". . . I felt
Something melt inside me
That hurt in an exquisite way
All my longings, all my dreams and sweet anguish,
All the secrets that slept deep within me came awake,
Everything was transformed and enchanted
And made sense."

~Hermann Hesse

Her mouth slides over his, and she explodes into him. All of herself pouring through his mindheartsoul, a thousand, thousand synapses exploding all at once in a single brilliant star, pulling together, coalescing at her mouth on his. It's too much. His hands spill forward, his body going limp, and all he can concentrate on is her mouth, sliding over his. The one focal point in a thousand, thousand inconsistencies (because he can taste all of her she was giving up, all the amazing, amazing women she will now never be because of him. Amazing. Amazing.)

If his mind had room to think about it at all, he would have noticed.

He would have noticed how her mouth snags against his, how it is dry, how it sparks and fizzles against his lips as the poison burns up through the energy of ten regenerations.

He would have noticed how the kiss is almost hesitant against his kiss, how it is just a mere press of lips, almost chaste in what it is trying to accomplish, combining two into one being. He would have noticed how her breathing slips past his lipsteethtongue and curls in his mouth.

He would have noticed how her fingers

trembled

at the corners of his jaw, the way they were hesitant and light, like moths.

But as it is, all he can notice

is

River-not-River. Melody.

Melody.

This is Melody kissing him. If her hello had been born out of tainted lips, her goodbye is soft and tender and rife with all those might-have-been possibilities.

(even if he visited her parents for holidays and all she knew of him was the man in the funny blue box who always brought the best of Christmas presents, she still would have kissed him under starlight-moonlight, probably at university when he visits her for her, for her first, first time. even if she'd had red hair and was studying to be a nurse.

even then)

Coming together, like a heartbeat curled inside love's echo. Two heartbeats, each to each.

Always.

(and her fingers, trembling on his skin, and her mouth, tender sweet in his)