That fierce need to protect this moment rises in him and he cannot tell what he might do with it. Does he want to carve it away into time and space? Does he want to preserve it forever? The possibilities rush up beside him and he is dizzy with the new options that lay before him. All the ways that he might be able to change the narrative—all the power that now lies within his reach should he try to grab for it.
His thoughts storm and tumble upon one another, leaving him half distracted, but he is aware enough to engage with her as she smiles and teases him. As she folds into his chest and he holds her gently. There is a warmth that blooms there and he smiles down at her, the corners of his mouth crinkling.
Oh, how they all get such different pieces of him.
How many masks he wears—how many parts he plays.
But she gets the gentler side of him, dishonest as he may sometimes think it is, and he cannot find himself regretting it. Even as he deceives her with this gentle nature, the one that masks the ugliness underneath, he does not regret shielding her. So he smiles and bumps his nose against her neck. “You matter to me too,” he promises, wondering how he might care so deeply for something that he has dreamt up.
It is not enough for him to crack open his chest and share the details with her though. Instead, he skirts around the subject—just laughing quietly and moving on as though she had not prompted him to tell her where he had been. What had happened. Instead, he pivots, his mind latching onto the thoughts that had been forming in his head. The idea that grows and grows with each passing breath until he cannot stop it.
“What if I made you real,” he asks, the words coming too quickly.
“I think I could,” this less self-assured. “I think I could bring my dreams to life now, if I wanted.”
so as our grief falls flat and hollow upon a billion blooded seas
all our worst ideas are borrowed (you do and don't belong to me)