The cold has gone and settled into its place. Penetrating deep into her bones. Clinging to her skin, what remains of her clothes impart numbness. 

Deadness of her limbs. Gradually. That’s what she feels all over as the rain continuously falls. 

She hears a roar. Heavy brooding steps. Warning her of danger, yet she can’t bring herself to move.  

Naturally, the demon has come back to finish her. Or maybe it’s a new monster chancing upon her body, Shuhua doesn’t know how long she has been here. 

Unmoving. 

Waiting for something to happen as she listens to her own slowing inhales. 

Shuhua closes her eyes; she closes them not because she is afraid. She has already undergone that stage of wild fear—cutting her breaths short.  

She has always thought her final moments would be years down the line. Long after she has married and had children. She has envisioned her own children crowding around her bedside and she would be wondering. Thinking of what awaits post-death, ashes scattered to the wind.

Now for the time being. 

Tranquility came to her at a certain point, after she lost her will to scream. 

Shuhua closes her eyes because she prefers to see what could have been. And it is far more beautiful than her reality. 

So when she hears the singing of an arrow, the shaking scream of a beast, she keeps her eyes closed. When there is only silence, she stays still. 

Even as a foreign touch imparts heat. Fingertips tracing along the groove of her neck. Stopping at her pulse. 

The warmth retreats and she only feels the cold again. 

“Do you want to live?” 

Quiet. 

Cautiously offering. 

Shuhua opens her eyes to a vision painted to life. All edges, sculpted and carved to absolute perfection. 

A walking angel without wings.

She must have been granted a last gift from the heavens.

----

Miyeon shifts, sits up languidly. Squints at her for a couple seconds, clearly taking a while to gather her bearings. The first thing Miyeon says is: 

“You’re still here.” 

Shuhua had sparsely slept, drifting in and out of consciousness every half hour or so, followed by lengthy bouts of time spent studying the ceiling. Her first mistake was trying to fall asleep on the floor. Albeit she did have a rug for her and the couch to lean against. 

Not that they were helpful in any way, her body is feeling the effects.   

The dull ache in her head rages on. Obstructing the last vestiges of coherent thought. Her ability to process and parse gave up on her at five in the morning. Three hours have passed since then.  

“Yeah. I’m here.” She can’t even string together an intelligent reply. Apart from listing basic facts. 

“Why?”

“You told me I could stay.”   

“I didn’t think you would.”

Shuhua is sitting across from her, staring up at Miyeon on the couch. It probably felt odd to Miyeon too. She would like to believe that’s why Miyeon lowers herself to the floor as well. 

Mimics her sitting position. “What do you want?” 

She did expect Miyeon to ask, staying overnight was ridiculously out of character. She knew it would warrant some sort of discussion in the morning. She knew beforehand. And she has prepared herself for this all through the night. How to answer. How to get her point across so there would be no ambiguities.  

In this moment, with her carefully constructed answers up to bat, with Miyeon awake, she hesitates to speak. 

Sorting through the fog of her thoughts, she thinks of the way she planned to thread her response together. She’s not eloquent, she never has been, and now that she has to cough the exact words out, her mind is spinning. Scrambling as her chest tightens.  

Nerves set alight. Afraid of messing up. 

Yet Miyeon isn’t rushing her, expression unchanged, waiting patiently. Giving Shuhua her full attention.  

The carefully constructed, planned answers don’t seem appropriate anymore. Miyeon isn’t asking for perfection. Shuhua probably can’t deliver an answer that would neatly tie withering loose ends either. 

But honesty will always be valued. 

Her delivery can be fumbled, she can afford to sound lame and out of her element. Shuhua had promised herself; above all, she has to be honest. 

And she will be. 

The following centuries cannot pass like the last 400 years.  

Grappling with the tremble in her voice, giving way, it comes out in a hushed quaver. 

“I want us to be okay.” 

Miyeon’s entire body deflates. 

As Miyeon opens to speak, Shuhua notices the little details. The rise and fall of her chest is barely there. But first and foremost, she notices the dullness in her eyes. 

“You want us to be okay.” Repeats her word for word. Tone for tone. Soft and scared, blindly reaching into the dark. “How do you want that to happen?”

Shuhua can easily decipher the underlying question. How should they undo centuries of the hurt they caused each other? Emotions avoided—allowed to fester in resentment.  

If there’s even a semblance of trust between them, it’s only in her own head. 

“I think we should take it slow and be honest with each other.” Shuhua holds her breath. 

Restless.

“I think so too.” 

A part of Shuhua is glad Miyeon agrees. 

Another part of her wonders if Miyeon truly wishes for their relationship to change for the better—is desperate for an end to the pretenses. She needs to hear it out loud. “Did you agree to come with me every night because you really wanted to fix whatever, whatever's,” she huffs. “Can we talk about last night?”  

The other woman bites her lip. 

“I wasn’t going to faint. At least not in front of the dragon.”

“I had no way of knowing.” 

Her gaze drops down, avoiding Miyeon’s eyes. “Do you know what I felt seeing you like that?” She tries her hardest to keep calm, yet it’s too late to seal the overflowing dam within. “I thought you were going to collapse on the spot, I thought the dragon was going to,” her hands grip her knees, unwittingly, squeezing so tight that it hurts. 

Her voice came out louder than intended.  

The same fear from last night returns: a mix of distress spawned from possibilities, imagined outcomes of lifeless pulses and solitude, anger at Miyeon. Anger at herself. 

Why is she still holding back from saying everything she wants to say?  

Herself most damning of all, she’s livid with herself. 

“I thought I would lose you!”   

Silence. 

An empty beat.  

Maybe she has gone overboard. 

Maybe she has said too much. Maybe she shouldn’t have even bothered. Her vision blurs, forming a glassy film. . She shouldn’t be doing this— 

Unnaturally warm fingers unclench Shuhua’s hands. Worming their way through amidst the battering, the crashing rush of her heart. 

“I do know what it feels like,” says Miyeon, “or at least I think I do.”

Her head is gently tilted up, thumbs brush the skin beneath her eyes. Lightly grazing. “And I’m sorry for putting you through that.”

“Please don’t cry.”  

AN: title from Halsey - More