[ he doesn't look at her, instead keeping his eyes on the way the photograph curls and smokes beneath the glowing tip of the cigar, the corner slowly disintegrating to ash. it's an absurd metaphor, too heavy-handed to appreciate, but it gives him something to focus on when alina's pained anger washes over him. he already knows he's not going to meet it with an equal measure of ferocity. he feels like he's the one burning, his insides raw and exposed to the bright embers glowing in the darkness. ]
So you can't. [ his brow pinches as the photograph finally lights, waiting until he feels the heat of the flame against his fingertips before releasing it to float down to the water. there are so many things he wants to say, and yet none of them feel right. none of them feel like anything more than too late. all of them feel like his capacity to love — not enough.
a breath pushes out of him, twisted into something like a bleak chuckle. ] Mal loves you, Alina. You know that. If you were a burden on him, he would have left you long ago. You're not holding anyone back, least of all me.
[ he reaches into his lap for something else to burn, words across pages he doesn't bother to read, and he's mildly horrified to discover a tremor in his hand he doesn't quite catch fast enough. the paper ignites more easily than the photo, burning fleetingly bright. ]
You can't. Not when I'm just realizing that you — [ he flicks the pages toward the darkness of the water and takes a quick pull of the cigar, exhaling smoke from between his teeth. ] You are so far out of my reach.
[ the pain that comes with that admission is almost welcome. he embraces it, lets it settle like a familiar ghost at his side. he finds there's no pleasure that comes from being right this time. it's one fight he can't win when he's hardly equipped with the tools to do so.
but it's only one. he always has others because he picks so many, even if they pale in comparison to this one. melancholia weighs him down, and for a brief moment he hates himself, wishing desperately to be someone else, someone who knows more than he does, who's better at the things he falls short at. then he swallows it down and grinds a lid on top, steeling himself before taking another puff and tilting his mouth upwards to blow a stream of smoke at the sky. ]
Of course I'll tell you what to do, Starlight. [ he finally meets her gaze, slanting his mouth into an iron sharp smile. ] You let me do what I do best. Let me be that clever little fox. Let me do all the things you'd never want, with all those deceitful, immoral, dehumanizing schemes that we both know I'm better at than this. Let me be the man that doesn't deserve you, but the one who is precisely what you need. I'll make sure you don't lose.
no subject
So you can't. [ his brow pinches as the photograph finally lights, waiting until he feels the heat of the flame against his fingertips before releasing it to float down to the water. there are so many things he wants to say, and yet none of them feel right. none of them feel like anything more than too late. all of them feel like his capacity to love — not enough.
a breath pushes out of him, twisted into something like a bleak chuckle. ] Mal loves you, Alina. You know that. If you were a burden on him, he would have left you long ago. You're not holding anyone back, least of all me.
[ he reaches into his lap for something else to burn, words across pages he doesn't bother to read, and he's mildly horrified to discover a tremor in his hand he doesn't quite catch fast enough. the paper ignites more easily than the photo, burning fleetingly bright. ]
You can't. Not when I'm just realizing that you — [ he flicks the pages toward the darkness of the water and takes a quick pull of the cigar, exhaling smoke from between his teeth. ] You are so far out of my reach.
[ the pain that comes with that admission is almost welcome. he embraces it, lets it settle like a familiar ghost at his side. he finds there's no pleasure that comes from being right this time. it's one fight he can't win when he's hardly equipped with the tools to do so.
but it's only one. he always has others because he picks so many, even if they pale in comparison to this one. melancholia weighs him down, and for a brief moment he hates himself, wishing desperately to be someone else, someone who knows more than he does, who's better at the things he falls short at. then he swallows it down and grinds a lid on top, steeling himself before taking another puff and tilting his mouth upwards to blow a stream of smoke at the sky. ]
Of course I'll tell you what to do, Starlight. [ he finally meets her gaze, slanting his mouth into an iron sharp smile. ] You let me do what I do best. Let me be that clever little fox. Let me do all the things you'd never want, with all those deceitful, immoral, dehumanizing schemes that we both know I'm better at than this. Let me be the man that doesn't deserve you, but the one who is precisely what you need. I'll make sure you don't lose.