Glancing past the rim of her cup, she watched the stream curl around her in a false embrace. Her plastered smile carried only cold numbness, the expression of a ghost tethered by casual warmth. Sugar spilled from her lips like honey, lacing the air with a slow, teasing pull, though every syllable scattered like refracted light in a vast indifferent ocean. Her limbs swayed easily with the rhythm of conversation, a rehearsed number, like binary. Each breath pressed heavy in her chest, like a lover who asked too much. The weight was intimate, irresistible, that she almost welcomed it. Surrender, for the first time did not feel like defeat. Because that is love. Perhaps it feels like a release. A sip of tea warms the numbness, lulling away the quiet which the sand promised beneath countless moons.
She was seductive, a breeze that whispered of a void more intimate than the morning sun. Still, the last sip burned between her hands.