Meri crept slowly into the room. It looked like a study? A library!? Joy crept carefully into her bright green eyes as she stumbled past the room and into the dim light. The smell of old books wafted into her nose and she loved it. It was like warm blankets were being wrapped comfortably across her shoulders. She hadn't seen anything as beautiful as this for a long-time; not since the manor. So she stood, dressed in blue, basking in the warmth that the unopened books gave in the candlelight.
The Host, having heard her come in, was standing hidden behind a bookshelf, but emerged slightly so that she knew he was there.
“Hello. Are you looking for something?”
Meri looked up at the sudden introduction of a voice. She hadn’t expected another voice in the silence. Rubbing her eyes softly, Meri shook her head; words melting on her tongue. She tilted her head to the side, green eyes soft and confused. It seemed to take forever but soon her mind begins to whirl again and her lips purse in a little smile. “I-It’s a library!…I-I hadn’t seen t-this in..I dont know” her wrists rolled as she spoke.
He smiles softly.
“You’re welcome to look around if you’d like.”
Crossing over to a desk set in front of a window, he sets down the books he was carrying.
“Really!!??” She chirps in unadulterated joy, sounding more like a child in a candy store than a twenty-five-year-old woman. Green eyes scan his desk quickly before her porcelain face cracks into a genuine smile; it’s soft and careful and her lips are light and covered in smudged pink and red. “Thank you!” She whispers, barely audible before scampering off, shoulders back and head tilted upwards.
If we were being honest, she was absolutely terrified, she had seen the bandages wound around his eyes and the dried blood scattered against the yellowed white. Meredith knew that she couldn’t trust anyone, so off she went trying her best to look confident as she limped into the rows of books. Desperately she wanted to feel safe within the walls of words and palaces of paragraphs but it was something that would never be.
“You’re welcome.”
He smiles slightly and sits down at his desk, opening one of the books and starting to read. The book is in Braille and print, the pages alternating. He runs his fingers over the page quietly, listening to Meri’s footsteps among the shelves.
Nervously, she tiptoes through the corridors, the heels of her blue shoes clicking powerfully as she wanders. Every now and again, the clicking would stop and there’d be a murmur of interest. A few moments later, she tracked back to the Host, holding a book close to her chest. In the gentle light, it’s clear that her dress is torn and scraps stand out against her pale skin. “E-excuse me-…I-I found one…M-May I sit?”
He murmurs a narration quietly to himself, catching a glimpse of her appearance in his mind’s eye before turning and answering.
“Of course, anywhere you’d like.”
He smiles slightly to reassure her, but his expression turns to concern.
“Are you alright?”
Her eyes dart around the room before she kneels. It’s easier for her to curl up at the side of his desk, her back straight against the wood. His question takes the wind out of her sagging sails. “p-pardon?” She stares up at him for a while before sighing and simply shaking her head. “I-I don’t know” on her breaths, there’s the slightest trace of champagne.
He’s still worried, but he knows not to press the matter. He knew all too well the need to keep talk of traumatic events to almost none. Sighing quietly, he turned back to his book, wiping away a single drop of blood that fell from beneath his bandages due to his narration.
“Well, if you need anything, let me know.”
Meredith curls up by the closest window sunning herself in the lightness. her thumbs trace the letters of the book. it had felt so long since she was able to hold a book and feel the papers and text against the pads of her thumbs. “I will…thank you” Carefully she opens the book, breathing in the smell of the old pages. “everything feels and looks so different”
The Host tilts his head to the side, intrigued by this comment.
"How so?"
