#shilah: screams

[withbeasts]

6, shilah

basorexia; a kiss during a fight.

it's not hard for him to hear it; the way that her heart beats louder in her chest when they're like this, the hitch of breath when he takes a step closer. ( sometimes, he wonders, if there is a part of her that is scared of him; if that human instinct will always know that there is a distinct difference in what they are, despite appearances, and despite what she said. ) and there were other reasons, too -- a man was a man at the end of the day, and life had taught lessons to the woman before him.

there are moments like these where he has to decide if he wants to push, to keep the fight like this; the thrill of them screaming at one another, of keeping this tension, a sort of vulnerability he opened when they were most honest. here, and the nights when they whispered across pillowcases, just the moon as a light. wasn't it fair of him to feel like this -- that jealousy should burn so bright in his chest that it might just set him on fire?

but he doesn't let it go on. the steps to her are quick; a kiss to her cheek, too close to her lips, and he's telling her that he'll be back when he's had time to calm down. ( to extinguish -- before he managed to set them both ablaze, and ruin everything altogether. )

[withbeastsarc]

TEXTS;  accepting.  @ruinaa​ asked for [  mad  ]  for roman.  

          it takes a lot for him to be angry,  especially with her.  he knows that she would rather they scream and fight it outwardly than sit around in silence,  or have him run from it,  but he leaves and she goes to because she can go to shilah’s for her escape.  when they are upset at one another like this,  there is no one that he can turn to.  

          he sits on the edge of a bar stool and feels himself get more and more upset,  until he had his phone out,  feeling just as out of place in this dive as he did when they first met.  

[  text;  josephine  ]:  i’m really upset.

[dirtypawar-blog]

@xenoevil // sc. 

           “  tell me the truth,  di.  “  he places his hands on her shoulders.  “  i can handle it.  “

[vigilantesyd]

me, talking about a fly: listen i don’t mind that he’s out here living but can he do it away from me????

shilah: ....@ men

[dirtypawarc]

two things that shilah is afraid of: ghosts and cars driving too fast with him in it

[dirtypaw]

@brutlist​ liked x. 

          he does not doubt that heugh is fully aware of what he might be.  the web that the other man dug his hand into,  assumedly,  stretched too far outwards for his identity to be completely secret.  shilah had waited for some kind of question,  a knowing look or glance,  but it had never come.  and so they had cordially treated one another as a friend of a friend,  sharing an occasional glass of wine. 

           but shilah does not hesitate to feel bone crush under his palms for him,  silencing the agonized scream in a quick motion.  he is able to see the other man do much the same,  moving with efficiency.   “  --  so you’re very strong.  “

[wthwolvesar]

“You asleep?” / shilah

SOFT STARTERS. accepting, ( @ruinaa ). 

          they argue  –  it’s a lot,  to be in this house together sometimes,  when all she wants to do is leave.  once a week,  there’s a build up of emotion that ends with them either arguing,  not speaking,  or screaming at each other.  it could be all of the above. 

         this time,  he doesn’t know how it starts.  maybe he makes a comment,  maybe she does,  but whatever the reason their voices are raised and they throw things that they don’t mean.  their tempers both burn hot,  and they can both be cruel where they never want to.  but she turns her back and slams the door to her bedroom on him and he does the same. 

         hours later  –  he hasn’t even bothered to look at the clock  –  he finally calms down from it all.  he thinks about getting up,  going to her room,  like he knew he would do eventually,  but tonight she beats him to it. 

          “  no.  “  he opens the door a crack,  and looks at her through it in the light of the hall.  she looks like she’s been crying.  he sighs,  feeling his heart hurt a little bit.  “  –  come here.  “  

[godivasims]

Forgotten Hollow; 2:46am; three days until Bel’s birthday

Chrys: Where the fuck have you been all night, Shilah? Shilah: What the hell, Chrysanthemum? I’ve been at work! You know that! Chrys: Never in your entire career as an officer have you ever come wandering in at two in the morning!  Shilah: Calm down! Don’t push me, please! I went out with some of the rookies for some drinks! Why are you acting like this?

Things between Chrysanthemum and Shilah had, needless to say, not gotten any better. As Chrysanthemum seemed to get more and more fed up, Shilah continued to work later and later at the station. By the time Shilah made it home in the evenings, the triplets were always in bed. Chrysanthemum spent most of her day wrestling Nona, who constantly screamed for her daddy.

[fiendfyreheart]

@disintegratiive

            after their hall meeting,  he doesn’t see much of her again.  coming in,  sometimes walking past the gym,  that was all.  but when shilah learns that she’s in the same building,  he’s too pleased.  his only comment is a wow,  how coincidental,  and roman knows that the gears in his head are turning.  and when he comes home one night to see a dog happily wagging its tail while none other then josephine pets him,  roman almost screams.  

            “  don’t.  “  he tells josephine,  pushing the dog with his foot.  “  he’s just skulking around.  he doesn’t need the attention.  “ 

[withbeastsarc]

TAKE MY HAND;  accepting.  @ruinaa​ sent  [ save ] for shilah. 

          that day,  he had meant what he said.  he was tired of dying.  

          and yet he still fought with the same reckless abandon that he always did;  little care and concern for himself,  throwing his body this way and that,  all brute strength with claw and teeth.  he was fast,  and he was deadly,  even more so shifted.  it did not mean that he was fully invincible.  his blood was still thick and red,  dripping at his side,  his wounds still working to catch up with his chaotic methods.  

          if he let it wash over him like this,  too much sometimes,  caught up in his own anger  --  after all,  he could smell her blood,  hear her voice,  feel the pressure of the air as things took the turn  --  he could forget himself.  it did not matter,  suddenly,  whether or not he lived or he died in this building with these men.  it mattered that he took care of each and every one of them,  that she was left the last one standing,  the one who remained.  

          but he has pushed himself too far.  his body lags;  forced to shift back,  holding the wall,  bare skinned and bloody.  his brief hesitation is enough for a shot to ring out  --  one close to his ear enough to dizzy him,  and then the sudden feeling of being pulled while the wall behind him shatters again.  he can hear her voice,  muffled in his head,  screaming at him.  his body is working overdrive now to make up for everything happening,  caught in the middle of beast and man.  

          she tugs his hand,  harder.  it is the last thing he knows before everything goes black.  

[vigilantesyd]

i only told her that taylor was putting her music back on spotify and nothing else she came to this conclusion all on her own without using the internet she truly has spent too much time being my friend

[dirtypawarchive]

jo holding his hand

Hold Shilah’s Hand!

          it’s his idea;  roman gives him a Look that makes him think he should have reconsidered.  but what was the point of their costume if they only went to one party?  they  (  he and josephine  )  had put a lot of work into making everything as movie realistic as possible.  managing her hair into buns was the last thing  (  there were a little bit of hairs sticking out,  but it was the best that could be done.  it wasn’t like he completely matched luke,  either.  )

          they go to a halloween festival on the pier.  to the haunted house,  where he receives said Look.  roman takes a phone call and waves them to go in.  josephine makes no expression until they’re in there;  and then his hand is gripped so tight he feels like all the blood is gone from it.  

          “  --  jo,  “  she screams loud in his ear,  making them ring.  he should have taken that look a little more seriously.  

[ruinaa-archive-blog]

SOMETIMES, THERE ARE MOONLESS NIGHTS. SOMETIMES, I DON’T WANT TO BE ALIVE ANYMORE.

          for @dirtypaw in response to this meme.

i. 

she knows the story. 

a boy in the woods, a boy with a curse, a boy who will live forever.

she feels guilty, sometimes, that that is such a comfort to her -- that so many things can change, that the world can shift and turn and keep twisting into something unrecognizable, but shilah will always be there. with her. for her. at her side, his arm around her waist, her head on his shoulder. the world can change in so many, many ways, and there they are, josephine and shilah, as they’ve always been. as they always will be.

or -- how they’re always meant to be.

he comes back, and the world changes, but not in the ways she wants it to.

ii.

“shilah?”

her voice is sticky in the silence. raw. gutted, like an open wound, something carved out of her and left bleeding. it doesn’t sound like her own.

“shilah?”

get up, she thinks, desperately. get up.

he’s been through worse than this. they’ve pieced each other back together from things much worse than this. the ugly smear of blood on the floor terrifies her. she blinks once, slow, like she expects it to go away. it doesn’t.

“shilah, you have to -- get up. get up.” 

small. pleading. there’s a flicker in the back of her mind of how familiar this is -- how it mirrors the awful moments of silence after sam, when she was still blinking ash out of her eyes, when it was still clinging to the sweat along her hairline. how it didn’t make sense. how she expected it to change. how she knew it wouldn’t. 

she knows, standing there, that he’s gone.

iii.

she locks herself in her bedroom for four days and waits.

this time, he doesn’t come back.

iv.

they go to colorado.

it’s what he would’ve wanted, she says, but the thought of it -- of returning to a place that was theirs and theirs alone, where she went to heal and he went to help and where he will no longer be -- breaks her heart.

roman reaches out a hand to touch her and she turns away.

please don’t.

v.

the first time she sees him -- standing in the yard outside shilah’s cabin, like he’s afraid of coming too close, of taking that first step onto the porch -- she lunges at him before roman can stop her.

animalistic, wild-eyed, she rakes a hand down his face hard enough to draw blood but there’s a spark of heat at the tips of her fingers and she carves out deep, ugly marks in his cheek instead, a scar that will stretch from brow bone to jawline, the skin cauterized, gaping.

roman’s arms wrap around her from behind and pull her back and she’s screaming, thrashing against him, fighting with all she has left. 

forrest, the coward that he is, turns and runs, and still she keeps screaming.

after, when she finally breaks -- when she and roman slump to the ground and he keeps his arms wrapped around her tight and his voice is low in her ear, as wounded and aching as hers is, she cries herself sick, kneels in the grass until there’s nothing left and she curls up on her side, watches the sky bleed red and then purple, like a bruise. 

roman carries her inside, and she lets him.

vi.

i don’t think i can do this, she tells him in the dark, voice a whisper. 

the moon cuts a swath of light through the room, a rift between them both, and she watches his face in the dark just outside of it. 

he doesn’t say anything and, for the first time, she wishes that he would lie to her, just this once.

vii.

there’s no body to bury, but shilah deserves something. he deserves more than she can give him, now.

it’s simple -- her and roman deep in the woods, in the clearing shilah brought her to the first time she came here with him because it was filled with wildflowers, all soft pinks and bright violets and yellows -- and it’s the hardest thing she’s ever done. 

(it’s what he would’ve wanted, she knows, but it feels like leaving him behind here, out of reach, too far from her. this is his home, where he belongs, and she tries very hard not to think of how many times he’d looked at her and said that his home was wherever she was. it leaves her winded, aching, and she has to turn away.)

viii. 

roman leaves her alone, though she can feel him lingering at the treeline, watching her. 

all this time -- all these years -- and she’s never once thought of what it might be like to say goodbye to shilah. in all her worst moments, on all those darkest nights, she’s never considered that he would be the one to leave her first. it’s always been her instead. (it was supposed to be her instead.)

she used to joke, easily, that she didn’t know where she’d be without shilah. not when he’s kept her out of trouble all this time; not when he’d ripped half the world apart with roman to find her; not when he’d been the one to curl up beside her in the weeks after adrian; not when he’d stayed with her through the worst of it, the days she couldn’t get out of bed and the nights she couldn’t sleep because every noise set her on edge, terrified. 

she’d needed him then and she needs him now and, for the first time, he isn’t there. 

she buckles under the weight of it.

ix.

their last night in colorado, she thinks of telling him she wants to stay. that she can’t bear to leave this place because it feels like leaving shilah behind. because she’s afraid she’ll lose him piece by piece and bit by bit until there’s nothing left of him. because she needs him and he’s here and what will she do -- what will they do? -- when they return to a place where shilah isn’t?

they go back to new york.

it feels like a betrayal. 

x.

her grief is an ugly, visceral thing, and it lasts and lasts and lasts.

[wthwolvesar]

@ruinaa​ sent:  she's sure that roman has only pretended to stay asleep;  he's an early riser and an even lighter sleeper and none of their children can boast about being very quiet.  still,  he doesn't come downstairs through the longer-than-necessary ordeal of making breakfast and arranging gifts and signing the sixth card they've made him,  none of them able to agree on anything.  when josephine goes to get him,  she's not surprised to find him sitting up in bed,  waiting,  just as she knew he'd be.  "  happy birthday, tiger.  "  she presses a kiss to his cheek,  and downstairs,  she can hear andrew say something,  shilah quickly shushing him.  grinning, "  it's a mess down there. i feel like i should warn you ahead of time.  "

          birthday’s in this household always tended to be an ordeal.  a night before and the whole next day operation,  even when they were just sticking to things at home,  which is what he planned.  the kids were a little disappointed,  so maybe there would be some ride in the car to get ice cream and cake.  as long as they were happy,  he was happy;  it didn’t matter what they did. 

         he doesn’t get up and do his daily run,  knowing that everyone else is already downstairs,  preparing things.  he listens to josephine and shilah herd them around here and there,  smiles when he hears isabel’s matter of fact tone to shilah that daddy does not,  in fact,  like it when he is teased so he shouldn’t do it so much today.  after a while of noise and shuffling,  josephine finally comes up the stairs to where he waits.  

          “  i already got that idea.  “  he smiles back,  chest warm.  from the door,  ellie must have broken free,  peaking her head in.  he holds out his arms for her and she lunges on the bed,  screaming happy birthday to him.  (  a few minutes later,  it’s all of them,  and quite some time before they finally make their way downstairs.  )  

[starlightsulu]

You are on my list of love. I love Sulu and I love the way you write him and I'm glad that we reconnected through this blog. Shilah and Sulu's interactions are funny and also pain. You're an amazing writer, and your love for Sulu is obvious in everything you write. I'm happy to know you and happy to scream at each other about hands and our fools.

omg ew who would ? love ? hikaru ? sulu ? what a fuckin los- *trips* *drops thousands of photos * fuck those aren’t mine i swear --- i’m just holding them for a friend i --- * slips* they’re not mine i hate him. he can’t even fly a starship properly ! wH Y WOULD I ---

HOW DARE YOU BRING UP HANDS. I THOUGHT WE WERE FRIENDS. /OBI WAN VOICE: YOU WERE MY BROTHER NOEL. I LOVED YOU. 

but no real talk ilu and ur shilah and i’m so glad we reconnected on this hell site. i love him and the lore behind what he became, i love what he did after and who he made himself become, and i love your interactions with @ruinaa and @guttersniper and i’m like look at my homies look at them they’re so great ilu all and your ocs fuck. 

[vigilantesyd]

this is what i woke up to this morning... shes in the middle of finals week can u tell