Page 52 of A Grave Not Made For Mourning
He knows this pain of mine—understands it. I study the planes of his face, the lines creasing in his forehead as he furrows his eyebrows.
“Do you… want to talk?”
It’s as if the cracks in Azaire’s shell fortify and send spikes through my walls. I don’t want him to tell me if he isn’t ready. I’m about to say as much when he mutters, “All I remember is someone taking me to Visnatus in the aftermath.”
I feel his pain, a guilt-ridden agony like my own. But he doesn’t harp on it, doesn’t tug the splinter out just to shove it right back into his skin.
Azaire’s gaze shifts to mine. “I don’t want to make you feel this,” he says.
I realize his walls closed not because he didn’t want to tell me, but because he wants to spare me the pain.
It’s the most thoughtful thing anyone has ever done for me.
It makes me feel guilty—drawing him in, knowing I can’t give him everything. I can’t give himme. He will only ever get pieces, crumbs of a meal, and it doesn’t seem fair.
With a single shrug, I try to give him all I can from my half-empty cup. “You don’t have to be alone in feeling it.”
Azaire looks away, back into that blue oblivion. “I don’t mind it, really. People have their problems, and you have yours. Sometimes you meet someone who has a chance of understanding, but most people don’t.” Then he adds, “I think I prefer it alone.”
His words sound like my own. I could almost get used to him speaking my mind. If there’s anyone in this universe who has the chance of understanding me, I think it would be Azaire.
Selfishly, I hope he feels the same.
Selflessly, I hope he finds someone else.
Alone is the one place I could sit without the burden of others. The one place I could reside without the added weight of someone else’s pain.
It’s the only place I can be myself, where I can feel my grief without someone telling me it’s wrong. I never wanted to openmyself to the criticism—I’ve always known I was wrong. That I’m a burden.
I don’t need someone’s words to tell me so, nor their emotions.
Meeting Azaire’s gaze—heightening his emotion within me—I decide to give him all of me, even if only for a fleeting moment.
“Feel it,” I tell him as I reach for his hand. “I’ll be right there with you.”
?
“I want to try,”I whisper to the boy as I enter my room.
Seeing Desdemona and Lucian, being with Azaire today, it stirred something within me—the aching emptiness I can never forget. A gap that is always growing, no matter how much I try to ignore it.
The boy is the safest way to fill it—to quiet the emptiness that lingers beneath my surface, if only for a moment.
He sits before me, cross-legged on my bed, his posture unbothered, but his gaze is intent. He watches me with the kind of attention that makes me feel like I’m the only thing in the world.
I suppose in his world, I am.
“I don’t know I can do it, but—”
“Don’t you dare underestimate yourself, Wendy Estridon.”His voice may be low, but it still carries conviction. He rises to his feet and takes my hands in his.
My gloveless hands.
His skin is the only warmth I’ve felt in years. His thumb grazes over my knuckles, tracing circles, as if he’s grounding me.
“You are power incarnate. You are everything.”
“Yeah,”I mutter, looking down. The boy knows exactly why I disdain such a title. My power was revered my entire life—but it was never useful.
