Jude
If Koa strikes an intimidating figure - and he does - it’s lost on Jude. The hurt and upset are jagged metallic things inside his chest and every time he breathes they cut him someplace new and he has little blood left to give. Koa grabs his wrists and pulls them away, and Jude isn’t sure if he feels chastised or simply bereft when they’re released without fanfare. Rebuked in such a calm and dismissive fashion that it only solidifies - in his own mind - the fact that he means exactly that to the other man.
“Yes. No. I don’t know!” His fingertips dig into his hairline when the pressure of the heels of his palms digging into his eyesockets isn’t enough pain to relieve the feeling inside. Maybe Koa’s stony face lingers too strongly, because he doesn’t lift his hands away. Like a child believing the blanket over their head makes the monster not exist.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Either to enlist him in the search efforts or to protect him. Or any reason at all. Isn’t that the question this all boils down to, once the pressurized steam is released? “I don’t understand.” And the exclusion of it all - the singled out sensation - is somehow not nearly as painful as the idea that maybe it hadn’t been intentional at all. That he’s an afterthought to everyone, as he’s always been, and Koa was never going to be an exception.
“Yes. No. I don’t know!” His fingertips dig into his hairline when the pressure of the heels of his palms digging into his eyesockets isn’t enough pain to relieve the feeling inside. Maybe Koa’s stony face lingers too strongly, because he doesn’t lift his hands away. Like a child believing the blanket over their head makes the monster not exist.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Either to enlist him in the search efforts or to protect him. Or any reason at all. Isn’t that the question this all boils down to, once the pressurized steam is released? “I don’t understand.” And the exclusion of it all - the singled out sensation - is somehow not nearly as painful as the idea that maybe it hadn’t been intentional at all. That he’s an afterthought to everyone, as he’s always been, and Koa was never going to be an exception.
My tongue will tell the anger of my heart
Or else my heart, concealing it, will break
