LILY—
They circle around violence, carnage like flies—the heavy gravity drags them in, binding them like an ill fitting skin. It is with the air, a subtle wisp of a thing, that they are freed, made light, the chains loosened.
“Just a glimpse? I thought I would’ve done better than that,” deflection, it eases the pain. “You know, if you keep playing coy I’m going to get offended, K.” She grins; they are like children, existing for mere moments at a time.
She is quiet for intervals as he carries her towards the water, cradling. And perhaps, she had just wanted to be held like this. For now, there is no fear; street lamps hang over head, phasing out as they leave the main streets, the sky a backdrop of clouds, a dark blanket over the city; an equally gentle caress.
(You point to the water; a land unknown; a future unseen.)
“Wow, someone’s getting funny now. Where’d you learn that?” There are moments when he is gone and she is there; then she is there and he is elsewhere. They are always passing each other, two sides of the same coin, watching from a distance. But tonight they have crossed paths, awake, “I’m not ready to die and neither are you.”
(For a moment, everything is real before it is obscured; a misty night descending on the shoreline.)
“Plus what would Cerisse do without you? That’s right, she can’t; she has no idea where the pens in the office even are and you’re saying you’re even carrying bandages? What would we do without you?” Beneath them, the pavement turns to sand; their bodies shift in unison as the earth bears their weight.
(Does she mean I?)
tools are meant to be used. so he smiles, tipping his head as he sets her down onto the sand, little grains of the world dusting against their thighs. “if i didn’t carry bandages,” almost wry, “then you’d bleed out before i could even write your obituary.” he waves a hand. “cerisse can be funny,” again, dryly, “and if i learned my sense of humor from her, then could she be called my mother?” there it is. that word.
there used to be attachment—entangled and gone dark with time—to the way that particular word liked to trip off his tongue; nowadays, the way he says it is bland.
he settles in beside her, shoes discarded. his toes curl into the sand as he brings his legs up to his chest, pressing his cheek against the rise of his knee. “do you like fighting?” he asks, a flickering curiosity lingering in golden-amber irises. “is it the blood?”
see, he is a means to an end: a pinprick point in the darkness, overwhelming force be damned. there’s no enjoyment to the way he fights—dirty, bloody, and terrible—to the way he views each job as an obligation he must fulfill, simply for one more chance at seeing dawn.
so he palms the bandages in his pocket and motions for her to come closer. “where does it hurt?”
