Driving Rain

A guest blog entry.

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What does any of this mean, if you're not here?

When I'm alone, I just feel worthless. How can I really know that I exist without other people there with me? Without YOU there with me?

You always leave me, and that makes me feel worthless. No--I make me feel worthless, because I think that if I were worth loving, if I were somehow a better person, then I could make you stay, make you love me. But because I am nothing, a selfish person, a pathetic person, you turn away from me.

I've memorized every line of your retreating back, the way you hold your shoulders, the way the small of your back tenses up just a little, as if you can feel my eyes on you. Sometimes, I hate you then, but I think it's just love, crystallized to a sharp point, digging into my chest until I can feel it twisting in my side. I think you can feel it, too, it hurts that much. Maybe I want you to feel it. If you could just understand how I feel--if I could just understand how you feel--

Kohra laid on the floor of the Twilight God's shrine, staring up at the statue with blank, unseeing eyes. Half-reclined, his lanky, muscular body was stretched out onto his elbows, his legs splayed wide and his long, unbound hair in an aureole around his head. He wasn't sure how long he had been here, staring up at the statue with its nebulous face; the little light that reached the grotto from the winding staircase was barely enough to illuminate the polished, gleaming face of the statue anymore, but he couldn't seem to rouse himself to light candles. When he laid here, just like this, like a discarded toy or a powerless automaton, he felt surrendered to everything. And it was safe to surrender, here, where no one could see him. The body could fade away, and he could grapple in solitude with the emotions that were threatening to devour him of late.

It's like a storm, you and I.

I want you so much. I need you. I hunger for you, for your touch and your eyes and your voice. I want to forget everything else around me.

It's so easy to do that when you're there. I can lose myself and all of those things that I hate about myself when you offer your arms to me.

I almost forget what your embrace feels like. I forget what lying with you in the darkness feels like. I forget what the sound of your heart is like. I forget the feel of your chest breathing. I would rest a hand on your chest sometimes at night when you were sleeping, just to feel your chest thrum with your steady heartbeat, just to feel your body sway slightly with the rhythms of your breath. I had to, because I had to reassure myself that you were alive, that you were real, as real as me and my pain and all of the things that I hate so much about this world. Then sometimes, you'd respond to my touch in your sleep, and your lips would part just slightly, dried out from sleep, and you'd sigh a little. I'd see your eyes moving under your eyelids, and you'd surrender a little to my hand.

I'd give anything to see that unguarded look of love that your sleeping self wore, just one more time. I'd take it deep into myself, and burn it on my soul so that I'd never forget again. Or at least... I'd try.

Kohra rose to his feet. He made a half-hearted effort to pull his cloak back around him, mostly because the gusts of wind down the staircase were surprisingly cold, and he wavered for a moment on his feet, his body protesting at the sudden movement. He suddenly didn't want to see the statue anymore, with its lying, wavering face and its cold distance. It was just fucking stone. What good was THAT to him, to anyone? He slammed the door hard on the way out, taking a small twinge of satisfaction in the echoing sound of the door, and ascended the stairs two at a time.

It was as dark as midnight outside, and the tower which hid the entrance to the shrine was slick with rain; Ronfaure's mighty trees tossed in gale-force winds, and horizontal rain lashed at him as he stepped out from the tower's protection. The rain was surprisingly warm, and Kohra turned his face up, water stinging his eyes. The air above was charged and rippled with thunder and lighting; the skies were dancing, and ripping apart, and within himself Kohra felt something begin to open up and respond. He flung open his arms, dropping his pack, and shed what was left of his armor; rain and wind tugged at his clothes, demanding that he dance as well, and Kohra turned in the downpour, glorying in the feel of the rain and the charge and the raging skies.

And then, Kreoss was there as if it was meant to be. Kohra felt strong fingers on his arm, and he turned to look down into shuttered blue eyes half-hidden behind shades. Kreoss's face was rigid, and the eyes turned up toward Kohra were questioning, yearning; if it had been any other moment, Kohra's doubts would have made him turn away, murmur doubts, close himself off, but the storm and the statue and the moment all seemed conspired somehow. Kohra's hands closed about Kreoss's wrists, and he pulled the Zilart close, their rain-soaked bodies pressed against each other, and Kohra almost shuddered in delight at the way sinew and muscle joined together, as if they were a perfect fit. Kreoss yielded, and Kohra accepted; their lips met under the lashing sky, and thought itself seemed to end in that electric caress.

I thought being with you would mean that I would lose myself--not find someone else there, beside me.