You're so cold
but you feel alive
With nothing more immediately in her hands, the girl turned to face Sunjata as he started to answer. She had not expected him to, and listened with a breathless stillness about her as he related the tale. Blow by blow, as if it was an official report made by a bystander. As if it was not about him at all, and he couldn't care less.
But seeing the feathering of his jawmuscles, the tension over his shoulders, the dark roil in his eyes, she knew it wasn't true. Brief as their acquaintance was, she had experienced enough of his moods to recognize a storm when she saw one. It was there behind the steely gray ocean in his gaze, in the tone that was just a little too even. The shallow breaths worried her. Maea watched him as he went to settle tables back in their places, and came over to join him in the task. Not because he needed the help, but because she wanted to.
"I am so sorry," she said softly, meaning to lock gaze with him as they lifted one of the heavier tables into place together. Warm and sincere, her sympathy for him was palpable. "That it ended this way. That it had to end at all."
Phoebe had been important to him once. Perhaps still was, for all that the two had hurt one another to the best of their considerable abilities. If it had been love between them at one point, then this must be the most bitter of partings. In anger, in pain, in mutual loathing. And perhaps it was the bar Phoebe had taken out her rage on, but it was Sunjata she had aimed at. Every blow. Knowing it would hurt him most to lose this place.
It was quite deliberately done, as far as Maea could tell. And as her gaze trailed over him, landing on bite marks along his neck and wrists, she thought she knew what had brought it on. Her glance asked the question, even if words never would. Had it been on purpose? Going to that ascended healer, knowing what it would result in?
But seeing the feathering of his jawmuscles, the tension over his shoulders, the dark roil in his eyes, she knew it wasn't true. Brief as their acquaintance was, she had experienced enough of his moods to recognize a storm when she saw one. It was there behind the steely gray ocean in his gaze, in the tone that was just a little too even. The shallow breaths worried her. Maea watched him as he went to settle tables back in their places, and came over to join him in the task. Not because he needed the help, but because she wanted to.
"I am so sorry," she said softly, meaning to lock gaze with him as they lifted one of the heavier tables into place together. Warm and sincere, her sympathy for him was palpable. "That it ended this way. That it had to end at all."
Phoebe had been important to him once. Perhaps still was, for all that the two had hurt one another to the best of their considerable abilities. If it had been love between them at one point, then this must be the most bitter of partings. In anger, in pain, in mutual loathing. And perhaps it was the bar Phoebe had taken out her rage on, but it was Sunjata she had aimed at. Every blow. Knowing it would hurt him most to lose this place.
It was quite deliberately done, as far as Maea could tell. And as her gaze trailed over him, landing on bite marks along his neck and wrists, she thought she knew what had brought it on. Her glance asked the question, even if words never would. Had it been on purpose? Going to that ascended healer, knowing what it would result in?
lay your hands on me
one last time
MAEA
