Isabella Foster
I like a look of agony
because I know it's true
I
do not know if this counts as my first date. Because there was once a boy who i met behind bookshelves in the library. Fitting that a Foster should have her first kiss tucked behind book cases, with words of tales and facts spilling over pages written by other, older members of my family. I remember that kiss though. Electric and soft, and tentative and certain. Terrifying and exactly right. And then all that feeling was gone.
We went back to our seats, to our studies. He passed me a note, I opened it, shrugged. I passed him on the way out. ‘It was just a kiss.’ I said and left. He didn't come back to the library.
Kill me softly. I have always loved this line. Maybe because there is such simplicity in the statement. We agonized over the line in class. ‘What does it mean?’ My instructor asked repeatedly. We wanted context, but she would not give it. We guessed it was like placing a pillow atop of someone, or the gentle dying of poison, but all of them were wrong. Until my sister, Ainsley, spoke. “It is a lover, who takes pieces away at a time, but you want it—you want it.” I think of Hagar with the line. Kill me softly.
Maybe all of us are dying the same way.
He holds onto me and I find myself bristled by the closeness of him. I do not dislike him, but he does nothing to spark me either. This perhaps the exact type of first date my parents would want for any Foster child. Polite, quiet, without great events. But then he is laughing, slipping and stumbling. If I were another I would join in, but I offer a simper on my lips that is well enough a gift to him. “Try it yourself the rest of the way,” I say, try to be encouraging.
“In truth, it was my parents suggestion,” I say, as if suggestion were not just another word for command. “Come,” I ice skate towards the edge of the lake and wait for him to catch up. “What do monks drink? Are you at least free to tell me this?” I ask with a raised eyebrow as I remove the skates from my feet. “Is mulled wine off the table?” I say, knowing I am not old enough, but some how, this night feels like exceptions from the rules. “Drink and tell me three secrets,” I ask of him, this night would not entirely be a waste. “I will do the same,” I say as I take a generous drink of the warm wine that makes my body feel as if I were next to a quiet fire and not out in the icy snow.
Drink.
One.
“I do not fit in with my family as a Foster should, but I would never be allowed to voice such a complaint.”
Drink.
Two.
“I wish I was part of the Halcyon, I would kill to have a pair of wings.”
Drink.
Three.
“There is a woman, in Day, Hagar, who I am irrevocably attracted to and I can never tell if she feels the same or if she is simply trying to destroy me from the heart on out. And if I wish to do the same to her.”
Drink.
Drink.
Drink.
Mulled wine and three secrets.
One.
Two.
Three.
Three secrets and mulled wine.
picture colored by Elidhu
@Tenebrae
