Oh gods, if you had anything at all to do with it, thank you for bringing them back.
Furfur was a shooting star, a milky pale streak launched with singleminded intent toward his brother. The boys were quickly jumping and wrestling and playing with such joy that my heart broke all over again for tearing them apart. Yet I did not have long to linger on my guilt before Avesta was pressed against me once again, and there was too much joy in my heart to leave room for any other emotion. “Sister.” Looking back, I am surprised and impressed by myself for not crying.
Of course there was something different about her. Something different about me, too. I expected no less, so I was not bothered, not a first, when her kiss felt like it did not know what it wanted to be. Like maybe love was a thing that could be outgrown, and we had both done an awful lot of growing.
(Love is not a thing that can be outgrown, I thought then and I think now-- but I am prone to self doubt, and I wonder sometimes, I wonder…)
“Tell me,” I breathed her in deep. The first inhales of someone almost drowned. And that is what it had felt like, at times, when she and the rest of our family was across the ocean. Like a slow drowning, very slow. To breathe once again was the most beautiful feeling in the world. “Tell me everything.”
I had my own stories to tell and small tokens that I had saved from my travels to share with my sister. A sand dollar from my first encounter with the enchanting Sun King. A beautiful pair of earrings from a kind and (in recounting the tale I would blush)rather handsome yet unfortunately talkative boy I met at the market. A fallen leaf from a birch tree in Delumine that had spoken to me. A throwing knife from a badass woman that reminded me of our father. These items were deeply important to me, and the memories they invoked even moreso. But I was in no rush to share them, and I knew my humble, maybe even silly, stories ("his eyes were so blue") would pale in comparison to whatever Avesta had seen and done.
And more importantly... She was right there in front of me, alive, and that was all I had wanted since the moment she left, but once reunited I instantly felt greedy. I needed more. I had to know that she was not just alive but also well.
@Avesta <3
