Original fic: Stars
There’s nothing worse than a coward.
A coward who had had their chance years ago. Had their chance with the most beautiful woman to ever have blessed their eyes with her image.
Had their chance years ago.
A chance that had stretched gloriously on with relieving infinity, like the night sky. And it was the same night sky that I admired that made me ruin my chance.
It stretched out too long. It lulled me into a sense of security, of thinking that we had forever. There were so many opportunities to tell her that I loved her. And with each one that passed by - blinking out like a sparkling star - I ached. But I consoled myself with the fact that many stars had gone before, but the night still seemed as bright as ever, and she not any less radiant.
But these things happen gradually. One fallen star does not plunge the night into blackness. But if, over the passage of time, hundreds of stars go out, the night will slowly darken around you ( and you, like the fool you are, will go on standing there, oblivious to the fading of the light) until at the very end, you find yourself standing in total darkness.
And the stars winked out so slowly that you are surprised.
And so it happened. The stars fell, and over the weeks, the months, the years, her eyes gradually became dimmer. And looking back, I notice this with painful clarity. But only hindsight has twenty-twenty vision, and so each day I did nothing, and those eyes were sapped of a little more light each time until the day that I found myself standing - utterly surprised - in that darkness, facing those eyes which did not light the way this time. Those eyes which were dull but with a bright, glassy surface.
And I was chattering on obliviously, juggling the shopping bags - I miss the meaningless and simple things that we did the most - until I noticed her stillness. The pain and distraction in her eyes, as she turned to me and I was told with a softly hoarse and helpless voice, with hands spread in unwilling and painful surrender, “This isn’t going to work.”
Her silvery voice was fragile and crackled with quiet sadness.
For the longest time we simply stood and stared at each other, my arms slowly lowering and voice trailing off from my animated and impotent speech.
Perhaps in that stillness and silence there was a communication that could have saved us if it had come earlier.
***
But it didn’t. It didn’t come earlier. It came, like most bolts of realisation that are actually worth the thought, too late.
And so now I sit here at this table draped in white and feel my unusually painted lips stretch over my teeth as I watch the woman I love get married to a man who can say the right things.
Perhaps she loves him. But I doubt that it is the kind of love that she should feel on her wedding day.
I know that I should not feel this kind of love on her wedding day.
I know that I should try to make my stretching of the lips look more like a smile and less like a grimace.
But it’s so hard. It’s hard because she looks so beautiful, and it’s the special kind of beauty reserved for brides.
She’s always been perfection to me, but this is different. This is the kind of different that, in some corner of my mind that is rarely touched upon, I had dared to hope that we would experience. But together had been the point.
I had hoped that she would look that kind of different for me.
So why, my mind rails (as Lucy had railed at me. She had always known. “You’re an idiot. Everyone has their limit, and you will become hers if you don’t say something,”) didn’t I do something about it?
I could come up with reasons, excuses. Excuses and reasons. But none of them would be sufficient to explain the loss. No reason or excuse that I care to dredge out of my mind could possibly excuse the sheer loss that I brought crashing down upon myself.
I could mumble about how I was scared.
“I was scared!” Lucy had scathingly parroted, mocking my inadequacy, her normally delicate silver voice turning into something sharp, something hissed. That voice of silver bells turning into silver razors with sharp edges.
And so Lucy had been the looking glass for all my excuses.
But no other looking glass had ever reflected with such clarity. All other mirrors are dull, flat and faded in comparison, reflecting only the person I had made myself to be, only the person who I had made with clothes and make-up. Not me.
But Lucy, no such lies there. If I raised my left hand, Lucy would show me just that.
All of my failures were polished and presented to me, after the fact.
But that wasn’t her fault. She had always been there, glassy surface shining brightly, always ready to present to me my unsuitability.
But what good is a mirror if you cover it up? How can you possibly expect to see yourself if you refuse to look? It was I who covered her up. Draped a dusty sheet over that shining face so I would never have to see myself again.
It was only when it was too late that I whipped off the sheet with unnecessary desperation and speed. And saw that the mirror’s face knew that it was too late and was sporting a twisted and bitter smirk. One that perfectly reflected my own.
And so now it hurts to look at either woman. The one sitting at my side, draped in silk and shining more brightly than ever. As mirrors do when you use them, and keep them dusted. Bitterness gone now, just a quiet sympathy that causes her to be the pillar of support, silent and strong, to my right.
And it hurts even more to look at the woman at the head of the table. The ring on her finger winking at me, like those stars that winked out, taunting me. The gems and the pearls in the soft white folds of her dress catch the light, glaring into my eyes, hurting them. It hurts to look at her.
But when she passes by me, surged along by the sea of well-wishers, I am able to contort my face into a smile as our eyes meet. Though her smile, bright and laughingly genuine, falters somewhat, and for a moment I see our years flash across her face as the shards of light from her diamonds flash across my eyes.
Her face contorts, and for a moment I see every euphoric up and every desolate down that we shared reflected in each strained muscle of her face, as she stands, static, as if time stops just for us.
The smile she conjures up is frozen and totters on the brink of a grimace, as if she hadn’t realised how much it would hurt to invite me to her wedding.
The people around us blur as though lace curtains have been dropped down, encircling us, only the bride and myself in the centre. Their voices dim to a faintly flowing mumble, moving as freely as a stream, though the people themselves seem to be made of marble, unmoving and pale. Silhouettes to our drama.
All the tiny muscles that make up her plump, pouting lips are stretched smoothly over her teeth, as soft and vivid-red as the ‘sumptuous rose’ the lipstick claims to imitate.
It used to be mine. I lent it to her one day, years ago, when she had turned to me and proclaimed that none of hers suited her mood.
The smile, although smooth, trembles, fragile and breakable.
And time stops for no-one, as the illusion shatters around us, the curtains are yanked away, off-stage , and the marble figures warm and gain life, movement, their chatter becoming louder than ever as she is bourn away by the crowd.
Leaving just me and my mirror, my Lucy, sitting stiffly beside me, back straight, delicate head poised, staring straight forwards, as though balancing her intricate hairstyle atop her head.
The only sign of life is the hand that lies in my lap, clasping mine so tightly that it is as if it is her heart that is ruined.