Soft and galoshes and her ringlets in disarray, damp and dew-clung, she walked.
Wren- Because she was trying to think of herself as a new bird, and she found the word, the name, one that rested easily on her tongue, as if that nest had been built long before, as if it had been waiting for her to come live within its chambers of twig and sinew and blood.
The name felt like home, but it came with no memories. It stirred nothing inside her, and she was forlorn about that. She'd always believed that learning would be remembering. That if someone just came to her, filled in her blanks, that everything would become clear. She would remember everything, and she would understand how everything came to pass, and the world would change. Eyes opened wide, and she would be able to decide where to place her next footstep. But it wasn't like that at all, and she knew nothing but names.
She was still herself, as she had been on that crossroads. She was still adrift, and she wondered if her life was meant to be big tops and omens forever.
Step, step, step, and she tried not to think of Rory. She'd been waiting, waiting to see if he contacted her, but he hadn't, and there was something that lived beneath her breastbone that said someone should wilt without her. That was how it should be, and she would accept nothing less, not even for the sensation of living. Because for that moment, in that evening, inside the circle of his arms, she'd felt alive.
Crack, snap, and the twigs beneath her felt alive with each protestation. The birds were beginning to return, to sing, the bold and brave ones that ventured from warm climes early. The world was less dead, and perhaps it was time for her to live. Truly live, and not wait. Because she'd waited and waited, and yet here she stood.
She sensed someone in the woods, but that was nothing new, and it was nothing odd. Outcasts, like the ones from the carnival, like Matt, like all the little houses dotting the treescape and no longer abandoned. She sensed them all, and sensing someone was nothing odd. Still, she stopped, soft steps slowing on the dying twigs.] Bonjour?