a dream from which we cannot wake

Jude

In my head I am hunting for myself
but I come up empty again

Despite the teasing of her tone, he is miserable enough to believe that she's right. Remembering Sohalia's kindness is too painful, his father's kindness too paternal. Aside from Koa, he doesn't think anyone has ever exhibited this sort of insight and patience toward him - maybe it's a Carpenter thing. "You're the nicest person I've ever met, violent tendencies aside," he parrots back, unable to help the small twitch of humor at the corners of his mouth. It still hurts to feel happy, but right now it's a pleasant kind of hurt, like stretching a sore muscle. The same way it feels to squeeze her hand back, knuckles still aching beneath the surface where the waters haven't soothed.

The prospect of singing is startling, jolting him out of any mimicked suaveness he had affected. It's certainly true. His father plays guitar and had taught Jude how to sing and strum from the time he could hold it in his hands properly. That doesn't mean he thinks he's a good singer. But she had asked, sincere despite her playfulness, and part of him - wretched and hurting and broken - wants to give it to her because he'd never done it for Sohalia. "It's a repeating refrain. I didn't get much further."

It hurts all the more because the last song he'd written had been when he was still with her. Scraps of lyrics that he'd composed while getting Edmund to safety, bits of love and memory to cling to - only to finally reunite with her and have it be the end.

"I can't move 'cause she's comfortable there. Her legs tangled in mine, hands tangled in hair," he sings softly, slow and melodic, cresting just beneath the sound of the waves on the beach. "And I can't stop thinking about how nice it would be, to be bothered by your breath reclaiming mine. To wake up in the morning half-dead to you, unable to find a place to rest your arms." He keeps his eyes wide open to make sure Noe's dark hair doesn't glint gold in the dark, refusing to let the image of Sohalia asleep in bed in the morning light intrude the way it had when he'd been writing these lyrics. "I can't stop thinking about how nice it would be to be bothered by your breath reclaiming mine..." he trails off, and shrugs awkwardly, head ducked and shoulders creeping up. "It's a repeating refrain. I didn't get much further." But it would be enough to warrant 'a song', short and sweet as it was.

the night is a cavern
I am underneath it, inside it, anything but free of it