Shifting Lines

The door swung open unceremoniously in that speed between graceful and abrupt, exposing that from which he had been hiding his eyes:  hers.  Pale green and intense in what they could say without audible language, he avoided contact for periods longer than one or two beats, but this time he couldn't break free.  His mind was taking too long to process what her presence meant, what that pain was he was feeling suddenly, all while taking in more and more to process from those stunning orbs.

Once he sorted out that she must have found out where he was from his boss at work, he moved on to why she would actually put in the effort to find him. Flashing, swirling possibilities took turns in his brain, none catching hold as a real possibility, so he let go of that conundrum to focus on the first thing depicted in the quick increase of white visible, surprise possibly.  No, it was more elation.  She was happy to see him. Initially.  That gave way to the second expression, when the white disappeared, brows came down together at a harsh angle, and the pain started.  She had remembered that she was angry.

That’s when the pain started.  The brows raised in the middle. Her head tilted slightly to side, and little lines appeared around the edges.  Satisfaction.  She had gotten what she wanted.  Why did that fade so quickly?  The lines became more pronounced, but everything had softened.  Concern.  She was worried that things weren't as she had hoped now.  It wasn't clear what that was even to her anymore.  It was shifting through the windows.

As he was slowly moving toward the floor, he realized that he was about to lose her gaze, but he wasn't finished figuring it out.  The tile was hard on his knees, and when he saw his face was about to hit it too, he realized what had happened.  The black plastic shell and the nodes of the stun gun bounced off the tile in front of him.  The grout lines shifted and the pattern wavered. 

She cradled his head in her lap, and started to sing.  It was a lullaby, sweet and soft, full of imagery that replaced what his actual sight could no longer register.  Her hands were gliding through his hair the way they used to.  Even if he had wanted to resist, he couldn't, but it felt so good to be like a child with no control.  If only it could stay that way.