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Are you strong and courageous? The Unknown invites you to the struggle, dares you to its conquering. Nay, it is perhaps your future beloved, waiting to reward your daring passion with the fervors of fresh creation. Are you feeble and timid of spirit? Bow your head to the ground. Still you must meet the future; still you must go in the track of the others. You may hinder them, you may make them lag; you cannot stop them, nor yourself.
"Did they sleep, I wonder, on the night before the 20th of May, when that dark thunder of vengeance was gathering to break? Many slept well the next night, and still sleep; for 'then began a murder grim and great,'" Beatrice speaks to the hanging sun. She once found a strange comfort in those words back when the world seemed so much more cruel.
Such prose returns parted sisters from the veil of death and the stench of decay wafts along the sea breeze. They lost too many people to conflict. Memories from the war have lost it's serrated edge and the scars have begun to heal. In its wake it has brought her here on the Sicilian beach of Zingerello.
"Then Caesar took his legion and crossed the Rubicon," Ava teases with a wry comment. Turning to her side she sees her lover with a terribly radiant smile etched across her features. She reaches out taking her hand, her chest expands basking in the warm golden glow, a laugh shakes free as she exhales.
"I hardly believe twentieth century anarchist literature gave Julius Caesar the conviction to claim the Roman Empire for himself." Beatrice says through a smile. She catches the change in Ava's demeanor. Going from playful to positively glowing. It steals the breath straight out of her lungs.
Nobody has ever looked at Beatrice the way Ava does. The way her deep brown eyes soften and her smile grows loose like the very sight of Beatrice has left her dumbstruck. She could almost believe that she's beautiful. Ava drifts her hands up Beatrice's bicep and leans forward to press a kiss against her cheek.
"Well? What are you waiting for?!" Ava drums her hands against Beatrice's arm, "Seize the day and all that bullshit!" She tears herself from Beatrice's side and rushes towards the sea still fully clothed. Ava laughs with wild abandon letting herself fall backwards into the sea, she pops her head up swimming backwards, "Come on soldier! Scared of having fun?!"
Ava's misplaced confidence has her drawn in. She won't dignify her with a response so she unbuttons her dress shirt and trousers. Unlike her lover she has come prepared with a bathing costume under her clothes, but it doesn't dissuade her from bombarding Beatrice with wolf whistles and suggestive comments.
Carefully wading into the water she's greeted by Ava's dizzying enthusiasm. As she approaches she spies a hidden mischief dancing between her eyes. Ava closes the distance between them by jumping out of the water and enveloping Beatrice in a tight embrace. Just as Beatrice sinks into her she feels Ava's hands on her head and she's plunged below the sea's cold depths.
Pushing herself back up she's greeted by the sound of Ava's rambunctious laughter. She seizes her opportunity and sweeps Ava into her arms holding her in a bridal carry above the water. Ava bats her chest laughing and demanding to be let go. Leaning in she feigns a kiss whispering a dreamy, as you wish, before dumping her into the water.
Ava jumps back up celebrating as she throws her hands in the air; she smiles up at the sun bursting with pride. Her smile turns innocent and bats her eyes when Beatrice pulls herself above the water. Heart swelling with love she retaliates and tackles Ava plunging them into the deep once again.
She's sure to keep Ava above her. A trained instinct that Beatrice will gladly be never rid of. Because in war or in peace she will always protect Ava. Her world begins and ends with the angel floating above. They resurface together. Ava places her hands on the sides of her face while Beatrice holds her by the waist.
"Ah minha vida," Ava whispers against her lips, "Show me how it feels to be loved by you." Beatrice releases her inhibition and lets herself kiss Ava. Her lips taste of salt, a soft lilt bubbles up from her throat, and she holds onto Beatrice as if her whole world was encapsulated into one person. It's a heavenly thought because she feels the same.
"Do you think we would still be here?" Ava asks, "Still be us?" They're sitting atop the canopy of a wrecked fishing vessel watching the sun set. Ava is tucked into her wearing Beatrice's grey overcoat while her clothes dry on a railing beneath them. She looks down, captivated by the orange and purple hues dancing across her features, "What do you mean, darling?"
"You know, like this, together, swapping spit, doing the devil's tango, swiping my card on your-" "Ava." Beatrice interrupts, chastising her with a face redder than the evening sky. The laugh that peels from Ava's lips quells her racing heart. Ava pushes herself further into the embrace and presses a kiss onto the line of her jaw.
They haven't crossed the barrier into physical intimacy yet. Beatrice is unsure if she could bring herself to give up in the face of carnal lust. She's unsure if she has the capacity to feel such a desire, but she knows Ava does. Ava looks at her as if she were a vessel of pure divinity. The burning lust in her eyes holds her captive in the ordinary mundanity that is now their lives.
"I mean, we met because everything had to go wrong. Shannon, your shitty parents... my mom," Ava sighs like it were her last breath on this mortal plain, "I can imagine the world if everyone lived or if I learned how to walk, but it's impossible to think of a world where I don't get to have you... I don't want to."
Ava drags in a ragged breath, "I love you, Bea, so much. If we had never met... I would be living with half a heart and I wouldn't even know it. That's so terrifying. This, our love, isn't a fluke, it's not something circumstantial. Don't you feel it too? If there were hundreds of us spread through time and space would I still be yours?"
The words make her heart swoon and her breath stall. She's wasted most of her life as a willful passenger to her destiny. Choosing to abandon her identity, her name, and banish herself to a future of service, pious in life and death. To live and die in the name and shadow of her divine creator whose hands were sullied by her choices.
Because, despite the vitriol that spills through her veins, she knows that being here with Ava is the closest she'll ever get to seeing the light of heaven. Her laugh is the sound of holy trumpets welcoming her into paradise. Her touch is that of an angel's beckoning her to let go of her earthly tether bringing her to nirvana. Her kiss is the promise of no grief or strife. Ava's is the face of god.
She wouldn't have this without pain.
"Statistically," Beatrice cups Ava's cheek with her palm, "Our meeting was improbable, but God's will deemed it so that in order for our lives to intertwine everything, in a sense, had to go wrong." The light in Ava's eyes dim. That wasn't the answer she was looking for. Her smile turns into a playful pout, "So you wouldn't love me if I were a worm."
Beatrice's heart melts fondly remembering a cold rainy June morning in New Zealand when Ava woke her from a dead sleep with a question on her lips. She held her almost the same as she does now, kissed her the way she did before, and quelled her fears, "Of course I would, darling. I would provide you the proper nutrients and cultivate-"
"Ava?!"
Adrenaline floods her veins hearing a stranger call Ava's name like it heralded the second coming. They turn together Beatrice ready to attack subtly placing herself in front with her hand hovering over the seam in her trousers where two throwing knives lay in wait. The man who called Ava's name seems vaguely familiar sporting a pretty face, possibly a man from Switzerland.
"Holy shit!" Ava cries, "JC!" She nearly trips over Beatrice jumping off the roof of the boat without care for the rocky shore below. She plows into him with a delighted giggle bubbling up past her lips. He holds onto her like he was grasping the ghost of what could have been. They both seem to sigh once they're in eachothers arms.
He whispers something in her ear, too faint for Beatrice to hear, but it has Ava cackling loud enough to alert a shoreman off the coast of Tripoli. When he pulls away he stares in astonishment, "How the hell did I find you?" JC breathes out, "At some dusty beach in Sicily no less."
Beatrice rises from her perch and quietly brings herself to her lover's side. She's unsure of her feelings for Ava's former paramour. From what she knows Ava abandoned him at a shipyard in the minutes after Lilith's first death. During their exile in Switzerland Ava had nothing more than fawning praises. She was excited to show him all the progress she's made.
Maybe she can have a chance now.
"I wasn't alone," Ava instinctually leans back into Beatrice, "This is Beatrice, the ex-nun who's ex-trying-to-kill-me." The way she says it, so light and carefree, does nothing to the cold dread sliding down her throat. It was her duty in protecting the halo. Ava was a stranger to her, a thief, who held the balance between heaven and earth yet acted like a child.
"Good to meet you again," JC smiles at her with an untamed charm. She can see why Ava fell for him. A charismatic stranger who saved her life with the devastating looks of a god. He turns away from them walking towards the cliffs. "Come on," JC calls over his shoulder, "I have the keys to an apartment in Gela. It's got a wonderful view."
Some hours later when the veil of night has engulfed the island they're laying together in a modern if bland living room on a couch a couple of years out of date. Beatrice lays on her back reading a well worn book of poetry listening to the waves battering the sandy shore. Draped across her front Ava snores lightly peaceful in the dim yellow light cast by the table lamp beside them.
She sleeps unaware of the turmoil brewing in Beatrice's subconscious. After reading the same line over and over without the ability to absorb it she quietly shuts it allowing it to dangle at the edge of her fingertips. Her eyes drift towards the window. In the glow of a faulty streetlight she sees the crumbling skeleton of a building across the street.
It's rather unremarkable in the grand scope of history and entirely forgotten by a city's inherent push for progress. If a home or a studio, the people who once poured their love into that space have long since abandoned it. Her heart pangs with familiarity. Too many homes in the English countryside fall victim to the same illness; however, it's not the buildings but the residents.
Beatrice places her book to the wayside, unable to quell the storm brewing in her mind. Ava's actions in the very beginning might have been childish, but she was experiencing a life she believed was unobtainable after her mother's death. She had found said happiness in partying into the early hours of the morning and finding solace in the company of strangers.
Said stranger sleeps comfortably in the room over. JC, Ava's first love, someone she ran away from destiny for. Ready to destroy humanity's fragile mortal coil to have another day of freedom. He gave that to her. All of the world's possibilities sat in the palm of his hand. It was addictive and enticing.
She should know, because Ava was the exact same for her.
"Bea?" A sleepy voice wafts up from her chest. Ava blinks beerily up at her confused. Beatrice realizes the hand she has protectively around her back is squeezing the soft flesh of Ava's hips too hard. Horrified, she releases her grip and reverently caresses the pink skin she left behind.
"Go back to sleep darling," Beatrice whispers, "I was transfixed by the author's prose." Hearing her words Ava reaches up, placing a hand along the apple of Beatrice's cheek. Instinctually she lays a kiss against her pulse point feeling Ava's thumb brush against her jaw. Ava nods, acquiescing, "Okay, get some sleep, baby," she yawns, "I love you."
I love you too, her mind pleads, but the words can't slip past her lips. Loving Ava comes as easy as breathing and being loved in return is the sweetest nectar that heals all wounds in mind and body. Beatrice has never felt such strong devotion to another person. In secret, shrouded in blasphemy, she worships Ava as if she were god himself.
Though she can not say it Ava smiles at her as if she could hear Beatrice's thoughts. It's the kind that nearly splits her face in two and it never fails to sweep her off her feet. The edges slowly begin to fall as Ava drifts away back to the land of dreams, her hand still resting on her cheek. She too, now clear of mind, is ready to follow her lover no matter where she went.
In the morning JC wiles them away into the back seat of his car before the dawn's light can break. As both Ava and JC wrap themselves into comfortable conversation Beatrice notices a small sedan rolling up to the building. Her mind begins to dwell as she sees a small family enter the same flat she just spent the night in.
"And then Bea flips the guy over the table!" Ava loudly recounts a largely unsuccessful mission as if it were a retelling of Alexander's conquest of Persia. The grim subject matter earns them withering stares from the other cafe patrons. She can't bring herself to care not when Ava looks so free and full of life.
"Okay, so, you know those pens with chains that banks have? Well, Bea snapped it off and started whipping the pen around like a total badass!" Ava mimics the motions with her straw in a poor attempt to convey her story, "Then she wrapped it around the barrel and ripped it from his hands!"
"It's simply rope darts, darling, it's merely a trick used by street performers." Beatrice pats Ava's arm trying to dispel any false notion that what she did was remarkable; however, when Ava turns back to her jaw is dropped and incredulity dancing in her eyes. She leans into Beatrice with a dreamy sigh, "But it was so cool, bebê!"
"For what it's worth, Beatrice, if I hadn't seen it for myself I would say it's unbelievable," JC pops a grape into his mouth, "But I'll hand it to you; you are pretty badass." Ava preens at his compliment. She wraps her arms around Beatrice laying a deep kiss against her cheek smiling at how it renders her useless. No matter how often Ava expresses her love it never loses its luster.
"JC, I am afraid to ask this of you, but seeing as we're just outside Paterno I must reach out to my superiors." Beatrice holds no qualms in telling him of the nature of such a visit. Their mission is simple reconnaissance work that Ava has interspersed with extended breaks and out-of-the-way sight-seeing.
"Oh come on Bea!" Ava whines, "Do we have to work?" She tugs at Beatrice's sleeve with a saccharin sweet pout that normally would have a weaker person melt, and Beatrice falls for it. She's saved, however, by JC who flashes Ava a devilishly charming smile, "I don't see why not, Beatrice, I believe Ava and I can scrounge up some fun in Paterno."
"Hell yeah! Look, Bea, I knew you could trust random strangers!" Ava preens under his attention brushing her shoulder against his. Beatrice hides her smile behind her coffee cup sending them both a lukewarm glare. She hops up declaring, "I need to retreat to the little girls room. Warm up the car?"
JC agrees cooly, taking a long drag of his coffee. She watches her disappear into the cafe careful to track the people inside. It seems searching for danger in every situation is a hard won habit that will never ease even as time slinks further away from the war. A dark chuckle slips through her musing, "Can you believe it?"
Turning to him, "I apologize?"
"How could I let a woman like that walk away?" JC asks, his eyes distant. There's a tremor in his voice that wasn't there before. "You always hear stories about the one that got away. I never believed them until she left me in some dusty port city in Morocco. Whatever you're doing. Keep it up. Don't let her walk away."
"I don't believe I understand what you are insinuating," Beatrice sits straight, voice hard, "Ava is her own person. If she so chooses that my love isn't sufficient enough to maintain this relationship I will not stand between her and her own agency. A love that builds itself from ego cannot last."
"So I wouldn't be wrong in assuming you've never had your heart broken?" JC answers easily. His dark eyes peer into her, appraising the most minute tick in her stiff body language. Beatrice holds her tongue unwilling to betray Ava by openly discussing a trauma that she's still sorting through so blase.
The edge of his lips uptick into a knowing smirk. His cocky bravado has found a dent in her armor. Small and overlooked, it's a flaw nonetheless. He leans against the chair rest, cup in hand, he draws it back one last time, "Well, hold onto whatever it is you're feeling right now and remember, there will be others."
"Hey! I thought you guys were starting the car?" Ava bounds up to them. She looks like a vision even when she's standing in dirty trainers and clothes that are not her own. If she never sees the light of heaven she holds no doubts that Ava holds a piece of it in her smile. That smile that always seems to grow brighter when Beatrice is near.
"Of course darling," Beatrice answers, "We simply lost track of time."
Their envoy, an older Cappuchini monk, welcomes her with the same respect he would a sister warrior. Even in the face of Ava bellowing out a sordid array of affectionate pet names he looks at her as he would if she were wearing a cloistered hood. In fact, he smiles like a father would to his daughter finding her first love.
He leads her to the grand cemetary pressed behind the church and former convent. Carding through tombs and graves they lose straying eyes with every dizzying turn. They reach an inconspicuous crypt inscribed with a faded name that holds no ties to the city of Paterno. It's there he leaves her to descend into the hidden bunker.
The room at the bottom of the stairs is rather unremarkable. A bare sickly yellow light bulb illuminates dusty old technology. She settles for the closed circuit telephone resting on a few decades out of date box of ammunition. It serves its purpose well when after a single ring a chipper voice greets her.
"Only you could find an excuse to work on your honeymoon, Bea." Camila teases her. Her cheeks are set aflame at the absurd accusation. They haven't agreed on what to call themselves let alone be joined in marriage. Besides she would never chain Ava away from the world. It's her life. She should have the choice to live it with whomever she pleases.
"I'm afraid you're mistaken, sister," Beatrice counters, "If I were under such conviction my absence would be much prolonged and my correspondence far shorter." A coy smile creeps its way onto her features. This carefree nature, entirely alien to the person she was just a few years ago, is all Ava's fault.
There are few sounds in the mortal realm that contest with the magic of Camila's laugh. Although her relationship with Ava has unleashed this new carefree version of her, she believes it was Camila who first brought this person to light. It was she who fostered the possibility of sisterhood apart from their solemn vows.
Camila sighs sweetly, "I like this side of you; you sound happy."
Refreshed after her lovely conversation with her close friend Beatrice wanders the grounds allowing Ava and JC time to enjoy their day. Her eyes catch people of varying ages paying their respects to loved ones long passed. A child visiting a grandparent, an old man talking to his brother, a family entering a crypt housing multiple generations.
Here, among the silence and penance, she lets her mind stray. Two unequal conversations lay heavy. Where one was filled with warning the other sang softly with the wonders of love. JC's held knowledge, yet so did Camila's. One on romance and the other on Beatrice. His is hard-earned, her's was hard won.
When it involves matters of love they're both inexperienced. Whereas Ava has a former paramour, her bleeding heart antics and proud declarations of love are extracted from the various movies and television programs she saw as a child. It's a far cry from her own childhood.
Yet the same isolation prevailed.
When she was younger, and more abrasive to her carnal truth, this kind of dissonance would have caused her to lash out. Her heart aches as recalls the memory of leaving Ava in tears the same night she learned to read her pounding heart. Even as the years have passed she still finds that urge to push, but she wishes not to repeat her mistake.
She catches her reflection in the death portrait of a young partisan. At first glance she's an ordinary woman with an unremarkable conventional attraction to turn someone's attention; however, there's a deepset exhaustion weighing atop her shoulders and deep lines carved into her features. Her's is a face that has seen war.
Although rather unfair to either party her traitorous mind drifts to superficial comparisons. How easily he melts into conversations, the way he immersed himself in Ava's touch, and his dashing rugged handsomeness that pulls people into his orbit. Turning away from her reflection she finds the man buried across from him, a black shirt, enemies facing each other in death.
It's unfair. To think of JC as the enemy. Afterall, it was him who saved Ava's life. It was him who inadvertently prepared her for the trials that came with being the sword of god. Were he never a part of Ava's life then the woman she loves today would never exist. If anything she should be thanking him.
However, Don't let her walk away, rings traitorously in the empty space between her thoughts. She is the reason why Ava ran from him in the first place. In tearing them apart she forced Ava into this life and unfairly she took away her free choice. The air around her turns frigid.
I will not stand between her and her own agency. How hypocritical; how foolish. She already broke her own sacred promise the day they met. Beatrice's bullish tendencies to push against the people who try to get close burned Ava once. A love that builds itself from ego cannot last.
Of course, it was at a time of collective grief and she knew nothing of this orphan. She was a flight risk and a liability because that was all she could observe. By the time she made that vow she understood what life was like with and without Ava. Suffocation and isolation led her through an adventure both exhilarating and traumatizing.
The sound of her boots tapping morph into something lighter. She realizes she's in the chapel now. Its spartan interior encourages worship to the ornately decorated altar. Only a few people pray before the watchful eyes of their savior. Most linger towards the back only passing by for a brief prayer.
Softly, she hears one man pray for his wife. He begs for her to be healed. His salvation comes from her and if he were to go without he might easily be led astray. The man's plight calls forth painful memories of long nights that bled into the morning with stiff hands and sore knees. She prays for his soul the same as she once wished for herself.
A faint buzzing in her pocket alerts her to a text message from Ava, I miss you! It's followed by a battalion of emoticons each more over the top than the last. Beatrice smiles to herself, despite being in the house of the lord she sends back a message asking to be picked up. Typing out a confession, she deletes it, reconfiguring it to a heart.
She leaves it unsent.
It's odd, the balance between love and religion. The ghost of one can be recognized in the other. Whereas god gives a mercy to a life hard lived; it's love that makes the hardships worth it. Both have brought her pain and they will in turn bring her to salvation. She slips through the doors unseen.
"Bea!" Ava calls out. Sprinting towards her Ava jumps into her arms, locking her legs around Beatrice's waist. She crashes into Beatrice with enough force to knock the breath out of her. Ava mutters aimlessly about a statue of some sort against her chest making the words difficult to make out.
JC muses aloud, "She couldn't last a minute without talking about you."
"Shut up," Ava chastises JC, "I missed your stupid sexy brain so much! I saw this really cool old statue with that flakey zombie paint and JC couldn't tell me what it's called! Like the one Lilith has in her torture dungeon!" Lilith's room, her mind wishes to supply, but she keeps it locked away for a better day.
"I believe you're referring to the Spanish artform of polychrome sculpture, darling," Beatrice answers with a gentle smile. She feels Ava's grip tighten as she leans up to kiss Beatrice's cheek. Adjusting her grip on Ava she keeps her secure against her chest and hides her blushing face against Ava's collar.
Her thoughts in the cemetery metastasize in her mind. A cancer that needs to be cut. The Ava of yesteryear would never say anything as impossibly endearing as missing Beatrice's intellect. Though never cruel she would have no pretence in masking her boredom.
Ava herself admits that she is rather emotionally short sighted. Even as years have melted away the harsher edges to such a brash outlook she still prioritizes her happiness. By some divine miracle that happiness includes Beatrice. She makes another familiar vow to never squander this.
Pulling her face from the safety of Ava's shoulder she finds her smiling face basked in the golden glow of the early afternoon. Her brilliant smile almost pinches her eyes shut and threatens to tear her face in two. A deep yearning grips her, her mind drifts to the message left undelivered, she feels it with all her being. It beats in rhythm alongside her heart.
Beatrice kisses her instead.
"If we leave now, we can still make Catania to cap off this lovely visit," JC clears his throat. Over her shoulder she feels Ava extend her arm to give him the finger. Not in front of a church, Ava! Pinching her side Beatrice tells her to play nice. She melts when Ava's bright laughter chases away the birds sitting atop the roof.
The blood red sun has set across the Sicilian landscape and the chorus line of stars, the planets, and the moon herself has casted their shroud over the sea. JC has found a rather unsavory club near the outer seam of the city. He sneaks them in through an emergency exit left ajar by a careless bartender.
Swathed in the mad chaos of music and strobing lights the people inside take no notice of their presence. In his ever enchanting charm JC has garnered the attention of a young woman. Her eyes rake over Beatrice like she was issuing a challenge to stake her claim. Not that she cares, her attention is solely gripped by Ava.
Beatrice slinks away to the bar content to watch from afar as Ava bounds her way into the crowd absorbing herself into the chaotic mass. She orders water just so she can keep her wits about her. The bartender pays no mind, not bothering to coax her into something stronger, and fills a glass before returning to another customer who loudly demands shots.
Though she doesn't taste the dull sting of alcohol on her tongue Beatrice grimaces at the acrid taste of her own cowardice. They are not strangers to this type of conversation. Ava fondly calls a night meer weeks after returning from war their 'Baggage Night.' It was there they combed through their deepest insecurities and found ways to combat them together.
A fire burned in Ava's eyes as she declared that nobody, not even Beatrice herself, could stand between her and the love of her life. Ghostly blush burns across the apple of her cheeks just remembering her vow. Then why is she torturing herself so? Because one night can't erase twenty years of insecurities.
It was her who said those words afterall.
"If she were to leave tomorrow; would that be enough?" JC asks as he sits down next to her. The woman he was conversing with glares at her from the edge of the crowd. She can keep him. Maybe it could alleviate the lonely challenge lacing his words. Beatrice looks up to find him smiling at her. She thinks she can recognize the look.
He needs to come to peace with the fact that the girl who got away. That Ava, wonderful sweet Ava, slipped away from him and that it wasn't his fault. Countless nights where he replayed their every step and wondered where it went wrong. She understands his hesitancy, because she too found herself in that same dance.
Two loves of Ava's life. Each knowing a different person than the one in their mind. They stand across from each other what might have been and what will be. One holding the means to comfort and the other the need to warn. Are they so lost? Are they even at odds?
"Of course," she understands this topic painfully well afterall, "We are never guaranteed a tomorrow no matter how happy a relationship may seem. If she were to decide I was not a successful partner and chose to take matters into her own hands, I would not resist. It's her happiness I care for most."
"Then why are you so afraid to tell her what's on your mind?" JC asks, looking back at her as if he recognizes her hesitation. Terrified of poisoning Ava with her love and giving her the burden that made her parents turn her away. To recognize them in her usually awestruck eyes; to see her lips turn down in the same disgusted sneer her mother held the last time they saw each other.
It's why she couldn't say the words, I love you, to Ava during their first goodbye. She could only speak to a cold, bare room because Ava deserves her freedom. That freedom has brought her the most happiness. Without it Beatrice will make herself no better than Sister Francis.
Keeping his distance JC places his hand next to her on the bar. A silent reminder that she isn't alone. He has found the answers he was looking for by being here with them. Looking into his eyes she realizes he wasn't here to warn her, but to convince her to never leave words unsaid. His voice is soft, "Tell her, you both deserve it."
As he stands, adjusting his shirt, he winks at the woman who so shamelessly flirted with him. Gliding past her through the crowd he lets his eyes drift across her body. Ava might be the one who got away, but he will have countless nights to find the one after the one. Gently he places a hand on Ava's shoulder to garner her attention.
Leaning down he whispers salaciously in her ear. A deep burning red blush dusts her cheeks as she pulls away to nod emphatically. He smiles at her enthusiasm and emparts her with a more public declaration. JC presses his lips against her forehead. Taking her hands he squeezes them once before lifting them up to be kissed reverently. With that he leaves the club.
In his wake tears begin to gather in Ava's eyes. Just the same in all times before she turns to Beatrice; however, instead of a torrent of devastation her face breaks in two with her most brilliant smile. Like a moth drawn to a flame Beatrice leaves her seat entranced by the woman who stole her heart.
Impossibly Ava's smile grows the closer she gets. Beating loudly in her ears her pulse trips at the sheer dangerous thought that Ava could dare love her more than she loves life itself. Her freedom. If by some miracle, maybe her freedom has taken shape in Beatrice's love.
"I love you."
Attention rapt, she watches the words envelope her lover. The steady confidence in her squared shoulders sinks; her face melts until Beatrice is met with a naked admiration. She's seen this person before. This look always turned to a new experience or a breathtaking view that she could have never dreamed of confined to a bed in a vast empty space.
To see it directed at her. To be the object of her admiration. To see her bravery and apprehension. To be the person to love and be loved by Ava. There's nothing else like this. She suddenly feels silly for her apprehension, yet she's grateful to have said it now instead of early in their relationship. Being loved like this might have broken her.
In a flash it's gone, replaced by a confused tilt of her head. Her eyes narrow and she conspiratorially checks over her shoulder like she's expecting some boogeyman to jump from the shadows to ruin this moment between them. She leans in, "Wait? Is- is this? I knew that guy was creepy! Do you really think he's got a- y'know," she whispers, "Demon?"
Looking up she sees a rather awkward young man staring longingly at Ava. He seems harmless, if he were to make a more physical proposition Ava can easily take him down. Beatrice smiles, ducking her head, "No, darling, this isn't code. I'm sorry, that would be emotionally disingenuous and unfair to you."
Her words unleash a beautiful blush dusting across the apple of her cheeks. Suddenly there's a new emotion in the mix of adoration, nervousness. As if she can't believe that Beatrice is real; that she could possibly love her. It's reflected in a soft and timid voice, "You love me?"
"I love you, darling," Beatrice responds just as quietly. The world around them seems to disappear and the loud thrashing pop music dulls to nothing. Ava flings herself at Beatrice. She catches her all the same. She feels Ava's heart thundering against her chest.
"I love you, I love you, I love you," Ava repeats squealing with delight. She's certain the music is drowned out by her own laughter. She never believed that she could be this person, this recklessly in love. Dotting a thousand kisses around her face she places her hands on the side of Beatrice's face, "I'm so proud of you, bebê!"
Turning to a crowd of strangers she announces to a crowd of strangers, "She loves me!" The people around them brush her off, likely thinking of her as some drunk, and return to their lives choosing to ignore her. She will never see these people again in their lives so Beatrice follows suit, declaring, "I love her!"
Ava turns to her, her arms have shifted to be curled behind Beatrice's neck, she sees their love reflected in each other's eyes. She would tear apart both heaven and hell for her. The wonderful woman in her arms has been through both and still graces the world with her brilliant light.
Catching movement on the edge of her periphery she notices some patrons talking to a bouncer. She takes the woman curled around her and expertly escorts her through the crowd blending in. They exit through the same door they entered and disappear into the night.
Struggle waits—abortive struggle, crushed struggle, mistaken struggle, long and often. And worse than all this, Waiting waits —the long dead-level of inaction, when no one does anything, when even the daring can only move in self-returning circles; when no one knows what to do, except to endure the ever-tightening pressure of intolerable conditions, how to better which he knows not; when living appears a monotonous journey through a featureless wilderness, wherein the same pitiless word "Useless" stares at one from every aimless path one seeks to follow in the despairing search for a way out. And happier is he who perishes in the mistaken struggle than he who, with a hot and chafing soul, but with clear discernment, sees that he is doomed to go on indefinitely in submission to the wrongs that are.
...
The force of the lesson of the Commune is that people cannot be made free who have not conceived freedom; yet through such examples they may learn to conceive it. It cannot be bestowed as a gift; it must be taken by those who want it. Let us hope that those who would have given it, bought that much by their sacrifice, that they touched the unseeing eyes of the somnambulist proletariat with a light which has made them dream, at least, of waking.
Voltairine de Cleyre, The Paris Commune
Nordaz68 Sat 31 May 2025 08:45PM UTC
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