Brave

Brave (to write this)

Prompt 6/19

He was watching her... as she danced around the table, her face
strained, her long hair flowing. He was watching her spinning around
and around until she was dizzy and fell to the floor, exhausted
mentally, physically, emotionally. She was humming a song that only she
knew and no one else could hear.

The candle light reflected on the knife she raised to admire and she
wished he was there, but he was only watching from a distance, knowing,
not wanting to know, absorbed in his own pain.

"You can only heal me if you first heal yourself," she whispered, and
started laughing joylessly. He never understood that. His devotion was
beyond doubt, his intentions flawless, but his own disabilities made
him stumble and left her alone with a knife in her hand.

He was watching her trace the knife across her arm, her hand, her
wrist, and he winced, unable to help her because to do that, he would
first have to help himself, and he did not have the strength to do
that.

She scratched her skin lightly, enjoying the power, enjoying the
knowledge that she could, if she so wished, end it all. She traced the
scratch with her tongue, then started sucking softly, drawing blood.
Not too much or he would see. Hide the cut, hide the pain.

She slashed two deep lines where her watch would cover the marks, and
watched the blood pour. He was watching her relish the pain, tears
rolling down his cheeks.

"Star light, star bright," she whispered and she started another
pattern, next to the first. She pressed the knife on her skin until it
sunk in, creating her own star to wish upon. "First star I see
tonight," she sung and started to giggle. It felt good. It felt right.
It felt wrong, and she destoyed the pattern with a few hasty slashes,
covering her guilt, covering her pain, like she always had.

He was watching her cut lines, some deep, some shallow. He was watching
her cry and laugh, dance and stumble, live and die, and he was
wondering how he could possible heal her if he could not even heal
himself.