear of the truth. Fear of that lay beyond the bedroom door…

…reality. Harsh, cruel, stark naked reality. Where teapots and candlesticks only serve bitter tea and burn your fingers if you get too close. Where sacrificial love didn't free the beast from his ugly visage. Where Beauty stared into his face- and flinched because of what she saw lurking behind his eyes.

Dear God, what is true love made of? Is it hearts and dreams and wonderful things? Is that what love is made of?

No, my child. It's blood and pain, everything I've lost yet that no one seems to gain.

But…it's still there.

And like this kiss, that he gives her, pours into her, demands from her, how can she resist? It is –not everything, but she knows she cannot have everything- what she wants. And it is all she has. And so she kisses him back.

.fin.

"cry with me, for we don't have forever.

only now.

but sometimes, if we're very lucky, that now can seem like forever.—"