the stars lined our heartbeats

Deimos

we are all b r o k e n
that's how the l i g h t gets in

He leaned into her touch, thought about closing his eyes again, about just feeling, about just knowing, about not being torn apart or mauled or condemned; rattled by how he’d managed to traverse so far with her. His breath curled and intermingled with billowing shades along curves of her fingers, orbiting, revolutions of stars and shields and swords, cloaked in something not brutal, not consigned to oblivion, not contorted into upheaval – swallowing, burying into the devotion, the ardor, the love, that he thought long since bleak, extinct. He couldn’t fathom what she saw, what she thought – but took the devotion for all the reverence, rapture, and ardor, strived to continually extend it in return.

The beast might’ve snorted at her wonder and amazement – no matter how many times he extended his created contortions towards her, no matter how many times he proffered the wake of his contortions, extended and gave and granted. Instead, his gaze sketched and traced over the foundations of those brightened, jubilant intervals, as if he was afraid they wouldn’t last, as if frightened and aware he could easily ruin, diminish them, with a fault, with a flaw, with some stupefied error. The apprehension churned to the back of his throat again, her excitement pervading and surrounding, and his misgivings, his reservations, his insecurities rampantly deigned to take over.

But so did his ferocity. So did his passion. So did his commitments, his convictions, his resolutions. So did his reverence for her, for her, for her.

One hand reached down into his pocket, withdrawing a box he’d been hiding, containing, for the entire Fiat Lux event, intending to strive, to try, to echo back everything encompassed in his essence. His words wouldn’t be enough; they never had been. So his fingers nervously brushed over the edges, the fringes, and then pulled it forth, before her – and if his palms were shaking he said nothing about it, opening the box to reveal the ring. “I -,” and then he stopped, because the discourse was going to break him apart, reverting quickly to bonds, to connections, where his voice wouldn’t quiver and his heart wouldn’t stammer and a thousand other things wouldn’t flicker into his lungs. A rumble, a ricochet, a resounding of oaths and assurances and trying to convey everything properly - not enough, not enough, not enough. Love you. The item shined in its gold and silver plated glimmer, in the drawn etchings of stars and moons and things he likely had no place in striving for – gaze fixated on her and waiting, waiting, waiting for some inevitable shift. Marry me?

keep the ones who
h e a r d y o u
when you never said a word