The word fell -- a weighty thing, stilling every part of her. Every part, save the tiny spot inside her stomach that shivered between hope and fear, every time he let her be this close. Now it shuddered and grew and shook and pushed its way through to her bones, shaking them out of her stillness. She could hardly breathe through it.
Cowardice kept her in the warm circle he'd set around her. The pressure of his arms told her to stay, but she knew -- knew that if she did, she'd miss the chance to know the truth. She swallowed, her throat clicking from the dryness, and steeled herself. It still took eternities for her to finally lift her head.
The irony wasn't lost on her. She stood surrounded by the words of centuries in paper leaves on wooden shelves, yet knew none to fashion the question or the hope stamped in her expression. She hadn't moved much at all -- just enough to set her hands on his shoulders, as much for the steadying effect as anything else. But what she couldn't manage to say, her fingers translated instead. They curled and smoothed and pleaded for him to mean just exactly what she hoped he meant.
"You," she repeated back at last, the stupidest, dullest response she imagined anyone could say, but with an ache that colored the word so thoroughly that it could have been an eloquent declaration all on its own.