My heart's a stereo, it beats for you so listen close
Flora approaches the task of documenting the excursion like she does most things in her life—with theatrical devotion and detailed precision, as if mediocrity has personally offended her and she intends to conquer it on sight. It presses a near-constant smile onto his face, one he keeps trying to rein back to maintain proper rank and file, but he fails spectacularly into a burst of laughter on more than one occasion as they traverse the city that once was.
He watches her more than once when she won’t notice, or pretends to scan the skyline for Weather or aligning positions on his map, while really he’s just marveling at the way she throws herself into the bit, into everything. She crouches for the perfect shot, intimate with the drama of shadow, wind, and angles like they have always been her besties. She clambers over jagged stone outcroppings and the scattered remains of things that’d once been monumental as if she could defeat change by standing atop it.
All of it he encourages and performs right back, because this is how they reclaim something. He valiantly leads them across broken paths and leaps over crumbling ledges just to wrestle a better look. He mourns things lost with a smile and a salute, allowing the camera to memorialize what has shifted its skin and found new form. He hurls himself into the idea of bravery with every stance she orders him into, and before long it’s honest instead of pretend. As they wander, their stories and laughter breathe something new into the rubble, and it stops being a march of loss, becoming something fresh and treasured instead.
When she insists on the duo shot beneath the arch, he doesn’t hesitate. He steps in close, shoulder to shoulder, posture organized in just the right way for glory and legacy. When she leans in, his arm settles naturally at her back, their bodies pressing in with an instinctual fit. Rank’s abandoned for the sake of something steady, the picture sealing it in place.
By the time they return to the deck, clothes disheveled with effort and salt drying on their skin, he feels lighter than he has in weeks. ”Excellent job Hot Honey!” he commends before dropping his pack near the large map. The feather boa has completely escaped to the stairs leading below deck, but the other paper weights have remained at their stations. He watches her flip through the polaroids, the little square memories fanning between her fingers. He slouches into place beside her with a grin, brushing against her and leaning over to point out a shot she’s holding up with a delighted laugh. Images of himself mid-stride, others of him framed like a statue ready to be made, her on the narrow edge like some sun-blessed conqueror—though not nearly as nicely looking as the ones she’d taken of him, his skills clearly better at reading maps than composition.
”She will,” he agrees without hesitation, because he’s in love with them, and they’re a far better display of the city than the lone structures and obscure movements of strangers in the shots he’d taken before it fell. The ruins feel so much more alive in her images because she knew how to capture happiness. A grin curves slowly across his mouth as he nods toward the shot of them under the arch. ”She doesn’t get that one though. We’re hanging that one somewhere prominent.”
”Think we should get a shot of her when we call her?” he says with a tilt of his head, peering up from their tangible moments to the aqua of her eyes. Excitement gleams back from his, eager to harness the stars into the shape of their love.
He watches her more than once when she won’t notice, or pretends to scan the skyline for Weather or aligning positions on his map, while really he’s just marveling at the way she throws herself into the bit, into everything. She crouches for the perfect shot, intimate with the drama of shadow, wind, and angles like they have always been her besties. She clambers over jagged stone outcroppings and the scattered remains of things that’d once been monumental as if she could defeat change by standing atop it.
All of it he encourages and performs right back, because this is how they reclaim something. He valiantly leads them across broken paths and leaps over crumbling ledges just to wrestle a better look. He mourns things lost with a smile and a salute, allowing the camera to memorialize what has shifted its skin and found new form. He hurls himself into the idea of bravery with every stance she orders him into, and before long it’s honest instead of pretend. As they wander, their stories and laughter breathe something new into the rubble, and it stops being a march of loss, becoming something fresh and treasured instead.
When she insists on the duo shot beneath the arch, he doesn’t hesitate. He steps in close, shoulder to shoulder, posture organized in just the right way for glory and legacy. When she leans in, his arm settles naturally at her back, their bodies pressing in with an instinctual fit. Rank’s abandoned for the sake of something steady, the picture sealing it in place.
By the time they return to the deck, clothes disheveled with effort and salt drying on their skin, he feels lighter than he has in weeks. ”Excellent job Hot Honey!” he commends before dropping his pack near the large map. The feather boa has completely escaped to the stairs leading below deck, but the other paper weights have remained at their stations. He watches her flip through the polaroids, the little square memories fanning between her fingers. He slouches into place beside her with a grin, brushing against her and leaning over to point out a shot she’s holding up with a delighted laugh. Images of himself mid-stride, others of him framed like a statue ready to be made, her on the narrow edge like some sun-blessed conqueror—though not nearly as nicely looking as the ones she’d taken of him, his skills clearly better at reading maps than composition.
”She will,” he agrees without hesitation, because he’s in love with them, and they’re a far better display of the city than the lone structures and obscure movements of strangers in the shots he’d taken before it fell. The ruins feel so much more alive in her images because she knew how to capture happiness. A grin curves slowly across his mouth as he nods toward the shot of them under the arch. ”She doesn’t get that one though. We’re hanging that one somewhere prominent.”
”Think we should get a shot of her when we call her?” he says with a tilt of his head, peering up from their tangible moments to the aqua of her eyes. Excitement gleams back from his, eager to harness the stars into the shape of their love.
Kaisel
Make me your radio and turn me up when you feel low
Wearing a watery blue, faded and stretched-out sparkling hair tie on his left wrist
