there's a ghost around this town, and she looks a lot like me (halo 5/5)
five. looking into the heart of light, the silence
Three days later, Embry walks through the door of Crazy Horse.
Jenny is waiting for him.
“Would you like to see her?” she asks, and he doesn’t need to ask who.
He nods, once, which is good with Jenny. The sound of his voice may make her break, even though she has spent hours practicing this, how to hold herself up right, how to freeze her tears solid, how to make her voice steady, like a long held note.
She leads him to the backroom, then leaves him at the door. She places one finger against her mouth, for silence, and turns to the tiny figure painting in the backroom.
“Diana?” Jenny’s voice is infinitely gentle. “Diana, there’s someone who would like to see you. Are you all right with that?”
He can see that long, shining, silver hair, pulled back with a tie. Such a small girl, Embry thinks, and then it occurs to him : dynamite is small as well. She has her back to the door, and a huge easel spread out before her. He can make out the deep, cool greens of the forests around La Push. He thinks he can see smudges of grey and russet shadows, weaving amongst the tree trunks, the flick of tails. And the white gleaming of fangs.
But the girl. The girl. He feels the world narrowing in on him and falling away at the same time. Jenny’s voice is the only thing that makes sense, and maybe that’s the one thing that will never change.
“You can go in,” Jenny says.
“But I - ” Words fail him. “I don’t even - ”
“Go on,” Jenny’s mouth says.
Love her, Jenny’s eyes say.
~
Jenny watches from a distance, as Embry and Diana speak quietly together, their heads inclined towards each other. So different-looking, but their faces have the exact same expression. She doesn’t need to hear their words to know that they were made for each other.
When she comes back to the counter, a small figure is waiting for her, standing tall and defiant, an old battered novel clutched in his hands.
Not so small anymore, she thinks, and her heart goes out to him.
“Just because it’s not imprinting,” Collin says, fierce and red-eyed and oh, Jenny is reminded too much of herself, a swing set three days ago, crying in the dark that would be merciful enough to hide your tears from anyone except those gifted with a wolf’s eyes, “doesn’t mean that it’s not real.”
“Oh, Collin,” and she reaches out to him and she realises that she had never even held him like this when he was a child. He’s not like Diana, and he’s not like Jenny herself - he doesn’t collapse in someone else’s arms when they try to comfort them, he holds himself hard and angry and tight.
“I love her,” he says, furious, as if he’s swearing, as if it hurts him to say this.
“I know,” Jenny says.
She remembers Alan’s words, and wraps them around herself like the sweater Alan lent her :
You’ll love again.
end.