Living as long as he has—and being dead for that long, too—means that he is in-tune with his own feelings. He has known, for a while at least, that something was wrong. That things were not correct here. It started as an uneasy stirring in his belly and then a stone in his chest. He carried it with him until it was nearly a crippling certainty. Something was wrong—very wrong—but he had no idea what.
So when she finds him, she finds him sleepless and staring at the stars. His wings are folded over his back and his head is tipped back and he wonders how he can be so alive and yet feel so empty inside. All of the joy he had felt upon returning to this world has since bled from him. All he feels if the weight.
He doesn’t respond right away when she calls for him, even though he feels the instinctual need to go to her and pull her close. He swallows the need down, hesitating—stalling. He doesn’t want to know why she has come here today with that sadness in her voice. Plume is not sure he’s ready to hear it.
But he can’t avoid it forever and so, with a sigh, he drops his head down.
Slowly, he opens his plain brown eyes to study her, his face drawn up into lines of knowing and sadness. He doesn’t know, but he does, he thinks. Knows enough. “Agetta,” her name is still sweet and he lets it linger for a moment. Lets him savor it this one time more before whatever she has to say comes to pass.
He finally finds her eyes and then studies her face, trying to decipher what lies beneath.
PLUME
but my heart, it don’t beat, it don’t beat the way it used to