there is violence, and there is exigency, and there is her; lydia martin, his own personal trapping in the second circle of dante’s inferno. the hyperbole does feel literal, in the sense that he’s spent the past half-decade a walking corpse without her, that half-life of a half-person with half-feelings. when it comes to her, he never half-anythings, and there are no exceptions to this rule. even in this moment of hushed breaths; in the orange glow of a single bulb swinging in a storage closet. she is so beautiful, and he is enraptured.
her chest heaves — he can feel the way it curves towards him, as if aching every second spent without his touch — and he is enamoured. it’s like freefalling from high altitude, being so close to her in a space so small, a spinning feeling making him dizzy with the gravitational shift of her demands. but he has always been careful with every brush of his fingertips upon her skin, always intentional with every kiss from his damaged mouth.
isaac touches her now, those steady hands pressing callouses against the fine arch of her throat. gentle, as if cradling an ancient manuscript, he traces the words hidden beneath her skin. everything feels loud. or perhaps that’s just the treble of his heartbeat ringing in his ears, a blood rush to the head being close quarters to the first and only girl who ever made him feel truly alive.
fingertips draw patterns, playing connect-the-freckles along her jawline, cheeks, temples. he cannot look away. hammering, hammering heartbeat — hers in sync with his. he’s missed this secret song. he’s missed the rightness of it.
‘ i never stopped loving you. ’ ( never stopped aching for you. so many late nights spent hoping, wishing, dreaming i’d see you again. that you’d still love me too. ) he is lovesick; a sailor lost in her siren song falling wilfully to his doom. the hand moves — presses a thumb to her bottom lip, dark eyes caught on the taboo. you are so lovely. ‘ i won’t ever stop loving you. ’
this felt simple. so the language must pursue it; the pulse felt like it ought to choke her. it was heavy in her neck, heavy in her chest; an anchor of them & what it means to stay. with his hands at her neck, she felt her skin burn as if to raze the imprints of any other & decide on him.
“ i- i still... ” frightful of dissonance; his words overwhelmed her. his touch felt like it bit her with static, like it had lived inside her all this time. reclusive little words, aren’t they? confessions of this open truth of one thing: i don’t blame you. i never thought to blame you or hate you. i just wanted you to come back. i have learned to clear a space beside me, not inside of me [..] i am ready.
stutter shook & tongue-tied, she feels herself swilling down inside of him as he spoke (visceral means of possession), her eyes burning back into the ocean of his own; lachrymose, tendered & loyal. to want, to need; it was the truth of hoarding, the truth of over-extending & knowing not how to love, but how to see him as simply part of her, a limb to lose, a heart to break; but for love, you are beside me & i, you. we hold onto each other as means to share & not to lose, not to consume.
“ i love you. it’s- isaac, it’s always been you. ” the words trembled on her self-assurance, cheeks burning with the vulnerability of it all. it was always going to be you. it was a reply. it was to correspond. i look at you with this, i touch you back (but as well), my hands clasping against your own as if to hold you still with indulgence but the need to contend that reality has salvaged my dreams & how awake i am.
the pull of his thumb against her lip, the merge of her frame forward into his own & the quiet breathing met by the only sounds she knew for sure. his voice & her heart, the throb of it all as nostalgia. the rounded, upturned tip of her nose inches against his own, lashes sinking cheeks as her eyes closed & so the burning could dissipate. the burning of her eyes, the burning of it all; the strike of a match in a quiet, dark space of coming closer.
“ all i’ve ever wanted is you. ” barely a whisper. a nod to her impatience as to her greed, we do not find ourselves without flaw; her thumb catches his, clearing it from her mouth as it beseeches his own. an open door; a (kismet) kiss. it did not define itself as passion or lust nor the ingredients for mindless caving. it defines itself as a kind of mourning, to old selves, to old patterns; it felt like ten years [..] it felt like time.