Amalia
For my part, I know nothing with any certainty
The moments stretch and strain and linger, so many, too many, her anger ticking like a time bomb, her insecurity rising like a tide. Misinterpreting and misunderstandings: they were inevitable, bound to come at some point, his reticence and her over-analysis crashing at last into glorious chaos, smoldering beacons of good intentions decaying into wicked ash. Her faults are carved into the wood, each claw mark another sign of her weakness, her anxiety and ineptitude swarming through her mind. I am not enough, I was never enough, I wanted to be enough, I can never be enough- the mantra has sustained the girl, as familiar as breathing. They are the words she repeated to herself when her grandmother died, when her mother left, when she stood on the bone bridge and wondered if she ought to follow in kind, when she stood before Ludo and wondered why she had been allowed to taste oblivion and had it snatched back. They are the beat of her heart, an ache in her bones, and he does not know, he cannot know, but oh, she wishes he did.Her dark eyes drop as Deimos draws near, nails curling into her palms as he takes her hand in his. Don't, she wants to snap, to howl, to sob against his chest. Don't pity me, don't placate me, don't give me kindness I don't deserve. His limbs are shaking, a sign of the storm, and she wonders a moment if he will snap, if anger will roll from the glacial expanse, if at last he will tell her he has had enough. He asks if that is what he said- "I can't read your mind-" she snaps without thinking, a wounded animal lashing out, feral and ferocious and stupid with pain. The remorse is instant, and her hands curl tighter, pinpricks of blood springing up on her palms where leopard claws cut into human skin. But the implications cannot be swallowed: they linger, brazen, in their midst. She licks her lips and hangs her head, feline features still persistent, wounds and wishes behind her teeth. "I can't read your mind," Amalia whispers, her strong brows furrowed into a frown.
But neither can he read hers.
They are broken things in the silent shop, tense and coiled, broken and breaking, the fragile beauty of their bond threatening to tear away.
She wants to recoil from him then, not from any wound he inflicted, but because of the countless she's left on herself. She wants to save him from her insecurity, to release him from a contract signed without understanding of all that she is. A child, a small and simple and stupid; a bundle of anxieties and trauma and nerves. She wants to explain, to bend down, to beg, to be forgiven for the sins that she has committed, to be chastised and chagrined, for at least if he hates her she will be absolved of having to try.
Sometimes, it is easier to be lonely than to be loved.
He does not chastise. He does not rage. Amalia does not look at him as the behemoth begins to explain, confessing to fear with greater courage than she could ever muster. He tells her honestly what he means, and she knows that it is difficult, and she knows that he is right, and oh, she wants to run away, to sequester herself in silence and cry into the dark. She is not brave, she is not strong, she is not the things he thinks, the things he is. How can he not see her terror, every moment of every day? How can he not know how little she amounts to, how weak and pathetic and woefully small? It would be easy to retreat, to vanish into her own anxieties; it would be easier to yell, to let her anger flare and rage.
"I'm sorry."
It would be easy, but it would be wrong, because he is brave and bold and generous, and he deserves her honesty, if nothing else.
"I'm scared, too." The first confession is whispered, exhaled, fervent, and her shoulders slump. She tries to bring her limbs back to her, to wrap her arms around herself, not meeting his eyes, not yielding to his touch, not taking the blessings she does not deserve. "I'm always scared. Every day. I'm scared of everything. And I- I keep trying to be better, but I.." Her head shakes, curtains of hair falling over her face, obscuring the closed eyes from view. "It's not that you don't believe in me. It's that I don't believe in me. I've never been strong. And I've always been afraid. But- please, Deimos, I have to try. I have to do whatever I can. For Safrin, and Ronin. And for Remi. And for you.
"I can't lose you, Deimos. I can't."
She trembles as the words leave her lips. It isn't what she meant to say, and she isn't sure it will make sense, but it is all she has, all she is, sharp edges and jagged knives slicing wounds that never mend. There is blood on her hands, and it is hers, because nobody can hurt her more than she has already hurt herself.
but the sight of the stars makes me dream
