{se} I wonder if I'll ever stop wondering

Hotaru

I don’t care, I’m in love
(Stop before it’s too late)

The thoughts plague her for days before she gives in. Tossing and turning, staring into the dark of her house holding herself as she tries not to feel like all the good she has just gotten her hands around is slipping through her fingers like sand. She thinks of going to Deimos, Talyson or Alys - the only friends she really has - but she knows Deimos, ever the protective brother, will have endless opinions on not only her thoughts but her actions. Talyson was growing, bless his heart, but she couldn't be sure he would be capable of a conversation so heavy and full of history. And Alys...well, she doesn't want to scare the woman away.

Sunjata's promise rings in her head every night. And every night her resolve weakens, her fear and anger grow, and the inevitable draws closer.

So it is that she arrives at his window at the House of Midnight in her falcon form, golden feathers pale in the moonlight overhead as she taps her beak against his window and calls out through the bond. Sunny? Are you awake? Can you come outside?

And I still don’t know why it’s happening
(But I make the same old mistakes)

// and i hear your ship is comin' in, your tears a sea for me to swim in
and i hear a storm is comin' in, my dear, is it all we've ever been? //

He still barely sleeps these days, none of that has changed. So it’s about the time that he’s tossing and turning in the bed that he hears the tapping, exhausted and unsure if it’s just a particularly rowdy crew beneath that has even his loft shaking — when he realizes it isn’t, the second Hotaru’s voice filters through and he sits up like a bullet, heart hammering for a brief moment as he pinpoints the falcon at his window.

Blankets are tossed back, Sunjata forgoing having to walk around the edge of the bed to shift into his macaw shift, leaving a few blue feathers behind before he shifts back into himself to open the window, offering a quiet yes, give me just a second, a second to throw some semblance of clothes on, a shirt unbuttoned in his rush, pulling on a pair of pants he doesn’t take the time to button yet, immediately shifting back into the macaw to meet her outside and yet again returns to his human shift. Everything okay, Ru? He asks sleepily, hoarsely, working to button up his clothes before he starts to comb his fingers through his hair.

anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love

SUNJATA

Hotaru

I don’t care, I’m in love
(Stop before it’s too late)

The reflection of the glass makes it hard to see him clearly which at first only worsens her panic, but the frantic beating of her heart slows a little the moment she feels his mind touch hers. It feels like agony to dive off the windowsill to provide him room to exit, gliding down and further from the brothel to the open field of flowers still stubbornly blooming in the early autumn, lit up like satellites by the fullness of the moon above.

There she lands and transforms back - equally unfit for company in her nightwear. Given how she has been thinking of him for days now, tonight that means the striped shirt she'd admitted to having stolen from him. It sags comically on her frame and conceals the shorts she's wearing beneath, standing barefoot in the flowers looking stranded and small. Hotaru had hoped it would help, that it might stimmy the urge to see him, but not only had she failed she'd failed so utterly that she'd flown here without even trying to change into something presentable.

Though he asks the question across the bond, she can't bear to have it fully open right now, and comes straight into his arms without a care for how he's trying to put himself together. "I think I'm, I'm, fucked up or broken or -" she immediately dissolves, any pretense of greetings or explanations fizzling away beneath the weight of her emotions. "I don't know. I didn't want to bother you, I didn't want to make this about me." Not when she has mistakenly framed this in her head as her being there for Sunjata, not the other way around. "But I didn't know where to go. I didn't know who to talk to." And it's clear by the way her voice wavers hard in the middle that tears are on the horizon if something doesn't happen.

And I still don’t know why it’s happening
(But I make the same old mistakes)

// and i hear your ship is comin' in, your tears a sea for me to swim in
and i hear a storm is comin' in, my dear, is it all we've ever been? //

He finds her amongst the field of flowers, in that same striped green shirt he’d loved so long ago, and if it weren’t for how dire and how, well, not put together Hotaru is, he’d likely comment on it. But given the late hour and the moon and stars overhead, the way she looks so sad, he only manages to get his pants buttoned before his hands fall away from the shirt the second she dives into his chest, closed off and hidden from him.

He tucks her in, and he’s silent as he listens to the way her voice wavers and uncertainty and fear lingers in the tones of her voice that he can’t help but to wrap his arms around her tighter as if he can let all of his draconic protectiveness ensure nothing gets to her while he’s here. “Hey, shh, it’s okay. I’m here for you too, remember?” He starts to say, voice still rough and accented but gentle.

“What happened? Are you hurt?” He asks, pulling away just enough to let his hands roam around her shoulders, along the familiar fabric of his old shirt, as if checking for wounds or heat. Regardless, his concern is felt through his side of the bond and the way he checks over her are entire trademarks of his attention to making sure he doesn’t need to leave right now and find whatever it was that has upset her.

anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love

SUNJATA

Hotaru

I don’t care, I’m in love
(Stop before it’s too late)

Long has she been the only rock in this storm, propped and aided only by the earthen support of those few who would not see her utterly lost to it. Hotaru had forgotten the way this feels - the way he feels - when he is the one to keep her feet on the ground, because as his arms come around her and his raspy, tired voice touches her ear, the clamoring in her head goes quiet.

Left with only his side of the bond and the sudden quiet in her head, she feels unsteady on her feet as his hands carefully check over her, and her eyes can only helplessly come to his face. Utterly lost. "No, not hurt," she manages to mumble, and pries slowly at her side of the bond until he can begin to feel the echos of her own emotions, though they're rather muddied. Hurt, fear, dread.

"I don't know what to do." It's practically a whimper. She hasn't felt this adrift in literal years. But her hands come up without her permission, holding onto his shirt as if afraid he'll step back the moment he's sure she's not injured. "I went on a date. Two dates, actually." It comes out of her like a confession better fit for pews and pulpits, scarcely daring to blink as she searches his eyes for - what, forgiveness? "I did it all by the book. I like him. I - I even initiated and -" she doesn't assume she needs to explain what it was she initiated honestly, "- and when he tried, I couldn't. I couldn't let him touch me. I couldn't have him close." And it's clear from the way her eyes are going glassy that this is far more serious to her than her frantic words are managing to convey; luckily, her bond fills in the rest. "What if I can't, anymore? Can't - can't -" love?

Her lips begin to tremble and her hands tighten in his shirt. "What if you were the last? What if I ruined myself over you?" Because god forbid she blame him even now, it has to be her fault.

And I still don’t know why it’s happening
(But I make the same old mistakes)

// and i hear your ship is comin' in, your tears a sea for me to swim in
and i hear a storm is comin' in, my dear, is it all we've ever been? //

It is only marginally satisfying to him when she confirms she isn’t hurt. It doesn’t help that she’s still an utter wreck, and it’s the exact thing that keeps him in her space even as his shoulder loosen with the tension of her agreement and he exhaled a breath he didn’t know he’d held.

His brows pinch, however, as she explains that she doesn’t know what to do — so at odds with how she always seemed to know what to do. She was impulsive at times like he is, but she was also methodical, agonizing over every detail until she was sure it was perfect. What he doesn’t expect to hear is a date, however, and all he can do is stare at her, waiting for the ball to drop.

He has no reason to be jealous or protective. They’re working on their friendship, of course, and that was their priority over anything else. If anything, he finds himself proud of her for trying again — because gods knew he wasn’t going to allow himself the same. So he’s silent as he listens, as she explains and searches his gaze for something he doesn’t know, only able to express back to her nothing but understanding when the pieces fall.

She has a death grip on his open shirt and the muscles tick in his jaw the second the truth comes out, and his brows pinch further as understanding hits and there’s something that feels cold and still on his side of the bond before he starts to block it off too. “I’m so sorry, Hotaru.” He doesn’t know what to say. But as always, he fills it in with actions, pulling her in against his chest again, arms winding around her to keep her close against his scarred and warm body.

“I… Know what you mean, though.” He’d slept with Danta as a quick fling, the first and only man he’s been with since. The other, she’d know, was Isla. And it had taken him so long to even be okay with that which was so at odds with his usual coping mechanism that she’d know all too well. “It’s difficult because you want it to be how it was and when it isn’t, it’s just…” He exhales a sigh, unsure how to end the sentence, hoping maybe she can fill in the blank.

The only thing that comes to his mind is; ’wrong’.

But what he can assure her of is with all the fervor he has within him when his accented voice picks up again. “You’re not broken.”

anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love

SUNJATA

Hotaru

I don’t care, I’m in love
(Stop before it’s too late)

The closing of his side of the bond only makes her tighten her hands in his shirt until she worries either her fingers will go straight through or her hands will go numb. It feels like he's leaving her even when he's standing right there.

She doesn't want his apologies. She wants him to fix this. Fix the part of her that still loves him, that started waiting and never knew when to stop. She wants to shake him, demand it, force him to do something that will finally make her let go. Instead, she curls into his arms and shakes. Hotaru isn't sure if that's an improvement.

"If I'm not broken then how do I fix it? And how do I know?" Because Sunjata knows, but he has also given up on opening his heart to new people. What if that is her fate? Through the bond these thoughts are so clear he can surely parse them, though she doesn't consciously give them words, so broken open that even her internal monologue is clear.

She'd kissed George so many times, and each time had been pleasant. But just pleasant. Was it a fulfillment of her touch-starvation, then? Nothing more? Was she addicted to toxicity? Was that why she'd been so ravaged by Thranduil, Ashamin, Sunjata himself? Would she never be free, even with an opportunity at simple, easy happiness so close at hand?

Pulling back from him she looks up at him desperately, tormented by sleepless nights and the fear that after all she has lost, this too has been sacrificed. "Kiss me." A command, a plea, it doesn't matter how he takes it. She just needs him to.

And I still don’t know why it’s happening
(But I make the same old mistakes)

// and i hear your ship is comin' in, your tears a sea for me to swim in
and i hear a storm is comin' in, my dear, is it all we've ever been? //

His bond only starts to close because he doesn’t want to worry her with the uncertainty that lingers in himself, the cold dread of I’ve ruined this too and we’ve just gotten started. Some part of him oily and dreading the idea that she was right, that he’d ruined her chance to love again, though how could he have known?

It’s a slow going process though and her panic is what keeps him from shutting it completely, just enough to keep the more worried thoughts from slipping through — enough that he can still feel the way her side feels like a hurricane while his feels like the waves of a sea, reacting to such an upset of the status quo.

“It took… A lot of persistence, after Lusea.” And while he didn’t love Maea the same, as he had the fiery Korofi woman and how he’d loved Nate, it had still taken Nate picking him up in the darkest times. Hotaru had done that too, though he doesn’t know how to explain it in a way that makes it make sense because his bond drops open the second she commands him, his arms tight around her still, initial confusion mixed with understanding, Sunjata meeting her dual toned gaze as if trying to seek out whether or not she wanted this. He doesn’t mention any attempts after Nate, however, because each one had felt not quite whole; each kiss from Isla had been great, don’t get him wrong, but it felt different at its core for him, as if he knew that he couldn’t allow himself to actually enjoy it. It was wrapped up in everything when they’d cool off, when they’d share a bed and he could forget about things for a while. He’s never put much thought into the feeling it sparked (or didn’t, aside from natural bodily ones in those instances).

But it was just a test, right? For her to see if it feels different? He selfishly hopes it doesn’t change the hard work they’re trying to do, but he absolutely won’t deny her. Okay, if you’re sure. He says through the bond, unsure if his actual words would fail him, searching her face and her side of the bond for confirmation before his hand lifts to her cheek, spreading his fingertips through her blonde hair to tilt her head back, leaning down to press his lips to her in a gentle kiss, tasting the fresh salt of her tears, unable to keep his side of the bond from warming like a crackling fire to soothe her. And gods, does it feel different to him.

anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love

SUNJATA

Hotaru

I don’t care, I’m in love
(Stop before it’s too late)

This night can be seen in two different ways; the inevitable backslide after a strong forward march of healing and discovery, or the masquerading of inner feelings as something necessary for the sake of pursuit. Hotaru is tired trying to figure out which she falls into. Tired of trying to analyze herself down to the last atom in the vain hopes of asserting enough impartial control over her own actions to prevent the cataclysmic events of years before. Though she’d been a controlling woman before, now it has become a complex, a twisted web that means she must oversee and judge her own decisions and eternally find them lacking. It means she can’t trust herself.

But in her mind she sees this is a necessary test. He had promised not to leave, and she doesn’t intend to even after this, which means there is a presumed measure of safety that secures her against abandonment. Now, by kissing him, she can swiftly figure out if she truly is broken; if even Sunjata can’t make her feel anything anymore, when she knows she feels more for him than any other person on this earth, then there is no hope for her. Otherwise, she’ll feel something, reassuring that she still can but also hopefully providing a barometer for the ‘why hadn’t she before’. And, lastly, whether or not she has any hope of finally closing that door that has stood open and wanting for four years.

His hand cups her face. She tilts her head and sees him backlit by stars, moonlight creating a halo around his mussed hair. There, in her chest, is the fondness she always feels and has grown used to weathering the pain of. Everything so far is bearable. Normal.

Then he kisses her.

And she feels something come untethered, and glassy eyes spill over.

And I still don’t know why it’s happening
(But I make the same old mistakes)

// and i hear your ship is comin' in, your tears a sea for me to swim in
and i hear a storm is comin' in, my dear, is it all we've ever been? //

His side of the bond drops open, eyes shutting as their lips meet, as his arms remain tangled with her both offering and taking in the warmth her body offers. And the sensation that his bond has to offer is that of crackling embers, warming like the smooth waters of a hot spring, comfort.

It’s like he’s gone these past two years (and before, with Nate, because she’d always been part of the plan then too), he’s been a broken puzzle piece, missing the part that could connect him so fiercely to anyone else. She fits against him perfectly, like there’s a whisper calling from his inner dark, jagged void, of finally.

It’s terrifying, to an extent, but it cements the words he’d given her in the inn when he’d told her that he always would love her. Because this kiss doesn’t feel like a goodbye or a mediocre thing, it feels like a homecoming, and he’s blinded by the warmth and rush of emotions it brings, causing his possessiveness around her to grow tighter, hand tightening in her hair, his other arm keeping her against him while she wears his shirt. It ticks all of the boxes that broken thing inside him needed to quiet down.

anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love

SUNJATA

Hotaru

I don’t care, I’m in love
(Stop before it’s too late)

She can’t tell if the burn in the back of her throat is the sting of tears or something akin to liquor down the throat of an alcoholic. She’s an addict, and even four years couldn’t keep her from reaching for that bottle again. Because the moment he kisses her it’s like she has opened her eyes and realized everything she thought was once straight had merely been a trick of the eye, because her axis has centered and the strain behind her eyes has disappeared as the world rights itself.

And isn’t that the worst part? Because she doesn’t even have the wherewithal to dread or celebrate her revelations, too consumed by the kiss itself.

By their standards it’s painfully simple, and yet it feels like every dead nerve is waking up and lighting itself on fire to spite her for all this time wasted. He holds her firmly, not like she’s glass, or like she needs protecting - the way George had. Her hands, formerly gripping his shirt, push upward and over his shoulders with such immediate need that it bunches the fabric until she can get her hands in his hair to pull him closer. Arching into the space his body makes for her until every ounce of open air is crushed between them. The bond between them only makes it that much harder to think, because for once she can feel how he feels, and she thinks if they’d had that before then it might have saved them.

But for him he won’t feel a homecoming, because for Ru it’s like one final stone crumbles and the void she was living in is pierced with light that nearly blinds her. A swift, immediate resolution to a loneliness and isolation that she has been carrying for so very long. And that’s precisely why the tears sneak onto her cheeks; she can feel. She’s not broken. She’s just doomed in a different way, because she can’t find it in herself to pull back. Telling herself just one more second, just to be sure. Then I can quit.

And I still don’t know why it’s happening
(But I make the same old mistakes)

// and i hear your ship is comin' in, your tears a sea for me to swim in
and i hear a storm is comin' in, my dear, is it all we've ever been? //

He doesn’t have to be soft and gentle with her – she’s always been the more fiery between the two of them. His protectiveness is simply from the comment he’d made in Frey’s Breath where she’d asked him what kind of things he hoarded. The protectiveness he shares with her right now is precisely that – a treasure that he doesn’t want to give up right this second.

And it feels like time slows, because he doesn’t know how long they’ve been in this kiss, only brought back to some semblance of what’s going on right now because of the way her hands drift up, the fabric bunched and pulled in all sorts of directions until they’re let go, until the fabric hangs loosely on his frame as she arches against him, hands in his hair, and he leaves one to cup her face while the other trails down to the small of her back, pressing down into the kiss to minimize all the distance they feasibly can.

He doesn’t want to break it either, but he has to – though it doesn’t keep him from separating them. His hands still keep her close, his forehead meeting hers as his chest heaves for breath, having no doubts over the question she’d had earlier if she could still feel, because he could sense every bit and piece in the bond to prove that their feelings sparked like livewires. And he feels frozen, not wanting to give up this moment, to stay here as long as he can.

anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love

SUNJATA

Hotaru

I don’t care, I’m in love
(Stop before it’s too late)

It should be something out of a fairytale, and if they were two different people maybe it would be. Maybe another version of them out in the universe is standing in this same spot, but it’s their first kiss, and it’s utterly perfect. The stars, the cool night air, the flowers gone silver with moonlight. But their story has chapters upon chapters already written and thumbed aside; this is no beginning, but it’s also no end. Blank pages cascade out before her and her hand hesitates, uncertain what words are supposed to come next.

He pulls away, exhibiting more strength than she has, but the intoxication scarcely fades when their emotions are intertwined like woven threads that keep her head snared in the clouds. For such a simple, if passionate kiss, she shouldn’t be trying to catch her breath - but she finds she is anyway. Blinking stars out of her eyes that she hopes are just from the ones she can see past his cheek, Hotaru swallows and slowly brings her hands down and away from his hair to rest on his shoulders. The ground has fallen out from under her feet and she doesn’t know how to bring herself back to earth; part of her, addicted to the way he has always made her feel, doesn’t want to. The other part only quails further, terrified by what she has done - just as nervous as Sunjata had been before that this will (or already has) changed things.

“Um,” she utters, and her voice is an almost comical squeak that she has to clear away as heat climbs in her cheeks and up her ears. She isn’t sure if it’s shame or fluster. Would it matter which? “I - thank you.” Maybe if they don’t talk about it she can save this. No matter how hard she has worked to be more communicative, more open, she feels that progress slipping through her fingers as she realizes how badly this could go. And, once again, it would be all her fault. But her head is clear and free of panic, and that’s all she’s asked him to do. He had fulfilled his end of the bargain. So what now?

And I still don’t know why it’s happening
(But I make the same old mistakes)

// and i hear your ship is comin' in, your tears a sea for me to swim in
and i hear a storm is comin' in, my dear, is it all we've ever been? //

They both share that uncertainty if they’ve ruined everything – but one thing is for certain. They’re more mature now, they’ve lived and learned and made those boundaries to start again, to work on it, and even if this kiss felt time stopping and perfect and vibrant in all the places where Sunjata had lived with a drought and she was the rain, he’s smart enough now to know that for him, despite his worries and fear, that it won’t ruin it. He won’t let her think that she has.

Her voice is a squeak and all Sunjata can do is hum a breathy snort, pulling back a little more to focus his steel gaze on her, arm still around her while the other starts to pull away from her hair, running his fingertips along her jawline. “You’re welcome.” He murmurs softly, before realizing that through the bond she’s settled, that it had answered her questions, quelled her fears, and it’s what bolsters him enough to give her one of his traditionally roguish smirks, even if the scar bunches awkwardly on the corner of his lips.

“If you need another reminder all you need to do is ask.” It comes out as a gentle tease, evident in how his side of the bond is calm and even, not overwhelming or expecting or pressuring her into changing her mind. A joke is all it is, punctuated with a wink, torn between pulling away from her to separate them more or remaining close in case she asks him again.

anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love. anchor up to me, love

SUNJATA