@wretchedhearted asked : "What’s it like to be empty, full of only echoes?" Algernon to Cam or Natalie in any time period in any situation go wild do whatever you want punch me in the face i'm ready
julien baker prompts , accepting .
oh ——— what did he see ? one question alone , and she feels called out : did her eyes betray the emptiness of her , how she’s been filling herself up with horror , drop by drop , to convince herself that to learn is to conquer ? did he see her getting conquered instead , thick black tendrils wrapped around ankles and wrists , caught in a web of her own making ? eyes scanning his features with a sense of urgency — fears she is missing something , a hidden meaning behind this odd twilight encounter : it is an overwhelming sense of amnesia that suddenly turns her mind foggy and makes her wonder — is this an experiment in becoming her mother , or is this simply a dream unraveling itself , the way her dreams never do ? she is staring at the man now , though he’s less man and more fog , a shadow - like presence at the edge of existence : she stares , trying to remember the seed of a thought that fled from her before she could even name it . on the tip of her tongue , just dissolving : something that has to do with the sadness pouring from his eyes , flooding everything … it’s gone . with childlike frustration she turns away , lets not the anger but the still sharp blade of the last rays of sunlight sting her corneas . somewhere out there is her father’s grave , half - hollow , now . the day he’d died they told her he’d stay with her , and she’d spent the night awake , staring at the ceiling expecting a white sheet man hovering above her . now , he is living in her , that is true : but the way a ghost lives in a house and haunts it , and sometimes pieces of her mother joins him and together they dance , and wail , and sing around her bones . is this what he meant ? the echoes …
“ it’s terrifying” . her admission is extorted without her consent by the force of this thought : how carefully she avoids turning the lenses to herself , and how excruciating it is now . “ it’s loud , and you begin losing yourself in the sounds : you don’t know who you are any more , if not for the sounding board of something that’s dead and gone” . as the last shade of yellow gets buried behind the horizon , camille instinctively wraps her arms around herself and resents the stranger for bringing such cold with him —— it is this town , she tells herself , and all the grief that’s drenched in its grass and cobblestone : there is no escaping ghosts in their territory . as a single enraged tear peeks out of her lashes , camille rubs her cheek and turns to him , hardened : “ why are you asking me this ? ” , though the question against the floor of her mouth is different — she needs to ask , why does he look so familiar ? like his sorrow and hers have a similar taste , like he knows . still that question , she does not feel safe with — one single curiosity she won’t satisfy , an irrational fear of what the answer might mean , and so she turns away yet again , recoiling :“ i have no idea who you are” .
