11-01-2025, 01:54 AM
— i would rather learn what it feels like to burn than feel nothing at all —
She wishes, again, that this was easier, or that she was better at it.
She has lived most of her life chained to her bitterness and self-loathing, and trying to navigate the world without their weight has her feeling unmoored. Words don't come easily when they’re no longer sharpened by anger. The anger is still there, of course, but it is more of a quiet simmer than an inferno. Easier to manage, maybe, but it leaves her quiet, hollow. She can’t remember the last time she had a real conversation, or at least, one that didn’t veer into an argument or end in some kind of fight.
With guarded, fire-lit eyes she watches him, her expression still mostly unreadable. At his comment about being the first tree healer she exhales a sound that might almost pass for a laugh, but she does not say anything.
She wonders what it might be like to have the gift of fire but not be so entirely consumed by it. To seemingly possess only the good things about the element; the strength and the spirit, the captivating spark. Ever since the day her skin ignited into a flame that never extinguished, her world had felt tilted and wrong, and no matter what she did, nothing seemed to make it right. She isn’t even sure what she thinks would fix it at this point; even if the fire were to disappear entirely, it doesn’t feel as though there would be anything worth saving in the ashes.
She is still watching him, and yet somehow, his touch manages to catch her off-guard.
A jolt races through her like an electric shock as she sucks in a sharp breath, reflexively flinching away from him as if he had burnt her. “Don’t,” the word comes out blunt, but there is an undertone of panic to the single syllable, her heart beating erratically in her chest. Even reaching into the darkest depths of her memories, she could not recall the last time anyone has touched her, and beneath the flames the weight of his touch still lingers.
It takes a moment for the surge of adrenaline to slow, and for her mind to form coherent thoughts through the static — to realize that she had, somehow, not burnt him. Maybe it was stupid of her to have not already made the connection that he would not be quite so easily harmed by fire, but she wouldn’t have predicted that he was impervious to it.
Slowly, the tension eases from her rigid frame, though not entirely. Somewhere beyond the suspicion and confusion there is a curiosity kindling, and, finally, she says, “I don’t understand how that is possible.”
She has lived most of her life chained to her bitterness and self-loathing, and trying to navigate the world without their weight has her feeling unmoored. Words don't come easily when they’re no longer sharpened by anger. The anger is still there, of course, but it is more of a quiet simmer than an inferno. Easier to manage, maybe, but it leaves her quiet, hollow. She can’t remember the last time she had a real conversation, or at least, one that didn’t veer into an argument or end in some kind of fight.
With guarded, fire-lit eyes she watches him, her expression still mostly unreadable. At his comment about being the first tree healer she exhales a sound that might almost pass for a laugh, but she does not say anything.
She wonders what it might be like to have the gift of fire but not be so entirely consumed by it. To seemingly possess only the good things about the element; the strength and the spirit, the captivating spark. Ever since the day her skin ignited into a flame that never extinguished, her world had felt tilted and wrong, and no matter what she did, nothing seemed to make it right. She isn’t even sure what she thinks would fix it at this point; even if the fire were to disappear entirely, it doesn’t feel as though there would be anything worth saving in the ashes.
She is still watching him, and yet somehow, his touch manages to catch her off-guard.
A jolt races through her like an electric shock as she sucks in a sharp breath, reflexively flinching away from him as if he had burnt her. “Don’t,” the word comes out blunt, but there is an undertone of panic to the single syllable, her heart beating erratically in her chest. Even reaching into the darkest depths of her memories, she could not recall the last time anyone has touched her, and beneath the flames the weight of his touch still lingers.
It takes a moment for the surge of adrenaline to slow, and for her mind to form coherent thoughts through the static — to realize that she had, somehow, not burnt him. Maybe it was stupid of her to have not already made the connection that he would not be quite so easily harmed by fire, but she wouldn’t have predicted that he was impervious to it.
Slowly, the tension eases from her rigid frame, though not entirely. Somewhere beyond the suspicion and confusion there is a curiosity kindling, and, finally, she says, “I don’t understand how that is possible.”
Brinly
@Fireheart