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Daylight Fading - Unreal
Apr. 1st, 2005 09:58 pm((Part of THIS THREAD))
Instead of replying right off, Illyria took on Fred's form, swathing herself in the kind of light, flowing dress that Fred had worn in life very seldom, actually. She strode forward, something almost pleading in her expression. I stood frozen, confused and even a bit cross at the idea of her taking Fred's image out here, of her own accord.
"This... isn't a lie, Wesley. I'm not a lie. You are. We were... cuz, well, we weren't, y'know?"
My jaw was clenched so tight it was starting to hurt, not that I really was paying attention to it. Instead, I was glaring back at Fred-- Illyria-- before me, and nearly flinched as her hand touched my face.
"We never had time, we never had, well, anything. And if there was never anything... how can you keep missing me so?"
There was a moment when the dull, impotent rage that wracked my body to nearly trembling was threaded with the most infuriating realization possible. That there was truth in Illyria's words. I heard the tone of it, could feel the shape of that truth, but walls were too high, and made of stuff too hard and cold.
As she shifted her form back to her true self, to the blue-shot hair, and the frozen granite eyes and pallid skin, the hand on my face now covered with soft leather, a shudder ran through my body. There was no word for the anger, no containing the loathing and disgust with myself, the fury at Illyria. Illyria, who merely had the temerity to tear the curtain away and expose the workings of the pathetic play I'd wrought for us both.
"I am real, however. And this... this is what you may have. But not her. Never again her."
Rage made way to share the shaking remains of my mind with loss. The lie was over, the charade ended. There was nothing left but me, and for God's sake, what in the hell was there left of me?
I was barely alive as it were. Without the lie, without that crutch, that last, desperate thread of something better to which I clung, knowing full well what a sad, pathetic figure it made of me?
Without a thought, my right hand swung back, muscles tensing, ready to whip-snap forward, striking Illyria across the face with all my mortal strength.
The hand never flew.
Instead, it dropped to my side, useless; impotent as I was.
My head dropped with the weight of the loss, and I glanced up at Illyria with hooded eyes.
"You presume one thing incorrectly, Illyria. You might be real..."
Feet moving clumsily but quickly, I stagger-stepped to the door that would let me back into the pensione.
"... but I'm not. Not anymore. Not for a very long time, perhaps."
A quick check verified that I had my wallet and my gun. I turned away from the stairs and toward the front door. There were bars in Rome, and nightclubs. In one of them might be a girl with brown hair and an easy laugh who might be enough of a lie for a night. And if there wasn't, or if I didn't have the damn guts to do it, there was trouble to be found, as well.
Instead of replying right off, Illyria took on Fred's form, swathing herself in the kind of light, flowing dress that Fred had worn in life very seldom, actually. She strode forward, something almost pleading in her expression. I stood frozen, confused and even a bit cross at the idea of her taking Fred's image out here, of her own accord.
"This... isn't a lie, Wesley. I'm not a lie. You are. We were... cuz, well, we weren't, y'know?"
My jaw was clenched so tight it was starting to hurt, not that I really was paying attention to it. Instead, I was glaring back at Fred-- Illyria-- before me, and nearly flinched as her hand touched my face.
"We never had time, we never had, well, anything. And if there was never anything... how can you keep missing me so?"
There was a moment when the dull, impotent rage that wracked my body to nearly trembling was threaded with the most infuriating realization possible. That there was truth in Illyria's words. I heard the tone of it, could feel the shape of that truth, but walls were too high, and made of stuff too hard and cold.
As she shifted her form back to her true self, to the blue-shot hair, and the frozen granite eyes and pallid skin, the hand on my face now covered with soft leather, a shudder ran through my body. There was no word for the anger, no containing the loathing and disgust with myself, the fury at Illyria. Illyria, who merely had the temerity to tear the curtain away and expose the workings of the pathetic play I'd wrought for us both.
"I am real, however. And this... this is what you may have. But not her. Never again her."
Rage made way to share the shaking remains of my mind with loss. The lie was over, the charade ended. There was nothing left but me, and for God's sake, what in the hell was there left of me?
I was barely alive as it were. Without the lie, without that crutch, that last, desperate thread of something better to which I clung, knowing full well what a sad, pathetic figure it made of me?
Without a thought, my right hand swung back, muscles tensing, ready to whip-snap forward, striking Illyria across the face with all my mortal strength.
The hand never flew.
Instead, it dropped to my side, useless; impotent as I was.
My head dropped with the weight of the loss, and I glanced up at Illyria with hooded eyes.
"You presume one thing incorrectly, Illyria. You might be real..."
Feet moving clumsily but quickly, I stagger-stepped to the door that would let me back into the pensione.
"... but I'm not. Not anymore. Not for a very long time, perhaps."
A quick check verified that I had my wallet and my gun. I turned away from the stairs and toward the front door. There were bars in Rome, and nightclubs. In one of them might be a girl with brown hair and an easy laugh who might be enough of a lie for a night. And if there wasn't, or if I didn't have the damn guts to do it, there was trouble to be found, as well.
