running on empty :: saylor/fridae
Feb 13, 2021 16:58:08 GMT -5
Post by ᴥ on Feb 13, 2021 16:58:08 GMT -5
s a y l o r .
"so it goes
my summer rose
cut and thrown away"
It's not bravery, but something close. Her eyes are glazed with exhaustion, like that could obscure the blue flames blazing within. More than enough to wound but I'm so cold that I revel in the way she lets me take up space beside her. Not drawn into her orbit but allowed to exist within it.
If I met her outside the Capitol, would she still resemble a bad omen? I'm memorizing faces, wondering if her's will be the last I'll ever see. What weapon might she wield when she tears out my throat? Will she wear regret or relief? I've got so many questions and answers to none of them, but I still hope she'll at least remember this insignificant little moment when we were just as damned but a lot less afraid.
"Saylor, yeah." Heat floods my cheeks, heavy with guilt at the way she says my name. She's from the Distrct before mine, I'm certain enough of that. "I'm not quite as good with names, sorry 'bout that." Mumbled at her feet, fingers digging into the back of my neck to give me something sharp to focus on. Simple conversation is suffocating, people are less predictable than livestock.
Something tells me that'd be a shitty explanation, so I bite my tongue.
Then she smiles at me and it's strange how I feel like that gives me permission to smile back. It splits my lips, too much teeth around the way I hiccup out a nervous laugh. She accommodates my company like it's the most natural thing in the world, like she didn't even have to think twice about what to say to me.
I feel a bit foolish for thinking she wouldn't.
Lonely is the worst thing you can be this close to the end.
"I can do it!" A reflexive lie, grandstanding just like my father taught me. Like pretending to be strong will keep me alive, all bad habits I can't quite shake. I bite my tongue, concentrating on keeping my grip on the metal bar though my palms have started sweating.
Silence is heavier I remember as I pull myself up over the bar three times before I lose my grip and my breath, with my back flat on the mat and very much wishing it could swallow me whole. I can only hope her expectations were so low I still managed to exceed them.
I cover my face with my hands and it makes me feel a little safer.
"I don't think I know how to be strong." I admit through the gaps in my fingers.