#pulchral ... august walker.

[yuanwang]

@pulchral, august ; i guess this shirt'll do.

“definitely not...” the cool-worded response falls flat at his efforts, yanking the bundled shirt from his grip immediately. the bathroom is already a lost cause, her clothes don’t have to take any sacrifice. she takes advantage of the opportunity to turn away from him completely, tossing the dress shirt aside to take in the rest of the porcelain room in front of her, untouched of crimson... more or less. the view is like taking a deep breath after emerging from the ocean—but, with her eyes. she hasn't inhaled through her nose since the first whiff of rusty metals nearly had her vision swim. it’s both her commitment and lack of energy that roots her to the floor, shoulder blades warming the lip of the tub he sits in. josephine reminds herself to concentrate on the throb of her feet rather than the skin pulled taut by the drying red at her brow, to focus on the grooves of the gauze when she finally raises it to august, a legitimate tool for his injury instead. she holds his gaze in an attempt to steady herself, yet trying to disguise the fact that she needs to at all. “is the water cold?”

[yuanwang]

it’s almost getting predictable, how she’d find herself in the company of him when the sun begins to kiss the horizon. it’s getting predictable in the same way it’s getting routine—and they’re both never one to stay in the same place for too long.

these kinds of escapades ring just as precarious as anything else does in their separate ( though evidently entwined ) lives, where there is a constant exchange of life and death. nothing is set in stone, every aspect of their lives is subject to change in the same fraction of a second it takes a bullet to leave its cartridge. their lives are contained in an ancient stronghold whose walls are so sacred that even erosion is accustomed to leaving it alone; its foundation is unshakeable, yet here they are—or rather august was—defying the very decree it prides itself upon with its own teachings. there’s an obvious irony that neither of them feels the need to point out anymore.

@vtriggers,  august walker   —   have you ever met anyone like me before?

“ jealous? ” she answers quickly, an amusing tilt to her tone as she quietly discerns his question at heart. the ridge of her spine is against the doorframe of the bathroom, head turned away from his position at the sink and instead toward the hallway she’s vaguely familiar with, it’s gaudy in the way you’d expect an impromptu safe house would be. in her hand is a folder, barely containing its contents with the various sizes of sheets and photocards—reinforced with a rubberband just in case, too—it’s a mass of personal identifications and recent tails of individuals she remembers solely for her reputation as a prestige informant. and in answer to the question of what could possibly link these persons all together to place them in the same vanilla divider, josephine would grimly reply that each one of them would rather see a bullet sunken into augusts’ head rather than a shard of glass.

“ if i had ... do you think i’d be here? ” she responds in full this time, keeping her eyes downcast as she turns towards him, extending the folder his way.