[For once, though, it's not a statement she delivers with effortless authority, the way that she does many of the things she says. It's not the voice of someone who once led five boys and herself through calamity after disaster, making snap decisions not because she thought she was fit to lead but because she thought she was right and there was simply no one else to do it. It's a voice that makes no assumptions, that doesn't demand to be recognized. It's a voice that comes as soft and shy as his is, but that slides underneath the gravity of his like a card being shuffled into a deck, like a lieutenant falling into place at its captain's side.
The knots of tension that have twisted her stomach ever since that day at the flower-sharking are finally starting to ease. It finally makes her feel like she can eat again. It makes her feel like she can breathe again.]
Y'know, you said...that you thought, that if you found out my name, it would mean we couldn't be friends anymore.
[Her weight shifts forward, a little more onto the balls of her feet, nudging her into being just a little bit taller from how she's putting more of her weight onto her toes as she gravitates toward him.]
I don't...I don't think we're just friends anymore.
[The corner of her lip catches beneath her teeth, just for a moment.]
So maybe...if you still don't want the real one, then. Will you pick one for me that's just for us? That's just...yours?
no subject
[For once, though, it's not a statement she delivers with effortless authority, the way that she does many of the things she says. It's not the voice of someone who once led five boys and herself through calamity after disaster, making snap decisions not because she thought she was fit to lead but because she thought she was right and there was simply no one else to do it. It's a voice that makes no assumptions, that doesn't demand to be recognized. It's a voice that comes as soft and shy as his is, but that slides underneath the gravity of his like a card being shuffled into a deck, like a lieutenant falling into place at its captain's side.
The knots of tension that have twisted her stomach ever since that day at the flower-sharking are finally starting to ease. It finally makes her feel like she can eat again. It makes her feel like she can breathe again.]
Y'know, you said...that you thought, that if you found out my name, it would mean we couldn't be friends anymore.
[Her weight shifts forward, a little more onto the balls of her feet, nudging her into being just a little bit taller from how she's putting more of her weight onto her toes as she gravitates toward him.]
I don't...I don't think we're just friends anymore.
[The corner of her lip catches beneath her teeth, just for a moment.]
So maybe...if you still don't want the real one, then. Will you pick one for me that's just for us? That's just...yours?