twenty one pilots one shots

Muscle Memory

A/N: I really love this song so I'm writing a one-shot lol and it's jalsey bc I never write jalsey as much as I should haha anyways enjoy

When something new enters into your life, you know it almost immediately. It's like when you've been inside a cold, air-conditioned room for a while and the heat outside is so warm and enveloping. You can't help but notice the difference, for it's so dramatic, frightening, and beautiful, your breath gets sucked into your lungs and doesn't want to come out.

That's how it was that wonderful, wild, wintry night in December when I felt that change like a lightning bolt.

Cold breaths passed between us, a sign of life frozen and crystallized in the air. Our trembling fingers sought warmth in each other's bodies, wandering and digging for even a dying ember.

Our chapped lips met, blades running against blades, a tense, yet sweet ringing as the metal collided. There was still the chill of malice in the rigid edges of our blades, but our swords began to warm up as sparks flew from the constant contact.

Memories of being with him blew through my mind as briskly and as quickly as the winter gusts around us; memories of exchanged glares and glowers, spitting poison and baring pointed, bloodthirsty fangs.

Yet, here I was, as the burst of extreme cold faded, kissing him, feeling him under the light of a flickering street lamp.

After a gasp of a blizzard, you can't help but feel like something's different now.

I couldn't stop wondering about how I got here, how that hurricane of snow transported me to somewhere so foreign. But as I felt that warmth radiating from him, I didn't want to leave. I didn't want to face the cold again when I had a fireplace to sit in front of, or a mug of hot chocolate I can wrap my half-frozen fingers around.

When we finally pulled away, we still weathered the winter, refusing to weakly sway like a weathervane.

The winter passed by like those brisk winter winds, but instead of focusing on the chill, we marveled at the migration of snowflakes carried by the wind. We admired the blocks of ice that somehow formed the most beautiful patterns, and how each one we saw was different.

I was never a huge fan of winter, and neither was he. We both hated the cold. It settled in our souls, giving us the "winter blues."

But there was that change, that lightning bolt, that made winter much more beautiful and exciting.

Instead of angrily stomping on the snow, wishing it would go away, we made snowballs and snowmen, shaved ice and snow angels. Snow became heavenly dust, weaving into our hair and clothes. He looked ethereal, like something out of a painting. I wondered then if he felt the same way when he looked at me.

However, winter doesn't last forever, and that jolt of change isn't always positive.

Alas, as winter melted away, the warmth between us began to freeze.

Our precious snow was gone.

When spring came along, he seemed to be getting headaches, pain blossoming like flowers in his poor, rattled mind. The pain was so severe he could barely function normally. But he always said it was nothing, just a headache. Whenever I gardened, he would be lying in bed, veins visibly pulsating as migraine after migraine took over. I would look down and see a dew drop rolling off a petal, only to realize it was a tear.

I grew hopeful as summer approached, hoping his migraines would go away and we could be together again. I didn't want to see him in pain anymore, either.

My hopes were for naught.

His headaches dulled to an almost inaudible hum, but the heat was taking its toll on his body. He was constantly sweating, panting. His body was still frail and recovering from the season of migraines.