The words barely have time to form in her mind before she feels the first pull, and it's unlike anything she's ever felt before. She could liken it to the tide, the powerful ebb of water returning to the sea -- or wherever the inlet empties -- only it wouldn't be enough. Not even half. Not even close.
With it comes the most blinding, mind-numbing agony she's never felt before.
And there are no more words.
Her body curls around his like match-lit paper, crumpling in on itself and shivering. She can feel every vein, every vessel, shuddering and racing, her heartbeat is mourning bells in her ears, hands flat and stiff and trembling. She can't breathe.
If she could, she would be screaming.
She drifts, perhaps in and out of consciousness, she can't be sure. She sees barley fields and peach trees and two old hounds, crawling violets and morning glories plum and cotton candy pink and whitewashed walls, and sea blue eyes lit like the sun peeking out from behind black boughs and knotted twigs, he opens his mouth
Daddy?
and he's holding her, holding her tight, the way he always used to when she'd tussle or fall from her young mare, and his voice in her ear is like a salve, gentle like the purring of a kitten, like the whisper of reeds. He says he's sorry, he's sorry...
It's not him.
She's weeping. The pain subsides enough for her to realize that much. Enough for her to feel Ben's arms clamped around her, no longer lifeless but full of desperation, and his feeble voice bitter with remorse. It's over.
She blinks.
And again.
And now weak, now shaking, she pulls him even closer, and hushes him like a child.
no subject
The words barely have time to form in her mind before she feels the first pull, and it's unlike anything she's ever felt before. She could liken it to the tide, the powerful ebb of water returning to the sea -- or wherever the inlet empties -- only it wouldn't be enough. Not even half. Not even close.
With it comes the most blinding, mind-numbing agony she's never felt before.
And there are no more words.
Her body curls around his like match-lit paper, crumpling in on itself and shivering. She can feel every vein, every vessel, shuddering and racing, her heartbeat is mourning bells in her ears, hands flat and stiff and trembling. She can't breathe.
If she could, she would be screaming.
She drifts, perhaps in and out of consciousness, she can't be sure. She sees barley fields and peach trees and two old hounds, crawling violets and morning glories plum and cotton candy pink and whitewashed walls, and sea blue eyes lit like the sun peeking out from behind black boughs and knotted twigs, he opens his mouth
and he's holding her, holding her tight, the way he always used to when she'd tussle or fall from her young mare, and his voice in her ear is like a salve, gentle like the purring of a kitten, like the whisper of reeds. He says he's sorry, he's sorry...
It's not him.
She's weeping. The pain subsides enough for her to realize that much. Enough for her to feel Ben's arms clamped around her, no longer lifeless but full of desperation, and his feeble voice bitter with remorse. It's over.
She blinks.
And again.
And now weak, now shaking, she pulls him even closer, and hushes him like a child.