* all of me
( * it all feels dangerous, like a train losing brakes, and he’s afraid it might go off-track before he can even notice so he tries to reign it all in; quiet demeanor kept, sitting up like magnet to momentum, following after her just as usual; pretending as if this is a reaction he expected )
they’re still my family. i have to be there for them.
( * he calmly explains, parroting himself, and for a moment he wonders if this is something she can understand, if this is something anyone from the city can understand; the dysfunctional bond formed within a family—no matter how torn apart—when family is all he’s had his entire life. and he doesn’t know what else to say, because there is no way out of this and he needs to go; and he is looking at her the same way he always has, as if she is the very moon of the night, the sun of day, all the stars in the sky )
< ` her words are selfish, rotten to the core. it’s a self diagnosis of princess syndrome but she has never pretended otherwise. all in life has always been provided for her, a blessing to be brought up in escorcia. she has all she needs and everything more. isn’t it love to wish to give him the same?
yet what is there to give to a boy who isn’t there? how does it reflect on her when he chooses the isle instead? she’ll be a mockery amongst her friends; social suicide and that isn’t even the worst of it all.
she wants him to stay. she wants him to love her. she wants him to choose her. she wants and wants and wants. it’s a sickening mindset of greed but what did he expect? he’s the only one she’s ever loved and this departure is a first.
pen keeps meeting paper but she can’t bring herself to write a single letter. never mind that every beat of her heart is loud with the words: don’t go, don’t go, don’t go. pride was a tricky thing and she was already in a losing fight. >
