Tall Tales

- 23 -

T W E N T Y  T H R E E

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Shards

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The tension loomed over the small living room. There are memories, stories etched onto every inch of this space, forcing a pang of nostalgia down herself. She swallowed them all, pinning her focus at his back.

"If you don't want to talk, then there's no point," she pointed out. When he's made it clear that he's not going to shift his focus from the maquette, she huffed. "Fine. I'm going to take a shower."

She took her sweet time under the running water, letting the events sink in. They'd been fighting a lot more lately that even the most trivial of things could create such a rift between them. The fight earlier was one of them, he got angry that she'd insisted on adding more salt to her soup. It's not even his plate; his food would remain untouched. He argued that she shouldn't be eating too much salt. She retorted that it was too bland. Besides, it was her cooking, so it shouldn't have bothered him if she commented on the taste. A loud crash broke her out of her reverie. She quickly turned off the water, slipped into her sandals, threw the oversized tee over her head, and rushed to the living room.

"What happened?"

Her hurried steps turned to a small run as she saw him crouched near the faucet, reaching for what looked like glass shards.

"Rion? What happened? You shouldn't be using your bare hands!" She caught his wrist midair.

"It's fine."

"No, it's not. Ri, look at me," he did, his brown eyes cold and hard.

"I'm sorry, I knocked over the vase."

"It's okay. Just wait here, okay? I'm getting the broom. Do not touch it with your bare hands," she gave him an imploring look. She didn't leave until he gave a small nod.

She let out a little sigh in relief when she saw him leaning over the faucet counter, the glass shards untouched. She made a quick work of the shards, the weight of his stare boring into her.

"You know I'd still pick broken goods over lost ones, Ri," she muttered, sweeping over the last shards into the dust pan. "Because no matter what, what's broken can always be fixed, but what's lost are gone forever," she added with a whisper.

"Well," he looked so deep in thought. She gulped, his thoughts are always unpredictable. "Not always. Some lost things can be found and some broken things can't be fixed. But anyways, I'm glad you think so, cause let's face it, Ann, we're a lost cause."

She gripped the broom so hard, her fingers are starting to lose color. "What do you mean by that? We're not lost, Rion. We're not beyond fixed."

He scrunched up his face to show his disagreement, and with that, her heart was scrunched as well. "Yeah, we are. You're no longer the Analiese I've met in that sandy beach and I'm no longer the Rion whose artworks got featured. We've changed so much – we've come so far. And it's not all bad, but these changes shaped us differently. Our puzzle pieces no longer matched."

He trained his eyes to the tiles, she noted. Slowly, she cocked her head, her eyes assessing him. "It's just a vase, why– what brought all these?" She frowned.

"The vase is some sort of a dam, I guess. When it broke, the dam broke as well and all the pent up things just gush out. Look, some broken things just can't be fixed, Ann. You have to be more flexible sometimes." He said coldly.

Flexible. Her mind grasped onto the word he'd said. He was three steps away when she whispered again, "Then we too can be found, can't we?"

He turned to face her. His brown orbs held her gray ones, which had never look stormier than they currently were. "Nothing is quite one thing and not the other nowadays. Lost and broken are nothing but words anyway. But some things you just need to take a hint – whether it be with your head or heart."

In that proximity, she could see it. His red rimmed eyes. His ruffled hair. His messy figure. "Don't be so hard on yourself," she murmured. "How many times do I have to tell you that it's okay for you to rely on me sometimes? How many times do I have to tell you to have more faith in me? How many more times do I have to tell you that I love you, Rion?" Her tone kept rising with each word she uttered. She raised her hand to his face, placed it on his soft hair, and almost sighed in relief when he leaned into her touch.

"I... I don't-" his voice broke.

She stiffened when he first wrapped his arms around her, burrowing his head into the crook of her neck. "Let go, Ri, don't shoulder the world on your own," she muttered as she rubbed his back soothingly.

"Why wouldn't you leave me?"

"Because I believe that we're not lost. Because I believe that you're just broken, but it has to be you who fix yourself. Until then, I promise I won't ever leave your side," she blinked back tears, but the clog in her throat and nose was getting heavier with each passing breath. The left side of her sleeve was already clinging to her skin.

"Thank you."

"Please promise me you won't ever stop fighting?"

He pulled away, bore his eyes into his, and nodded. "I promise."

- Jan 4, 2018 | Oct 4, 2018

A/N: I'll be honest: I have soo many unfinished prompts that I have no idea how to finish and it makes me sooo pissed off with myself. Oh, and the next two chapters are all ready, this one though, took a quite some time of debating. I had another prompt I want to put up, but well, Shards won my heart in the end.

Post Scriptum

I hope your week's better than mine :)

If you're looking for name meanings, there won't be any for this one hehe the names were kinda spontaneous for this one, and I looked for their meanings, but it just wouldn't have any effect to the context.

Love eternally,
Caera Keane