[ 52 - Broadcast Mind | Memory/Dream ]
You're exhausted. Your clothes are tattered and dirty, and your muscles are sore all over. You're tired enough in mind and body that you're sure if you laid down now, sleep would not refuse you.
But now isn't the time for that. Mei is waiting for you in the other room. She's been waiting four days, and right now, you're going going to change into fresh clothes and go to her. Go to her and apologize and reassure her that you're not going anywhere again.
Only...when you return, you find she's fallen asleep waiting for you. It's clear she hasn't had much sleep this week either, and you don't have the heart to wake her.
Gently, very gently, you slip a hand under her back, and...after some hesitation, another under her legs and lift her up, closing your right hand into a fist as soon as she's balanced in your arms. Your steps are quiet as you walk the few paces to her bedroom, grateful that the door was already open so you didn't have to risk waking her to open it yourself.
You set her down on the bed as lightly as if she were a porcelain doll and pull the blankets around her, then whisper a good night as you turn to leave...but then you stop. You have a better idea. You pick up the desk chair from a few paces away and move it next to the bed, settling down beside her. If she'd fallen asleep waiting for you, the least you could do is be there for her as soon as she awakens.
The passage of time after that, is muddled. You're not sure how long you've been sitting there, and you think you must have dozed off for at least a few short stretches, but it affords you plenty of time to think.
You did a lot of that, back in the tunnels, when you wondered if you were going to survive, and what would happen to her if you died and didn't come back. You're sure someone would have taken her in, and it's funny how that thought alone sends a twinge of jealousy through you.
It's funny, because you've always thought she deserved better than you, that you had no business attempting to raise a child on your own when you barely had a childhood yourself, when you've never known what it is to hold something and let it flourish and grow. All you've ever known is how to destroy, and it is your greatest fear that everything that is inherently chaotic and destructive about you will someday destroy Mei, and you will never forgive yourself for the rest of your life.
You're afraid of other, lesser things, too. You're afraid you won't be able to give her what she needs. You're afraid that even if you can somehow manage everything else, she won't be happy with you--or at least, as happy as she could be. You've always thought she deserved to live with someone who could give her the love and affection she deserved, someone whose every emotion wasn't entangled in confusion, fear, regret, guilt, bitterness, and anger. Someone who didn't flee from touch like a wounded animal.
All the same...the very thought of Mei finding that someone who is better suited to care for her seizes your heart with an entirely different kind of fear than those other things. A cold kind of despair in the knowledge that you would let her go because you would never let her settle for less than she deserves.
You're not sure when or why, but at some point you started lightly running a hand through her hair. You don't notice until she shifts in her sleep, mumbling something you can't make out, and you freeze instantly, waiting for her breathing to even back out before you move. It does, and then you remember the hair ribbons. She's already asleep, but you decide to untie them so she can sleep a little more comfortably. The ribbon fumbles a little as you try to handle it in your non-dominant hand, but you get it eventually, and you brush the freed black locks behind her ear before lowering your arm.
...Or try to, as she shifts again and latches onto your arm like a teddy bear.
You catch yourself wondering what she's dreaming about. You catch yourself, then, hoping that in her dream, she is smiling.
You don't know when it happened--when she took hold of your heart so completely that all you wanted out of life anymore was to make her happy. You didn't know, after all these years of hatred and malice, that you even had a heart left to give.
Indeed, all those years...you had merely been living. Now, you finally have something worth living for.
In all of Anatole, no one else had been able to give you something like that. No one had been able to make you care without reservation, to feel attachment without guilt.
The guilt was there, yes, but it was for something different. She had blown into your life one day a year and a half ago and rarely does a day go by that you wonder what cosmic entity could have deemed someone like you worthy of any of it.
...back...knew...it...missed...
She's mumbling in her sleep again, and you've made no move to take your arm back from her grasp, though the mention of your name makes the muscles tense for a moment.
Scar...san...
And that's when it hits. She's dreaming about you. You stare in shock, for a moment, before your gaze softens, but a light shiver does still run down your spine.
It brings back an old thought from when you were trapped underground, too. It's something you've never said, to anyone, and the prospect of saying it now is a bit terrifying, but...
But. What if you never get another chance?
She's asleep now, and she probably won't hear you. But you don't think you can hold your courage until she wakes up, so you lean in close enough to whisper in her ear.
"I love you."