01-29-2017, 07:30 PM
It was doubt that had forced her away from him, a sudden and painful worry that she had pushed too hard, too far, and now he craved that isolation he was so used to. She could feel the fear like a burr in her chest, tight and sharp and digging into the soft of her wretched heart. But when she did pull away, when she tried to put some distance between them for him, for the sake of his sanity, he was quick to pull her back again.
She gasps against his chest, quiet and tremulous, breathless from the heavy way his jaw presses into the soft of her blue roan shoulder, from the way it makes her pulse hum and her chest ache. It is easy to imagine that this gesture is selfish, possessive, that he is holding her tight to him because he wants to and not because it is a reflex to do so, and so she does imagine it. She is selfish, too.
It feels like home here, tucked gently to the curve of his neck and the wide of a waiting embrace. It feels like home with her chest pressed to his and their hearts beating a strange and tangled kind of rhythm. Luster, he whispers again into the blue of her skin, and she is unraveling beneath him, a million stars shattered across the furthest corners of the darkest galaxy. Her nose pushes hard against the point of his shoulder, the flat of her teeth just barely sheathed beneath the pale of those delicate pink lips. “Stillwater.” She says back, her voice soft and tight and colored with the palest shades of accusation. He must know what he is doing to her, must be able to feel the tremble of her skin where it presses flush to his, must be able to count the beats of her heart and realize it hums faster than her stars, now. “You have to stop saying my name like that.”
Never, never stop.
But then he does pull away, forced back by the weight of her confession, by the blade of reality that hangs over both of them. Nothing has ever felt quite as cold as the air that rushes in between them, touching and cooling the places he had set fire to with the velvet of his dark lips. Her eyes are luminous in the night, worried as she pulls her light to him so that she can more easily see his face again, can pick apart the sad and the tension to find the man that stays hidden underneath. But there is so much weight in his expression now - maybe even pain, she thinks, tracing the lines of taut muscle below his cheek. Did she do that to him?
His lips find the curve of her cheek again, and she leans into it readily, closing those dark eyes because that is what you do when you’re dreaming. But he is still there when she opens them again, still there when they fall pleading against the dark of his solemn face. Come home with me, he says, we will stay awake, he promises. He asks, because he doesn’t realize that she is already home at his side – that her heart already sits beside his in the dark and quiet of his chest. “With you.” She agrees quietly, touching her lips to his cheek, carving promises into the smooth glossiness of his black skin. Always with you.
He shifts to guide her up the slope behind them, his lips warmer than sunshine in the crook of her blue shoulder. As they pull away from the water, away from the open air and a black sky shrouded by the lace of trees and leaves, she calls the light back to her. There are only a few dozen stars left, those strange flickering lights, and they fall against her skin and her back, slip across his spine and the gleaming dark of his flesh, and then wink out of existence, one by one. In the new dark, she is unsteady, hesitant when her hooves hit damp earth and smooth stone. But with Stillwater back at her hip, with his mouth by her skin, she eases forward past the boulders, fitting easily in the gap of such a small and narrow entryway.
“Stillwater?” She asks the dark, reaching for his warmth though she can find nothing nearby. Her hoof hits a bit of damp stone, wet with earth and moss and she can feel when her body twists to catch her. But it is just a moment too late and her shoulder is thrust against jagged rock, the soft skin splitting easily beneath those sharp grey points. She gasps and flushes, biting down hard on her lip to keep the sound hidden from Stillwater. She is embarrassed by her misstep, embarrassed that she had been looking for him instead of looking down, embarrassed by the wet pain that now dampens her shoulder. In the dark her eyes are like bright bruises, quiet and aching and pushing away the pain that spiderwebs around the cut in her skin. “Stillwater?” She says again, and her voice is tight and quiet, betraying the pain that is etched in red like a constellation against her shoulder. “Are you still there?”
She knows she shouldn’t, can tell by the way her legs are unsteady beneath her, by the way her muscles tremble beneath the blue like plucked string. She can tell by the heaviness in her bones and the ragged way her chest fills with air. There is nothing left to give to the magic in her skin, nothing left to feed the soft lights that suddenly illuminate the cave, the same stars from outside – though these seem tired and sad and dying. But it is dark in here – she doesn’t mind the dark, it is so much like home – and the floor is slick and the footing is uneven and she is wary, wary of the jagged stones in the walls around them. She eases forward again, swaying gently, tiredly, and then biting back the grimace that wants to warp the beauty of that delicate blue mouth, “I bet morning doesn’t reach in here.” There is a smile, almost a smile, soft and strange and teasing as she searches the half-dark for him again, “I could stay forever.” It is just a whisper of sound, like snowflakes when they land, spoken so low, so quiet, that she does not think he will have heard her past the echo of their hooves.
She gasps against his chest, quiet and tremulous, breathless from the heavy way his jaw presses into the soft of her blue roan shoulder, from the way it makes her pulse hum and her chest ache. It is easy to imagine that this gesture is selfish, possessive, that he is holding her tight to him because he wants to and not because it is a reflex to do so, and so she does imagine it. She is selfish, too.
It feels like home here, tucked gently to the curve of his neck and the wide of a waiting embrace. It feels like home with her chest pressed to his and their hearts beating a strange and tangled kind of rhythm. Luster, he whispers again into the blue of her skin, and she is unraveling beneath him, a million stars shattered across the furthest corners of the darkest galaxy. Her nose pushes hard against the point of his shoulder, the flat of her teeth just barely sheathed beneath the pale of those delicate pink lips. “Stillwater.” She says back, her voice soft and tight and colored with the palest shades of accusation. He must know what he is doing to her, must be able to feel the tremble of her skin where it presses flush to his, must be able to count the beats of her heart and realize it hums faster than her stars, now. “You have to stop saying my name like that.”
Never, never stop.
But then he does pull away, forced back by the weight of her confession, by the blade of reality that hangs over both of them. Nothing has ever felt quite as cold as the air that rushes in between them, touching and cooling the places he had set fire to with the velvet of his dark lips. Her eyes are luminous in the night, worried as she pulls her light to him so that she can more easily see his face again, can pick apart the sad and the tension to find the man that stays hidden underneath. But there is so much weight in his expression now - maybe even pain, she thinks, tracing the lines of taut muscle below his cheek. Did she do that to him?
His lips find the curve of her cheek again, and she leans into it readily, closing those dark eyes because that is what you do when you’re dreaming. But he is still there when she opens them again, still there when they fall pleading against the dark of his solemn face. Come home with me, he says, we will stay awake, he promises. He asks, because he doesn’t realize that she is already home at his side – that her heart already sits beside his in the dark and quiet of his chest. “With you.” She agrees quietly, touching her lips to his cheek, carving promises into the smooth glossiness of his black skin. Always with you.
He shifts to guide her up the slope behind them, his lips warmer than sunshine in the crook of her blue shoulder. As they pull away from the water, away from the open air and a black sky shrouded by the lace of trees and leaves, she calls the light back to her. There are only a few dozen stars left, those strange flickering lights, and they fall against her skin and her back, slip across his spine and the gleaming dark of his flesh, and then wink out of existence, one by one. In the new dark, she is unsteady, hesitant when her hooves hit damp earth and smooth stone. But with Stillwater back at her hip, with his mouth by her skin, she eases forward past the boulders, fitting easily in the gap of such a small and narrow entryway.
“Stillwater?” She asks the dark, reaching for his warmth though she can find nothing nearby. Her hoof hits a bit of damp stone, wet with earth and moss and she can feel when her body twists to catch her. But it is just a moment too late and her shoulder is thrust against jagged rock, the soft skin splitting easily beneath those sharp grey points. She gasps and flushes, biting down hard on her lip to keep the sound hidden from Stillwater. She is embarrassed by her misstep, embarrassed that she had been looking for him instead of looking down, embarrassed by the wet pain that now dampens her shoulder. In the dark her eyes are like bright bruises, quiet and aching and pushing away the pain that spiderwebs around the cut in her skin. “Stillwater?” She says again, and her voice is tight and quiet, betraying the pain that is etched in red like a constellation against her shoulder. “Are you still there?”
She knows she shouldn’t, can tell by the way her legs are unsteady beneath her, by the way her muscles tremble beneath the blue like plucked string. She can tell by the heaviness in her bones and the ragged way her chest fills with air. There is nothing left to give to the magic in her skin, nothing left to feed the soft lights that suddenly illuminate the cave, the same stars from outside – though these seem tired and sad and dying. But it is dark in here – she doesn’t mind the dark, it is so much like home – and the floor is slick and the footing is uneven and she is wary, wary of the jagged stones in the walls around them. She eases forward again, swaying gently, tiredly, and then biting back the grimace that wants to warp the beauty of that delicate blue mouth, “I bet morning doesn’t reach in here.” There is a smile, almost a smile, soft and strange and teasing as she searches the half-dark for him again, “I could stay forever.” It is just a whisper of sound, like snowflakes when they land, spoken so low, so quiet, that she does not think he will have heard her past the echo of their hooves.