[P] kiss me, and you will see how important I am;

[Marisol]

who are you
when it's all over?

“Do not,” she threatens, “speak to me of God.” 

It is too sensitive a topic. Even the word makes her skin crawl. She has lost too much in the name of God to speak of her so freely, less so to an entitled boy with knives for teeth. She cannot un-remember the way they looked at her during that meeting - the way they said she was insane to still worship Vespera, that she did not care about the commonwealth, that she was foolish for believing their God cared at all. But Marisol loves Her like she loves the way flying feels under her feathers, and there is no blood, nor tar, nor saltwater that can drown that feeling.

She is not sure why she came to him. It seems her reflexes have dulled, or are now willfully stupid. On her patrol down the rocky-dark beach she had caught a glimpse of him in the water shimmering in and out of vision like a star. And where she should have turned around, she instead kept moving, followed the mirage until it solidified into that strange, vicious man she had caught one day in the ocean. Oh, she should know better. She has seen his shark-smile. The blood on his chest.

And yet something in her - woefully, desperately begging to be loved - simply could not leave.

Anyway, she had followed his tracks all the way down. It is bitterly cold by the sea; his footprints are toothy with frost; Marisol’s short hair is crusted with salt, and she shivers against the frigid bite of wind. The black of the wet rocks is interrupted with streaks of pure snow. She has no reason to be here, but still she wants to stay.

Still she wants to talk to him.

But when he asks her about God, she almost regrets it. Her shoulders stiffen, her gaze narrows, her lip twitches a little, but still she stays there, cemented in place, and after a moment only shakes her head and snorts in a little derision. Her eyes are cold silver, mouth soft and unsure. Do not ask me about God, she says, and does not know what to say afterward.

It is the only thing she knows how to talk about.

credits