#bellespirits

[narrativestutter]

❛  did you hear that?  ❜ / eli @ lincoln

Lincoln's head tilted to the right so slowly he can't imagine it was comforting to witness against the midnight backdrop, but he wanted to give his good ear a fighting chance at clarifying because he definitely did hear...that. If he had to guess — now left with only a thundering quiet made up of their startled hearts to go off of — his money was on feet. Typically, feet were attached to a someone or a something, and therein lied the problem with that bet.

They were no longer alone.

They were supposed to be alone.

The next forty seconds Lincoln dedicated to weighing their options. One: get the fuck out — plain and simple, tried and true. But Lincoln wasn't done. Eli would be welcome to leave him, but his brain tossed it off the table as soon as it was put down. Two: go looking and establish if it was a person, or perhaps a rodent of an unusual size, before making any further decisions. Rational and irrational in equal measure, so he was inclined towards it in any other situation, but it didn't suit his priorities in this one. He was on a mission and this was a deviation from the course that he didn't have time to indulge. Which left him with three: continue to fuck around, and find out.

Still crouched in front of the lock of a particularly stubborn door, Lincoln finally cast his gaze up towards Eli who had been so gracious as to hold the torch for him. When his gaze was met back with wide, worried eyes, he offered up what he hoped was an appeasing smile.

“ It's just a sound, ” Lincoln assured him just in time for his smile to twist into something impish, maintaining eye contact as he took his cochlear off.

[ 𝙵𝙾𝚄𝚁 𝚆𝙾𝚁𝙳 𝚂𝙴𝙽𝚃𝙴𝙽𝙲𝙴 ]: accepting. ↳ @parkerlots

[ripely-pines]

[ TRAVEL ] :  both travelling solo, our muses end up sat next to each other on a long haul journey / @ matilda fr victor palmer — @bellespirits. re : unconventional first meetings , accepting.

𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐈𝐍𝐃𝐎𝐖, 𝐅𝐈𝐄𝐋𝐃𝐒 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐒𝐄 𝐎𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐅𝐈𝐄𝐋𝐃𝐒 in an endless string of golden nothing. so much nature one could drown —— become nothing, one with the earth. it’s a comforting thought, in its morbidity: returned to the soil, bones hollowed out to make homes for new roots, new trees. a life able to grow itself out of her remains — mother, again. matt turns away from the window. the racing landscape on the other side of the train makes her nauseous — a man sits across from her, seemingly as unbothered as her by the view. she much prefers focusing her gaze on him. quietly — her eyes still trained to the ways of discretion, never too inappropriate but always observant. first she sees the cap shadowing half his face. then she realizes the vague purple-ish shadow around his eyes is not from the cap, but some sort of bruise he’s sporting quite modestly. then she catches a faint, distant uneasiness in movements — as if he, too, doesn’t have much of a patience for long, slow train rides through the nothing of the countryside. this sightseeing of hers isn’t much, she thinks, but it’s better than thoughts. better than thinking of her miserable weekend in chicago — of the way her daughter seems to recognize her a little less every month they meet. 

her focus shifts to the next aisle — a middle aged woman sips from a water bottle while looking out the window, her sadness dripping out of her in an uncomfortable aura. her bagagges take up the most of the surrounding three seats — on top of a duffel bag, a chihuahua snores quietly in a carrier. this is her life, matt thinks. this is a whole life in four suitcases and a pocket sized dog. the thought depresses her — could’ve been her. could be here. maybe it is her, somehow. ❝ christ ❞. unnerved, she reaches in the backpack on the seat next to her — produces a flask from its depths, its content some low grade tequila from the drugstore around the corner from arthur and cassie’s apartment. it tastes sad, but not as sad as the woman next to her. she meets the man’s gaze now, as she brings the flask to her lips — something about him is familiar, and for a second matt feels he sees it, too. her eyebrows furrow, she stops the flask an inch from her lips. mentally, she begins running through a half foggy database of faces and names from her life before. one of cullen’s men, maybe ? another collar she got her hands on ? she resists temptation to outright ask why he’s so familiar — instead she pulls the flask away from her mouth, half raises it in invitation, while her brain is still computing. then she asks, quietly — as if not to startle the woman with the chihuahua: ❝ you want some ? ❞

[ripely-pines]

❛ I am nobody’s moral center. ❜ ( beth fr jay ). — @bellespirits. re : dance fever starters, accepting.

𝐒𝐇𝐄 𝐃𝐎𝐄𝐒𝐍’𝐓 𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐀𝐊 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐒 𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐋𝐎𝐔𝐃. nobody would ever ask that, not of you, she thinks, but keeps the thought to herself — it’s a vile one, even with the glimmer of truth it holds. but the idealist in her can’t approve, and reprimands herself with the sour aftertaste of regret —— would’ve made more sense to be this callous before, before it all came to a premature end. but now, in the remains of life as it once was ? what good does cynicism do now ? hope is desperately needed : hope might be the only salvation that’s left. and hope takes many shapes, each more inconvenient than the last, and when it comes to someone like jay it takes an exceptional kind of hope, bucketloads of it, it takes something closer to faith — to believe that morality could be anything worth of respect from her.

 ❝ what do you want me to say ? behave and you’ll get something nice ? it doesn’t work like that, jay. it doesn’t work like that anymore. ❞ beth doesn’t carry a gun. when she unofficially accepted the role of doomsday guardian of sorts, matilda left one for her on the table — it was foolish perhaps, to not carry it around, but it felt safer. call it an investment in trust. she can’t raise a gun on jay: can hardly blame her for stealing what’s needed to survive. but she fixes her gaze anyway, and her eyes are open, unrelenting — demanding attention.  ❝ but we owe something to each other. all of us — because either we work together, or i’m telling you, there isn’t much of a life on your own out there anymore. ❞ arms crossed : she is not a threat to her survival.  ❝ if you think you can survive on your own, i won’t stop you. ❞, beth shrugs.  ❝ but if you think you might wanna be a part of this, you can. it doesn’t take much. you just gotta start by putting those cans back where you found them. ❞