[There's only one word for it, the overwhelming this that's filled up his chest, his skull, the white ghost of a SOUL clasped between their fingertips. There's only one word for what's swelled up between them, the fragments of knowing that have leapt, unbidden, from head to heart to SOUL to back again.
It's not really real.
It still scares the hell out of him.
And that's the bottom line, ain't it? The fact that - that even if this, all of this, is terrifying and unknown and unknowable - that he couldn't get away, even if he wanted to.
Except he doesn't want to.
Even before he felt this, this everything, this heavy something-everything-nothing, he's had a thought, see. A thought not worth admitting aloud, 'cause saying it might make it real. A thought he saw played out across the looks of stunned, angry betrayal screwed up in the faces of two dying children, and a thought he saw in the Shadow of a tipped-over bottle over at Delight's.
Because maybe it's a what if. Maybe it's only a maybe.
But maybes it won't always be maybe. Not forever. Not with things always changing, always moving ahead. Not with how it's all fallen into place like pieces of a heart, slivers of a determination-red sky been pulled into one whole. And they are. And he is. And it's terrifying. Because they were never broken. Just a little bit chipped 'round the edge. And it's small, so very small, but - it's there in the careful leaning forward, the small bump of his skull against their forehead in a closeness that just feels right, an action that's just as spontaneous as it is something half-remembered.]
[And it's there in the words that follow. Quiet, so quiet. Barely a whisper.]
no subject
It's not really real.
It still scares the hell out of him.
And that's the bottom line, ain't it? The fact that - that even if this, all of this, is terrifying and unknown and unknowable - that he couldn't get away, even if he wanted to.
Except he doesn't want to.
Even before he felt this, this everything, this heavy something-everything-nothing, he's had a thought, see. A thought not worth admitting aloud, 'cause saying it might make it real. A thought he saw played out across the looks of stunned, angry betrayal screwed up in the faces of two dying children, and a thought he saw in the Shadow of a tipped-over bottle over at Delight's.
A thought that there's not a tomorrow worth having without them in it.
Because maybe it's a what if. Maybe it's only a maybe.
But maybes it won't always be maybe. Not forever. Not with things always changing, always moving ahead. Not with how it's all fallen into place like pieces of a heart, slivers of a determination-red sky been pulled into one whole. And they are. And he is. And it's terrifying.
Because they were never broken.
Just a little bit chipped 'round the edge.
And it's small, so very small, but - it's there in the careful leaning forward, the small bump of his skull against their forehead in a closeness that just feels right, an action that's just as spontaneous as it is something half-remembered.]
[And it's there in the words that follow. Quiet, so quiet. Barely a whisper.]
I love you, kiddo.