WLW Short Story: “Cuddles”
It had been a long, tiring day at work that day. Willow's bones creaked and her voice sounded like the screams of the night, wafts of innocent soul burring and reforming around her silky black cape. She wasn't normally quite so dead-looking, today was just an exception. See, she'd fallen into the river again, it really wasn't her fault this time, and the spirits had torn away her flesh from her bones to feed themselves. That sort of thing tends to put quite the damper on one's mood, you see.
Willow's phalanges shuddered and clacked in an attempt to hold the apartment key straight, but she got there eventually and the door opened with a smooth creak. She settled her scythe by the doorway, the metal of the blade already repairing its rust, and Willow pointedly avoided looking at her reflection. The wood dripped by the radiator, but it would be dry by the morning. The door clicked closed and the hallway was gone.
She chucked off her cloak onto the arm of the sofa, fully ready to collapse on the couch and wait until the aggressive ringing in her currently theoretical ears abided. If it had been any other day she may have been fantasizing about a glass of calming tea, too, but she doubted it would do her weary bones much good today. On second thought, maybe she should put the cloak away. Angie liked the look of the house when the cloaks were put away neatly, and the brilliant Angie was certainly a much more trustworthy of a judge when it came to these things the half-alive Willow was feeling up to that night.
A comforting humming song was coming from the bedroom. There, in the soft light from the bedside, came the familiar crackling thrum of the antique radio singing pop music from her lover's nightstand. Angie was singing along softly, the bed covers already snug around her as she swayed her head softly to the tune. How Willow loved that girl. Angie brightened when she saw Willow's ominous figure in the shadows. Why the room felt a few degrees warmer under that gaze. Angie patted the neatly arranged bedding beside her, warm and inviting.
Angie had come to do that often on nights like these. If Willow found herself drowning in work to the dead of night, when she would come home drained and barely alive, she would see Angie. The bed would be covered in carefully selected blankets, as though she had made it her personal mission to ensure Willow had a warm bed to come home to, and her love would be there waiting to hold Willow until she fell to sleep. It was a unique sort of love, one unprompted but very much treasured. The blankets smelled freshly washed. They were soft. As Willow settled down beside her, Angie's fingertips brushed ever so softly against Willow's cheekbone, as though she were bushing away the ghost of a strand of hair. For a moment the screams in her mind lost their voice and she could almost say the word in that clarity.
Love was a word rarely spoken between the two of them. Perhaps it got caught somewhere between their heart and their lips. Angie seemed to hear it still - she somehow always did. People had said that one could assume it was scattered through the air freely with the way they acted towards each other. Perhaps they were right to think that, for even though the silence of the night sit undisturbed with spoken words, it was very much there, and Willow could hear it too. The word was in the interlacing of their fingers. 3 squeezes to say "I love you". Their hands felt as though they had never belonged anywhere else. The word was in them too. To Willow, Angie sounded like it, she smelled of it, and every bit of her felt of it. It was sure in her heart, steady as the tender kisses scattered to flushing cheeks. With a love like hers there was little need for words.
The radio thrummed and crackled still, but it fell to the silence. Ba-dum, ba-dum. The only sound she wanted to hear right then was the melody of Angie's heart. The steady drum melted all of Willow's worries away. Ba-dum, ba-dum. She felt the vibrations of Angie's humming from where she lay. Her eyes grew heavy. The pull of sleep was warm and welcoming from within her beloved’s arms. Sleep’s voice only ever called so sweetly from the home Willow found within them. Ba-dum, ba-dum. It didn’t take long to fall asleep after that. Peace at last.
Willow had settled into that calm, deep sleep without a fight or fear that night. She dreamt a pleasant dream about what she would do the next morning with her wonderful Angie. While she wouldn’t remember the contents of the dreams the next day, she wouldn’t need to when she would awaken to the sight of her lover resting beside her. Her dreams had already come true, after all.