When enemies are at your door, I'll carry you way from war
The admittance does not sting. If anything, it’s a relief to know he’d been right, that he’d carried this weight for a reason rather than imagined it and worn himself out over nothing. Even so, it’s a truth that Jack remains, in their home, like a presence that refuses to be cleared out fully. The home is full of spirits, but it had never felt haunted until Kaisel’s awareness of that space rose up.
He exhales with a heaviness that does little to lighten him as she explains. It all makes sense, but there’s more than that involved here, on behalf of them both. ”It’s not him knowing,” he insists, voice just a low murmur, trying to hide nerves with softness. His gaze dips from hers for a moment, tracing the fold of her hands between them. ”It’s that it’s there. Still.” It’s more than a room, it’s a statement of who’s important to her, who she cares about, and it staying says a lot about what she’s holding onto. ”Could paint over it, turn it into an empty guest room, or storage. It could be anything…but it’s still, Jack’s.” It’s evidence of all his fears, that however under lock and key it is, however much she explores the other rooms and opens them up to laughter and sunlight and memories, that it remains like something she could walk back into. Like something she might want to open up again. It might not be fair, especially when she's telling him it's nothing like what he's imagining, but those roots have already taken hold of him.
As her tears return in earnest, always something he can hardly bear to witness, he loosens his hold. His palms press gently onto either side of her face, holding her like something he fears might break further. His thumbs sweep over the ridges of her cheeks, careful even as his own breath shakes now in the wake of all this quiet ripping of the stability they’d woven. ”C’mon,” he says softly, giving up on combating her tears as they continually stream down, her sobs growing more strangled, words splitting apart into the noise of ruin. Instead, he clasps the hand her ring is on with one of his own, intentionally adding the curl of his grip over it and tugging them down. ”Floor time,” he urges, already starting to drop down to the floor, sink cabinets at his back like a reminder that something in this moment will hold. Yielding to gravity makes it so much easier to stand stronger under everything else, something he sighs gratefully into as he settles.
Nevermind the room. That’s not what really matters here, because she didn’t say goodbye, she didn’t open it back up, and he's clinging to the fact she's still here and telling him that she's choosing him in all the ways her tears could. ”I hear you,” he asserts, and he does, now that he’s not staggered by self-inflicted damage. ”This matters. So tell me everything.” he encourages, swallowing against the lump in his throat. He’s still trying to adjust to the new weight of this.
”How long?” He wonders, the thought landing suddenly, heavier than the locked room ever was. The whole time? ”How long have you carried it?”
He exhales with a heaviness that does little to lighten him as she explains. It all makes sense, but there’s more than that involved here, on behalf of them both. ”It’s not him knowing,” he insists, voice just a low murmur, trying to hide nerves with softness. His gaze dips from hers for a moment, tracing the fold of her hands between them. ”It’s that it’s there. Still.” It’s more than a room, it’s a statement of who’s important to her, who she cares about, and it staying says a lot about what she’s holding onto. ”Could paint over it, turn it into an empty guest room, or storage. It could be anything…but it’s still, Jack’s.” It’s evidence of all his fears, that however under lock and key it is, however much she explores the other rooms and opens them up to laughter and sunlight and memories, that it remains like something she could walk back into. Like something she might want to open up again. It might not be fair, especially when she's telling him it's nothing like what he's imagining, but those roots have already taken hold of him.
As her tears return in earnest, always something he can hardly bear to witness, he loosens his hold. His palms press gently onto either side of her face, holding her like something he fears might break further. His thumbs sweep over the ridges of her cheeks, careful even as his own breath shakes now in the wake of all this quiet ripping of the stability they’d woven. ”C’mon,” he says softly, giving up on combating her tears as they continually stream down, her sobs growing more strangled, words splitting apart into the noise of ruin. Instead, he clasps the hand her ring is on with one of his own, intentionally adding the curl of his grip over it and tugging them down. ”Floor time,” he urges, already starting to drop down to the floor, sink cabinets at his back like a reminder that something in this moment will hold. Yielding to gravity makes it so much easier to stand stronger under everything else, something he sighs gratefully into as he settles.
Nevermind the room. That’s not what really matters here, because she didn’t say goodbye, she didn’t open it back up, and he's clinging to the fact she's still here and telling him that she's choosing him in all the ways her tears could. ”I hear you,” he asserts, and he does, now that he’s not staggered by self-inflicted damage. ”This matters. So tell me everything.” he encourages, swallowing against the lump in his throat. He’s still trying to adjust to the new weight of this.
”How long?” He wonders, the thought landing suddenly, heavier than the locked room ever was. The whole time? ”How long have you carried it?”
Kaisel
If you need help, I'll shut down the city lights
Wearing a watery blue, faded and stretched-out sparkling hair tie on his left wrist
