marked me like a bloodstain
—get off of me, Flora.
Why it vibrates with the same resonance as years spent walking silently through the woods the closer she and Enzo came to her father's home, she didn't know, but amidst the memories of her recent encounter with Asta were bright green leaves that shivered with a very similar sort of paternal rejection. It cast her thoughts in shadows of burnt gold that served only to make ugly the blues and bruised purples of her ego as well as her boy.
Her lungs ached from holding her breath, but so long as there was air in them capable of screaming, she'd wait. Long ago she'd learned that screaming underwater wasn't as satisfying as books made it seem, and so, opening in her eyes in the vain hopes that the healing waters would stop her tears, she saw him.
The ripples of the water made him hazy, but Jack's figure was one she knew quite well by now, and had she not known what he was capable of, she might have tried to swim silently away without her noticing. But if he was there, then he knew she was too.
Surfacing, the water around her a muted pink as the water went to work on her wounds, Flora looked away from the captain even knowing he still couldn't see her. "Go away, Jack." Go away or I'll give you a headache the likes of which not even Dahlia could match, she thinks hotly, before tendrils of doubt wormed their way up her spine; she'd failed at what she'd set out to do with Asta, and now the last thing she needed was to have Jack laughing at her inflated sense of confidence rather than just tolerating it.
Why it vibrates with the same resonance as years spent walking silently through the woods the closer she and Enzo came to her father's home, she didn't know, but amidst the memories of her recent encounter with Asta were bright green leaves that shivered with a very similar sort of paternal rejection. It cast her thoughts in shadows of burnt gold that served only to make ugly the blues and bruised purples of her ego as well as her boy.
Her lungs ached from holding her breath, but so long as there was air in them capable of screaming, she'd wait. Long ago she'd learned that screaming underwater wasn't as satisfying as books made it seem, and so, opening in her eyes in the vain hopes that the healing waters would stop her tears, she saw him.
The ripples of the water made him hazy, but Jack's figure was one she knew quite well by now, and had she not known what he was capable of, she might have tried to swim silently away without her noticing. But if he was there, then he knew she was too.
Surfacing, the water around her a muted pink as the water went to work on her wounds, Flora looked away from the captain even knowing he still couldn't see her. "Go away, Jack." Go away or I'll give you a headache the likes of which not even Dahlia could match, she thinks hotly, before tendrils of doubt wormed their way up her spine; she'd failed at what she'd set out to do with Asta, and now the last thing she needed was to have Jack laughing at her inflated sense of confidence rather than just tolerating it.
