Where Our Memories Began || Closed
disarmmywords:
“Who cares?”
Though it was a flippant statement, said as though it meant nothing, there were a crack in his voice. The slightest sliver, a hairline fracture, his façade beginning to falter. It was an honest plea, buried in layers of practiced apathy, sadness tempered with anger and indignant self-righteousness. It was a sob wrapped in a promise of protection; it was the only kind of protection he had left.
There were no more tears now. Not because he was stronger or happier, but because it was weakness, and all moments of weakness were opportunities to be hurt. Any hint of weakness and they would descend, any glimpse of weakness and they would devour. He would never get hurt again, no matter what the cost.
In that moment, the glint of the scared, inconsolably sad child inside showed through the break in the shell, and in that moment, he clutched to the false form below him, balling his trembling hands in the fabric and pressing his face into the breathless chest to hide the quiver in his lips.
Ren's embrace held firm as Aoba buried himself deeper into his broad chest, his strong arms taking care not to hold him too tightly or in a way that might distress him. They'd spent enough time together in Rhyme and in Aoba's head for Ren to know what was or wasn't safe, at least for the most part. Aoba was still something of a wild card, his fickle desires alluding the Allmate at times.
Motionless aside from an occasional blink, Ren stoically held the trembling boy as he considered his next words carefully. Aoba mattered to him more than anything else, seeing as they were the same person, but he knew how dismissive his other self could be. Wouldn't it be spectacular if he confessed to Aoba how he really felt, only to be met with a spiteful challenge?
It wouldn't come as much surprise, at any rate.
"I do not want Aoba to be in danger," he began somewhat cautiously, his voiced hushed in a whisper to match the ambient sounds of the rhyme field.
Ren paused, unsure if his next words would be too revealing. In the end, they were vague enough to apply to both his Allmate self and his true self. It would be fine, he reasoned.
"I would not exist without you. So I do not want to see harm done to you. I want you to exist. I want you to be safe."
