honest_johns | (no subject)

(no subject)

Morning. A few hours after dawn; the light slants in through half-drawn curtains, making window-squares on the blankets.

(Come)

Alain's arm is curled around Lilly. Both of them are asleep, breathing slow and regular.

(Come)

And then

(Come)

he's awake, staring blindly at the ceiling,

(Come)

and all he can hear and see and feel and think is that pounding silent call.

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Lilly's not a light sleeper, not under ordinary circumstance. These aren't ordinary circumstances, even without the nightmare where she wakes to find him already gone.

Alain's gone tense suddenly, and it's not enough to quite wake her, but her arm tightens reflexively around his waist.

He feels it only dimly. His arm tightens around her, too, fractionally, but he barely notices that either.

He doesn't know

(Come)

and he can't remember, can't think, can't hear or feel -- there's no room, no white ceiling above him, no bed underneath. Just white light, and the awareness that the front door is there, a hundred yards away.

(Now)

But there's something else... there's something...

(Come now come)

The world begins to filter back. Slowly, in pieces.

He hasn't moved.

Lilly hasn't woken up yet, not quite. She's in that half-sleep where you cling desperately to good dreams and wrestle blearily with alarm clocks for just five more minutes.

(one moment more)

It's still working, for the moment.

He still feels dim, and distant; the door's call is the loudest thing in his head, muting everything else.

But he's back. Enough.

(Come)

Enough for a sinking feeling, as he turns his head to look down at Lilly's head resting on his shoulder.

(now soon come)

He bends his head to press a light kiss to her hair.

He can't think how to say it.

Lilly blinks, letting the dream slip away as she smiles sleepily up at him.

"Morning, 'lain."

He can't smile back.

His arms are around her, and one hand rises to smooth her hair back from her face. Memorizing the feel of it.

It feels as if his blood is pulsing in rhythm with the call.

Lilly's more awake, now, but the dread growing in her mind is pure nightmare.

"'lain? What's wrong?"

She has a horribly sickening feeling that she already knows.

He turns slightly, shifting, to rest his forehead against hers, eyes closed.

He can't look at her stricken face and say this.

Alain's speech is never this disjointed. There's something a little too distant about it; he's only half-here, and fighting hard for that much, and it shows.

He breathes in, and out. A little shaky. Lower,

He's holding her, tightly.

It's today.
Today you closed the door and said
We have to get a move on.
Shocked silence, for a long moment, as her eyes fill with tears she's desperately blinking back.

"No," she finally whispers, sounding not much older than the little girl in the pictures Alain once saw.

"No, it can't be today, that's... no, it's too soon..."

And then the useless protests trail off, because... they are useless, and she knows it more clearly with every word he says, every shaky breath he takes.

It's today.

His eyes are still closed. But his lashes are wet, now, and his voice thicker.

He swallows, and presses his lips together.

Lilly doesn't say anything else, just turns her head and buries it in the pillow so he won't see her face.

He's not someone she can cry in front of anymore and she hates that. For a moment, she hates him.

Only a moment though, before she pushes it away. She can always hate him later, when he's gone. When it won't matter to him.

Right now, she just loves him. It wouldn't be so hard to breathe if she didn't.

She's hiding her face from him, and he hates that -- hates that it's necessary, hates that he can't argue with it even inside himself.

Hates that she's crying and he is too and still the loudest thing in this room is the door's call. There shouldn't be anything harder to ignore than the fact that his girl is crying in his arms. But there is.

He just holds her as tight as she'll let him, dimly feeling the first tear slide over the bridge of his nose, and concentrates on being here.

Just a little while longer.

Her eyes are squeezed shut against the tears that are falling anyway. Lilly moves blindly, her arm wrapping more tightly around his waist as she buries her face against his shoulder.
Hold me, even though I know you're leaving
And show me, all the reasons you would stay
Nothing she can do but this, and even this is fleeting at best.

And so they stay. Alain has no idea how long; his time sense is utterly gone, buried beneath the door's call.

But eventually, her tears slow, and they lie in a silent tangle of limbs, clutching each other tight as if to memorize the feel of their bodies fitting together.

Alain slides a hand up her back, slipping gentle fingers along Lilly's cheek before reaching to the back of his neck to fumble with a slim chain. A jade pendant hangs from it, shaped like a tiny eagle.

Lilly lifts her head at the movement, her eyes wide, the lashes still wet with tears. They get wider when she realizes what he's doing.
Give me
Just one part of you to cling to
"...oh, 'lain."

He gets the clasp undone, and brings his other hand up to put the necklace around her neck. A soft kiss to her forehead, as he fastens it.

It's a benediction.

The pendant feels like life, like sunlight, like the breeze off the ocean.

With it gone, he can already feel the door's call increase. He doesn't show it.

One hand closes around the jade pendant, still warm from Alain's skin. The other still clings to him.

Lilly looks up at him, and smiles, or tries to. It's a benediction, and something to cling to, and it's nowhere near enough.

It's just enough to steal my heart and run
And fade out with the falling sun

"I love you."

He holds her tight, with both arms, and smiles back. It's watery; the tears are threatening to flow again, though he holds them back.

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