Page 113 of My Lovely Tragedy
There is no part of me left and nothing has ever felt so right.
“It’s warm out in the sun,” Brooklyn says after a while, head tilted back, eyes closed as he faces the light. I follow every line of his body, covered or otherwise, from where I sit behind him, leaned back against the cabin.
His chains have enough slack to leave him comfortable, and though the sight makes me rationally sick, I do allow myself the reprieve of enjoying his acceptance of them.
It’s as if he doesn’t even realize they are not an extension of his body, but a foreign entity, not meant to grace such lovely, fragile flesh.
“The snow is gone,” he says softly.
I finally rip my eyes away to scour the land before us. Wet and bare, hollow after the cold of winter. Ready to bloom. To live vibrantly.
No more than a few seconds later and I’m back on Brooklyn, unable to help comparing him to the life around us. How eerily similar it all is.
“It is, indeed.”
“It’s…” He hesitates, picking at the seam of his pants. My coat slips from his shoulders, baring his nape. “Weird.”
“What is weird?”
“The snow. Being gone. How… different it all looks. I just keep picturing the storm, blowing and blinding. How fucking cold it was; I felt the ache of it in my bones. The aftermath that lasted for weeks. And now… It’s kinda surreal that that’s all gone already.”
I understand the feeling more than you know.
Yet another tragedy interwoven into our story.
“Weeks have passed,corvus.”
He glances over at me, small and resolute.
“Yeah.”
“Don’t you like the warmth?” I ask, nudging.Needinghim to say it. He shrugs, sending the coat sliding the rest of the way off. With his back now bared to me, I greedily follow the path of his spine, each etched vertebra, the hollow compressions between. The two, small dimples on either side of his tailbone.
“I don’t know. I was kinda enjoying the enclosure of it all.” He looks at me, expression resolute, and I cannot breathe. Heart thrashing as each breath grows smaller.
“Seasons change,” I croak.
“I wish they didn’t.”
My eyes close of their own volition.What can I possibly say to that? I am trying, and his resistance is far too perfect.
“I wish, too.”
“Maybe we can make our own perfect oasis and stay there,” he says quietly, as if he is speaking to himself, but I know it was meant for me.
“Oh?” I begin unpacking the basket, setting out our array of food before pulling out two glasses and uncorking the wine. “What would that look like for you?”
Brooklyn turns to face me, knees still drawn up. He takes the glass of wine, and I watch as he swirls it around the crystal before bringing it to his lips. “This.” He swallows. “What about you?”
I have never felt so out of control than I do in this moment. Utterly helpless as I succumb to his entrancing allure for the last time. “I would have to agree with you, darling.”
“That’s cheating,” he says into his glass.
“I don’t believe there is such a thing as cheating when speaking of hypotheticals.”
“Of course, there is. Rules are rules, and you have to come up with your own. You can’t take mine.” My brow lifts as I finally manage to bring my glass to my mouth without the wine sloshing over the side.
“But it isn’t yours. It’s reality. So, if one of us were breaking the rules, it would be you.”
