"i thought i lost you!"
the blood loss had been great. almost too great to spare your life. you'd been choking on heaps of salt, wet & burning at your open flesh. the shouts of your siblings, your parents' touch. everything hurt. everything was red. one last hilted breath, & then, nothing.
you notice it first when you wake. that new feeling. to be touched by life & death & life again, an out of body sort of thing. the light stings, pinching the sap of your eyes shut just as quick as they had briefly opened. her voice, the second & only other thing you can feel, beckons them open again. you're greeted with a ceiling, & her worried face shadowing yours. your shell aches, bruised & rotted, all over. you're alive. but you don't understand.
the ocean lives in her teary eyes, & though you are hardly in a position for rash movements, your finger twitches in natural thought. a hand, as high as you can pull it up, to meet her own. there is barely enough in you to curl your digits around hers. even less for you to squeeze. ❝ tsi'reya. . . it's okay. ❞ tongue scorns in it's drought. ❝ i'm okay. . . i'm right here. ❞