Change isn't treated well in the slaughterhouse. Aria learnt that far too late.
OR - in which seven hopefuls do whatever it takes to become the star of the ballet season
( original applyfic )
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IN THE PAST, IT HAD BEEN THEORISED THAT HUMANS EXISTED AS EIGHT-LIMBED CREATURES. Twice as powerful as one would expect from having two brains and two hearts. In an unforecasted, belligerent rage, Zeus (god, king, soldier) ripped flesh from flesh, eternally blemishing his divine fingertips with mortal ichor and heartsickness. According to the elders, from that point onwards, the purpose of human life changed; humans were now destined to find love from what they had lost. This was a constant- something not restrained by era, race or age. Humanity's stubborn search for its better half, a being whose flesh moulded perfectly into the curves of their own, progressed. Both scientists and Shakespeare did
To love or to be loved. That was what was continually taught and strived for.
For Aria H, the fact still stood that she had yet to love. Well, to love another human. There were many things that she loved; cherry ice lollies in the haze of the summer heat, annotated collections of poetry and, quite obviously, ballet. But the feeling the poets described love- the way your breath faltered when their name was mentioned in conversation or how time slowed when you met their gaze- she had yet to experience.
When she was young, her mother had blamed the lack of emotion on a lack of experience.
"One day, you'll find a person, the person." she has assured, whilst she ran fingers worn from she scrubbing at her husband's stiff cotton shirts through Aria's hair. Was that love? Straining one's body to pleasure another? Hurting to get "the one's" affection? Blood in soapy water?
Before she has moved to Taureau, on the eve of her cousin's wedding, Aria was tapped on the shoulder. An old woman with a kind face carved by age poked her side.
"You'll be next."
Three seemingly harmless words uttered from timeless lips. She thought nothing of the phrase. They were sweet nothings, audible gifts of butterscotch to be received with a polite yet reserved smile.
She caught the bride's bouquet of roses the next afternoon. Staring past the layers of incarnadine petals, all she could see was a sign- a warning. Young women were taught to use these ceremonies as prophecies, destining a domestic life of comfort. Of dependence.
Of love.
To Aria, it was a sentence. A restriction forced onto her by fate in the form of bleeding petals and kind women with mocking smiles.
She wasn't the next to be married. Nor was she the second, third or fourth.
Now, months after she had caressed someone else's roses in her hands, she had yet to cradle her own. She had yet to wear white and she had yet to cradle her own. She had yet to sink her bleeding fingers into a cold washbasin.
Was this loneliness? Was this independence? Was she an anomaly - a withered half being that never needed to be split? According to young brides and old wives; a poor soul with no man to warm her bed and now promise of a life of unity and devotion
So she found someone. And then she found someone else. Neither had brought the abundances the elder women in her life had proclaimed to her. Yes, perhaps it was nice to fall asleep with someone's hands tangled in her hair and receive a kiss to her jaw every morning before heading to practice.
But the sweetness of that initial glow dulls after some time. Little did she know, there were reasons humanity had, quite literally, been ripped apart by their seams. Some pairings were dangerous- almost parasitic, sucking the goodness out of one, leaving a hollow, flaking shell of a person behind.
That, like many things in her life, she learnt that too late. Boohoo.
