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It's embarrassing, almost, that when your feather light touches span his sleeping face, you feel your eyes mist.
It's not often, rarely ever, that you're allowed to marvel in this rare kind of beauty. He's always on the run, always busy. There's always another patient, another error in research. And you, always someone somewhere who needed saving. It's becoming rarer by the day for the two of you to steal more than whispered promises in two minute phone calls, much less have the time to spend together.
You've all but forgotten his perfect features, even as if your touches on his skin don't commit them to memory.
Your eyes run along the many scars adorning his finely-muscled arms, his exposed torso, his shoulders. Your fingers yearn to commit even those to memory, a part of him that he won't share. A past that's too rough for your special kind of normal, and so you're left only this. Only able to trace along the jagged, pink lines etched in the wide canvas that was his body.
Zayne's face twitches in his sleep, a long sigh interrupting the usual calm, low buzzing of his snoring. He shifts, slightly away from your roaming fingers and immediately, as if the guilt itself singed your fingertips, you stop. There's a deep hurt, secrets buried so deeply within those scars that even unconsciously, he wards you from it.
You sigh, biting your lip against the wave of pain that bubbles in your gut when flashes of Zayne's torturous struggle with control of his Evol after the wanderer's attack on the hospital invade your mind.
Love was meant to hurt, sometimes. You know that. But to even possibly be the cause of this hurt was almost too much to bear.
There is so much to Zayne that you don't know. Things he refuses to share, some things you're not even sure he's certain of. He does so much to protect you and it hurts you, that he thinks you need it. You almost think, at worst times, that you hate him for loving you.
But you will not disturb him now. He does not rest well alone, plagued with crippling responsibility and wretched nightmares. This pain, you can heal.
And so, even with misty eyes and torn lips, you lean in and press your lips gently against his forehead. Run your fingers through his heavenly soft hair, watch his eyelashes flutter against his raised cheekbones and you wonder with a smile on your face what he's dreaming about now that he's warm and safe in your bed.
Almost as if he hears your thoughts, you watch on as a light frown morphing his eyebrows and pulling his lips down appears on his face. Instinctually, his arms reach out and find your figure, pulling you further until you're pressed into his chest and his arms are wrapped around the small of your back.
You coo gently, pressing your fingers now to the center of his chest as you gently arch your neck up to press your lips against his temple.
"I'm here." You whisper into his ear, feeling the fingers of his right hand squeeze against you in his sleep. "I will always be here." Slowly, gently, his fingers began to lax. His fist unclenches and his arm stretches out below you. His face loses its tension, its unspoken pain, and in its stead, such a beautiful peace overcomes it all.
"I can protect you, too."
In the morning, as the warm light filters in through the window blinds, you're slowly woken by lips pressed to your own.
His eyes, sleepy and brighter in the trickles of morning light, smile at you as yours open.
"I love you," his warm breath whispers the words against your lips.
You smile, because you believe that. Even as the tear runs down your cheek, even as his scars become more prominent in this light.
There's still so many stories they hold, so much you don't know about them.
And they're beautiful like this, you think.
Your arms stretch to wrap around his neck, pushing yourself back into his perfect lips.
"I love you too."