Author's Note: You guys are really the best. I'm so grateful for your presence here. I hope you are healthy & happy & well! Please enjoy!
By some miracle or magic, or perhaps just the healing powers of the sun, her marks began to heal. Even the scar from that night, all those months ago.
The mark that Ja— he gave her had faded completely. While the other he had tended to only diminished somewhat.
For some reason, she could not let it go. But little by little, she would. She promises herself.
I did not know a human's kiss could do so much.
She giggles to herself. When that human is who they happen to be, more vulnerable than she has ever seen him before —
It did not excuse his actions. But X'hal, his kiss.
His kiss.
She woke up late in the day and immediately fought the urge to look for him and forget again. So for hours, she has been on the roof, warmed by the October sun and calmed by the cool breeze that continues to wash over her.
She does not believe last night happened.
Or the past three or so months, for that matter.
"Time on Earth is strange…" she mutters to no one. Always excuses.
She tenses as she hears the door to the roof open, willing herself not to react.
And yes, she hopes it is him, and the hope is shameless; only for a moment.
His voice envelopes her in warm, warm water.
"You've been up here for awhile."
She refrains from looking at him and hugs her knees to her chest. "Did I worry you?"
He's slow to walk closer. "Yeah. Of course."
She bites back her smile. "Apologies," she says, but she is not sorry at all.
He stops behind her, silent. It almost feels like a game — and she refuses to turn around and lose.
But as the seconds stretch to minutes, the knot in her stomach tightens. She sneaks one glance at him and immediately shoots up, fear constricting her chest at his grief-stricken expression.
"What happened?" she whispers frantically, crossing her arms tight across her chest.
"Oh," he shakes his head. "Sorry. I didn't mean to scare you, I… I was just… thinking."
She steps closer, tempted to reach for him. "About?" she says gently, afraid that any other noise would shatter the moment.
"I called my father earlier today and… and my friend just now. The one I left to see." He sucks in a shaking breath. "They're going to check his grave."
"...Oh."
"Oh is right… I just don't know how to feel about it. You know?"
"It is understandable."
"What if it's something else entirely? What if we're just disturbing his peace?" He bites his lip roughly and tugs at his hair. She almost pulls his hand away.
His breath quickens and his lips begin to twitch. He is panicking, and it is happening so fast that it almost sends her spinning. "What if his body isn't there?"
That is something she had not thought of. It is hard enough for her to comprehend that he is supposed to be… not alive. Especially when she felt just how alive he is. But no matter the circumstances, she prays he is fine.
And that she is wrong about many things.
It does not take her long to give in when he begins to scrub his hands over his face. She gently takes his wrists and pulls them down to her chest, where she encases them in her arms.
This is not a good idea.
But how can she keep herself from comforting him? When this was all she ever wanted?
His bare hands are trembling and cool against her skin. She runs her nails up and down them softly, all the while shushing him, asking without words to breathe for her.
He closes in slowly as she eases him, and she allows it. His forehead presses to hers and then, like a strike of lightning, the memory of his tenderness from not even a day before surfaces in her mind.
How sweet and how kind he can be. Like a little puppy, like an innocent child.
He mumbles and pulls his hands away. She is almost hurt, but then he is removing his mask and tucking it into the pocket of his sweats.
"Better?" he says breathily, eyes glassy and gleaming, and she knows he is trying his best to look her in the eyes despite his discomfort.
She nods, encouraging him. "Absolutely," she breathes back.
After a moment: "You caught me before I really lost it. Thank you."
She smiles. "I know you, Richard."
His hand slides smoothly onto her cheek and neck. He looks dizzy as he speaks. And she feels it. "Don't stop saying my name," and it sounds desperate, pleading.
"Richard…"
He squeezes his eyes shut. "Mmm."
"Richard."
"Mmm," he whimpers.
"Look at me, please."
And he does.
But whatever she had wanted to say gets caught in her throat.
His stare, so striking that she is bound to it. That she remembers just how this world is her home.
Remember when this was all you longed to see?
How does it feel now that she has been granted her greatest wish?
She cannot answer that — she cannot name something she is too frightened to experience to its fullest extent. She cannot destroy the barrier that protects her heart from the sheer overwhelm that this moment would bring her otherwise.
It is not that she feels nothing. It is that there is no way for her to take everything in without falling apart. And she would.
Half of her died sometime ago, along the way. Even with the undeniable surge of life in the way he looks at her and bleeds, beautiful lips and brows trembling under the weight of it —
Who is she to stand here and accept his kiss? The faintest brushing of lips, the softest drooping of lids. His liquid gaze like the ocean under moonlight, boring into her and burning when she should drown in its salt.
But who is he to give into himself? When his presence wounded her still, so utterly and vehemently, an openness in her body that she attempted foolishly to vacate. When he had all this time to fill it.
Yet she stays. Feet planted onto the ground. Last night's memory at the forefront of her mind, as she can see the ghost of his smile, recalling the tenderness that aches her heart with its bullet holes, dull.
He lays the same tender love upon her cheek. "Iartă-mă."
Her lips tingle with the strange familiarity of his, the language he whispers across her skin, soft like setting suns and freshly bloomed petals.
The words escape her without thought. "Nu inca."
He steps back as if she struck him. Her skin crawls with the hurt that flashes across his face.
But she has already decided.
"I told you last night."
He grimaces. "I know."
She wraps her arms around herself — for comfort. To keep from closing the gap between them once more. To protect her insides while they twist and turn; not from speaking the truth, but to keep his pain from spilling in any further. She has no space left.
"If we are to begin anew, why embrace where we should have been long ago? Why go in blindly? Even if you were to give me your all— I do not want your all. My heart," she clutches her aching chest, "my heart, it still hurts. I want it to stop. More than anything, I do. And then I want for yours to… to… I know how you hurt. I can imagine, how every morning you wake, and the very second you do, the pain makes you long for sleep. But even then… even then, the dreams I've had… the yearning it instills in me. And I."
She falls silent. What is she saying? What a fool she must sound like. Who is she even speaking about?
"I do not know what I yearn for anymore," she finishes lamely.
She feels it in the roof of her mouth, building upon her tongue; everything she has longed to say for months, unarticulated. Thoughts and emotions and observations and dreams, crossing over one another, many overlapping and contradicting. It did not occur to her that she would have this time and desire to say it all.
She recalls his letter. How she knew it must have taken him so long to express his regret without disregarding her pain. How even then, it was not how he wanted it to be, but he simply had to settle.
And then she remembers Jas— Jay. Him. He who withdrew the poison from her heart only to sink his teeth into her neck and bring it back. But oh, how he used to take the pain away.
Oh, how he made her body ache for new reasons.
Because of what the boy in front of her held back for so long.
It is not his fault, she knows this, but the ugly part of her wants to blame him.
It is all his fault, she thinks, but it is not something she believes wholeheartedly.
He steps back, almost pouting, afraid to hurt her.
His eyes spark across her mind, the single flash of fear she had once caught.
The night she had gone to him, crying.
When he first claimed her.
"Star, are you okay?" he says, and it's then that she realizes how her silence worried him.
"Yes," she sighs, smiling slightly.
"Is it okay if I ask what you're thinking about?"
"Too much." She wraps her arms around herself once again. "I do not know what I am speaking of."
He runs his hand through his hair and tugs at it. It breaks her heart, how beautiful he looks. "I understand you. Or at least I think I do. Just… I'm sor— no, I can't keep apologizing…" he mumbles, trailing off. "You know I'm always sorry already."
She nods, encouraging him to continue, suddenly so lost in his presence. A safe distance remains between them as her vision tunnels around him.
"I know what you mean. It hurts to wake up, hurts to breathe. To exist. To see myself and then you and how you're not by my side."
Despite herself, oh, X'hal, "I am always by your side."
How dare he doubt my loyalty? My love?
The vehemence of her response leaves him flustered, eyes bigger than she's seen them— though this was the second time she has. He fights his smile and fails. It also leaves her stunned.
"I know you always got my back. I'm not questioning you, or doubting you. I was, and I am doubting myself. But not you. Never you. After everything you've done for me, for our friends, for a world that you've only just come to?" He chuckles. "Never."
She knows he wants to step closer, but he shifts nervously instead. She does not know if she is grateful for it or not.
"I just don't think I deserve you, Star." He coughs, a flush creeping up his cheeks. "Koriand'r."
Her name, wrapped around by his voice, like her favorite star in the sky.
A punch to the gut.
X'hal.
"When I woke up today, I didn't want to go back to sleep."
She whimpers, the flame of his kiss tingling her lips.
"And before I fucked everything up, I felt that way, too. Even when it felt like the whole world was gonna fall apart on all of us, it was you who kept me going. Who woke me up. I knew I fell in love with you when I realized that seeing you was better than any dream I could ever have."
Broken.
Whole.
Where are the pieces of her?
How is she alive to hear this…
When had he gotten close? "I'll ask you for one thing," he says low.
A sort of quiet noise escapes her.
"Let me be selfish," he rasps.
"Mm?"
His expression twists with what pounds in her head as longing, longing, longing.
And then his hands, strong and large, shaking and cool, slip around her neck. "I need to kiss you," and he says it as if it were a fact, known by the entire world.
He kisses her again.
Firmly, deeply, lovingly, slowly. He slides his lips against hers and it stirs the heat below her navel, steadies her sanity as she feels his magic sink through every layer of her skin.
She grips his shirt at the waist and tastes her cold tears between their mouths.
Does he pull me together or break me apart?
Her knees buckle and she drops her weight against him, her lips drawing away from his as she gasps. He wraps his arms around her waist and helps her stand, his grip only loosening slightly once she does.
"You alright?" he mumbles near her cheek.
"No," she says, a whisper. "What do you do to me?" To make her this dizzy, this weak, unbelieving of the world around her?
He frowns before pressing a soft kiss onto her hairline. And she cannot help it: it releases her, somehow, and she falls against him again, eyes fluttering shut and hands on his chest.
How can something so heartbreaking be so soothing? He is like… like the homesickness that lies in the very depths of her soul, her whole entire being.
"I could ask you the same thing," he mumbles into her hair.
She laughs, but it sounds like a sob. He holds her tighter. "Richard."
"I've got you."
Find the strength. X'hal, give me the strength. I beg of you.
Without opening her eyes, she pushes herself away from him and crosses her arms over her chest. Before she can speak, he does.
"It's okay. I shouldn't have done that."
"...No, it is—" she blinks her eyes open and stares down at her feet, afraid of what she will feel if she looks right at him. "I do not know what it is."
He holds his trembling hands up and stares down at his palms. "It's like I can't not touch you… after I finally did… it drives me crazy," he says quietly. He shakes his head and pulls at his hair again. "What am I, a dog?"
Through her tears she cannot help but giggle, the sound slight but there and enough for him to hear. He shifts his wide-eyed gaze to her and blushes.
"I'll leave you alone n-now," he stutters, rubbing the back of his neck. "Whenever you feel like you're ready to… talk. You know where to find me."
She nods, slowly stepping back. She watches as he turns his back to her and pauses.
Then before she can understand the moment, her face is cradled in his hands, his eyes killing her all over again.
His voice is a whisper, wrapping around her ribs and pressing down.
"Pentru tine, nu aș mai visa niciodată."
And with his promise burning down to the bone, he fades away from her vision.
How's he supposed to be?
The world is closing in and opening up — he can't sit for longer than a few minutes. He's stuck on the feel of her warmth, her intricacy, fire on him. He keeps pacing pacing pacing around his room, his nerves prickling and something else he feels insane. There's no way life is real.
But it's happening, he recognizes details to being alive here that he wouldn't in his head. The exact smell of her, strawberries and cream and like being in the sun. Her tears, sweet like rose water and sugar, pressed against his mouth.
Her lips, an answer to the prayer he's never spoken out loud.
He commits every single second to memory. He writes about it. He scribbles it down but then his head gets lost in the moments again and he stares off into space, afraid to forget anything at all. If this is all he gets, he'd rather live like this.
Oh, he kissed her.
More than once.
More than twice.
She kissed me back.
She "...loves."
Oh.
No, he should stop thinking about it. His chest is swelling and he thinks it might burst. His smile comes and goes, almost broken, almost crazed. He feels crazy. It can't be true.
His chest caves in, and the air seeps into the hole there. He's breathing easier, somehow, but the rest of him is sore.
It's grief, but also the opposite of it. A reverence that's replacing his blood.
What am I feeling?
"What… wha—" is this?
His sense of time is warped — he must have been in his room for hours, trying to collect himself. But it's pointless. He's broken. His mind broke last night and then again, however long ago it's been since he kissed her and she kissed him back.
The ghost of her lingers; he whimpers.
He writes it down: I ADORE you.
No language.
None to describe her.
He doesn't even know he's drawing circles, over and over, staring into it and fading away, lost in a haze, not until his wrist goes limp and the tip of the pen drags down the page. He draws lines until the ink runs out, but there wasn't much left anyway, at least he doesn't think.
That's right, he doesn't think. Or he thinks too much. He let himself think there's a chance. A chance for what? For it to stop hurting? To be redeemed? Relieved?
He's drifting. Timeless.
There's nothing else but her. His reality and fantasy for the world as it turns slowly around him. The liminal space of his room.
His phone rings and the sound is violent.
He shakes his head, coming back to life, and he stares dumbly at it, almost hating it. It rings and rings and rings and then it stops and it rings again, and then the dots connect.
He grabs it quickly, roughly, flipping it open and pressing it to his ear harder than he should, but now his whole body is rattling.
"Why didn't you pick up?"
"Buh— I dunno."
What did he even try to say?
She's breathing heavily into the phone.
He doesn't want to ask. He waits, guts twisting.
Her sigh is choppy like waves in a storm. "Dick."
He makes a noise.
"Are you sitting?"
Another noise. He feels nothing. None of the panic or elation or disbelief.
He sits and he is nothing.
"He just checked. He's not in his grave."
Author's Note: :^)
I am a sucker for speaking in mother tongues... forgive me, I had to use google translate, so if you speak Romanian, I hope you're not cringing lmfao
Iartă-mă - Forgive me
Nu inca - Not yet
Pentru tine, nu aș mai visa niciodată - For you, I would never dream again
Had a blast with these last three chapters... but please... don't let it be indicative of the endgame! ;^)
