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If I could begin to be
Half of what you think of me
I could do about anything
You look at me like I placed rubies in my eye sockets just for you. You look at me like every ounce of love in you is directly only at me. Like you’re Cupid himself shooting me with the painless arrow. You look at me like blood has not been dripping from my hands longer than I would care to admit. If I were the way you saw me, that precious little teenager to protect, I would be a hero. I’m no hero, I’m just a traumatized boy obsessed with revenge. You look at me like I’m something precious, something that is deserving of care. I have not even begun to be the person you somehow think I am.
I’ll never understand how you can think I’m anything but a murderous monster. You know I kill, hell you’ve seen me attack someone just for claiming to be a Spider. Yet somehow you think of me as someone worthy to be around, to even think about.
I could even learn how to love
I thought that capability died the day my clan was slaughtered like pigs at a butchers. Like those pigs we cut down during the Hunter’s exam. Though the capacity to love may not be as shriveled up as I thought it was, I still don’t know how to. I don’t know how to hold you close and caress your cheek without fearing abandonment. I don’t know how to accept your gentle touches without flinching away. I don’t know how to let you hold me without thinking of escape routes. I don’t know how to show you the parts of me so drenched in blood I know I’ll never be clean again. I don’t know how to let you kiss me.
When I see the way you act
Wondering when I'm coming back
Walking away from you is always one of the hardest things I do, and yet I can’t seem to stop. It’s harder than taking a life, because you’re what makes my life any bit humane. I just come in and out of your life like a revolving door. I can’t pretend I don’t see how your smile never meets your eyes when we say goodbye. How disappointed you get every time I say I need to get. I know I just leave you wondering when the time will come that I’ll stop saying goodbye.
I could do about anything
I could even learn how to love like you
Everything about you radiates love. The way you treat me so gently when you treat my wounds, though you know I can handle more pain than you could ever give me. The softness of your touches, the way you whisper questions of consent before each action. How you purposely walk heavily so I’m never startled by your presence. The way you shift in bed to let me know you’re awake even before you’re coherent enough to speak. The way you settle yourself when I’m only increasing in my vibrant red.
I always thought I might be bad
Not even you can deny that I’m a bad person. Even though the Phantom Troupe deserve a death penalty, the way I end people is always more cruel than necessary. I chose my ability only for taking lives. I put a dagger to my own heart soley for the purpose to murder, ready to even kill myself for the sake of blood. My hands are as red as my eyes with all the sins I’ve committed. When I look in the mirror I only see red tears staring back.
Now I'm sure that it's true
Only someone wicked could turn their back on someone like you. Only someone cruel could say goodbye to you over and over again when I know it just breaks your heart every time. Only someone bad ignores your every call until I need help. Only someone evil treats you the way I’ve been treating you since we met on that boat.
'Cause I think you're so good
You are good. Gods, you’re more good than anyone I’ve ever met. You may put on a facade of greed and selfishness but no mask can hide your pure heart. Nothing can ever tarnish your need to save people. Though it is my gods given duty to avenge my people, you’re the one with the righteous quest. Saving people for free is inhumane in the way that no average human would ever think to do that, let alone risk their life for that goal. It is inhumane in the way that humanity is too cruel for such an endeavor. And here you are, an angel without wings.
And I'm nothing like you
You are tranquility and safety, I am recklessness and self-destruction. You are love and care while I am revenge and hatred. You are everything good while I am damaged goods.
Look at you go
I just adore you
I never meant to fall in love. When I met you, I thought I hated you. I wanted to hate you. I never meant to get attached, to be willing to risk everything for someone I only just met. I never meant to sit in a cave ready to me taken down by snakes if it meant I could save you. I never meant to put my revenge on hold for anyone, let alone a man I was never supposed to fall in love with. I never meant to crave making you laugh and seek out your every smile. I never meant to wake up crying from dreams of you. Crying because I know I’ll never be with you, that that happiness is only a sleeping fantasy.
I wish that I knew
What makes you think I'm so special
No matter how much I’ve thought about it, it just doesn’t make sense. With your charm and your compassion there’s no way you wouldn’t win any heart of your choosing. It’s not logical to choose me, I have nothing to offer you. I’ve given you no reason to look at me with so much adoration. All I’ve done is yell at you, insult your intelligence, hold you back. And leave. And leave. And leave.
If I could begin to do
Something that does right by you
I would do about anything
Nothing I ever do is what I know you’d want of me. You’d want me to let go of my revenge, and seek real solace. Go to therapy, for fucks sake. You’d want me to stop pushing you away, or at the very least find someone to confide in, even if that wasn’t your friendly ear. You would want me to eat a healthy amount, shower more than once in a blue moon. Actually own a toothbrush and hair comb, and then make use of them. You’d want me to stop holding a dagger to myself always too ready to press it in.
I would even learn how to love
If anyone, it’s you who can teach a broken person like me how to love. You’re likely the only one who can, someone as empathetic and generous as you. Someone who wouldn’t see me as a waste of time. Someone who could even see me as worth their time.
When I see the way you look
Shaken by how long it took
I could do about anything
You make me feel like I can break out of the mental chain jail I put myself in. You make me feel like I don’t have a knife already ready to split my heart open. You make me feel like I could have a real life love story.
I don’t think you have ever expected me to stay, but gods I know you’ve hoped for it. Your eyes light up even more than my own scarlet when you see me. If I’m rubies you’re tigers eye. You look at me like I can be more than the monster I’ve turned myself into.
I could even learn how to love like you
Love like you
I’ll never have the ability to give unconditional adoration to anyone I meet, but maybe I could learn to be more than just an empty shell. Maybe my heart can be filled with more than blood and arteries and valves. But not without you.
Love me like you
I can’t love me, at least not by myself. I can’t see past all the red red red. Of everyone in the world, you’re the only one who could show me how to love someone as broken as me. I don’t understand how you loving me can teach me how to love myself, or at least not hate myself. But with you, anything’s possible.
I know I need to walk through that door, and lock myself in. Give you the key. I need to let you choose when I turn my back again, if I need to. I need to give you the key, so that for once our next separation is on your own terms. But maybe you will not even want to say goodbye again. Something in me tells me that you’d much rather say hello than see you later.