This is one of the heaviest things I've ever written. In spite of Ozbert being my OTP of all OTPs, I sure do write a lot of depressing shit to detract from it. /sobs

I own nothing. Lyrics are "The Graveyard Near the House" by The Airborne Toxic Event.

prompt: 372. mint and lilac

soundtrack: threnody - goldmund

.tethers

/

so bye bye bye, oh bye bye

to all this dog-eared innocence

i can't pretend that i can tell you

what is going to happen next or how to be

but you have no idea about me, do you?

/

Oz passes by on a soft cloud of perfume oil and fine lace, and you've never wanted to reach out and cling to him so badly in all your life. You want to catch him by the cuff of his sleeve and hold onto him, pull him into your arms and rest your chin atop the blond halo of his head just to feel him, just to relearn every line and arc of him until you can almost convince yourself that none of them have changed. It's a lie you tell yourself every day, every night when you help him tie his cravat or adjust his collar when it folds over the wrong way. You still smooth down his hair when it kicks up where it shouldn't. You still reach over to tuck an askew flap of his shirt into his vest, even though his hands have this habit anymore of beating you to it, just as his eyes have a way of smiling when he says, "I can take care of it, thanks."

You hate these social gatherings – if not for the incessant noise of boot heels against marble floors echoing over the droll chatter of half-strangers, then at least for that bottomless sort of feeling that always attacks your stomach when you cross the threshold one step behind Oz and two steps behind Alice. She always leads the way in, every time, with her tiny hand stretched back for Oz's whenever she gets the vague longing for something to hold, as if she needs it. You have half the mind to tell her that you've gone twenty-four goddamn years without a hand to hold, all the while knowing the implications of that and still wanting it; her ignorance on situations like these, as plausible as it may be, annoys you to no end, just as much as it spikes a hot shard of envy to spear straight through your gut. You can't help it – to be so bitterly aware of human matters such as love and longing to the point of feeding off of them just about does you in every day as it is; for such things to land before this girl, this chain, when she can barely even comprehend their meaning makes you sick. You've always memorized every letter of anguish this world has to offer you, and yet here she is, all violet eyes and delicate wrists, taking them from you as if they've been her lines to memorize all this time. For all you know, that could be true.

But you see the way Oz looks at her. There's no getting around it. You see the way he squeezes her hand sometimes, how his fair brow lifts in faint concern whenever she happens to look even the slightest bit confused or lost. Don't you always look lost, though? Aren't you always floundering on broken seas like some paper boat, bobbing this way and that beneath the ever-ripping current of I'm not needed or He's leaving me behind? Perhaps he's simply gotten used to it. Perhaps he thinks you're okay, truly, in spite of how you just happen to need him more and more with every stretch of his bones as he grows into something lean and statuesque and unfamiliar. (Perhaps he just doesn't…care, or…)

Even still, you're forever seeking out something familiar about him, something tangible enough to reach out and touch with a phantom hand when you're too timid to hold it with your own. Is that the hint of an impish grin you see lifting the corner of his mouth? Yes, you think it is. You still crave that teasing lilt to his voice when he calls out your name, just as you used to when you were much smaller and gentler, when you drank honeyed tea instead of coffee shot with rum, when you were happy. Every easy smile and flutter of pale eyelashes is a vestige to the master you've always known and loved far too much for your own good. You may or may not still quail inside at every chance you get to touch him, to be near him, to be needed by him.

Those chances, you realize with a slow blink, are dwindling more and more by the moment.

Which is why when Oz taps you on the shoulder to tell you that he wants to show Alice the balcony, you let him. You can't do otherwise, of course. You can't tell him. Your words and feelings and the stupid ways in which they correlate have always had a charming habit of fucking everything up anyway, and in all actuality, you're tired – tired of hurting, of waiting, of watching Oz's shoulderblades shift beneath his jacket as he reaches out to take Alice's hand, promising her how beautiful the night sky looks from three stories up. He tells her that it's almost as if you can reach right up and catch a star, and you're half-pressed to say, That's a lie. There's only one star in this whole damn place and it's you.

But you don't. You simply stand in the doorway of this grand and glittering ballroom and tug at your cravat as you wave him off, plastering on a smile when he nods you a little goodbye and leads Alice through the maze of silk skirts and aristocrats with no names. In just a few moments, they're gone, swallowed up by all the beauty and elegance of royalty that you've never wanted as your own anyway. To your left, Break is staring at you. He knows everything, just like always, and you don't have the energy to protest anymore. As if you ever could.

More than anything – and it's always been this way, from day one – you just want to be loved. Loved.

The air that Oz leaves behind smells of mint and lilac. You breathe in.