is this the end of all the endings?
For a moment Flora doesn’t lean into him at all. She lets him wrap around her, lets his arms settle, lets his chin find her shoulder, but her body holds there; still, braced, her gaze locked out across the harbour like if she looks away it might vanish and if it doesn’t then at least she won’t have to pretend she didn’t see it. The sails catch the early light in that way they always do, too red for morning, too sharp against the soft gold of dawn, and she knows first-hand how deliberate that colour is, how it was never meant to belong to anything gentle, how it was made to cut against the horizon like something bleeding into the sky.
It sits there like it has every right to. Like it always will, and something in her stomach tightens at that, a small, unwelcome twist that pulls her inward for just a second, makes her feel smaller than she should in her own home, in her own harbour, like something has slipped past her guard without even trying, like he can come and go as he pleases and she’s the one left reacting to it after the fact.
Her breath leaves her slowly, then, and the tension eases; not gone, but loosened enough that she can move again, her head tilting just slightly to nuzzle into the space where Kaisel's neck meets his shoulder, the contact quiet and soft, like she’s reminding herself of where she is, of who she’s with, of what actually matters in this moment and not the ghost of something that keeps showing up uninvited.
A soft groan hums low in her throat, the beginning of a complaint she doesn’t quite let form, her hand sliding up along Kaisel's arm instead, fingers tracing the line of him as she steadies herself, as she keeps her eyes on the ship just a second longer before letting them soften. "Do you think it matters?" she asks quietly, her voice low, almost thoughtful as it slips between them.
It sits there like it has every right to. Like it always will, and something in her stomach tightens at that, a small, unwelcome twist that pulls her inward for just a second, makes her feel smaller than she should in her own home, in her own harbour, like something has slipped past her guard without even trying, like he can come and go as he pleases and she’s the one left reacting to it after the fact.
Her breath leaves her slowly, then, and the tension eases; not gone, but loosened enough that she can move again, her head tilting just slightly to nuzzle into the space where Kaisel's neck meets his shoulder, the contact quiet and soft, like she’s reminding herself of where she is, of who she’s with, of what actually matters in this moment and not the ghost of something that keeps showing up uninvited.
A soft groan hums low in her throat, the beginning of a complaint she doesn’t quite let form, her hand sliding up along Kaisel's arm instead, fingers tracing the line of him as she steadies herself, as she keeps her eyes on the ship just a second longer before letting them soften. "Do you think it matters?" she asks quietly, her voice low, almost thoughtful as it slips between them.
my broken bones are mending
