03-20-2023, 10:29 PM
YOU CAN HAVE MY HEART, IF YOU HAVE THE STOMACH TO TAKE IT.
She has always trusted the river like an elder sister. In times of chaos such as this, she finds herself submerging beneath the surface. Down here, there is only the muffled roar of the current and her heartbeat inside her skull. The surface and all its turmoil is a distant memory that she only returns to when it pleases her.
Her long tail takes on a relaxed, serpentine rhythm that carries her further down the river where small fish bite at the glimmering stardust she leaves in her wake. And when she smiles, it is all teeth that dream of catching the young bass. Her jaws part, her tail pumps her forward. She can taste copper across her tongue already, she swears it. That perfect pink tongue slides over her fangs in anticipation just breaths before the world rumbles.
Katarine has felt such quakes before in her young life. She pauses, considers the world above the river and its people. There is a thought, briefly, to not return. They may all think her dead and leave her be. Solitude and quiet would find her at last, leave her to live in the muck at the bottom of the waters. How divine, to never let the sun shine across her pale lavender back again.
But a thread of guilt weaves into her thoughts, then: her mother would never heal from such a wound.
A frown bleeds across her face and those bright blue eyes begin to scowl. Slowly, she rises toward the light until just her ears and eyes peek from the rippling waters. The sun is already just a thumbnail over the horizon and the day is nearly done. Every minute, it’s getting darker and she seems to glow a little brighter in some beautiful haze juxtaposed against that hateful expression.
Her long tail takes on a relaxed, serpentine rhythm that carries her further down the river where small fish bite at the glimmering stardust she leaves in her wake. And when she smiles, it is all teeth that dream of catching the young bass. Her jaws part, her tail pumps her forward. She can taste copper across her tongue already, she swears it. That perfect pink tongue slides over her fangs in anticipation just breaths before the world rumbles.
Katarine has felt such quakes before in her young life. She pauses, considers the world above the river and its people. There is a thought, briefly, to not return. They may all think her dead and leave her be. Solitude and quiet would find her at last, leave her to live in the muck at the bottom of the waters. How divine, to never let the sun shine across her pale lavender back again.
But a thread of guilt weaves into her thoughts, then: her mother would never heal from such a wound.
A frown bleeds across her face and those bright blue eyes begin to scowl. Slowly, she rises toward the light until just her ears and eyes peek from the rippling waters. The sun is already just a thumbnail over the horizon and the day is nearly done. Every minute, it’s getting darker and she seems to glow a little brighter in some beautiful haze juxtaposed against that hateful expression.
KATARINE