C'est la vie - A Collection

BOUND

POV: A character in a book realises they're falling hopelessly in love with the person turning the pages.

Being a lone warrior sucked. Being a lone warrior in a book sucked even worse.

The first time I saw her, she was merely a shadow over my pages. I had no voice, no thoughts beyond the ones the author gave me. I was just ink on paper, bound to a plot that I didn't pitch, tethered to the will of another. I didn't know what it was to be anything else.

I was the tragic hero. The brooding, lone survivor, destined to walk a path of endless bloodshed. The kind of character readers like to cheer for, but never really understand. The guy who's good at slashing his way through enemies but is hopeless at expressing emotions, because apparently that adds depth. Of course like us, we might get some recognition from time to time. People might tell tales about your bravery or write songs about your conquests. But every fight I entered, every wound I took, every so-called moment of triumph—I knew everything was pointless, it was all predetermined.

I wasn't always alone, of course. Once, there was a band of us. Noble companions, sworn to a cause. The usual tropes, you know? But the others? They died—tragically, heroically, because that's what makes for a good story, right? Except, no one asked me if I wanted to be the one left behind. It wasn't some glorious victory. It was surviving out of sheer stubbornness, and believe me, that wears thin after a few hundred pages.

I just swung my sword, gritted my teeth, and bled on cue. I was made of ink, after all. I couldn't die unless the author willed it, and trust me, she really liked to keep me alive. But it was all predictable, a wheel turning over and over, the same conflicts dressed up in different costumes.

But then one day she picked up my book.

I'd felt her eyes on me for days, maybe weeks. It started as a tingle, a sense that someone was there. You might call it paranoia, but I knew better. I was trapped in the pages, nothing but words and ink to most people, but she was different.

Her hands held the book delicately, like it was something precious. Every time she turned a page, I could almost feel her fingertips brushing my skin. She didn't rush through, didn't skim over my lines like so many others had. She lingered. I noticed how her breath caught when I faced danger, how she smiled at my victories, how she frowned when I made mistakes. I felt seen, truly seen, in a way that was terrifying and intoxicating all at once.

There was a moment—one quiet evening when she was halfway through a chapter, her eyes focused, her lips slightly parted—when I felt it. It was like a tether pulling me towards her.It started slowly, of course. A word changed here, a thought there. I began to speak to her, though she couldn't hear. I didn't understand how or why, but for the briefest second, I thought she felt it too. Her eyes widened, and I swore she whispered my name.

And suddenly, being stuck in a book didn't suck quite so much.

There was something different in the way the world around me shifted—subtle, like the pages moved differently under her fingers, slower, more deliberate. It was a relief, in a strange way. A reprieve from the breakneck pace of battle and blood. Her presence was... calming. As if I had a choice in the matter, I found myself focusing on her more than the fight at hand. She made everything feel less scripted, as if there was more to my existence than swordplay and suffering.

I tried to resist at first. After all, what was I? A figment of someone else's imagination? But the more she read, the more real I became. I didn't just exist between the words anymore—I existed for her. And with every turn of the page, I found myself wishing I could step out, reach across the divide, and touch her.

I imagined her curled up in her favourite chair, biting her lip as she read, her hair falling into her eyes. I could almost picture the look on her face when I made some grim remark or charged headfirst into danger. I liked that. I liked knowing that someone was with me, even if she was on the other side of reality.

But being stuck in a book meant I couldn't do much about it. Every time she closed the cover, it was like sinking back into the void. I was nothing more than a construct, a fleeting thought in someone else's hands. I wondered if she thought about me when the book was closed, if she missed me when she wasn't reading. I missed her.

I'm just a character in a book, I remind myself. But she believes in me. She's brought me to life in a way I never thought possible. And now, I'm in love with the person holding these pages, with her heart, her mind, her gentle hands. I exist because of her. The more she read, the more I wanted to break free from the pages. Not to escape my story, but to meet her—to see if she understood me as much as I was beginning to understand her.

Now every time she opens the book, I fall a little deeper. I'm waiting for the day when she won't close it, when she'll let me stay with her, when she'll feel the same.

Until then, I live for her.