Prompt 64 - Promise - "Musings" - spikespetslayer - OC

[dedra.livejournal.com]

Prompt 64--Promise
Title--Musings
Fandom--None--OC
Warnings--None
Summary--There are promises that you try really hard to keep.

A/N: I had this three-quarters finished when authoressnebula shared her prompt post this afternoon. I started to scrap it, then decided what the hell. Consider it a companion from two like minded individuals.



I looked down into your face as you slept there so innocently and free of all care and wondered what life would be like for us together.

I’ve never been very responsible. I’ve always been first to shirk off work and anything that I thought was too difficult or trying. I’ve trod my own path of least resistance through life, clomping along in army boots crafted of indifference and careless abandon, looking for the next party, the next best way to forget the shit, the next escape.

Now it seems there is no escape.

I love you too much to just let you go. It hasn’t been long, our time together, but I still feel like I know you better than anyone else on this fucked up planet. There’s a special place in my heart for you that nothing else can fill now; if you left or were taken from me, I don’t know if I could survive.

Maybe that’s why I feel like I do right now. I feel like I need to change—not just myself, but the world. I want peace; I want kindness and love to reign, not the chaos outside the window or the tempestuous whirlwinds in my mind. I want so much for us that there is no way to express it in words. Even a picture would be a poor example.

Maybe even more frightening is the way I want to change myself. I want to work and spoil you, put you in pretty things and make you happy. If that’s what it would take, I would do it. Anything to see you smile again.

Your nose wrinkles and you turn over and still, I watch your sleeping body like my life depended on it.

I won’t promise you anything because promises are broken easily. Love, honor, and cherish. Pinkie swear. I promise I won’t do that in your mouth. People lie about these promises because they are easily broken and thrown away. They have affairs, they tell the secrets, they—well, you get what I mean. Or you would. Or will, if I ever repeat any of this to you while you’re awake and listening to me someday.

Then again, there are the promises that you try really hard to keep. Love, honor, and cherish. Pinkie swear. I promise that I won’t raise my child like my mother/father/whoever did.

Even those promises can be broken and you discover old patterns built on older patterns that are threaded through your life like a tapestry and make you a conglomerate persona instead of a flat, uninteresting nothing. They make you interesting and fun. They make life worth living. Kind of like you. You’ve made my life worth living, even in the short time that I’ve known you.

So, I won’t make the promises that can be broken. I will love you forever. I will try and cherish you every day and make you feel special. I will believe in you and in myself, that I can keep these promises and not break them or you in the process.

I’ll do my best for you, my child, because you depend on me now.

Your tiny fingers find my one large one and close around it, tugging it toward a rosebud mouth. Yes, I will do everything I can to make the world and myself a better place for you. You deserve it. So do I.

Comments

[thismaz.livejournal.com]

This - I’ve trod my own path of least resistance through life, clomping along in army boots crafted of indifference and careless abandon is a wonderful line. I really like it!
And it lies in such a lovely counterpoint to the tenderness of the ending - the promise given and meant, built upon a life-time's experience of broken words.
Lovely, as always.

[dedra.livejournal.com]

Thank you. As with all my pieces, there is a story beyond the story here--perhaps someday I'll sit down and tell it. Until then, I'm glad that you enjoy the snippets of my life.

♥

[smwright.livejournal.com]

Oh, so much to love here. This is beautiful... as always. (Don't you get tired of hearing that from me?)

I watch your sleeping body like my life depended on it. Gods, how I know that feeling; it's bone deep.

I loved the repetition in I won’t promise you anything because promises are broken easily. Love, honor, and cherish. Pinkie swear. and again with Then again, there are the promises that you try really hard to keep. Love, honor, and cherish. Pinkie swear. This is very powerful to me.

Just a lovely piece, very touching and very special.

[dedra.livejournal.com]

lol--I could never get tired of hearing that, Steph!

Thank you. I'm glad that you enjoyed it.

[smwright.livejournal.com]

Then I won't worry about being redundant!

[ayoub.livejournal.com]

This has to be one of my favourites this week :D

[beatzz.livejournal.com]

I feel like I need to change—not just myself, but the world.

I loved this.