Re: In-person: Zee/John
[The man she knew had ink upon his skin. Stories and prayers and protection, like her. They'd liked tattoo shops when they were teenagers. White floors and harsh lights and the smell of pot from one of the closed rooms, hand in hand, and they'd giggled and laughed and caused the kind of trouble that non-magical teenagers could not. The artists wouldn't be sorry to see either of them leave. She liked to strip down to nothing for the needle's kiss, and John liked to curse and smoke his way through his ink, and the rooms would go bright with magic on the air, and they wouldn't care who was with them. Tiny hedonists, and neither of them had been old enough for it. It had been a game, like all the games they played then, and they were their own universe and the world be damned. She wasn't concerned with colors then, white and black and her discomfort with the areas in between that tried to drag her down like lover's arms.
But the time for childhood was done, and she watched his lip curl.] I could show you, but I won't. I'm glad for every person I meet who didn't live through that war. [It was true. It had been Hell upon the earth, and she'd seen Hell. She'd walked its craggy cliffs in search of her lost father. She knew what the burn and acrid was upon the skin, and this had been worse. She let him polish off the cigarette, and she allowed him the distance of sitting up.
She considered, then, whether to tell him more. To tell him how all his demons had been excised and he'd been left with nothing to hide behind. To tell him how one of his demons had saved them all and sacrificed himself for the world. To tell him he hadn't been able to live with that understanding. But she left him in his oblivion, because she saw no purpose in making him bleed upon the red couch, not when he didn't need to. His thumb was drawing lines upon her shoulder, and she missed the kiss of magic. Even when he didn't wield it, it was there. He felt different than her companions here, and she'd always been attracted to power.]
I know that. [She knew he would leave, even now, even knowing this. It was why she had no doubt that he was who he was. She knew.] After, you came for me, once I was home again and the war had done. You made your explanations. [She smiled.] You were always very good at bullshit, John. I slammed you against a wall. We kissed. I dumped you, and I think you were glad for it.