#sunnonymous writes

[sunnonymous]

Lies

Keeping track of lies is hard.

What some would deem a sin is for others a necessary mechanism of survival.

But that doesn’t make remembering your lies any easier.

Your speech stutters, your throat closes, your heart hammers. Names, faces, words heavy with connotation all flash in your mind’s eye. Which lie is it this time?

Does she know he’s a he and not a she?

Which of your coworkers wearing rainbow pins still blanch at the word queer?

Did you use the word girlfriend with this group, or were you hiding behind partner? Could she only be your friend tonight? Was that all you were allowed?

In each new place, a judgement call. A snap decision, to see how much of yourself you can show, which of your jagged parts is welcome, how you will fill in the gaps.

New worlds spit into being as you fissure down the middle again, and these worlds must never touch.

It’s hard to keep track of the yous, of the thems, of what’s yours and what cannot be, not while you’re here, not in this company.

You shape yourself to hide in the space that people around you have named acceptance. The space is never the same size, never the same shape. But you try.

You can become any shape, any size.

You don’t know how to be alone.

You have no place that you have named acceptance.

You’re not sure what shape you are meant to be. All you know is you don’t look like you used to, and you don’t feel like you look the way you should.

What do you want? It’s not this, is it?

You like to believe you are an honest person, but you tell a lot of lies.

You’re not sure what you’ve been telling yourself.

But whatever it is, it isn’t true.

[sunnonymous]

"Barely."

"The hell do you mean, 'barely?' Being in love-"

"Is an extremely private predicament-"

"-generally involves at least two people, whose business the matter very much is."

"Yeah, well I didn’t know two people were involved, did I?"

"Of course you did. You love me. That’s two."

"How was I supposed to know you were in love with me, too?"

"Oh, I don’t know, maybe because we’ve going to the ends of the earth for each other for years now, braving thick and thin, always standing by one another’s side?"

"Purely coincidence."

"You’re a dolt."

"I am not. Besides that’s not love, that’s dedication."

"What else is love supposed to be?"

"It’s… more that that."

"More. Very specific."

"What do you want me to say?"

"Maybe you could tell me just what exactly you think is more loving than wholehearted commitment?"

"I don’t know! It’s, love’s not just always being around someone, is it? It’s not just duty. It’s… a searing feeling going up your throat every time they look at you for more than a second. It’s not being able to think straight then they press up against your side, and going insane trying to make them crack a smile when they’re blue. It’s the drop in your stomach whenever they’re in danger, doing anything and everything in your power to save them. It’s-"

"Drinking a deadly poison to free them from a curse, even though it means sacrificing yourself?"

"… When you put it that way, it sounds obvious."

"I was under the impression it was."

"Clearly not, or I would have noticed."

"You’re literally the very last one to notice."

"No, that can’t be true. I don’t know how you found out about me, either. I hid it well."

"You absolutely didn’t. But it stings a bit that you tried."

"I- but I thought… I never expected you’d want me to be in love with you."

"Why ever not?"

"Well, you’ve had suitors clamouring for your hand left and right since the day you came of age. I saw the lengths they went to, how they bored you, how they treated you like a prize… most of all I saw how badly it hurt you to be regarded that way. Like your affections were a plaything to be won with the right combination of words and gifts. I never wanted you to think I saw you that way. I didn’t want my love to hurt you, like theirs did."

"… None of them were ever really in love with me, though. You know that, right?"

"I know. How could they be?"

"Oof, I know you’re in a snippy mood, but that’s taking it a step too far-"

"No- oh, shut up! I meant, how could they be, when they didn’t know you like I do? They’d gift you gems and jewellery and I’d have to stand there silently rolling my eyes, knowing you’d have much preferred a book. They’d complement your hair and all I could think about was how you loathed brushing tangles from it every morning, or about the time I snuck you a pair of scissors and your mother went bezerk about the short cut you gave yourself-"

"Pfft, her face was as red as a beetroot."

"-and how you hate sitting still at fancy dinners, how your heart yearns for adventure, how you’d fight the world if it stood between you and doing what’s right."

"Goodness… you think awfully highly of me."

"I know, it’s a problem. You’re a brat who makes my job extremely hard."

"Is that all?"

"Obviously not. Though, they are your most defining qualities."

"But you still love me."

"Regrettably."

"Hey! I’d say it was quite fortunate that you do, or else that kiss wouldn’t have worked and I’d be cold as the grave right now."

"And I’d definitely be fired."

"We can’t have that."

"Good grief, I’m probably going to be exiled the minute we get home, anyway. What kind of bodyguard lets their charge drink from a poisoned chalice?"

"The kind of guard who can awaken them afterwards with a quick peck to the lips?"

"… I didn’t know it would work."

"I did."

"How?"

"Didn’t I explain already? Despite your best efforts you’ve been quite obvious-"

"No, that’s not- I meant how did you know that I… would kiss you?"

"Oh, love. It’s simple, really. You only let yourself care when you think I can’t see. It’s only once you think I’m asleep that you’ll stroke my hair, pull a blanket up over me, stoke the fire to make sure I keep warm. You slide extra food onto my plate when my attention’s pulled, you dim the lanterns when I pass out with my head in a book, and you always - always - fight for me. Even when I’m not there to thank you for it."

"I… don’t do it for thanks."

"I know that, too. You never ask me for anything, even when I wish more than anything that you would."

"You want me to ask things of you?"

"Of course. How else am I supposed to show you how much I love you, too?"

"… No wonder I didn’t figure it out."

Prompt #966

"Why did you never tell me?"

"It was a personal issue."

"You being in love with me kind of also involves me."

[sunnonymous]

She crosses her arms, her mouth set in a thin line that could either mean she was trying to hide bemusement or a desire to kill.

"I might be persuaded to believe it. Go ahead, convince me."

Oh. This is dangerous territory. Deadly in fact.

This is over the train tracks, past the ancient minefield, onto the fragile frozen lake as the sun began to rise, heralding the fresh spring thaw.

I feel the shiver of lingering winter lick up my spine in response to the iciness permeating from her frozen scowl.

"Gimme a second."

"Take your time." She leans against the doorframe now, a subtly menacing energy held taught in the lines of her slender body.

Her grey eyes never leave my dangling form, suspended halfway in, halfway out of the window to her second story bedroom.

"Rats."

"The exclamation, or the animal?"

"The- the animal?" I hedge. "There was one up here. I’m uh… I got a part time job. Pest control."

"Nope, try again. More believable this time, if you can."

I scratch at my nose with as little movement as possible, my eyes darting around the room in the hopes I’ll spot anything to explain away my current predicament.

The wooden ledge of the window frame is starting to dig into my stomach, and with nothing for my feet to find purchase on it’d be hard to do much to relocate that didn’t end with me tumbling onto the floor at her feet. I’m not quite so desperate as to put myself in that position. Yet.

"You’re losing credibility." She warns me, as if I had any to begin with, hanging here like a limp towel.

She’s examining her trimmed nails, and I still can’t for the life of me tell if she finds this whole situation amusing or maddening. Both options could leave me in the lurch, though not much more than I already am.

"Alright, fine, I admit it. I’m here for your interior decorating prowess. I’m redoing my room and there’s no one with a better eye for complementary colour pallets than you."

"I’m more inclined to believe the story about the rats."

I huff, slumping deeper over the sill and wiggling my legs uselessly behind me, as though I might kick my way out of this ordeal.

"You didn’t have to maim a poor tree because of me."

"You think that was my idea? Dad went at it with a chainsaw."

I wince. It’s hard to look up at her when I’ve no clue what expression will be waiting on her striking features. "Your dad knows I’ve been over?"

"He knows someone was coming over." Her shoulders hunch, long legs striding forward a few paces till she can sink down onto the end of her bed. "And now I’ve lost my main escape route."

"Well it wasn’t actually a root, it was a branch-"

"Don’t be arch, it’s not cute." The quirk at the corner of her lips makes me think she’s not being entirely truthful. The thought prompts bubbling, dizzying warmth to start fizzling back to life in my stomach. My very cramped stomach.

"You said you wouldn’t come back." Her smile vanished, gone almost as quick as it had appeared, leaving me anchorless.

"I say a lot of things."

"I told you not to come back."

"You tell me to do a lot of things, too." I attempt a shrug, though it must hardly look like one given the angle. "I listen selectively."

She rolls her striking eyes at me. The sight causes a beaming smile to leap onto my face. There are so many things she wants to say, I can see them, floating like a darkened storm cloud between us, waiting for the first lightning strike of her sharp tongue to hit before the torrents release in its wake.

But she was holding back. It gave me hope that maybe, if I was careful, I could make it off the ice after all.

"For no particular reason, could you possibly lend a hand, or… a chair, or something to hold onto, so I don’t plummet to my death?"

"Death’s rather dramatic," she chides my choice of words. Nevertheless, she kicks her desk chair over to window in one fluid motion so I have something to leverage my weight against when I start to shimmy in the rest of the way, "You’d probably just break both your legs."

"No need to- sound so cheerful- about it." Come my muffled gasps between the sounds effort that punctuate my statement. I pull and clamber and wiggle my body fully inside. Once there, I slouch bodily into the chair with a great big breath of relief, rubbing at my sore stomach as a grimace twists my face. She’s still squinting at me, like she sees right through all that I am.

"How the hell did you even make it to the window without the branch?"

"I jumped."

She blanches. "You did what?"

"J-u-m-p. Jump. It’s where you use your legs to push your body through the air-"

"All the way from the tree? How are you not dead?"

"I have good aim." I’m still a little breathless, brow furrowed as I rub over sore muscles, but it’s nothing I can’t manage.

"What if you hadn’t made it?"

"Then I’d have two broken legs." I quote matter-of-factly, nodding along to emphasise how we’re going round in circles, now.

She throws her arms up in frustration and makes a growling sound in the back of her throat, which makes my eyes dart to the slender column of her neck. I gulp. That same fizzy feeling is blooming out to fill my chest with warmth, threatening to pull my focus.

"You need to clear out of here before he gets home, you know."

"I didn’t think anyone was home at all." I mutter to myself, sitting up straighter on her chair in an attempt to gain back some dignity.

"Then why the idiotic acrobatics?"

"Just wanted to check if I could."

"Still not believable."

"I wanted to see you."

"Already said you didn’t know I was home, so that’s a manipulative lie. Strike one and two."

"I miss you." The words tear out of my chest like a sudden car backfire in the night, leaving me ringing from their heavy, hollow echo. They hang in the atmosphere, suspended in the charged air between us. "I miss you, okay."

Her eyes pierce into me, pinning me to the chair like a captured bug splayed under a piece of glass.

It hurts to see such stormy emotions behind the penetrating grey, knowing I’ll never find out what’s going on in there. No longer would she trust me enough to divulge the inner workings of her wonderful mind, nor could I ever discern her thoughts from sight alone.

"It’s time to go." She tells me firmly, leaving no room for argument, despite the slight waver in her tone. I feel a stone drop inside of me, and I wonder if this is what finally cracks the ice beneath my feet. Best not to push my luck.

"Alright. No arguments here. If the real pest catcher is on the way then this rat had better skedaddle." I stand from her chair and turn to awkwardly move it back to its place by her desk. I have none of her grace and elegance, I know, but I try to make do.

My hands dance absently over the surface of her desk, as if looking for other things to tidy. I’m stalling for time, just for another moment to be by her side, and it’s obvious.

The tension almost tips past a breaking point, but before it can I turn for the door, hands sinking into my pockets to keep from reaching for her like spring morning flowers reach for the sun. I’ve just passed the threshold of the door when the silence finally breaks.

"You’re so hard to read, you know."

The sound of her voice makes me startle a bit. Her admission catches me off guard. Blinking in surprise, I glance back over my shoulder and realise… I’ve never expected that she could be struggling with this just as much as I had. "I would’ve said the same thing about you."

"Yeah, I suppose a good liar would."

"It’s not that. It’s something about the two of us that just… we’re too different. Or too alike. Usually people tell me I’m an open book."

"No. You seem that way, it’s true, but it’s a mask." There’s a melancholy gleam to her eyes now, her still-crossed arms shifting to wrap more around her body as though for comfort rather than defensive posturing. "There’s so many layers, but you run off whenever anyone starts trying to dig. To find the real you. It’s so hard to know what you truly mean."

I swallow heavily, gaze falling shamefully to the carpet. If I were to be honest, which I rarely am… it scares me how accurate her assessmen is. Even while it’s still obvious she has no idea why I am this way. "Maybe we’re just both bad at reading people."

"That’s the first believable thing you’ve said in a long time."

"Have a good night." I leave her then, sweeping down the stairs and out the front door as quietly as a mouse, or rather, the rat she surely thinks I am.

The small package I came to deliver is sitting surreptitiously on her desk. I hope that she’ll open it before realising it’s from me. Even after everything, I had to give her the birthday present.

I always remembered. First day of spring, when the ice began to melt.

Not that she’d believe me.

Prompt #962

"You wouldn't, by chance, believe me if I said it's not what it looks like?"