You Were The Sun (snowbaz)

2

BAZ

When Simon turns to face me, I feel a shiver run through my body. This is it. This is when we can finally talk about things. I instinctively reach out for him, taking whatever I can get. He looks down at my hands for a moment, his dulling eyes staring down at my hands like they're diseased. They are, I suppose, but he's never looked at me like that. (Like I was some sort of problem.) Not since we'd gotten together, anyway. It sends a pain through me. 

"Simon," I say. Like it's magick. Maybe it is magick because he looks up at me, setting his cider and crisps down, and swallows. His Adam's apple bobs as he takes my hands tentatively in his own. This is the most he's touched me in months. The most he's looked at me in weeks. I want to control the pounding of my heart in my chest but I can't because we're so close to something here and I can't help but feel like this might have been the moment I've been waiting for.

I look in his eyes. They're paler than they were before. It's gotten worse recently, but I can still see him in there. I can see him breaking inside and trying to claw his way out before he's lost forever. I squeeze his hands. I won't let you lose yourself, I want to tell him. I'll help you out. I'll help you live again.

He smiles a weak smile, one that is not at all convincing. It's okay, though. A smile is still a smile, and, Crowley, I've missed his smiles (even this half-arsed one). I smile back at him, fighting the temptation to run my hands through his curls or kiss him softly. I don't know what to tell him, now that he's actually here and looking at me. I wonder if this is how he felt all those times, back when he stammered over his words and I'd yell at him to get on with it. I won't yell at him again. I won't break his heart, not even for one fucking second. 

"Baz," he whispers. His throat is hoarse. It breaks my heart to hear it. Given how little he speaks these days, it makes sense that his voice sounds like that, but I can't help but frown when he croaks it out. I rub circles in his hands to assure him that I'm here and that I'll listen. I'd listen to anything he wanted to tell me. I'd listen to him yell and cry and scream at me because it would be so good just to hear him again. 

I let him take his time. He clears his throat and looks down, that Adam's apple bobbing again. I want to kiss it. I don't. Not anymore. 

"I think we should...I think we should talk, shouldn't we?" 

I nod. Please, I want to cry, please talk to me. Tell me something. Tell me anything. 

He takes a deep breath. If he wasn't holding my hands, he'd run his hands through his mess of long, abandoned curls. "You know when you promised me that you wouldn't leave? That I was enough?" 

I nod again, having absolutely no idea where he's going with this.

SIMON

I have absolutely no fucking idea where I'm going with this. I thought it would be quick and painless. Like ripping off a bandaid. I thought I could just "use my words" and tell him that I don't want him here anymore. That I don't want him looking at me like I'm some broken toy that he needs to mend. But then he reached out for me and I let him take my hands. I let him give me that soft look and those reassuring nods and I let him rub comforting circles onto the backs of my hands and now it doesn't seem easy at all. It's like I'm fighting a dragon without any magick. 

I need to do this, though. I need to tell him that he's free now. That he doesn't owe me anything. It'll be better for him. I know it. I swallow again, that lump in my throat making it impossible for me to choke this out. He nods at me. He wants me to carry on. I try. I'm trying.

"You said you chose me," I manage. He looks at me again, but I don't meet his eyes. I can't. "And I know that all of that was before. When I was the Mage's Heir, yeah? And I had all of this power and no way to control it. 'Cos I was a nuclear bomb and so full of something. And now..." I gesture to my wings and tail. "I'm so full of nothing."

There's something that no one ever told me about those dead spots. They told me I made them like I made the Humdrum. That I filled them like I filled that void in the Humdrum. But that's a lie. It's a hot steaming pile of fucking rubbish. The truth is that I didn't fill those spots or the bloody Humdrum. The truth is that when I poured every once of myself into the Humdrum, when I filled him to the brim with my magick, he did something to me, too. He emptied me. He poured every ounce of nothing back into me until there was nothing left but a gaping hole where my everything used to be. 

It's like when the Humdrum attacked us that night at Pitch Manor. When Baz said he was empty and that I was so full. 

I was full, wasn't I? I was so fucking full all of the time it was exhausting. I was overflowing. And now I'm so fucking empty and I don't know which is worse.  

"Si--" he starts. 

I don't let him finish. "I'm not him anymore, Baz. I'm not whoever it was that you kissed in that forest. I'm not whoever killed the Mage. Defeated the bloody Humdrum. I'm not...well I'm not me anymore, am I?"

BAZ

If I thought being kidnapped by the fucking numpties was painful, this was torture. Even though I had grown accustomed to Snow's moments of self-loathing over these past months, this one broke my heart. We'd had something like this conversation a few times now, but never quite like this. He's mentioned losing his magic, the annoyance of the wings and tail, and how he's a Normal (not to me) now, but he's never said this. He's never told me that he's not the same person. I want to laugh because I think it might be a joke. But then I see that look in his eyes as he finally looks up at me and I deflate because I can tell that he's serious. 

I want to kiss him until he's better. I want to go back to that night and give the Humdrum my magick. I'd do it if it meant that we would never have to have this conversation. I'd do it a thousand times over again.

"You are you, Simon," I say, moving closer to him. Our knees are touching now. "You've always been and always will be The Chosen One. Even without your magick. You'll always be––"

"Stop," he says. There are tears forming in his eyes. I want to kiss them away. "Just...stop. I want to tell you that I'm not the same person anymore. Not really. So all that stuff you said about 'choosing' me...it doesn't count anymore. You don't have to stay here with me. You don't have to sit here day after fucking day waiting to see if the boy you kissed will just pop up. He won't, Baz. Don't you get that?"

I feel like I'm suffocating. I know what this is, I'm not daft. I know he's trying to break up with me. I won't let him, though. I won't let him break up with me because he thinks I'm torturing myself by staying with him. 

Because I'm desperate for him to understand, I release my hands from around his and cup his face. He's still so warm like he's as alive as he was all those months ago. Like he might catch fire at any moment. I look into his eyes for a moment, those eyes that I will never grow tired of, no matter how dull they go, and kiss him. It's only for a moment and he doesn't shove me away or tell me off. I kiss him softly because I'm afraid that if I push him I'll break him apart for good. 

When I pull away, I rub my thumbs up and down his jaw. "I won't leave you, Snow. I'll wait––"

He shakes his head. He's crying now. His eyes are overflowing with tears. They're streaking down his cheeks. "No," he says. He pulls my hands off of him. "No, Baz. I just...I need some time. Away from you. I need you to leave so I won't hurt you. I can't let myself hurt you anymore." 

Fuck the numpties. Fuck Simon telling me he's not him anymore. 

This is it. 

This right here, with Simon only inches away from me, is the most painful thing I've ever experienced. 

Simon telling me to go. Telling me he doesn't want to hurt me. Telling me to leave. 

You were the sun. 

And I was crashing into you. 

And I was right:

This ended in flames.