She’s beautiful when she’s asleep.
She’s always beautiful, but when she’s awake she shines so brightly that it blinds all around her. She is a queen with a crown of briary vines, smiling kindly at all who approach. She is leader and listener in turn, and her love blossoms with gifts and favours, even if they are never returned. Asleep is different. Asleep is defenceless; it is open, it is trusting, and it is cold. Asleep she can ignore the world asking for her light, asking for her to shine on them for a moment, a day, a lifetime.
She is the sun, and they are the sunflowers, following in her wake, demanding.
But sleep is not gone. Sleep is a curled hand on the edge of my shirt. Sleep is dulled hair between my fingers. Sleep is an open face, wiped of expectations and worries. Sleep is for my eyes alone, her light tucked away beneath the blankets and the pillows.
I am not the moon, a cool reflection softening the day. I am not the sea, the rise and fall, endless patience and sharp-edged rage. I am just an eclipse, there for a moment, covering her rays. It is not her light, radiant and gold, that draws me to her. It is the heat at the centre, the writhing fire tightly contained in her skin. It is the fury when they are gone and there is nothing but tears left to show, that clenches her fists and screams at the world before she sinks, spent, into my arms.
It is the least I can do for her. When she is gone, I am nothing. I sit idle, waiting for her to have use of me. And she will use me, her own light blinding her poor eyes, binding her lips into agreements she knows better than to accept. I’ve taken those lips before, refusing to let her agree. I’ve covered those eyes, letting cold skin hide colder views. I am nothing without her, and she is everything without me, and neither of us can live that way.
If I had her fire, the sunflowers would already be burnt dry, ashes drifting on a cloudless day. If I had her fire, I would be the dragon in the castle, her head resting on the softest petals, my mercy for her alone.
One day she will give me that fire and they will never bother us again.
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