08-15-2015, 12:31 AM
you taught me the courage of stars before you left
He flays her, and she lets him.
She can’t help herself.
No one can.
For a moment, stretched further than the oceans, she withers beneath the blade that is his tongue. It isn’t that she believes him, believes the hatred that spews like black blood from his sick mouth, it’s that he would ever say these things to her at all. There is a numbness that settles like dirty snow over her bright, aching skin. Her eyes fall on his eyes, reflecting the flatness, tracing the tension in his face, the sneer on his mouth. It feels like looking at a stranger, and her heart cries out as it burns up in her chest, settling like ash in the shattered hollows.
“Stupid.” She repeats numbly, clinging to a word that he kept carving away at her with. “Yes.” But there is some fire creeping back into her voice, and those eyes she fights to keep so flat and empty flash like melted emeralds. “I suppose you must think I’m stupid if you expect me to believe that.” But doubt is such a poisonous thing and she can feel her stomach clenching like a fist at the thought of Makai with someone else, of his children with someone else. The hurt and jealously and betrayal that flash through her veins hurt more than any physical pain ever could.
Her eyes settle stonily on the muscles quivering impatiently beneath the satin of his skin. “If you’re going to leave, then leave. But I hope you know better than to expect me to ever come looking for you again, Makai.” Suddenly she is Oksana again. She is tall and bright and mortally proud, and somehow, impossibly, she is keeping the unravelling pieces of her soul stitched tight. And it doesn’t matter that she’s spinning him lies, won’t matter unless he’s knows. Her wings fluff and resettle above her back, the edges of the feathers glinting suspiciously in the fading light.
Love, he says, and the word sits like poison in her belly. “Don’t call me love, Makai, you’re nothing more than a stranger to me.” More lies, they suffocate her. But she plays the part as well as he does, and it doesn’t seem to matter that each knows the others heart intimately enough to see the lies through the sneers. He’d be a fool to believe she wouldn’t always love him. That she would always be looking for him. But she hides that truth with distance in her eyes and disgust twisting her mouth. “I’m glad our children won’t get the chance to know you. They deserve so much better.”
This knife, delivered directly into his heart, this lie so carelessly crafted, hurts her more than anything he had said so far. It takes everything she has left to hide the sway as her knees shudder beneath her. But the effort it takes to stay stoically on her feet with her delicate head drawn proudly back saps believability from the mask she wore like a shield over her face. There will be a second, and maybe he’ll blink and miss it, where the agony in her heart reflects perfectly in the sudden vulnerability of her delicate chestnut face. But she recovers quickly because she must, because if he notices for a second and uses it against her, there will be nothing left to fight for.
And this fight is all they have left.
She can’t help herself.
No one can.
For a moment, stretched further than the oceans, she withers beneath the blade that is his tongue. It isn’t that she believes him, believes the hatred that spews like black blood from his sick mouth, it’s that he would ever say these things to her at all. There is a numbness that settles like dirty snow over her bright, aching skin. Her eyes fall on his eyes, reflecting the flatness, tracing the tension in his face, the sneer on his mouth. It feels like looking at a stranger, and her heart cries out as it burns up in her chest, settling like ash in the shattered hollows.
“Stupid.” She repeats numbly, clinging to a word that he kept carving away at her with. “Yes.” But there is some fire creeping back into her voice, and those eyes she fights to keep so flat and empty flash like melted emeralds. “I suppose you must think I’m stupid if you expect me to believe that.” But doubt is such a poisonous thing and she can feel her stomach clenching like a fist at the thought of Makai with someone else, of his children with someone else. The hurt and jealously and betrayal that flash through her veins hurt more than any physical pain ever could.
Her eyes settle stonily on the muscles quivering impatiently beneath the satin of his skin. “If you’re going to leave, then leave. But I hope you know better than to expect me to ever come looking for you again, Makai.” Suddenly she is Oksana again. She is tall and bright and mortally proud, and somehow, impossibly, she is keeping the unravelling pieces of her soul stitched tight. And it doesn’t matter that she’s spinning him lies, won’t matter unless he’s knows. Her wings fluff and resettle above her back, the edges of the feathers glinting suspiciously in the fading light.
Love, he says, and the word sits like poison in her belly. “Don’t call me love, Makai, you’re nothing more than a stranger to me.” More lies, they suffocate her. But she plays the part as well as he does, and it doesn’t seem to matter that each knows the others heart intimately enough to see the lies through the sneers. He’d be a fool to believe she wouldn’t always love him. That she would always be looking for him. But she hides that truth with distance in her eyes and disgust twisting her mouth. “I’m glad our children won’t get the chance to know you. They deserve so much better.”
This knife, delivered directly into his heart, this lie so carelessly crafted, hurts her more than anything he had said so far. It takes everything she has left to hide the sway as her knees shudder beneath her. But the effort it takes to stay stoically on her feet with her delicate head drawn proudly back saps believability from the mask she wore like a shield over her face. There will be a second, and maybe he’ll blink and miss it, where the agony in her heart reflects perfectly in the sudden vulnerability of her delicate chestnut face. But she recovers quickly because she must, because if he notices for a second and uses it against her, there will be nothing left to fight for.
And this fight is all they have left.
how light carries on endlessly, even after death
Oksana