The sound of his voice brings a smile to her lips, small and brief enough one could almost believe they’d imagined it, but a true one nonetheless. Head dipping into a more natural position, her dark eyes lift to find him coming towards her with that familiar lopsided grin of his on his lips. For a moment, she is struck by the urge to reach out and touch the corners of his lips in a familiar gesture, but a lifetime of caution stays her urge.
Instead she allows her own lips to lift once more in amusement, eyes warming as she peers up at him in unconscious welcome.
“I think I may be,” she replies demurely, playing into his teasing question with a heart made lighter by his presence. “I seem to have misplaced someone. He’s very handsome.” Her eyes light with a teasing glint of their own. “With eyes the color of new pines and wings like a falcon.” She takes a step closer then, features turning up slightly as she holds his gaze. “You wouldn’t happen to know where to find him, would you?”
She is close enough now that she can nearly feel the warmth of his skin. Can imagine the sound of his heart as though she were pressed against his ribcage, the comforting weight of his wing draped over hers. But she doesn’t close the narrow space that remains between, instead keeping her eyes on his face.
Waiting and watching. As though this might be the time she had feared above all others. The time that he would not choose her as he had so many times before. Her logical brain knows what a foolish fear it is. But ancient and long buried memories of rejection and pain always seem to rise in the moments like these. The moments she waits, heart in her throat, staring at him with carefully muted hope.
- noel
@[Nashua]