Work Text:
> Be Kanaya Maryam.
Your name is Kanaya Maryam, and you have never been more in love with anyone in your life. Granted, you have not been alive for long -- only a few sweeps in an endlessly stretching eternity, and there are still so many more to be had (you will live long enough to watch everyone and everything you love slip away from you, including her). But you love her, you think.
You miss her so dearly when she’s not around (which is most of the time). The kiss of her knuckles is never as good as the press of her lips. She bites. She draws jade from you every time she does. You like it when she hits you, but you adore it when she bites you. It makes you feel like, maybe, you aren’t so different from her. And that’s love, isn’t it?
You wouldn’t know any different. You have never loved anyone before. Pitch, flushed and pale all blur together in your head. Perhaps it’s because you have never known any sort of love, but she says the kiss of her fist is her way of showing you she is yours and you are hers, and who are you to question her? (You would have her either way, really, open arms or closed fist.)
She sits beside you, and you watch her. Her eyes are low as she talks animatedly, planning something and drawing in chalk on the floor of your hive. (Later, when she is gone, you will have to scrub the chalk off your floor. But you won’t for a while, and by the time you do, the markings will have faded to almost nothing.)
Her hair spills over her shoulder, matted and messy. You have asked more times than you can count whether you Could Possibly Brush It For Her Sometime, and the answer is always the same. A tilt of the head backward, and a laugh that reverberates through your soul. Your chest sinks like a two-tonne weight, and rises like a song.
A8solutely NOT! I’d never let you aaaaaaaanywhere near my hair.
You have gotten used to being scorned, and sometimes you ask just to hear her laugh.
You like it when she laughs. And she laughs a lot -- more often than not, at you. But you don’t mind. If you can make her laugh, you are satisfied. (That’s love, you think.)
You study the curve of her neck, slim and graceful, but so gawky at the same time. She has not grown into her neck yet, and you know better than to comment on it. Your eyes trace the highs of her cheekbones, the lows of her collarbones, the creases at the corners of her eyes.
She catches you staring, and her lips curve into a frown.
VRISKA: What are you looking at, Fussyfangs?
You look away.
KANAYA: Nothing
Her frown deepens, but she turns back to her drawing, and you breathe out an exhale you didn’t know you were holding. You love it when she looks at you (though she rarely does), and you never stopped to think about whether she liked it when you looked at her.
But you can’t help yourself -- you steal small glances at her whenever you’re sure she’s not looking back. If she notices you looking at her, she doesn’t say anything more, and you are thankful for it.
She stays over to sleep at your hive. She doesn’t ask whether she can or not -- Of Course Not, She Never Does -- but you don’t mind, despite the fact that you don’t sleep during the day. You sit at your sewing table, your hands steadily stitching together a new dress for her, and watch her breathing with her eyes closed. You think the only time she knows peace is when she sleeps, and even then you know she doesn’t always. She’s told you about her nightmares, in moments where you think she finds her home in you -- but those moments never last, so you treasure them as they come. She would never let you see her weak normally.
You know she’s hiding something from you. There must be a reason, after all, that she never brings you back to her hive. When you spend time together, it is always at your hive. You don’t mind it; not really. But your curiosity gets the better of you, and you finally decide to ask.
You ask her in the morning, once you’ve brought a cup of tea to her, where she’s sitting upright in your recuperacoon. You lower yourself to sitting on the ladder next to it that you use to climb in.
KANAYA: Vriska
She looks up, and when her eyes meet yours, sparks fly, you think. You stand on a precipice, adrenaline rushing through you. It is like this every time you ask her a question.
VRISKA: Yeah?
You take a deep breath, and jump.
KANAYA: Why Dont We Ever Meet At Your Hive
Your eyes remain trained on her face, searching for any sign of emotion. And you find it. Her eyes widen in surprise, and then harden, creasing at the corners the way they do when she’s in pain. You’ve known her in pain before, but you’ve never been the cause of it before. You suddenly hate yourself a little more.
VRISKA: It’s none of your 8usiness. Stop 8eing a 8usy8ody.
She climbs out of the recuperacoon and begins to gather her things. You stand abruptly, following her around your hive. Something in your chest suddenly weighs so much more.
KANAYA: No
KANAYA: No Wait
KANAYA: It Was Just A Question I Did Not Mean Anything By It
KANAYA: Im Sorry Vriska
KANAYA: Please Stop Please Stay
KANAYA: I Do Not Want You To Leave
You reach out with rainbow-drinker speed and wrap your hand around her wrist. Even now, you don’t grip hard enough to cause pain, don’t grip hard enough to bruise. It doesn’t matter to her; she rips her arm from your grasp and continues shoving her things into her bag. She’s not looking at you, eyes downcast. If you look hard enough, you think you see pale cerulean tears in her eyes.
VRISKA: Shut up! For fuck’s sake, Fussyfangs, stop 8eing so pathetic!
Now it’s your turn for your eyes to well up. You reach out for her again, but she jerks her arm out of your reach and wheels around to glare at you. A single tear drips down her cheek, and you ache to kiss it away even now, even after all the things she has said and done to you. Her rage is fiery and merciless, but you knew that, didn’t you?
So why don’t you leave?
Maybe it’s moments like this. These moments where she looks so beautiful, just like this, and you hate yourself for thinking it. Her cheeks are flushed cerulean, her jaw clenched and her head held high with pride. There’s still sopor slime in her hair, you notice as your eyes trail over her, the sopor slime from your recuperacoon.
She winds back her fist, and you know what’s going to happen before she does it. Her knuckles kiss you, and you feel something snap in the cartilage of your nose. A sickening, sharp pain, and then your face is slick with jade. You don’t know whether it’s from tears or blood, or both. Your blood drips down your philtrum, over your lips, onto your chest where it stains your pretty blue dress. You put it on when she told you she was coming over.
She’s breathing hard, shallow and quick as you look at her through your blurry gaze. Tears stream down her face; her knuckles are stained with your blood, and you cannot help but feel a surge of pride when you notice. The bridge of your nose aches, your chest even heavier -- but still, you love her, you think.
VRISKA: I h8 you. I h8 you so much, Kanaya.
She spits at your feet, and then she’s out the door. The only indications she was ever there are the chalk drawings on the floor and the cerulean spit spattered across your white shoes. The stain won’t come out, you can tell -- but you like that, kind of. (She marked you. Isn’t that love?)
You kneel to trace your fingers over the drawings. Blood drips down onto the floor, still running steadily down your face. You sniffle thickly and wipe at your eyes with the back of your hand. Your skin stains jade when you do. You stay where you are, your hair pinned up like you do when you sew, kneeling on the ground for what feels like hours.
You still love her.
You hate yourself.
But you love her more.
So you stay.