mirth to know not this hearth of his, a place where no warmth shall dwell and no flames shall kindle, wooden splinters dare not be whisked away upon an incandescent whim. calloused fingers cradled a crystalline glass, ice long since melted melds with lucent ambers, reverberates in whispers of his own troubled expression. Wolf doesn't know what to say to her, hell, for once in his damn life nothing rolls to the tip of his tongue, not a scathing, sarcastic comment, not a commemorative speech, fucking nada. so he does what he does best, tips back his head and swigs the last of the alcohol, relishing the burn, the sensation of a transient distraction, wiping that which lingers upon his lip with the back of his hand.
" Even after all this time, I still don't know what to fucking say," he mutters just beneath his breath to an audience of none, forsaking the glass upon polished wood, slouching into the gelid folds of neglected leather, his head buried in his hands, raking through tendrils of damp hair, a defeated sigh falls from lips drawn taut. " I really thought I had it this time." a confession filled with bitter resentment, for his own short-comings, for his failure. " Maybe im just'a letdown after-all." raspy laughter ensues. rising, he closes the distance between him and the mantle in a few, brisk strides.
Wolf reaches for her, for the meticulously designed frame and the contagious smile that once filled his heart with unrivalled warmth, allowing mournful fingers to find respite within its extremities; grief asphyxiating, condensing, threatening to prick at the corners of his eyes. hastily, he sets her face down, avoiding her, as he seemed to always do. " maybe next year ... i'll know what to say." with that, he turns his back on her, reaches for a depleting bottle and drowns what is left of that remorse.
