That was the first ever thing i've got to know about him. The real him. He always tried not to talk about himself, he always managed to change the subject when we were talking about something slightly more personal, or not answer at all.
How could I be so sure that he isn't lying this time too?
I tought while playing with the ring I always wear on my ring finger, too far away with my mind to notice his rough but sweet voice calling my name.
He repeated, sitting down in that cold, white cast of a snowy city landscape, before he took some of it from the ground and threw it in my face while bursting out laughing.
I shouted as I hardly tried to warm my nose, which soon became of the same red as my wings.
How could little moments such as this make me forget about everything? How could I forget that he doesn't know? What a freak of me...
He studied my actions like he couldn't figure out what i was trying to do, and once he realised, he got up and trapped the tip of my nose between two of his finger, slightly lighting them up to warm me.
He started while letting me go, sitting on that white stillness again and giving me a gesture to sit next to him.
It's been months since we've first met... and this has already happened over ten times. Ten fucking times where I always think about when will all this end? When could I finally look at him without hiding my filthy, guilty hands behind my ridiculous wings? Ten fucking times when all I can do is trying to find a way to tell him how things really stands but not being able to because of the deal I've made at 8 with that fucking agency.
I did as he said and wrapped myself in my own feathers, not able to even look straight into his eyes without feeling mines sting.
He continued while letting it slide trough his hands.
"That's because no matter how many years pass, it will always stay the same, with its freezing, white and beautiful shroud."
He took a deep breath, smiling weakly as if what he just said resembled him of something he didn't want to get reminded of in that very moment.
"It surely is melancholic, and that's exactly what i like the most about it. She seems to carry the weight of something heavier than her, she doesn't forget, she keeps it all inside."
He continued, with a tone almost the same as usual, or rather, to anyone it was, but not to me. Not to me who kept listening to him bragging and complaining about random things for the past five months. Not to me who was listening to every word he said careful enough to picture his lips moving without acutally seeing them. Not to me, who noticed his voice crack on the very last word and could imagine his expression without even looking at it.
He was disgusted and angry, he stared at the snowflakes falling on his palm as if they were something sacred he had to protect at all cost.
I whispered, not able to quite understand what he was doing. He laid down turning down the heat, almost letting himself sink in that sorrowful candid sea.
He asked laughing in a way I've never heard him do while turning his head to me, embeading his gaze with mine.
"Are you worried, angel?"
He asked in reply, raising his arm toward the dark grey sky
'Angel'... More of a demon I'd say...
"Y'know... That's when i finally feel alive again. Feeling my tortured and deformed body burning out of coldness and not because of my flames, that's what make me realise that I do still exist."
For a moment, the city felt impossibly quiet. No sirens, no wind strong enough to scatter the snow. Just his words hanging there, heavy, settling over us like another layer of white.
I shouldn’t be here.
I shouldn’t be listening.
And yet, I can't move.
I watched his fingers relax against the snow, the heat fading until the flakes stopped hissing and melting. He looked almost fragile like that, stretched out beneath the sky, letting the cold crawl back into him on purpose.
My wings shifted instinctively, feathers floating as I drew them in tighter around myself. I kept my gaze fixed forward, on the blurred outlines of buildings swallowed by the snow, afraid that if I looked at him too long, I’d give something away.
I murmured, quietly enough not to make that sound like an argument.
He scoffed, but didn’t sit up.
Another pause. Longer this time.
The cold soaked through my boots, through my clothes, grounding me in a way I hadn’t felt in years. For once, my head wasn’t full of missions, reports, lies stacked on top of other lies. Just the weight of the moment. Just him. Just the snow.
Without really thinking about it, my hand shifted in the snow between us.
I felt it before I realized what was happening. the slight brush of his fingers against mine. I froze, every muscle tensing, ready to pull away and pretend it was nothing.
His hand stayed there, palm down, close enough that our fingers touched when the wind nudged the snow aside.
Maybe he noticed my hesitation, or maybe he didn’t care. He didn't looked at me. He just slowly breathed out a thin cloud of steam which dissolved into the grey sky.
“the cold makes everything honest.”
Not me. Not that shitty fuckass liar I am.
So I stayed there, beside him, under the same shroud of snow, counting my breaths, memorizing the weight of his presence, pretending that this moment didn’t have an expiration date.
first chaper out now!!! i know it's kinda shrt, i promise i'll do better next time <3