#//i wanted srs titles but i guess this chatzy

[exorciseyourspirit]

The Ghost Of You || Theo And Rebecca

We were meant to live for so much more.

Theodora had to fight herself not to spend all her energy racing to Rebecca’s home at once. It had to be her. She was strong. She had fought him off before. She would fight him and surface again. It had to be her. But as she neared it, reached to pass through the windows and reach for her, call to her, a fear coiled around her and she hesitated. There was no telling why the dybbuk would trick Blanche again, what he would gain from playing a long game when he enjoyed his own existence so very much. And--dear God in Heaven--she was there. She was using Theodora’s old kettle, nursing her ribs. And she looked so tired. It must be her, mustn’t it? Theodora hesitated, then pressed her hand to the windows, rattling them as if they were caught in a gale. If it were the creature, he would see her. He would be cruel. And she had to be careful, certain. Didn’t she? “I know you’re in there,” she said, uncertain of to whom she was speaking anymore.

Rebecca had been icing her wound when she’d decided that a nice cup of tea would help calm her down. She’d waddled into the kitchen, still limping from the pain, though it seemed to be getting better. She’d have to schedule a doctor’s appointment, she wasn’t sure the demon had done so. It would be alright, in the meantime, with tea and ice and ibuprofen. She sighed, grabbing the kettle and filling it with water, sighing as she set it on the stove and clicked it on. She remembered her visions of the home, of the flashing clock on the stove. It wasn’t flashing now. It wasn’t beeping. Suddenly, the windows shook, a chill up her spin. Rebecca jumped, pulling out her ward. “Who’s there?” Limped over towards the window, when the voice filtered through. No. She-- she must’ve been hearing things. Backing away, she turned away. “Whoever you are, go away. I don’t-- I’m not who you’re looking for.”

Theodora passed through the glass as Rebecca backed away. The dybbuk would have no need to be afraid. He was too confident, surely. And he would see her. Mock her. Rebecca, on the other hand— “Darling?” She called softly. She knew Rebecca’s tired looks intimately. The way the creases around her eyes seemed to deepen, the droop around her mouth, the way her hair dropped with neglect. Hunting a dybbuk, even over the span of years, was hardly conducive to good rest. And it was all the same, now as ever before. “It is you, isn't it, darling? Rebecca?”

Rebecca turned, clutching the counter until her knuckles turned white. She’d finally lost it, was what this was. That voice, so familiar. She was back in that place again, wasn’t she? That must be it. This couldn’t be real. But the chill in her bones, the way her flesh tingled-- she knew it wasn’t just her imagination. Her lip quivered. Maybe if she ignored it, she’d go away. This couldn’t be happening. She couldn’t be back, couldn’t be here. Rebecca had only been able to pull through because she knew Theo was in a better place, knew that she was no longer suffering-- but now? Accepting this? “No,” she said, moving away from the energy radiating by the window. “No, you’re not-- you’re not here. Just go away, please,” turning her back to her again. Because if it was her, she didn’t want her to see the anguish in her face, the defeat.

“Rebecca--” Theodora called, drifting slowly towards her. She couldn’t mean it like this, surely. After all the time it had been, and the weight of these weeks knowing she was drifting alone in the black while the dybbuk mocked her existence, that the alternative was a cursed existence, pulling against a tide she could not fully control. If Rebecca knew it was her, surely-- Theodora brushed her hand through her hair, wilting as she realized that Rebecca might do just that, if she were alone enough, and hurt enough. The worst fights they had were the ones where Rebecca pushed her away when Theodora most wanted to be with her. “Don’t let’s do that cruel dance again, my love,” she said. “It really is me. And I’ve come all this way just to see you again, for true.”

“That-- it--” Rebecca stammered, shivering as something brushed across her skin. She screwed her eyes shut, pulling away again. How cruel could the world be? To give her her lover back like this? As the things she hunted? The things she had come to only feel, to hear, but not see. Never see. She cast her head down, arms wrapped around herself. Tears welling behind tightly shut lids. “It’s not fair! You can’t-- you shouldn’t be here. I’m so sorry. Why are you here? You shouldn’t be here. Go, please, go. Move on. Be happy. Please,” she begged, breath wheezing. The hurt in her ribs was now nothing compared to the hurt in her heart. The ache that clenched at her. She wished for so long during that year alone to see her lover one more time. To speak to her, one more time. And never had she thought to come back to White Crest. Never had she thought Theo would have been here, been around. And it hurt all the more, knowing that she could’ve known her this whole time. That she could have had her like this, the whole time. But her stubbornness, her pain had kept her away. And she only had herself to blame. “You can’t be here.”

“As if I could ever rest, knowing you were in pain?” Theodora asked. “Knowing I hadn’t done enough to protect you? After all my other failures, and all my other wanderings?” She lifted the hair that fell over her face, twisting it round in her grasp, such as it was. “Would you really deny us this, my love, after two long years? Haven’t we suffered enough apart? Must you punish us again?” If she could have only but summoned solid hands through will alone, the ability to pull her up, shake her, make Rebecca look at her and see her-- Oh, but that would have been too easy. Whatever sins Theodora was atoning for, she had obscured herself from such a blessing. “It’s one thing never to visit your wife, but another to cast her out of your home. And this is not the time for running, Rebecca,” she said, voice firm. 

“This isn’t-- this isn’t your fault, you know that, I told you that,” Rebecca pleaded quietly, shivering again when Theo’s ghostly hands passed across her. She looked up, bewildered, wishing now more than ever that she could see her-- cursing now more than ever, that she couldn’t see ghosts. “You should be able to move on, my love,” she said quietly, her voice strained as she fought back her tears. “You shouldn’t be here suffering with me.” The pain swelling again in a frantic sob, aching ever more thanks to the fracture in her side. She moved through the spirit in front of her, through the kitchen, and to the living room. There was a photo of Theodora on the mantel and she picked it up, knowing she’d followed her in, hands caressing her face in the photo. “I couldn’t bare to visit the place where I’d lost you. Where’d I’d failed everything in my life,” she confessed quietly, “my ultimate failure. Losing you.”

Theodora followed, peering over Rebecca’s shouler and passing her arms through her body, as if she would press her close, Rebecca’s back cradled by her chest. Some evenings, when Rebecca’s fear pulled and stiffened at her, it was the only way she could bridge the awful silence between them and hold her at all. If she could just take shape for even a moment, she thought. Even with hands of death, to feel anything-- “Oh, my darling,” she sighed, her voice shuddering. “It wasn’t your fault at all. I dove for him. I just wasn’t fast enough. That was my blasted foolishness, not yours.” She skated her ghostly hands over Rebecca’s. It was just a chill, Rebecca had told her. Like a pocket of icy wind. She did not know how it could comfort, but she hoped that from her, with her voice in her ear, it might for even a breath of a moment. “Is marriage not a sharing of suffering, anyway? I think I’m rather entitled, don’t you?” Her voice lilted softly upwards, hoping to soothe with a touch of levity.

Rebecca shuddered again, but it wasn’t an adverse reaction. Somehow, the chill of Theodora’s touch was a comfort. Perhaps it was her voice, or perhaps it was just knowing that that was what she was trying to do, but Rebecca didn’t turn away this time. She could feel Theo’s presence behind her and felt the longing inside of her to hold her and touch and her and felt the unfairness of the fact that she couldn’t. It felt like a physical ache in her arms that could only be quelled by Theodora’s touch, but she would never again feel it. Even now, with her here. “We never made it official, you know,” she said quietly after a moment. She turned around, looked up-- she couldn’t see Theo, didn’t know exactly where she was, but she could see her clearly in her mind. Standing there with her sweater on, that look in her eyes-- so soft, so caring. Like they could look into Rebecca’s own soul and pull out all the bad and make everything okay. With just a look. “I want to see you,” she whispered, “let me see you.”

“Not officially, no,” Theodora chuckled. “But we did a lot of married things in the eyes of our gods alone. It’s close enough. I told Blanche I was your wife. So at this point, who’s the wiser, really?” Rebecca turned to her, her soft face open and bright. There was a sparkle of hope in her watery blue eyes, that resilient seed that carried her through so many dark nights. Theodora passed her fingers through her cheeks. She dug deep into the core of her soul, just in case there was any strength within her that could summon to make herself solid again. Even a moment, a flash of contact, however soft. But she could not wipe Rebecca’s tears from her cheeks. She could not draw her close and fold her up in her arms away from the world. “Oh, if I only could, my love,” she said. “It is so good to see you after so long. I have missed you so very much. So very much. If I knew how, I would--” She could not bring herself to continue. It seemed too cruel, to speak hopes that had no promise of coming true. “But I would stay with you tonight, and every other, for as long as this lasts. I will help you, however I can.”

Rebecca lifted her left hand. There was a pale band around her ring finger. “I haven’t put it back on in a long time,” she murmured, curling her fingers in slightly before stretching them back out again. “It didn’t seem right. I was worried he might--” Take it. Break it. Destroy it. Destroy their symbol of love. She knew it sounded stupid, but she couldn’t bare the thought. She knew that their love was always going to be in their hearts, undead or not, no matter what. Even if Rebecca wilted away and her soul was torn from this world. She shuddered at the thought and clutched the picture to her chest, sinking into the couch. “Staying seems almost cruel,” she muttered, “how cruel is the world to give you back to me in the one form I can’t see you.” She looked up again, eyes worn, tired. “I want you to stay, but I can’t ask that of you. What if he comes back while I sleep? He’ll kill you, he’ll take you from me and I already lost you once, I can’t-- I won’t,” she set the photo down on the table in front of her. “I don’t know what to do anymore, Theodora. I’m lost.”

Theodora turned her attention to the photograph. Despite being only a year before her death, the woman in there seemed so much surer, stronger, than how she felt. Perhaps she was simply more corporeal. But lacking a reflection, Theodora found a strange sense of heart in the person she was. However damned she was, she had been a woman who could bear anything. The cruelty of loss. The rejection of the world. The breaking of her own body, over and over from one night to next. She could bear this too. And perhaps at the end of it, if she succeeded, she might uncover the misdeeds of her soul, might even find her way to absolution and peace. But what was heaven without Rebecca? The thought was meaningless, too selfish and small as to dissipate faster than smoke. Theodora knelt before her, hands cooling on her knees so she would know where to look. “Whatever you will of me, I will do it,” she said solemnly. “You wouldn’t be asking me to stay. You need only tell me you want it again and I shall. I would like to stay with you too. Comfort you, if I can at all, and to damn the risk. I can dissipate faster than he can reach for me like this. But If it will only cause you more grief and worry, I will go. I have places to stay. I’ll be alright. I won’t even be alone. Perhaps don’t think about this one overmuch, if you can help it. You needn’t ask at all, only say what you feel.”

Cool hands on her knees that she could almost feel, Rebecca looked down at where she knew Theodora was. She could picture her so clearly, kneeling in front of her, green eyes sparkling. Tears welled behind her eyes again and she let them fall freely this time, too tired to fight them off anymore. She wished she could see Theo, she wished so badly for the thing she’d worked her entire life to be proud of not having. Becoming an exorcist despite her inability to see ghosts had been one of her proudest accomplishments, and now, all she could do was curse the world for denying her this gift. “I can’t say it,” she finally admitted, her voice a hoarse whisper, “I need to know I’m me first. I need to know it’s safe, first.” She wrapped her arms around herself against and pretended they were Theo’s arms, sinking into her grasp like the safety blanket it had always been for her, from their first embrace to their last. “I need to feel safe again.”

Theodora was glad Rebecca could not see her then, for in two years of being invisible she had lost all habit of schooling her face to hide any emotion she didn’t want to surface. She hung her head and would have dug her fingers in with longing, with a silent plea, if she had anything to touch. She wanted to stay. After two years alone, torturing herself with memories, she wanted to stay more than anything. But the wishes of the dead and damned were of no consequence. Theodora was quiet for several moments, however, before finally saying, “Alright. Then I will go. I’ll return soon, though, to see how you are.” She withdrew from her, gliding away towards the door. “I hope at least that much is alright with you.”

Rebecca’s heart tugged because she could feel exactly what Theo was-- she knew exactly the look on her face. And though Theodora was here, she was so tired of having to just imagine things. To imagine what her lost love was doing, feeling, looking. “Wait!” she said, a bit desperately, “stay for a little longer. Please,” she asked, hoping her eyes were glancing in her direction. “I-- just a little longer.” She stood up, struggling, her side prickling with pain. “I can finish making us tea,” she said quietly, hobbling towards the kitchen again, “and...maybe you can tell me your favorite poem again. And just...maybe for just a little bit, you can stay…” she paused in the doorway again, looking around the room, wondering if she could simply reach out and feel her. “Please?”

Theodora wanted nothing more than to do all of those things with Rebecca. Just another evening near her, even if they couldn’t touch or meet eyes. But if such and evening was what she had really wanted, she would have said so. This gesture, however earnest, could only have been given out of love for her. And oh, how Theodora had missed being loved at all. To be offered something so simple, so kind, for no other reason than because Rebecca saw her and cared. If she could truly claim to love her in return, however, she would honor her first wish. The one she had made before she knew how thin Theodora’s skin had become. “No,” she said. “It’s alright. You should feel safe, first and foremost. No need to take on any shame about it.” And Theodora believed this, with all her heart, but she could not avoid the bitter sadness she felt. She had always failed at compartmentalizing cleanly when it came to Rebecca. Why should it be any different in death? “It is good to have you back, my love. Even like this,” she said. And before Rebecca could call to her again and change her mind, she was gone.