(i feel like i've been living in a city with no children in it)

[burnwithus]

Has it really been a year? I wasn’t expecting it to pass by so quickly, not when every day was a battle. But it has to be true, because I counted the days, not knowing why. Something to keep me busy, I guess. Keeping the madness away used to be a priority for me at one point

Comments

[cibosity]

Memories can be poison, and don't let no one tell you any different.

In stories, we're made to think that the people who let fires rage on in their hearts are the ones to follow. Like letting some cause burn on regardless of death and time is noble somehow, proves that you've got something worth fightin' for. Dying for. But the truth of it is, time wears everything away, makes monsters into longings and loss into nightmares. Letting it all simmer in your heart, it changes a person, twists them 'round until you know they ain't ever gonna be whole again, ain't ever gonna be right again, and I can't think of a single person I'd wish that on. I can't think of a single good thing it's done for me. Sure, maybe I had every damn right to kill Tom Sawyer in the end, maybe I put those bullets in the Others for a good reason, I ain't gonna try and dispute that.

But what good did it do me?Not a single lick

[burnwithus]

I hear him come in, and it registers briefly in my mind before he touches me. Honestly, on most days I wish he wouldn't do that, because I've already shot him once, but somehow today it's comforting. Like something a parent would do. Even if it is childish and I haven't been a child for years now.

Sawyer never does seem to understand that, though. And it occurs to me now that I don't even know what his real name is.

I drop my pen. It clatters on the desk and promptly rolls off. I'm grateful enough that it didn't leave a stain on the page, at least. "I haven't been writing for that long."

[cibosity]

There's a whole bunch of mixed messages that I sense right away. She isn't putting up a fight, for one, not even when I pat her head- doesn't even try to pull away, and it makes me wonder if maybe I've hit something on the head for once. Like this is the one day out of hundreds where she finally feels that she needs someone around. I'm not going to be the person to deny her that.

Course, with the way she drops her pen right after, I can't help but wonder if she ain't also trying to be difficult. I get it, I ain't the best guy at being comforting, or maybe she just feels an obligation to try and get along after she shot me with her arrow. But hell, I've dealt with stubborn people before, and I don't anticipate that'll stop anytime soon.

So, I walk around and plop myself right down in the seat next to her.

"If you say so," I drawl, trying to light. Failing in the next couple of seconds. "So, what're you writin'? Secret love letters?"

[burnwithus]

"Do I look like the type to write secret love letters?" he takes the seat next to me and I just shrug, picking up my papers and drying them by letting them flap into the air. It isn't very pretty, but it's the best I can do at this point and it'll have to be enough. I wonder why he's still hanging around me after the whole arrow debacle - in fact, I wonder why he chooses to hang around me at all, with everything that's happened and everything he knows.

So I ask him. "You should probably stay away. Who knows, I might shoot you again."

[cibosity]

"You seem like the type to have secrets," I tell her right off the bat. No sense in hiding it. She doesn't exactly try to hide that prickly exterior, that shield she holds so high 'round herself, the one that you know's hiding something pretty big. Whether or not it's anyone's business, well, that only she could tell you. But there's sure a whole lot she's keeping from the world, and I'm pretty sure it's only the fact that she's so uncompromising that's kept people from bugging her relentlessly for all the details. "And you don't seem like the type who can't love no one. Put those two together, and you with a pen in your hand, I don't think it's much of a leap to make."

I carefully reach out for a page, wondering if she'll just snap down on me and rip it away. She wouldn't be outside her rights to.

"Plus, one arrow out of how many times we've bumped into each other now? I'll take my chances."