Chapter Text
It’s a cold night. Two men sit around the sparkling fire.
Two lonely souls sitting in a circle of light.
Silence. Just the sound of ice clinking in the chilly breeze.
Darkness ripped open by the sharp blade of a flame.
The youth in front of you is freezing.
You can tell by the subtle fight of his body as it tries to hide under the blanket.
The blanket is too thin. It cannot warm a southern boy, nor mend a shattered soul.
The boy has not said a word in days. His tongue is as frozen as his heart.
There’s a shadow over his brow. The shadow of the dead.
He will not survive the winter, you think.
He will not survive if he perseveres in his endless grief.
He’s stubborn, he’d freeze to death without blinking.
That’s what he wants after all. That’s what he wants
since he came down the mountain, leaving a burial of snow behind.
He started walking, and kept walking long after the white tomb was out of sight.
And then you found him.
He didn’t know why he kept on walking, he said.
He had nowhere to go. No one to come back to.
Yet he kept on walking.
And as he had nothing left but aimless will
and two feet to stir the road,
you told him to follow you.
He stared at you, silent and wide-eyed.
A mix of surprise and disbelief crossing the depths of his pupils.
The same look he gave you the night you praised him in front of everyone.
As if he didn’t believe your words. As if he didn’t deserve them.
You told him to follow you.
And he did.
Right now, he’s sitting on the other side of the fire
and he’s choosing to die.
Not by knife, not by poison.
He’s just letting himself freeze to death.
He’s just letting his grief burn his soul to ashes.
You drag your fingers over the engraved blade,
tracing the familiar grooves there.
Carved trails whisper the name of your heart.
No one ever answers back.
You wish you could comfort him.
The boy in front of you.
But you can’t. You are too similar.
You’ve left a lover behind, buried in the snow.
Well, not a lover. Never a lover.
But you loved him as one, anyways.
You carry his name like an oath. Like a vow.
You cannot get rid of it. You cannot get rid of your love.
Heart can’t be mended.
However, you can patch the pieces back together
and take your heart with you to the end of the world.
That’s all you know.
But the boy doesn’t need to hear those words right now.
Instead, you stand up, walk towards him,
and lay your blanket over his shoulders.
You sit next to him, watch the flames
paint long-lost faces in the dark.
You say nothing, but you can feel
the boy’s gaze fixed on you like a question.
And yet, he remains silent.
As for the blanket, you don’t need it as much as he does.
In fact, you don’t need it at all.
You got used to the cold a long time ago.