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When Ralsei feels someone coming from the light world this late at night, he’s not surprised. It’s been an eventful day. When it’s only Susie he sees–maybe he is, a tiny bit, and then he’s embarassed, and then he wills himself not to be: it won’t help anybody.
He’s ready to smile at her, like she deserves, like he wants to whenever he looks at her: bright and fearless, pure, unrestrained energy. He doesn’t. He doesn’t know why, but he can just stare at her, and she just stares at him. This time he walks over and, as he stretches up to wrap his arms around her neck, she’s already bowing down and loosely wrapping a hand around the small of his back. He feels a lump in his throat, squeezes, and she doesn’t complain.
“Hey,” she mumbles.
“Hi.”
“My room free?”
They disentangle like the hug never happened. “It’s your room, Susie.”
She shrugs. He doesn’t ask why she’s alone, or why she’s come here, tonight of all nights. She just walks towards her room and he follows.
When they’re at the door, she hesitates–and Susie never hesitates.
“Susie-”
“You want a midnight snack?”
Ralsei blinks. “Um.”
“I mean, is this even night for you? Whatever. It’s dumb. But I’m- I’m hungry, and my fridge is always stacked up, so- come eat something. Midnight snack. On me.”
Ralsei’s working on a list of things he’s learned about his friends; when he notices something new he adds it to the list, which he then recites to himself like a nursery rhyme, until he’s committed it to memory. Based on that, he plans for gifts, for ways to improve their rooms, to surprise them and see their reactions. He likes to see them acting like people.
Here’s one thing he’s learned very early on: if it’s something she’d consider selfish, Susie never really asks for anything directly.
He guesses they have that in common; this small, terrible habit he’s never thought about but has been mulling over since he’s recognised it in her.
She doesn’t get it–she deserves everything. Susie deserves everything she wishes for, she’s even entitled to it, literally. He doesn’t understand why she wouldn’t just ask, because most things–he’ll do it.
He doesn’t think she understands, and at the same time, she understands better than anyone, because in truth Susie doesn’t care about the prophecy, about being something special, about being entitled to something–not when it means being above someone else. She doesn’t ask because she doesn’t want. She doesn’t want because, for some reason, she doesn’t want anyone–Ralsei–to do it for her.
He’s been looking inwards, recently: looking at his own desires, at how he reacts to them. His traits, his vices, sins. Daring to find something he saw in her first. What does that mean for him? He’s unsure. Here’s another thing he knows about his friends: they make him feel unsure. For the first time in his short life he finds himself not knowing.
All he knows is he’s growing selfish, and he’s somehow entertaining the idea it might not be all that bad. All he knows is he likes that there’s a small, terrible habit that’s shaped like Susie inside him. She’s a really bad influence. “I’d love to.”
In her room, Susie has a big bed, four pillows and two duvets, with spares in the wardrobe. Ralsei wanted to make it comfortable–which is something Susie doesn’t seem to be able to understand, the concept of being comfortable; she acts like she’s never been familiar with the possibility of it, like she’s in front of a wall full of candy and doesn’t know which ones to choose, unaware she can just eat them all. Frozen.
Ralsei isn’t stupid: he’s noticed, because all he’s done has been observing his new friends very, very closely. He’s noticed how awkward she is with touch, despite not outwardly avoiding it; how she flinches when Kris moves a little too fast–despite her feeling so obviously safe around them (It makes Ralsei ache, sometimes, something unpleasant he’s not familiar with in the pit of his stomach, but he ignores it). How preoccupied she is with food in a way that aims to be casual, like it’s all she’s ever known: food is fuel and nothing more, and it is not guaranteed. Like the enjoyment of small pleasures isn’t made for her–or she wasn’t made for it.
That’s another thing they have in common, Ralsei supposes. He’s trying not to think about how confused it makes him feel, to see so many resemblances: the concept of being in any way similar to someone so incredible, brave, and so bright he doesn’t know how such a light can reach this place and survive. So he ignores it in himself and takes care of it for her: he bakes, he cooks, he cleans, he sews, he fills up a fridge for her. Anything. For her, anything.
It’s almost funny how unsure both of them are: Susie doesn’t know how to ask for anything, and Ralsei–what? Ralsei doesn’t know what he’s expecting.
And sure, okay, maybe his mind’s been racing since Susie’s got here, maybe his fucked up head is making up scenarios he’s trying to push to the back of his conscience as hard as he can: a comforting, rough, deep voice whispering funny stories to him, a pillow fort, a hand on his cheek that isn’t bleeding.
He doesn't want that, though. He doesn’t want anything. He waits.
Susie gives in first: she’s visibly exhausted and there’s a light missing from her eye. She takes two snack bars from the fridge, takes off her jacket, gathers a pillow in the corner of her bed and sits on it. Then she pats the space next to her.
“C’mon, get up here. I got two.”
Ralsei gets on the bed, hugs his legs to his chest, and hopes to the angel he’s doing this right.
“You’re overthinking this, aren’t you?”
He picks at his robe. “Maybe.”
Susie hands him the bar, and he takes it. “I just… don’t know how to do this.”
“Do what?”
“Um…” friends? Relationships? Being a person? “...Sleepovers?”
“Eh, that makes two of us. Well, okay, I did have the one last night with Kris, but we just passed out on the sofa. Barely talked. I mean, I don’t have a ton of experience. Shit, is this a sleepover?”
Ralsei snorts, and Susie smiles. He feels proud. She hadn’t smiled once yet.
“Susie, why are you here?”
The smile falls, and Ralsei sees the haunted, exhausted expression on her face more clearly. She doesn’t look at him. “Felt like it.”
“Hmm.”
“It’s complicated. Fuck off. My turn. What were you doing before I came here?”
Ralsei blinks. He can’t say anything else but the truth. “W-waiting.”
“For what?”
He stares down at his robe. Susie’s voice is soft, careful, like it never is, like it was when–
“For us?”
Ralsei feels his face burn. He assumes that’s something he’s never really felt to this degree before now. Suddenly, like an explosion, there are a thousand new feelings he desperately wants to make into words: So what? You’re here, aren’t you, you hypocrite? and This is all I have, this is all I was made for and you really don’t get it, and I’m scared on my own and I don’t like being alone, and of course I’m waiting for you. I’m always waiting for you.
He doesn’t like it. He nods. Susie inhales sharply. Somehow, Ralsei knows she won’t ask, she won’t insist he could do anything else. Susie knows what it’s like to be alone. It's another thing they have in common.
“It’s my turn,” Ralsei says, quiet. “Why are you alone?”
“Because Kris’s sleeping at their place. Duh.”
“But–you never came on your own. I mean, I’m…” he doesn’t know how not to sound self-deprecating. “It’s just me.”
Susie crumples up the empty wrapper in her hand. “Ralsei, eat your snack.”
“Okay-”
“No! Nope. Wait. Let me rephrase that. Are you hungry?”
“...not really.”
“Are you in the mood for a snack?”
“It’s the same question.”
“No, it’s not! I’m asking if you want to eat that snack right now.”
“I- why would I if I’m not hungry?”
“‘Cause- just because! Sometimes you do things just ‘cause you feel like it. So. If you feel like it, eat it.”
Ralsei opens the wrapper and takes a bite. It’s sweet and crunchy.
“You’re really fucking weird, Ralsei.”
“I know.”
“But I- I like spending time with you. It’s… it’s nice, and it’s not the worst when-”
She pauses. Ralsei takes another bite. “...when, what?”
“When… when I want a break.” She looks uncomfortable, and doesn’t look at him, but he smiles at her anyway. “Okay.”
He needs to stop looking at her hand. He needs to–
“Is your hand okay?”
Something in her expression closes off. “Thought it was my turn.”
“Indulge me.”
Susie does this thing sometimes–she looks at him and smiles softly. It’s a smile she never wears, seemingly unaware of, and he never knows what’ll trigger it. It surprises Ralsei, this time. “It’s fine. My hand. Stings.”
Ralsei puts his empty wrapper aside and offers a hand, palm up. Susie huffs and offers hers. She doesn’t lean into the touch.
Her reaction to being healed hasn’t always been the best–especially when Ralsei had to touch her to do it: the first time she looked like someone had hit her, shocked and almost scared. He’s been thinking about it; that glint of panic in her eye.
“Susie,” he mumbles.
She barely looks him in the eyes. “Hmm.”
“Can I heal you?”
She lifts her gaze. “I guess.”
“No. Do you want to?”
Her guarded expression melts into one of fond exasperation. He likes it way better. “You ass.”
He smiles.
“Yeah, c’mon. Do it. It stings.”
Ralsei won’t say it, but the cut doesn’t look like something that would sting. It looks like something that would burn and pulse. Ralsei takes her hand, attuned to any change in her behaviour; she’s tense, yes, but this time she doesn’t have that aggressive, defensive, scared look in her eye.
Her hand is bigger than Ralsei’s. He takes a breath, then concentrates and traces her wound from one end to the other, across her palm. She flinches, then relaxes, and when it’s done she lets out a breath as if she’s held it for a few seconds. Her hand doesn’t move an inch.
“So,” she says, “why’d you do… that?”
“You mean the thing you just asked me to do?”
“Look who’s finally learned how to use sarcasm.” She hunches a little, her head closer to Ralsei’s. “I mean why’d you do it that way”, she says, gesturing to their joined hands.
“What way?”
“...Touching me. We both know you don’t have to.”
Ralsei sighs. He shrugs. “I felt like it.”
“Fuck off, you ass.” She’s smirking.
“You were the one to say I should-”
“Yeah, yeah, okay, point taken.”
The hand stays. Ralsei’s thumbing a spot between her fingers. “I don’t…” it gets stuck in his throat.
“...what?”
“I don’t like how I get when you’re not here. It feels weird. I feel like when I’m not looking, you two might–like you just-”
“Don’t exist?”
Ralsei lets out a chuckle. “Ironic, I know.”
“More like hypocritical”, she snarls.
“Okay, I get it!” Ralsei lets his hands fall on his lap. “Sometimes, the… touching helps. With that”, he mumbles, settling against a pillow, one of the big ones, he realises: the one Susie noticed first and loved to sit on whenever possible. “You should sleep.”
“oh, uh.”
Ralsei gets up and slides down the bed. “Um. Ralsei.”
“Come on. Chop chop. I’ll wake you early. You think I’d let you skip school?”
“Ralsei.”
He stares at her, curled up on the bed, in the corner, double his size and somehow looking the smallest she’s ever looked. Her hand is still hovering, unsure. Ralsei knows she's going to ask him to do something for her, in her long, convoluted and wonderful way. “Yes?”
“Do you sleep?”
“I’m familiar with the concept.”
“Your room doesn’t have a bed.”
He doesn’t look at her.
“My bed is really big. Like, freakishly big”, she says.
“I know. I chose it. You’re big.”
“And you’re very short.”
“So many astute observations today.”
“Dude. Will you really make me say it?”
That makes Ralsei smirk. Oh, he likes her. “Sorry. I’m enjoying it.”
“Just come have the damn sleepover. Properly. If you- if you want. There’s space. It’s fine.”
Ralsei hesitates for another second, but he’s decided as soon as he’s heard that little crack in Susie’s voice. He looks her in the eyes. “It is? You’re sure?”
“It’s fine, Ralsei.” If she were wearing any other expression, it would sound pedantic, bored, a lie, but Ralsei sees her eyes get soft again and feels safe in a way that never happens to him.
He crawls up the bed and Susie snickers when she sees he has to hop a little. Then he waits.
“Um.”
“Uh.”
“Get comfy, I guess.”
Ralsei awkwardly takes off his cape–the few times he’s slept, he’s stayed in his undershirt, large enough on him to look like a nightdress. It’s immensely hard for him to do it now. He folds his things as his face burns, and Susie asks, “Is it my turn?”
“No. But I’ll let you go twice.”
“Why- why did you agree? This easily?”
“...oh, Susie.”
Her eyes immediately harden. “Don’t make that face. Don’t pity me. Get out if you’re gonna pity me.”
“I don’t! I don’t. Susie, I love spending time with you. This is-” a dream, he almost says–but he’s learned he’s a bit too much when he says what he’s thinking, sometimes. “This is really, really nice.”
Susie is quiet as she–finally–slips under the duvet. Ralsei wonders when was the last time she experienced this warmth–at home? At Kris’s place? He wishes he could always be the one to offer that to her, and then shakes the thought away. He settles too, slowly, as she stares at him and he avoids her gaze, and he almost laughs when he notices they’re both curled up like shrimps, facing each other. There’s a lot of space between them, but their heads are close, and it’s almost too intimate for Ralsei to bear. He can see all of her thin scars, up her neck and on her jaw.
“Is this even an actual game?”
“Oh, hell if I know. I think it is. They do it in movies. You’re supposed to only tell the truth, though.”
“Oh.”
Susie smirks. She’d hate to know it, but it looks much less cocky from up close; more like a fond smile. “Have you been telling the truth, Ral?”
“Is that your next question?”
“No. It’s your turn.”
“Why do you hide your tail?”
Susie’s smile falls incredibly fast and her snoot darkens. It’s–almost cute. Ralsei snorts.
“Fuck off!”
“Did you think I wouldn’t notice?”
“I–what! I don’t know! What? Screw you.” Ralsei laughs, and she starts to smile despite herself. Her sharpest teeth glint in the low light–even though her eyes carry so much fatigue and pain, she’s bright. She’s so bright.
“Okay. Your turn.”
She stares for a few seconds, hesitating again. “Um. Were you okay, earlier, after, uh…”
“Oh. Oh! Yes! Yes. Of course I was. Of course! I’m fine, Susie. I’m really okay. Kris–even comforted me and everything. I’m fine.” He fidgets with the hem of his shirt. “And, um, you- you helped.”
“Huh.” He’s not looking at her. She sounds so close. “Thought I’d- thought I might have scared you.”
It’s such a silly suggestion that Ralsei has to chuckle. “No, Susie. And- isn’t that your goal?”, he teases, meeting her eyes. She doesn’t smile; instead she frowns, confused, almost hurt. “No. Never you”, she says.
“Is that the truth?”
Susie brushes away a curl on Ralsei’s cheek with her thumb. It’s so reminiscent of earlier that he trembles. “Yeah. ‘Course it is.”
As her hand retracts, and Ralsei misses its warmth, he holds her gaze–again that softness he can’t place. “I’ve never been scared of you,” he finds himself saying. “Not even once. I don’t know if that’s a good thing, to you.”
With how Susie’s eyes turn even softer, it’s probably the right thing to say. “Okay.”
“Your turn, then.”
She doesn’t speak immediately. “Are you scared? Of-”
“No.”
“Ralsei”, she spits, like it’s a threat, “I asked you to be honest with me.”
He bites his cheek. “I don’t like pity either, Susie.”
“This isn’t fucking pity!”
“And I’m not scared.” his voice shakes. “Not of what you think. I’m–scared of you two suffering. I’m scared of you having to- to see, or to do-”
“Ralsei-”
“I’m not scared of dying. I’ve never not known.” He looks at her, defiantly. “You need to understand this, Susie. This is what I was born to do. It’s my earliest memory” he looks away, voice shaking yet resolute. “I’ve never not known.”
All the pain and fear she’s been hiding come out through her eyes. She looks–confused, determined, terrified. Alone. “You weren’t born to die.” He doesn’t reply. He wishes it wasn’t like that too. And Susie stays silent–until she surprises him.
She touches him.
For the second time that evening, Susie reaches over and cups his cheek. Ralsei can still feel the healing magic’s energy– electric sparks flowing through her warm hand, and it makes him shiver. “I’m not going to let that happen.”
She doesn’t say it angry and rebellious, like before. She sounds as scared as he is, and just as stubborn.
Susie’s problem, the reason she’ll never truly love Ralsei, is that she really doesn’t understand. She’s not dumb, or blinded by determination or pride; Susie’s one of the smartest people Ralsei knows. But she doesn’t get it: that ultimately, the prophecy will come to pass. Ralsei’s scared of real things, things that are written somewhere: his friends looking at his corpse, looking at him turn into nothing, pure light. The people he loves losing him and, by extension, a place of comfort, a soft bed to sleep on, a fully stacked fridge; something helpful and nice and good no matter how fake. A fantasy for them to mold as they like. That’s what he is, that’s what he was always supposed to be, and that’s what he intends to be until the end–and that’s why he doesn’t like another fear that’s been slowly slithering its way into his two-dimensional, paper-thin mind: that that’s, truly, all he is to them. That as soon as he stops existing, their world will keep turning like nothing ever happened. Selfish, selfish, selfish. That’s all he seems to be lately.
That’s what the logical part of him thinks. That’s what he’s supposed to think. But Susie… Susie’s a bad influence, and his wishes have the best of him. And something inside him cracks.
“Do you think I want that? Do you think I- I don’t want to- to be with you forever, to live with you, to-”
“Ralsei, hey-”
“Please, please, stop. It hurts.” His throat is aching, his eyes are wet, his glasses askew. He looks up at her, like a dog asking for food. He’s aware of how pathetic he sounds.
“I want to live with you. I want to spend all my days with you two–to cook for you, to welcome you here, to go to school with you. To do your homework.” He hiccups, and his vision is blurred by his tears, “I don’t care how useless I sound, it’s the truth, and you deserve to know, because, Susie- Susie, I love your hope. It’s infuriating, and- maddening, and makes me feel confused, and it’s beautiful, but it’s yours. It has to be. It has to be, because when I- when I try to get some for myself, it hurts.”
He’s known her for such a short time, but Ralsei knows the broken expression on Susie’s face doesn’t belong there. He never wants to see it again. “Ralsei...”
“I can’t. Please, I can’t. All my life–I don’t know anything, Susie, all I know is the story, all I know are those verses over and over, they’re in my head all the time and… nothing, nothing else was ever supposed to get in, and now that it did it feels like something broke, and-” he can’t go on. He buries his face in his hands and cries, trying to muffle his sobs as best as he can. “I’m s-sorry. I’m sorry. Ignore me.”
Susie’s quiet for a few seconds, and he feels her eyes on him. Eventually, she mutters, “listen, I’m- I’m just gonna assume you’ll be fine with this, considering, uh. Right.” He only half-registers what she says, but every single one of his senses is immediately attuned to her the moment he feels her hand on him again; Susie takes off his glasses and seemingly puts them aside. She runs a hand through the curls on his forehead. “Hey,” she mumbles, as his face is gently pushed up to look at her bright, sorrowful eyes, “You’re an idiot.”
And before he can reply, Susie wraps an arm around his waist and pulls him close to her.
He feels shocked out of his doom spiral. Susie’s even warmer than he thought, and her hair feels rough on his face. His shaking hands end up close to her shirt, and she tucks his head under her chin–gently, tenderly, no matter how harsh her words might be. “C’mon. Shut up, now.”
He sniffles. Her arms are heavy, and it’s like they’re trying to stop his shaking, despite her clearly trying her best not to crush him. “Um.”
“Ralsei,” she breathes, “I’m staying put. Take your time. ‘K?”
He gets the biggest urge to cry again. He breathes deeply, following her, and for a while, that’s all they do: Ralsei’s more still than he’s ever tried to be; desperate to enjoy this, to take all the warmth he can get, and yet wondering if he’s even allowed to. He thinks of his wishes and vices and sins, he belittles himself for his selfishness–he’s too tired to really do anything about it. Part of him can’t even believe this is real–and just as he gets too into his own head, Susie’s hand lazily brushes through the fur on the top of his head. “These damn horns…”, she eventually says. It takes Ralsei a good few seconds to reply. “And they’re smaller than average.”
Her hand pauses. She snorts, and then laughs from her belly, and–oh, it’s different. He feels her shake with it. “Dude.”
Ralsei giggles. “What? Do you think I’m incapable of making jokes?”
“I- What? No, you’re funny, I just- I wasn’t expecting that kind of joke!”
“You, a prude, Susie? You of all people?”
“Oh, shut up, you ass–You can’t even bring yourself to say ass!”
Ralsei keeps laughing, and when everything feels much clearer, if a little sadder, he feels immensely embarassed, and his face warms up. “Um, sorry. And thank you.”
“Don’t mention it, idiot. What am I gonna do with you and your head…” she wants to prove a point, but she just holds his head against her. It makes Ralsei ache.
She’s absent-mindedly drawing circles with her fingers on his back, and when Ralsei lays his forehead on her clavicle, the movement stutters. It isn’t lost on him. “I have another question.”
“Shoot.”
“Is this,” he hesitates, “something friends do?”
Susie seems to actually think about it. When she hums, he feels it reverberate in her chest. “I wouldn’t know, Ral”, she says, low, “but I- I don’t… mind it.”
Ralsei hopes she doesn’t notice, but he twists the end of her shirt around his finger. His face is burning. “Me neither.”
She falls silent, finally succumbing to her fatigue. He breathes deeply, trying to sync up their breaths and not managing to because hers are much longer, deeper than his. He counts: how many seconds does it take for her to inhale and exhale? Five in, seven out. He repeats it in his mind like a lullaby until he’s committed it to memory, so that when he doesn’t have this anymore, he’ll remember how it felt when she was this close, warm around him and alive.
As he’s thinking this, she whispers, against his fur, “Don’t worry. I’m not giving this up easily.”
Ralsei’s chest hurts.
Out of habit, he tries to recite to himself the last lines of the prophecy, a sick ritual he’s been doing every time he feels anxious or unsure or lost. It always feels like a stone dropped on his stomach–but it’s something certain, reassuring. Now, all he can think about is: five in, seven out. It stutters when she hiccups, sometimes. I wonder if she snores.
She pulls him impossibly closer. Her hand keeps drawing circles, pressed against his shirt, and Ralsei still feels a crackle of electricity through the fabric.