Work Text:
The first thread of sunrise weaves itself on the curtains, its loose strands settling on the gaps between the floorboards. You rest your temple on Asahi’s chest, his wrinkle-drenched hands cradling your head like paper mesh wrapping white orchids.
Your snow-streaked hair doesn’t melt at the touch of his fingertips; this winter warms his skin. All forty winters with you warmed his skin. They eclipsed the blanket of sun stitched with the needles of summer, when orchids bend until they kiss the sun-drunk earth.
Asahi bends to kiss his earth.
You crane your neck, your eyes welcoming his smile back in. His thumb traces the permanent ripples on your skin: from the corner of your eyes to where your jaw meets your neck, he follows this memory-dented path until his thumb pulses with your chest.
“Welcome back,” he says, a greeting reserved for lovers unbraided in slumber and woven back at daybreak.
You wrap his spindle thumb with your fingers. “I’m home.”