They were selfish together, and it was a selfishness Tal wouldn't have minded if he'd even known of it. It was enough that she was alive and here, where he could see and feel and know it, and if she took some small comfort in his own presence then it was nothing he would begrudge her. He was sandstone to her granite, a weak and fragile stone to bear her sorrow, but better able to shoulder hers than his own.
It was what family did.
And if she had broken beyond repairing, then he would still love the pieces that remained.
The ghost of her lingered, at least. He heard it in her voice, the question as innocent as sunrise and as pointed as a cougar's fang. Delia was no blood relative of his, but a dear friend whose cowardice he might judge but didn't begrudge on this night when so many others lay cold and lifeless in the square. "Doesn't matter," he sighed into pale hair. "Least she's not dead. S'all I'm askin' for tonight." At least she was around to fight with and forgive over it. Strange, he wondered distantly, numbly, how one's priorities could shift so drastically in less than a day.
If only he had chosen different words. But he couldn't have, when he hadn't known. Hotaru's embrace softened and he held his breath, some ineffable sense of teetering on a precipice washing through him like vertigo as the silence stretched, punctuated only by rare heartbeats.
And shattered, not with a crash but with a whisper, whisking the world out from beneath Tal's feet and leaving him dizzy and sick in front of the door to Hotaru's house.
"Enzo...? Flora!" His name was a question, a name without a face, a story without a cover. But hers was a gasp as Tal stiffened and a memory of blonde insouciance and the taste of vodka on his tongue turned to blood and ashes. "Oh, Ru, fuck."
What else was there to say?
It was what family did.
And if she had broken beyond repairing, then he would still love the pieces that remained.
The ghost of her lingered, at least. He heard it in her voice, the question as innocent as sunrise and as pointed as a cougar's fang. Delia was no blood relative of his, but a dear friend whose cowardice he might judge but didn't begrudge on this night when so many others lay cold and lifeless in the square. "Doesn't matter," he sighed into pale hair. "Least she's not dead. S'all I'm askin' for tonight." At least she was around to fight with and forgive over it. Strange, he wondered distantly, numbly, how one's priorities could shift so drastically in less than a day.
If only he had chosen different words. But he couldn't have, when he hadn't known. Hotaru's embrace softened and he held his breath, some ineffable sense of teetering on a precipice washing through him like vertigo as the silence stretched, punctuated only by rare heartbeats.
And shattered, not with a crash but with a whisper, whisking the world out from beneath Tal's feet and leaving him dizzy and sick in front of the door to Hotaru's house.
"Enzo...? Flora!" His name was a question, a name without a face, a story without a cover. But hers was a gasp as Tal stiffened and a memory of blonde insouciance and the taste of vodka on his tongue turned to blood and ashes. "Oh, Ru, fuck."
What else was there to say?
