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He deals the cards as a meditation
The cards were shuffled.
And those he plays never suspects
Cards were cut.
He doesn’t play for the money he wins
Warry glances were cast between the table’s occupants. He didn’t even lift an eye.
He don’t play for respect
On the table, the poker chips gleamed.
He deals the cards to find the answer
This was a place of unreadable expressions, pressed smiles, and sheer luck. And of course, probability.
The sacred geometry of chance.
And chance was always her strong suit. Luck, was always on her side.
The hidden law of a probable outcome
And when chance failed, numbers spoke.
She has gotten a lot better at calculating the risks now.
The numbers lead the dance
After all, as all knows,
The lady of luck never loses.
So it shouldn’t have been a surprise when the most ambitious players of the casino had crossed paths. Crossed tables. Crossed eyes.
The eyes that held familiarity in them.
“I know that spades are the swords of a soldier.”
All around him, the battle roared. The soldiers formed a line, their shields looking like cards stacked together.
“I know that the clubs are weapons of war”
They had been in a standstill for too long. The soldiers were getting weary. All in their mind was, either get into a battle of get out of here.
Yet no one really wanted to break the standstill either. For to leave was to admit defeat and to fight, too wrong.
No one wanted to fight this war.
“I know that diamonds mean money for this art”
The reasons of battle too long past, both sides clinging to the prejudices of the old, both sides just, wants, to, rest.
Apparently, there was gold and riches and diamonds to the one who comes out on the top, but the accursed money of the old was starting to mean less and less to the ones of the times. Surely, they thought, surely no diamond is worth the blood of generations.
“But that’s not the shape of my heart”
As if you have a heart, she thought as she crumbled the letter sent to her in his neat writing, the hints of a scrabble and chaos still persistent despite all the calligraphy lessons they must’ve put him through.
It had just been so long.
She chucked the letter to the trash.
He may lay the jack of diamonds
Around them, a circle formed in anticipation of who will win the round. They didn’t notice, however. They were too busy having their own battle, that they had no energy for, in each other’s eyes.
He may lay the queen of spades
And in their gaze, and in their battle, there was an understanding, however unknowledged.
No one would win this fight.
Just like how it had been so many lives before.
He may conceal a king in his hand
Remnants of past, woven into their soul in years of pondering. Of questions unanswered. Why did I do that. Why did he do that. Why did she do that. Should I have done it another way? Was another way even possible?
Come right now, would I do it again?
While the memory of it fades.
A black crown. Cursed and wicked and dangerous even from its shape. Once a symbol of power and reverence. Now forgotten in an old and empty room. Concealed in the darkness it came from.
“I know that the spades are the swords of a soldier”
She is reciting form memory so long past but still bright, still strong.
She read the letter, all crumpled, till she etched every line to her soul.
Across from her, emerald green eyes widened.
“ I know the clubs are weapons of war”
Too many painful memories. Duties past down like the cycle of violence. They both remember it. Their sergeants looking in their eyes, asking if they are ordering attack, with fear and resignation in their eyes.
How can you give the order to slaughter someone you know is as human as you?
There was a little truth to the stories warning to never get close to you enemies. You start to understand.
“I know that diamonds mean money for this art”
All this blood, all this violence, all this game of chance, for diamonds. The more you think the more you want to laugh. There are tears in your soul.
“But that’s not the shape of my heart”
And then, a look. A look of pure emotion. So quick they would’ve missed it if it weren’t mirrored in each other’s eyes. This is not the shape of their heart. I don’t wanna do this. But I must.
Why
I don’t know.
And around them, the sounds of both the present and the past were echoing
That’s not the shape
It was not the shape
The shape of my heart
The shape of what? Didn’t they forfeit the very thing, the moment their eyes met?
And in a simultaneous fashion that can only come with time, they stood from the table.
It was time to stop the cycle of violence, the violence they inflicted to their own soul. Again and again and again and again. Ad eternum. It was time to end things, by letting another thing to start. Because growth and destruction go hand in hand like they were always meant to be.
It was time to change their fate.
“I forfeit”
Twin voices, twin hearts, one mind. They did not need a signal from the other to follow each other. The two constantly switching places to the one who leads with ease, for they only know parts of this road and the other roads are for the other.
They did not for a moment doubt the other. But it was still too early to call this a truce. First they needed to conquer their demons.
First, they needed to talk.
And for this treacherous act, they went to a treacherous place.
He never thought he’d be here again, not when she had sealed the door against him, per his wishes.
And they arrived to the accursed place where a single box with no ornaments sat alone, in their hands suddenly appeared two vaults. Their vaults. Without making any sound they combined their vaults with the box in the middle and their hands went to their necklaces. So docile and almost not there before, pulsing and buzzing with energy now. Together, they put the keys to their locks, perfectly intervened with the box and each other.
They did not speak. There wasn’t anything to speak in this minute.
And the boxes expanded and expanded and expanded till it was just one really big box. Big enough to fit two people while they were standing. He reached for the knob and opened the door, then gestured to her. He entered the room right behind her. With a deep sound, the door was shut.
Inside was impossibly larger than what appeared on the outside. It was dimly lit with no apparent light source and appeared to be empty except for a raised stand in the middle. Atop it stood a pitch black crown with jagged edges that seemed like darkness was oozing out of it. From the energy it was radiating, darkness was not the worst thing it contained.
The room looked darker around it.
First they just stood there, mute as they stared at the black crown. Slowly, he approached it, every step a little closer to the thing he never once adored in his life.
But oh so many people had.
He walked in front of the platform, careful to leave a distance even as he approached, and didn’t go any further. Minutes seemed to pass before she asked, ”How long has it been?”.
His gaze never left the accursed object like he wanted repayment for all that happened. For all the pain it caused, for all the blood it spilled, for all everything that happened because of it that he had blamed himself because he was the very thing that it stemmed from. He looked at it with contempt, with intensity, understanding in the back of his mind it was not the crowns fault but the ones who wore it, wondering if he had never made the crown from his very own soul, would he also commit these violent acts?
Of course he would. What is he even thinking right now. Had he not done much worse with a smile on his face even without the crown? But still, the voice at the back his mind persisted, what if he had the crown then too. Would it bring his head back together or push him to an even deeper end? The only thing he knew for sure was that, after all these years, he had finally understood what she had meant when she said she did not regret it.
He sighed internally, regret was a strong emotion. Was feeling it better than living with the knowledge that he didn’t regret anything? Would he be in a higher place if he recognized the things he had done were not things he should’ve done or if he went on like this, dimly unknowledgeing in his mind the utter cruelty that flowed in his blood, coated his mind and turned his heart to a blackened core of what was supposed to be?
That’s when his thoughts came to a halt, this was not the time nor place for such thoughts, he could have his pity party another time, when the thing pulsing with energy in front of him was far far away, or better yet gone. When the place it was in was once again divided to three, parts seemingly impossible to combine again. When the woman at the back was not there to watch him.
He did not know what to do if he turned around right now. And saw something else than hate and the gleam of a challenge in those eyes. Or resentment, or disgust, even annoyment.
Stupid cat, he thought to himself, you are here to do the opposite thing right now, do not dwell on the thoughts of the past and ruin this moment.
With one quick motion of his body, he turned so both the crown and she was on his sight of vision before he looked at her deep in the eyes. A silent invitation. Tonight has been full of silent invitations. Both of them giving each other a hundred chances, a hundred reasons to back out right now. But both remained. Both persisted. They wouldn’t be themselves if they had backed out from a challenge now would they.
So she took a step, and another and another and another till she was finally in front of the once dreaded man. She had waited there. Waited for him to pounce on the crown the moment he got the chance, to prove to her that he was really the person they took him as, as she once took him as. But he didn’t. Tikki couldn’t see his face for he had his back towards her but, it almost felt like whatever reservations people had about him, he had even more of them for that crown. This made her feel, at the far back of her mind, buried deep, almost a little relieved. And a little jealous. He was not the soulless monster people claimed him as, but she was every single bad thing they had said about her, they barely grazed the surface.
At least one of us could free themselves from peoples expectations, she said to herself.
Up close, the crown looked even worse. Though it wore bad and wicked like a charm, it was not under question that this was a device best used to evil. For a brief moment she peeked at the man at her side, and immediately discarded that thought. Things did not become evil because people used them that way. The evility of the thing came from the things it had done in its own accord, if only of the act belonged to it, it was evil. That crown had not hurt anyone that did not approach it first. The only ones it had brutalized was the ones that first used it to brutalize others. The crown, and the man were not different, the good it did to the universe to prison one part of him was up to debate.
She watched as his hands reached out to the crown, slowly, like even they dreaded the movement. He slowly but strongly grasped the blacken crown and stared at it for a long while. Then, with the same slowness, he turned to her, gaze never once leaving the crown, as if daring it to do something.
The crown remained placid.
Then, in a sudden moment she did not expect, his gaze went straight to her. They gazed at each other for what felt like an eternity. His eyes searching for something she did not know. Slowly, agonizingly, he lifted the crown atop her head. He was looking at her with such intensity, his burning gaze not leaving her eyes for a second despite the fact that hers only showed a well concealed bewilderment and a silent question.
What are you doing now.
And, slowly, steadily, but surely, he placed the crown on her head. The moment he did, the black tendrils that seemed to seep out of it recoiled, and the crown looked like just a regular crown. None noticed this, however as they were seemingly trying to decipher the meaning of life or perhaps just their actions from each other’s eyes. After an infinity passed, the air around them thick with questions that were already answered, but needed to be spoken aloud still.
When she was unmoving as if carved from stone, and the words to be said that are already shared with looks and time, announced it was time to come out, he broke the eye contact and tentatively took a step back. Instantly, she also averted her gaze, they had been transfixed by the moment before, they hadn’t realized how close they’d gotten. Both literally and figuratively.
After a moment she reached a hesitant hand to the top of her head and felt the crown. The material of it cold to the touch, but if one pressed hard enough, there was warmth too. She did not ask why he gave her the crown, you did not ask of those things. But it seems he deemed it was the kind of a thing that needed to be spoken, to be heard. None other than them of course, but the need to hear and utter it still strong. Just the more proof that all of this was real.
“If I told you that I loved you”
He wasn’t looking at her but it still felt like he did, like his gaze was burning holes and destructing whatever it touched in her mind.
“You’d maybe think there’s something wrong”
He looked at her, then, intense, but also a hint of a dare. A dare to lie, a dare to refute, a dare to accept, a dare to progress, a dare to rise up to the challenge as she had done so many times before.
“I’m not a man of too many faces”
It wasn’t even a face that he was standing with right now. It was something deeper, no external covering. Painfully susceptible to hazards in the environment to the point you’d wonder what is he doing going around like this. But he wasn’t going around like this. He had one, hard, face that he always wore, no matter the occasion, no matter the person. But he wasn’t wearing it at the moment. He wasn’t wearing it at all. She could tell from his eyes.
Eyes that held much more many colors aside from green now.
“The mask I wear is one”
The poker face, the one that won him so many games on the table. But he didn’t wear it right now. This isn’t a game.
“But those who speak know nothing”
Her eyes suddenly snapped to his, trapping him in a sapphire prison, it was now her who was looking at him with the intensity to melt the mind. Though, not much could be done to the mind melted by their own greed and hubris, living off of vicious rumors and sinister whispers. Feigning innocence and being so bad at it. But still, they were fun to play with. There is its own charm to hearing new things about yourself from someone else. As some say, the one who knows, rarely speaks.
Not like they were listening to the ones who do anyway.
“And find out to their cost”
Those people always found their dues, but them? Where was their punishment? Their portion of the sick order of things? Each other. They were sent on this earth to eat each other out and in the meantime, bring their own demise. But. No. think again. They had been punished and faced repercussions over and over and over again. Paid the price and the tax and the interest and the whatever had them fall this low that they were lying on the ground, getting some much needed rest. Through it all, there was only one constant, the other.
Maybe they weren’t sent on this earth to eat each other out after all.
“Like those who curse their luck in too many places”
If her eyes were burning him before, now they were staring at the other side of this seemingly endless room. Curse his luck. What a sick play of words. He should have an answer ready for that, but he can’t open his mouth. He can’t say anything. He can’t do anything except stare back like he is trying to solve a very hard -impossible- puzzle he just got the gist of. Like he wants to know. Like he wants to understand. Like he is trying to understand. Like he finally started to understand.
The shape of the heart.
“And those who fear are lost”
She looked away then, this one was for herself. For one who claims to be fearless, for there is no unknown to her, she is very afraid and very confused. Prideful too, she has enough honor to admit that.
I know that the spades are the swords of a soldier
The earth beneath their feet was tired of being bathed in blood, barely grew anything anymore. People were hungry. But still, they were polishing their swords, still they were patching up the wounded. But still, they persisted. These were the orders they were given, and soldiers followed orders.
From their room, their commanders watched them.
“I know that the clubs are weapons of war”
They were tired. So so so tired. No one cared about dying anymore, just a release. There were rumors that the commander of the opposing army had sent a letter to their commander. They had heard how vicious that commander was, but right now all anyone could think of, all anyone had hoped was that it was an offer of peace, however unlikely.
Imagine their faces, their joy, their anticipation as they heard the commanders would meet for peace talks. It was ending.
I know that diamonds mean money for this art
In the middle there was a giant cauldron. Actually, scratch that, in the middle there were multiple cauldrons, boiling with gold. As the gold boiled, trusted accountants from both sides divided the jewelry equally, and all the gold that were boiling in the cauldrons were to be divided as well. An equal amount of gold and jewelry for every soldier that participated in the war and their families. As the ground was fermented with blood, it had compromised where the golds were hidden -maybe the point of this war and legend was just that, who knows- and both sides had worked together to dig it out. Now all of them would be given to the soldiers. It could not replace life, loved ones, time nor health, but it could make them not worry about the financial side of things as they were healing from all it took.
The peace talks were complete, both sides were surrendering, they could finally go home.
But that’s not the shape of my heart
As Tikki sagged in her chair, she exhaled a sigh of relief. Oh how hard it was to explain a bunch of money hungry officials who never stepped a foot in the battlefield no one wanted to fight anymore. And to think the commander of the other side was the only one backing her up. Just as she was about to get up and get to work, she noticed a single red curl. A single red curl in her otherwise straight hair. She looked at it in disbelief, then hid it behind her ear. She’d have to look into that later.
That’s not the shape of my heart
It was time to send everyone off, and a send off it was. Both the commanders were publicly standing side by side for the first time. Their backs straight, obviously dressed up as they themselves sent everybody off, their soldiers and the other alike. Though it even seemed that, their commander had even done her… hair? They had never seen her like this and her hair was on that line between wavy and curly, whereas it was normally straight hair before. It is a joyous occasion, they thought and some even complimented her hair.
She was still their commander and she raised an eyebrow. They didn’t bring up the hair after that.
That’s not the shape
The shape of my heart.
The keys, were resting above their hearts again.