your touch brought forth an incandescent glow, tarnished but so grand
The tears that burn the back of Flora's eyes grow even sharper and more insistent as she closes her eyes. Resting her forehead against her knees, the queen's whole body tenses against the tears that still threaten to rain down her cheeks. "I don't want to be right. Or for you to be sorry." She mumbles against her legs, knowing that however muted the words were, Jack would be able to pick them up easily enough from her mind. Whatever monumental victory it might have been to someone else to hear the captain say those words, for Flora they only felt dull and flat; paper torn into shreds after hours spent staring at a blank page.
"I don't know what you want from me." Lifting her head, her voice as small and worn as she currently felt, Flora wraps her arms around her shins to tug her legs even closer. If she shut Jack out, she risked withholding the only aspect of herself that he'd ever said he liked; the part that presumably made him want to be with her in the first place. But if she continued as she was with her apparently unrealistic notions of being loved in return, then she doomed them both to constant repetitions of this exact conversation. "I don't want it to feel like there's an hourglass that's running out." An errant tear does trickle down her cheek, though if anything it eases the tension somewhat in her mind to not have to constantly flutter her lashes to hold it back. "But I'm not sure I can stop it from feeling that way."
"I don't know what you want from me." Lifting her head, her voice as small and worn as she currently felt, Flora wraps her arms around her shins to tug her legs even closer. If she shut Jack out, she risked withholding the only aspect of herself that he'd ever said he liked; the part that presumably made him want to be with her in the first place. But if she continued as she was with her apparently unrealistic notions of being loved in return, then she doomed them both to constant repetitions of this exact conversation. "I don't want it to feel like there's an hourglass that's running out." An errant tear does trickle down her cheek, though if anything it eases the tension somewhat in her mind to not have to constantly flutter her lashes to hold it back. "But I'm not sure I can stop it from feeling that way."
