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Your vision blurs. You should have known this was coming. After all, you were living with the threat of a bomb that could have gone off, or used as a bargaining chip. Seven goes on about how nothing between the both of you will work out the way you imagined, how you should not give your hours to a vile vermin like him and waste your time convincing him that it's worth the struggle someday, but all you could hear is the rushing of your blood and how your chest feels like a table had slammed against you. Your hands shake and you have no means to cease its movements. Your stomach lurched and you're certain this isn't going to end soon. Something is lodged in your throat and you're running out of breath. You try to swallow it down and take a gulp of air but you let it out instead. Seven trailed off when your tears came; however, he comes back with another blow that packs a punch, (for her own good, he always remind himself). You're seeing doubles and it hurts. You don't know where the source of pain is but your legs are starting to numb. You tilt your head up and blink the tears away, but they don't stop clouding your vision and leaving through your ducts like pouring rain. 5 4 3 2 1 breathe, breathe slow, damn it and you look back at the red-headed boy, your hands tingle and your mouth moves but you can't hear what comes next.
You are falling into oblivion while grasping at the fleeting light. You are falling and you can't see the shape of your hands. You are falling and you are so sure that nothing will ever make sense again. You are falling and he is just watching. You feel weightless. Your fall was broken and it was as though you have dropped from a great height into the raging ocean, completely underwater. The residue of your dried tears dissolve and you stare as the scene unfolds before you. Everything has blurred and distorted yet the shock of red hair doesn't escape your attention. He shouts something and for the first time since the attempted kidnapping, you feel calm. The sound of the water takes over the voice you crave for. You close your eyes.
(It doesn't concern me anymore. Is he crying? It doesn't matter to me anymore. It doesn't matter anymore. I don't matter anymore.)
You exhale.
---
She scares me more than my mother. She scares me more than what my father would do when he finally lays a hand on my brother. She scares me more than what my agency can do if I take one wrong step. She scares me more than my twin brother, whom I have not seen for years, and convinced that I had abandoned him with that sick woman.
Her eyes remind me of stormy nights and howling wind yet also of clear skies with muted songs of nature. I could have sworn she wears her heart on her sleeve but that was all an illusion as I see it hidden behind layers of fear, anxiety and I curse myself for not recognizing the symptoms. It did not show up in the medical records I pulled out on the first day and nothing of that sort showed up during those times where I sit staring at her through the screen. Caught up with the changing of the security system's algorithm and the search for my brother, it didn't occur to me that she meant it when she admitted feeling safe and calm despite the ominous presence of the bomb. It didn't occur to me that I have became her anchor, giving her strength as she can finally brave through without worrying if the storm will ever end. I'm a double-edged sword but she doesn't care. I should have stopped but I have cut her too deep. In the storm, she cries out but her voice gets taken away. I hold her close, taking the blunt of the storm yet she tells me that she is fine, that everything is fine and I choke. I have nothing to offer as comfort or reassurance. As I whisper her name, familiarity on the tip of my tongue and she, the extraterrestrial being on my spaceship for one with me, wails and- this is not how things were supposed to go but all he can do it plead her to breathe and
oh god, breathe. come back comebackcomebackcomebackcomebackplease.
---
The ocean trembles and shakes, but you stay undisturbed as you continue to sink. You can't- don't want to- remember his words. But it breaks through the barrier of the tears you give away from the very beginning, reaching your ears in nothing more than a whisper. You open your eyes nonetheless. He still looks devastatingly beautiful even when he cries and you would have hugged him. You would have hugged him and run your hands through his hair and down his back, pulling back to wipe his tears away with your thumbs gently and cradle his head against your chest. His actions mirror your thoughts. The same words thud against the surface of your ocean. With your fingertips below the surface of the tears you have cried, you listen for the words that are finally clear.
comebackcomebackcome back. I'm sorry. come back. (I love you, let me be your support.)
And when you break past the barriers that you hid behind, fingers splay flat against his lower back, you count as you hear his heartbeat.
5 4 3 2 1 thump. Fingers lace together.
5 4 3 2 1 thump. His forehead press against yours.
5 4 3 2 1 thump. He lets out a breath.
You breathe in him again.