saysweetprayers | Stirring up a storm in your mind.

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Stirring up a storm in your mind.

He is not solid, not a creature that is reliable and strong. he is more like water, more like shadows and the night sky. he is a creature of dark and quiet places, of words unsaid and caught in your throat.

He is so many things but concrete and stone is not one of them.

But the little girl interests him, she’s curious and so small, fragile with so many words caught in her throat. It’s delicious and interesting and wonderful.

He slips through he cracks, slides under her door and appears to her in the night whispers words into her mind and haunts her as she sleeps. He doesn’t care if it’s an invasion of privacy, such things are beneath him, but he does leave her notebooks as a thank you. He leaves her proper books as well, books of poetry and old stories, novels of adventure and of grief.

he leaves her all manner of words so she can fill herself up again, so he might find her antoher night and feed and haunt and revel in her.

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he watches her, watches the realization and the fear and all of it flicker across her face. He's silent, as is his custom and it looks like he's getting ready to leave before she spe3aks again.

Smiling a little, he nods, then moves to pick up one of the notebooks, scrawling out a reply in small, cursive lettering.

"But I didn't take all of them."

Justine watches him for a moment then gazes down at his written-down words in the dim light. He didn’t take all of them. She doesn’t know what to make of that at first. So, he stopped her from talking for a little while, he only took some of her words?

It’s all very confusing, but she’s intrigued, she can’t deny that.

“You take words,” she murmurs softly, “Some of them. That’s… that’s why you’ve been..” She trails off, pursing her lips for a moment. “That’s why.. you’ve… been coming round…”

She frowns slightly, “What do you do with them? Do you need them for something?” she asks.

The answer is written just as the last one had been and he holds it up for her. "I need them to survive."

Which is true. He needs the words of others to keep himself alive, to keep breathing. He needs them like others need breath or food or water. He needs them to keep going.

"Do you mind?" he writes beneath the other words. It's a question he rarely poses to those he feeds on, choosing to rather pick indiscriminately, but this has stopped being more than random choosing and he knows that.

She has the right to decline him if she so wishes.

Justine stares for a long time, it's a response that makes the hairs on the back of her neck stand up and her heart ache. She understands that answer in a way.

She too needs words to survive. They comfort her, give her strength. Words are her friends, poets and writers are her soulmates. If she didn't have books to read, her Calling would have killed her off long ago.

Her lip trembles, she knows that it's odd - that a man creeps like a shadow and steals her words as she dreams. But there's something... he's kind and he too needs words to survive.

"No, I don't.... I d--" he throat feels dry. "I don't mind."

She licks her lips, "W-would you like some tea? Or.. something?"

She's not a very good host. She doesn't have people round.

He smiles warmly at her, moving to brush strands of hair away from her face before lightly cupping her cheek. Moving forward, he brushes a kiss against the sip of her nose, the smile remaining on his face once he pulls back.

It's his way of saying thank you, the little displays of kindness, the touching. He's seen into her mind, knows that she doesn't get affection, doesn't let herself get touched.

He's showing her it's all right, that he can touch her if he so chooses and there's no risk of illness or infection.

At the offer of tea, he laughs, shaking his head. He can't actually consume things like tea or biscuits or anything else that people usually consider food and drink. His diet is strictly language and nothing more.

Her cheeks go crimson with the second kiss and she trembles a little. She's not used to all the physical contact and it shows.

She feels sick in her stomach because the fear of something wrong happening is still there, but there's another sickness - she has butterflies. There's sparks of joy because deep down, she craves it. She craves the contact, she's been a lonely little girl for too long.

She finds herself smiling, her eyes glazing over a little with tears. Because nothing's going wrong, there are no dire consequences.

She laughs silently at his reaction and nods her head in reply. "Alright, no tea then."

"I... Do you have a name?" she asks curiously, "I don't... really know what to call you."

He seems to consider the question for a moment before writing out his answer. "Cromwell works well enough."

He's never been fond of names but he has a few that he occasionally uses. Why he picked this one to use with the girl is beyond him but it doens't really matter.

"You may call me whatever you'd like, if that doesn't work." He knows who she'll be talking to.

She smiles a little. "Cromwell." she echoes softly. "Like Oliver Cromwell."

It's a strange name. But he's a strange man. It seems very fitting for him. Or so she believes, anyway.

"I... I like Cromwell." she says after a short pause. "I'll.. call you that."

He smiles, bowing a little and grinning. Good, good, this is all going wonderfully. he's not sure how he expected it to go, not really but this? Is much better than expected.

"Justine is a very pretty name," he writes, turning a page and showing it to her. "A pretty name for a very pretty person."

She's not show how she expected this to go either. It's all very surreal. It's still very much like a dream, but she knows that it's not.

Justine blushes again, shying away from the page. ".. I.. Well." It's just the name her mother gave her. She's never thought of her name that much. She's never thought of herself at all, really. Not in a good way, anyway.

"... thank you. I don't..."

She doesn't think she's in any way pretty at all. Her mother would often tell her it. Biggest disappointment. Why did they even bother having a second child?

"I'm... not... not very pretty, though."

he moves to press a finger to her lips, shaking his head.

Then, carefully, so that she might pull away if she so chose, be leans down and brushes a kiss against her lips.

"You are lovely," he writes when he's done. "Whether you see it or not, I see it and know it to be true.

She doesn't move away, she's too shocked. She's too busy thinking on what she's just said to realise what's happening.

Her skin feels like fire and she's shaking a little from it. She feels dizzy because of all the things to happen tonight, she didn't think this would be happening. From having next to no contact with others, it's gone to this.

That was her first kiss. At nineteen, she got her first kiss.

She's not sure what to do about that.

Raising a trembling hand to her lips, she's quiet for a long time. She tries to take in his words, but she's struggling.

"That..." she chokes on the words, "That.. was my.. my first kiss."

He tilts his head at her, arching a brow for a moment before nodding. "I'm sorry," he writes. "If i was being intrusive."

He didn't mean to shake her, not by any standard, he just knows that the contact is something she craves and he can give it to her.

But he won't say he won't do it again, not yet. If she actively tells him to, he won't but until then, he'll be quiet on the matter.

She purses her lips, trying to stop herself from shaking. She's glad she's sat up in bed, if she was standing, she'd have fallen over by now.

It feels like a dream, how is this all happening? She had her first kiss.

Biting back another wave of dizziness, she shakes her head at the written words.

"No. It's just.." she swallows hard. "This is all... so new. I've dreamt about kissing someone, but I.. not me. I never thought... that it would happen."

She shakes her head again, "I've.. I've wanted things.. like this. I wouldn't get them.. I thought I wouldn't. They.. they said I was wrong, untouchable."

"No," he writes. "Not untouchable at all. I know what that looks like and its not you."

He moves., kissing her lightly on the cheek one more time. His hand moves to stroke her hair fingers lightly brushing her cheek and tracing her jaw.

He won't stop touchinng her until she tells him to. She doesn't have to wake hp from this if she doesn't want to and he is willing to stay for quite a while.

Justine reads that and her eyes widen a little. She reaches forward and traces her fingertips over the words. Not untouchable at all.

Something breaks then. And the next thing she knows is a sob escapes her lips and there's tears streaming down her face.

Because it means so much. Because she's been told for so long she is untouchable. Because she's lived through her life with so little kindness. And now she's being given it, he's still touching her, he gives her kisses and touches and she craves it so much. But it's overwhelming, it's too much for her to deal with.

She leans forward, still crying and rests against him. She can't say thank-you, she can't say how she feels. She just cries into him because it's all she can do.

And even when she thinks she could say it,when the words are on the edge of her lips, she'll find that she can't get them out. But he's not doing it to be cruel, quite the opposite.

Although he's getting something out of it, he's trying to show her it's all right that she doesn't need to thank him.

Wrapping her up in his arms, he pulls her close, dropping kisses into her hair and humming softly.

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Stirring up a storm in your mind.

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