Poison hugs Faith from behind. "I love you..." She says under her breath.
She then laughs. At herself. Why is she whispering it? Who she's afraid will listen? She hates to admit, but she's nervous. Which only makes her laugh even more. What is she, a highschool girl with a crush?
"I love you." She finally says it properly, out loud. "I have avoided saying that for a while now. Because if I'm being honest, I was afraid. Afraid of what that actually means. Because I know when I say those words, they don't mean the same as when you say it. Or anyone else, for that matter. It sounds so...empty. I prefer telling you what I love about you."
"I love your voice." Poison runs her fingers softly across Faith's lips. "You have no idea how jealous I am about your singing. Even if you have been stumped for a while now, I'm sure your next song is gonna be just as beautiful as the last one." The fingers now move to Faith's face, gently tracing her cheek bones. "I love your face. I love the way your stupidly thick eyeliner sits on it. Makes you so hauntingly beautiful. Almost like an apparition..." The fingers move down to Faith's collarbone, playfully gliding from left to right. "I love your body. Your petite, skinny body. It looks so frail, and yet it has been through so much."
Poison finally places her hands on Faith's shoulders, turning the singer around so they are now face to face.
"I love every single stupid thing about you. Your sass, your strength, your stubbornness. You're very important to me. And you deserve to know it."
"How's that for music lyrics?" Poison chuckles. She couldn't help it. Humor was her favorite defense mechanism. But she meant every single word she just said.
They were words like sweet liquors, filling gliding atop her tongue, down her throat and into the pit of her stomach. And then, they were sex; the best sensations she had never felt all swimming over her at once. And then it was expression; wild, free, and unhindered but the constraints and limits of what she could and could not do.
And when she stripped away all her bad habits, every crutch she ever leaned on to make herself feel, Poison’s words were simply melody. A solid note with stem sitting on a quarter staff, one after another, until notes became phrases became music. Year long traumas slipped from her shoulders like a prickly sweater she was cut free from, leaving her free to experience the joys of rainfall and sunshine, and poems were written for lesser sensations.
There were a trillion allegories she could make, metaphors she could return in earnest, but none of them felt appropriate or worthy. But she herself felt worth, and it was an odd feeling. Out of all the eyes that looked upon her at any given moment, on stage, in a news article or otherwise, Poison’s held the most weight. An invite too warm, too sweet to be true.
Faith’s face In Poison’s chest, covered buried by the tattered sweater she wore for comfort, was the only place she could hide to weep. It was warm, welcoming, and the heartbeat she heard provided a steady rhythm; quickened, but slowly, steadily calming.
Inspiration returned to her, but not in the shape she expected it to take. It came from a great distance; before the dives, the tours, the empty beer bottles, the exes that used and abused her body…
..,before the cancer that once threatened to cut her life short..
...was the sound of a violin. A bow that slid across strings to give voice to a young girl’s dream.
That was what Poison’s sudden words felt like.
“They don’t sound empty,” Faith heard herself say. She retreated from the hiding place she made on Poison’s chest, tears running and eyes reddened. “They could never sound empty because I know how strong and how brave you had to be in order to say them. I don’t think I could ever transcribe what they truly sound like. But I’m probably going to spend a few months trying. And when I’m done, and I’m tired, and you get to hear it, I hope it says ‘I love you too,’ like it’s supposed to.”
titsay
vaporwave
jbbartram-illu
andulkaphoto
