Lust
He hates the way he feels when he looks at her like he does now, this friend of his. After all, he’s known her since before - since she was in the business of being wanted; of being looked at like he does right now. Since before she got that scar - that ragged gash on her neck, her life almost ended because someone thought they loved her; thought they deserved her. Then - thought no one else should have her, not if they couldn’t.
So it is because he knows her - knows this - that he feels the ache of shame when he looks at her like he does now. As he watches her as she paints, and sees not the stroke of her brush but instead the way her tongue licks at her lips; the way the sun lights up her eyes; the curve of her neck, her spine.
There is no shame in wanting, no. It’s all biology. He knows this. But it’s not just that; not so simple. It’s just - he doesn’t want her to think that he thinks he deserves her either; that that’s all he thinks of her. Because it’s not, you know. She’s so much more - is intelligent, and clever, and kind. Funny, in her own way; charming, in everyone else’s. Talented as all get out - he’s never seen such beautiful, haunting art - and knows it, but somehow doesn’t make it seem arrogant. Just makes you more confident in your own taste, because she thinks what she does is beautiful too. Is so much more than the scar, and the smile, and the curve of her neck, her spine.
But it’s hard, for him, you know - because she also, well, is. Is those things, that is. Is the way the way her dark hair spills over her shoulder; the way her shirt hikes up when she raises her arms, and the little slice of skin that appears there; is the ache low in his belly; is the curve of her neck, her spine…
He thought he was more than this too, you know. More than this animal longing; more than the eyes that follow at the curve of her spine to its end, and the belly that aches and wants. More than this hunger.
And he is, probably. More than this. But now it hardly matters - whatever he is, was, before, is null at the sound of the pretty way she says his name when she sees him standing there; like chimes in the air, ‘Oh, Adi!’ she says, and Gods alive and dead but she is so many things - multitudes, spanning life, spanning death - while he is only this. This shame; this weak will and this spinelessness; this ache. This neck stretched out, waiting for her guillotine touch.
