when words fail you / accepting
once again, she stayed long after her ‘ curfew ‘ - not that she needed one given that her family knew his well enough at his point to allow unannounced sleepovers - & had fallen asleep on his way too comfortable sofa. honestly, he should change it for a cheaper one since she seemed to take such a liking to it.
it’s not the first time he’s left awake to finish whatever obscure drama he has found at a vhs sale - it’s a hit or miss with them, really. it’s either that they both enjoy the plot or one of them is left awake while the other goes into a peaceful slumber. it’s not that bad. the blue light of the tv screen always casts a comforting glow over them as the clock ticks further & further towards the morning hours.
tooru makes space for himself on the sofa, lying down so that his body is in a parallel line with sachiko’s - soft breaths, chest rising up & down softly, velvet eyelashes resting on puffed cheeks. she was a sight, especially at 3 am, curled on his sofa, blue glow from the tv casting icy shadows across her body & setting her hair aflame with the chilling reality of a nymph being in such close proximity to him.
a hand reaches out - tentative, scared almost to touch her as not to disturb her sleep. index finger rests on the apple of her cheek which almost burns under the finger - was she always a human radiator or was he just abnormally cold that night ? middle finger & ring finger eventually gain confidence to touch the velvet skin & just as a sculptor would touch their greatest work of art, so did tooru’s fingers run down sachiko’s sun kissed face, naming freckles & birthmarks with astral names as his digits slid further down. her pulse felt hot against the tips of his fingers & truthfully - his breath died for a moment as he listened to the tune of her blood, her pulse, her lifeline.
beauty is not aesthetic. beauty is the essence of life.
would she believe him if he told her that ? would she laugh at his pompous expressionism ? perhaps her vision of beauty aggressively opposed his & she’d refuse any statements made by him. after all, she’s the artist. he’s the scientist. & so their dynamic works undisturbed. but would she be shocked to find that, underneath the heavy syllogism of his personality existed a violent sophism that only came out when she was the topic of discussion ? would she accept that a simple look in her eyes caused a tumult in his heart that required the brain power of a thousand gods to not have him shout at the top of his lungs how hard her gaze brought him to his knees ?
tooru takes a long look at her sleeping visage, discussing this hypothesis with himself. in the end, he laughs to himself & drops his hand from her face, feeling unworthy of touching her in such a moment of vulnerability. the house is quiet, the film credits are rolling in & 4 am strolls into the room with the smell of morning dew & summer.
she’s an artist & he’s a scientist.
it would be foolish to try & enter her world.
