(Rose)
I remember some of the tales my father used to tell me, about beings-like-her...
One thing about it, one reason I loved my father so much through his tales, was the second reading.
The one with his words. It was like hearing a romantic dream with the tale, and a romantic yet intelligent rationalisation afterward.
Sad stories about beings-like-her, djiins tricking humans, tragedies that made me cry on bright days. He always used to comfort me afterward, telling me how tales were meant to teach lessons through emotions; and to pick out for my memories what only I believed in, putting away what did not felt right or realistic to me.
On the other end, happy stories underwent the same rationalisation.
Stories of eternal love always felt a little sad to him, as would someone with a passion for flowers hear about a garden filled with blue roses...
People are complex dynamic beings, they can't always share love for all eternity. It's unrealistic.
Princes saving princesses in distress could also eventually fail at their noble quest.
His deep voice, helping me realise there was always another side to any tale or situation, it was my blessing. I miss him. Even though I was but a child, he always spoke to me with the same respect and patience he would have to anyone.
There was no childhood or childishness to him. Only maturing adults who deserved the same respect. His tales and second reading of them were my childhood true happiness, before I turned toward my first true love.
There are still dark gaps in my memory I might be better not trying to unveil. One at a young age, before father died, when I became afraid of being touched. Another when I died recently. I have bad feelings about those darknesses. And there might be a few more behind their veils.
The tales I read in that unholy book I uncovered in London, they spoke of beings-like-her. One especially. One with a few records about it, dating from the dark ages. I hadn't time to read it all at first. I only read that all these things want is the same thing that humans abandoned in the depth of a cave for days would want as well.
Reaching the light of day, the air, the outside world. Returning or turning simply to human life. Like plants growing toward the light, so they go toward us.
And so she did toward me. And so the tales of her primal instincts could be read as the tale of her love for me, like any plant would love what felt like the sun.
Behind tales of monsters slaughtering entire villages, there was strong desires not always hard to understand. Which country has never waged war against its neighbours?
No matter how black and white each side tries to turn things in his words and history, there's always another side of view that is not entirely wrong, and will tell something the other won't.
No matter how unbalanced things are, the absolute one sided truth only exists in tales... And I love tales so much because my dad used to read them to me, and then explaining another possible side of them to me.
A story where she loves me...
The truth could be read differently.
She was a parasite and a monster, craving for sunlight.
But seen from the other side, she was deeply in love with me, despite her lack of humanity.
This is also why love kills more than hatred. Well, killed, this surely happens less nowadays. And I know Blume enough to ascertain that she will never cause my death or any voluntary harm. She not only loves me, she also has a strong sense of virtue and growing moral values.
It wasn't easy teaching morals to such a being, but one way or another, it went through.
Now that we're together in divided bodies, it's different, yet it still is her. Except she sleeps too now, more than me even sometimes; but often less and poorly. She's anxious at night and regularly scared to sleep.
B - Because the consciousness I have when I sleep is similar to the one I have when my physical bonds are destroyed. It feels as if I'm dead if you will? So while my memory is deactivated during the sleep, I may think that I died, and the feeling of anxiety suddenly rising somehow wakes me up. My fundamental self if all my ties to this world were cut resembles that time of sleep when you have all your senses gone and no dream occurring yet. My instinct and nature make me try to escape that state.
Thus sleeping is difficult. It's like a trauma to her, her dark past. It affects her health and moral obviously. She's weaker than me. Not unlike how I looked like when I first looked for you...
Meanwhile, I try to help her. I hold her hand and sleep with her. She's grateful that she sheds tears every evening and morning, when she realises I'm there with her. She's more than romantic, she's truly a tender heart.
Meanwhile, perhaps because she looks a lot like me, or reminds me of you physically, I'm less anxious about touching each other. I mind not feeling her skin pressed against mine as we fall asleep. I admit I feel less lonely too. I've lived alone quite a while and this doesn't feel bad sharing day and night with someone I love.
She loves me back. She loves me a lot. To the point that she makes love to me in unexpected ways. She's so gently, she's been so gentle with me that I can't refuse it anymore. It's very strange sensations, yet very sweet too, and warm. I like sleeping on that. She does too. I guess she has better dreams after these times. I too.
~
I found comfort in something that used to scare me, mostly because it's not about violence as I thought it was. It's not about power and control. In a way, I pictured it as something very violent when it could turn out to be close to a motherly embrace, far more peaceful and softer than I imagined possible.
She just loves me.
Though travelling at two is very different, we manage. Food is still a little difficult but we manage. And we can cuddle together at night. That's something entirely new for both of us that we quickly grew fond of.
Since I woke up, she's leading the journey around there. She told me what her plan was, and I agreed for it; for most of it. We're going somewhere she deem fit for it to start.
We're going further away from our friends, we're going inland.
Blume thinks there is a good place for us a little further to set our fight. I'm not that glad that we have to settle things with a monster, but it's quite our responsibility now.
I hope this will work and that we'll be free to explore once and for all.
~
We mostly walk holding hands like children. Beside my parents and sometimes sisters, I've never held another hand like that before.
Her body now that I know it better isn't exactly like mine. There are lots of small differences. She sure looks a lot like me, but she's not quite a copy of me. And she's the Blume I know at heart and mind.
The way she smiles... It's not mine at all.
She's someone I love against all odds.
I feel like my thoughts and my intelligence have changed since my return. I feel as if some old thoughts slipped away, unknown ones sipped in, and my focus has shifted. I feel slightly different.
B - You returned as similar as we could, but there always are slight differences.
R - So many things have changed over time... We couldn't hold hands before. I'm however a little...
B - Lost?
R - Yes. I feel like... Some part of my brain still has not woken up. My focus and thoughts are different from before I can tell. Am I still myself?
B - You are yes. And you are the only Rose I love. Your former self is maybe gone but yourself still live, evolve... Change... Feel anxiety... oy.
A cramp suddenly strikes my right leg. I shout and fall. It hurts. The muscle in my leg wants to leave it I think. It feels that way.
I spent a few minutes with Blume trying to make it settle down. I still feel a little lost once the pain has settled.
R - I never had a leg cramp before...
B - It's alright. I'm there with you.
She clings to me. It's like a reassuring mother's embrace. I do feel more at ease with her...
She doesn't mind nor fear that my persona has changed... Hers surely did too, but not on that side.
I feel as if I had lost a good percentage of my memories, thoughts and persona in what recently happened to me. It's obviously a feeling that makes me anxious.
But she's here with me. I'm far from being lost alone.
My dear flowers do me a lot of good. I could almost say that I don't mind what I'll become, whether it's ill, less and less intelligent or whatever else, as long as I can be with her...
~
In my dreams, it was different.
This dream close to a nightmare was different. My main fear wasn't focused on the Ogre this time.
Rather on an old picture of myself. An anxiety about my identity and what death might have taken away from me...
This fear, it'll return I can tell.
As I wake up against her breast, I can't say I feel that bad. She's soft. She's so sweet to me.
I love her. And I trust her...
We will make it to victory.
~