This loss feels like a welcome home

Her questions fell on deaf ears and no amount of reassurances seem to convince him that she was okay. "Sirius, I'm okay, I promise," she told him softly, calmly, gently petting the foreleg attached to the paw she had grabbed. He was still too gone, too lost in the fear of it to hear her and she just continued to try and soothe him, waiting for him to fully realize what had happened - and more specifically what had not happened. He hadn't bitten her, hadn't hurt her. Startled her for sure, but nothing more. She let him keep tapping along her body, let him squeeze her tighter to him. If it would make him feel better she'd let him check from head to tail just to prove that he hadn't hurt her.

But then she felt his paw behind her head and suddenly he had pulled her down to him, claiming her muzzle in a kiss, making her eyes go wide. It was like a jolt to her fragile heart that she had been carefully keeping held together, shaking it loose. It happened so quickly and shocked her, making her react before her brain could process what was happening. She kissed him back with a sudden flood of longing that soothed the deep, aching loneliness that she had been hiding from and ignoring. Her eyes closed, she gave over to the desperateness of that kiss, the release they both needed.

And just as suddenly it was gone and the world shifted around her again as she tumbled off of him, rolling on to her side and hitting the floor with a soft thud, blinking with shock. She rolled back to her stomach and turned her head to look at him, her eyes wide and confused and... hurt? Or was that longing? It was so hard to pick the different emotions apart. The feeling of his lips against hers felt like it was burned into her brain and it made the loneness all the more pronounced. It was like grazing a claw against an itch and not being able to really scratch it.

"Sirius..." she breathed, her ears folding back against her head, her brows pulling together uncertainly. It tugged at feelings that she had long since buried, making her chest ache. As they trained together, as they grew closer, those hints of emotions had wormed their way into her heart and she had immediately stamped them out. He had Zee. He had Zee long before he ever had her. And then she had Resin. Resin had taught her how to love, taught her what it meant. She still loved Resin, but she loved Sirius too. But she had beaten it down, hidden it, disguised it as friendship.

She pushed herself to her feet and lingered there, hurting and pained and longing and lonely. But a thought kept whispering in the back of her mind, one she couldn't let go. She'd never be Zee. He said it himself. It had always been Zee. That's all he had ever wanted. She swallowed hard around the lump in her throat, finally pulling her gaze away from his to look at the floor, fighting with her inner conflicts, fighting with what was right. Can't you tell that I've always loved you?

"Tamsyn" | "Blue"