Somewhere along the way, it was turning into a fight and I wasn’t sure which one of us had started swingin’.

*"Dammit Ros, shut up for a second!"*

And whadaya know? I did shut up for a second, if only because my voice had become tangled and confused with Jiji’s sudden shouting. I blinked and watched the passion rise in her face and color her eyes and she was biting my head off and I was struggling to put the pieces together—

*”I wandered off on my own, got myself infected because I didn't stick by you. Its not your fault what happened to me.”*

“I should have been there anyway Ji!” I finally found my voice, my fists, and I was swinging back at her—but it wasn’t rage that propelled my words, rather a searing, manic terror at my own mistakes, a need to have them scrutinized, acknowledged and rightfully punished. “I knew there was darkness and I should’ve been there to protect you anyway and whatever, if you wanna take credit for the infection--fine! Take credit! But you can’t just disregard a big-ass SCAR--“ my voice broke a little bit here—“—like it ain’t no big deal! I can’t just look at you and see the mess and not remember the lighting pouring outta me and right at you! I did that shit, okay?” And even though both of our voices were raised, she was a blazing sun and I was nothing but a hot mess.

*"What do you mean glowing gold? Are you saying I'm happy? I'm not happy. I haven't been happy for a long time."*

Well shit. She was twisting my arm and I had to spell out exactly what was on my mind when I said that. “I didn’t mean—it wasn’t—“ I stumbled a bit, before something in me said “fuck it” and I belted it out: “—I MEANT YOU’RE FUCKING GORGEOUS JI! SHIT!” And I’m not sure how much of a compliment it could be when it was pulled from me, torn up and bloody and ROARED like it was, but there it was anyway, laid out and vulnerable and weird and gross and as honest as I could make it.

But I didn’t miss the meaning in her words: she was unhappy. It made my chest pull and my eyes grow tight and I wanted to take her and put my head across her back again and pull her close and curb-stomp the shit that was eating her life like that—

--but I didn’t go back to her. Because, in my head, how could I deserve to be her knight? What gave me justification to take away her pain? All I knew what to do with pain was feel it; all I knew what to do with it was cause it.

*"Goddammit Roskuld! Don't you tell me goodbye! It’s all you ever tell me!"*

Case in point.

She was rearing up at me again and I was gonna rear up at her and I hated to do it—I hated to raise my voice and push back, but she was missing the way she tugged at my heartstrings so hard, hard enough to break open a flesh-wound that would probably never, never begin to heal.
“And if I don’t tell you goodbye,” I said in a rough voice, half-way deranged, tormented, “If I don’t, if we just sort of piddle around doing what we’re doing and you--” My breath hitched, “Or if I--” I began panting from the panic rising in me, sudden and powerful, stripping the breath out of my throat and pulling it down to darkness somewhere in there.

I shook my head; I squeezed my eyes shut. I grit my teeth because there was something rising other than words trying to come out, and they never, ever could leave me. “I didn’t tell Ho--I didn’t tell him—“ I began, my throat shattering despite my best attempts to hold it together, “…I never said ‘goodbye’ to him.” It hissed through me; wild and free, escaped from my grasp. “And now it’s too late.”

When I opened my eyes and looked at Ji again, they were probably glossier than they should have been, and it would have been awful but I had to let her know--I had to let her see. “If something happened to you,” I choked out, “and I never got the chance to…to say…” I dropped my head, shaking it again. Words were never my strong suit.






@[Ranjiri]