*/
I swear to god
I wasn't born to fight.
Maybe just a little bit.
Enough to make me sick of it.
I wasn't born to fight.
Maybe just a little bit.
Enough to make me sick of it.
It is dark.
That is to say, it is as dark as the markets will be - still the orange glow of the city sky reflecting the colorful fabrics and glass-rimmed lanterns gathered below. Somewhere far above and far away the sky is just turning its darkest, the deep and somber blue humming the rest of the world to sleep. Michael is a cacophony inside himself, the roaring wind of the winter he fled still howls like so many wolves in the pit of his stomach. It is only here, in the din of strangers and the clanking and thumping of merchants at work, that he feels less loud than the world around him.
It is not much quieter, but it is quieter, and that must count for something, when you are a pig on a spit in your own chest, turning endlessly above the flames.
"No," he is saying, and laughing, to a girl with eyes like the sun and shoulders like his father, the type that makes Michael nervous for reasons he cannot quite place, "please don't do this--" but she hands him a bouquet of small white flowers, rimmed in thick, rubbery leaves and wrapped together with delicate maroon paper. His chuckle is tense, and sounds like vinegar when it drops from his mouth. Michael imagines each sound hitting the street with an audible thunk.
With a mumbled 'thank you,' Michael retreats to the other side of the street, where something is sizzling quietly around the corner and among the small crowd that pauses for one reason or another near to where he stands (despondent and anxious), Michael recalls just vaguely a face he's seen before, but cannot put a name to.
These are most faces.
"You," he says, maybe because he's sick, maybe because he knows, somewhere, that he cannot only speak to Isra and Fable and hide from every other citizen of Denocte for the rest of his life - we may never know.
"Take this." Michael holds up the bouquet, pristine and delicate. It shakes in his grip. "My treat."
That is to say, it is as dark as the markets will be - still the orange glow of the city sky reflecting the colorful fabrics and glass-rimmed lanterns gathered below. Somewhere far above and far away the sky is just turning its darkest, the deep and somber blue humming the rest of the world to sleep. Michael is a cacophony inside himself, the roaring wind of the winter he fled still howls like so many wolves in the pit of his stomach. It is only here, in the din of strangers and the clanking and thumping of merchants at work, that he feels less loud than the world around him.
It is not much quieter, but it is quieter, and that must count for something, when you are a pig on a spit in your own chest, turning endlessly above the flames.
"No," he is saying, and laughing, to a girl with eyes like the sun and shoulders like his father, the type that makes Michael nervous for reasons he cannot quite place, "please don't do this--" but she hands him a bouquet of small white flowers, rimmed in thick, rubbery leaves and wrapped together with delicate maroon paper. His chuckle is tense, and sounds like vinegar when it drops from his mouth. Michael imagines each sound hitting the street with an audible thunk.
With a mumbled 'thank you,' Michael retreats to the other side of the street, where something is sizzling quietly around the corner and among the small crowd that pauses for one reason or another near to where he stands (despondent and anxious), Michael recalls just vaguely a face he's seen before, but cannot put a name to.
These are most faces.
"You," he says, maybe because he's sick, maybe because he knows, somewhere, that he cannot only speak to Isra and Fable and hide from every other citizen of Denocte for the rest of his life - we may never know.
"Take this." Michael holds up the bouquet, pristine and delicate. It shakes in his grip. "My treat."
@Runaveig
