How do I keep myself from fallin' apart when I ain't never felt part of a whole?
It is like he slips his fingers between pages in a cracked book to open it wide, glimpses shifting to words that are readily translated. She basks and prods at the emotions around her, incapable of describing how she knows them but feeling them like a second skin. Ultimately someone else’s, but brushing against her own mind all the same. He will sense a flicker of abject relief at such assurances, moments before her own side of the bond tempers slightly in its overshare - as if it matters when moments later she is human anew and reaching to touch him once more. It’s easy, and she doesn’t know why. Certainly no romantic inclinations come to mind; perhaps it’s their similar life stories, or merely this awkward but fulfilling moment they’ve shared.
“And I would not give you another gift-wrapped crisis,” she teases, pinching gently the swell of his smiling cheek, smoothing over the area with her thumb when she releases it. The motion stutters when he softens, and her hands fall in natural cascade to his shoulders; averting her eyes only leads to a soft pinkening of her own cheeks at the unintentional glimpse of his body, but it’s easier than facing what he has to say visually. The combination of his sincerity and ethereal looks are too much for her, drunk in skin contact and Attunement alike.
“You are a stranger to me only in time it feels,” is her tentative admission. His hand is warm where it lays over hers, concealing it entirely. “Like looking in a mirror. I would not call myself a gift either.” To anyone. Though they both are perhaps seeing only the gold that holds the cracks together, kintsugi in human form, and overlooking the raw edges that they both feel internally. Hotaru is accustomed to people only appreciating the surface, but for once she doesn’t wish to intentionally hide that ugliness. “Though I admit I have only been spoiled by myself.” A sad truth she hopes he won’t read into too much.
Remi’s mirth earns him a pull of the earlobe with the hand his does not hold captive this time, find exasperation painting her face. “You’ll not be rid of me that easily now. Someone has to be a burr in your bosom to convince you of your questionable status as a gift.” A way of extending her hand across the metaphorical gap. They have missed a few steps on the path to a normal friendship, but that won’t stop her from trying. She certainly has nothing to lose - Deimos too certain a guarantee, and everything beyond him is ash.
“And I would not give you another gift-wrapped crisis,” she teases, pinching gently the swell of his smiling cheek, smoothing over the area with her thumb when she releases it. The motion stutters when he softens, and her hands fall in natural cascade to his shoulders; averting her eyes only leads to a soft pinkening of her own cheeks at the unintentional glimpse of his body, but it’s easier than facing what he has to say visually. The combination of his sincerity and ethereal looks are too much for her, drunk in skin contact and Attunement alike.
“You are a stranger to me only in time it feels,” is her tentative admission. His hand is warm where it lays over hers, concealing it entirely. “Like looking in a mirror. I would not call myself a gift either.” To anyone. Though they both are perhaps seeing only the gold that holds the cracks together, kintsugi in human form, and overlooking the raw edges that they both feel internally. Hotaru is accustomed to people only appreciating the surface, but for once she doesn’t wish to intentionally hide that ugliness. “Though I admit I have only been spoiled by myself.” A sad truth she hopes he won’t read into too much.
Remi’s mirth earns him a pull of the earlobe with the hand his does not hold captive this time, find exasperation painting her face. “You’ll not be rid of me that easily now. Someone has to be a burr in your bosom to convince you of your questionable status as a gift.” A way of extending her hand across the metaphorical gap. They have missed a few steps on the path to a normal friendship, but that won’t stop her from trying. She certainly has nothing to lose - Deimos too certain a guarantee, and everything beyond him is ash.
HOTARU
