Anna Amarande (
hauntedsavior) wrote in
deercountry2022-08-24 08:02 pm
Entry tags:
a girl came in the night [closed]
Who: Anna Amarande, Kainé
What: A reunion, of sorts
When: Late August, after the Clockhouse rebuilding project
Where: Anna's club in Cellar Door and their home
Content Warnings: Nothing yet.
a. it was always you
[it had been what, four, five weeks since anna and kainé made it out of that basement together? just a bit over a month since their metaphorical status changed to "it's complicated" on trenchbook? and here she is, playing shows again like nothing happened. there's certainly a handful of songs to pick from, but one she's certain to give a shot is "what about love?", a power ballad that's well out of her current fare, but that she spent a long evening crying over the first time she'd heard it. (here, three weeks ago, thanks to the trenchtube algorithm.)]
[the fucked up part is that she's always imagined kainé in the crowd every time she sings it—same as rose with "if it means a lot to you", beth with "someone", john with "echoes of you". (maybe tonight will somehow be the night that she shows up again. that would be fucking embarrassing. best to just keep imagining from behind the stage lights, where most of the room is illuminated and she can see what she thinks is everyone.) she hasn't been able to perform more than one song like that per night, so she's glad to sink back into things that feel a little less like she's tearing her heart open and bleeding all over the stage. would it satisfy them? she's not giving the thought enough soil to take root.]
[either way, she's finished this performance, and she takes her time in what meager backstage the bar has to pack her stuff up and make sure she's fulfilled everything she needs to to settle her tab for the evening. case on her back, she begins the short walk back home and prepares for another quiet night. it's distressing the kinds of things one can get used to; she doesn't even notice kainé's absence more than, like, six or seven times a day anymore. it's an improvement. she jiggles open the knob and pushes the door open with her shoulder, breathing out a deep sigh as she does.]
What: A reunion, of sorts
When: Late August, after the Clockhouse rebuilding project
Where: Anna's club in Cellar Door and their home
Content Warnings: Nothing yet.
a. it was always you
[it had been what, four, five weeks since anna and kainé made it out of that basement together? just a bit over a month since their metaphorical status changed to "it's complicated" on trenchbook? and here she is, playing shows again like nothing happened. there's certainly a handful of songs to pick from, but one she's certain to give a shot is "what about love?", a power ballad that's well out of her current fare, but that she spent a long evening crying over the first time she'd heard it. (here, three weeks ago, thanks to the trenchtube algorithm.)]
[the fucked up part is that she's always imagined kainé in the crowd every time she sings it—same as rose with "if it means a lot to you", beth with "someone", john with "echoes of you". (maybe tonight will somehow be the night that she shows up again. that would be fucking embarrassing. best to just keep imagining from behind the stage lights, where most of the room is illuminated and she can see what she thinks is everyone.) she hasn't been able to perform more than one song like that per night, so she's glad to sink back into things that feel a little less like she's tearing her heart open and bleeding all over the stage. would it satisfy them? she's not giving the thought enough soil to take root.]
[either way, she's finished this performance, and she takes her time in what meager backstage the bar has to pack her stuff up and make sure she's fulfilled everything she needs to to settle her tab for the evening. case on her back, she begins the short walk back home and prepares for another quiet night. it's distressing the kinds of things one can get used to; she doesn't even notice kainé's absence more than, like, six or seven times a day anymore. it's an improvement. she jiggles open the knob and pushes the door open with her shoulder, breathing out a deep sigh as she does.]

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The lights of the stage don't show everybody. Tucked away into a far corner, all by herself, Kainé was there. She couldn't see Anna very well, but goddamn, to hear that voice again. To hear her sing. She knew which song was hers, of course. Neither of them were any good at subtlety, and it sounded like she was half-sobbing by the end. It was beautiful.
Kainé is waiting there for her at home, their home, on the couch like she belongs there. Casually tipping back a bottle of beer, like she might have at dinner, or when they would sit here, listening to music or watching some movie, all sorts of things unfamiliar to Kainé that had made her life more than it was. Coming back was an impulse decision, one she came damn close to talking herself out of. She's running on sheer momentum now, not sure what the fuck she should be doing, just that it feels... right, to be here again. ]
Took you long enough.
[ She snorts, but rises from the couch, lets her eyes say more than her words could. And she smiles again, small and a bit wry, but a smile nevertheless. ]
Hey, Anna.
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Kainé.
[the word alone sounds breathless. she'd resigned herself to never seeing this amazing woman grace their once-shared doorstep again, but here she is—here she is, dammit, like she never went anywhere, like she already knows where everything is (because of course it is, because anna has held out hope against hope itself that exactly this would happen). she takes her bass off her back and rests the bag on the wall near the door, then takes several steps inside until she's almost toe-to-toe with... with kainé.]
You came back. I... [all she can do is give a breathless, disbelieving laugh.] You came back. [she reaches out, stops, decides fuck it, and touches kainé's arm. it's the prelude to an embrace, the orchestra slowly warming up before what could be an exquisite symphony.]
I was doing a show. How long have you been waiting? [years, anna thinks. millennia.]
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Yeah, I know. I... was watching.
[ Anna's touch on her arm is electric, as comforting as a thick blanket on a cold night. She puts a hand around Anna's waist, pulling her and resting her head on her shoulder. That should hide the tears that are starting form, at least for a few seconds. She feels as though gravity no longer applies, like the only thing keeping her tied to earth is Anna's body. ]
I heard you sing again... and that was it. I knew I needed to come home.
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You heard me sing that stupid power ballad? [she says it like she should be embarrassed, but really, she's a little glad. it was for her, after all.] You should've seen me the night I heard it for the first time. I was crying like a fucking baby.
[she thinks back to earlier tonight. how she hadn't been able to get through the last chorus, how she'd felt her throat tightening, how she could hold notes less well, how it was only by the grace of mechanized limbs that she didn't totally screw up the bass. how she'd had to take a moment to get a drink at the end of it, and how she let the backing track for her next song start and restart before she was ready to continue the set. "sorry, everyone," she'd said. "that one fucks me up a little more lately." she'd warned before starting the song, "if you've already found the best thing in your life, don't throw it away." she hadn't mentioned kainé's name, maybe out of superstition or embarrassment, but she really hadn't needed to.]
So are we trying it again? [she doesn't even know which "it" she means. living together, being together. it doesn't matter. she's barely holding back her own tears just to feel kainé's touch again.]
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Hey, I thought it was… [ She mumbles, suddenly glad that Anna can't see her face right now, because the tears are already starting to burn trails down her cheeks. She hasn't listened to music since she left Anna. But she did sing to herself. ] pretty good.
[ She'd heard words like that so many times from Anna before. When they'd been locked away by some girl's fit of Reckoning induced madness, and Anna had apologized to her. Before that, when she'd expressed her fears that she was going to end up messing things up. It's only recently that she quite understands what they mean. She's had a lot of time to feel them herself. She has so much to lose now, and so much she'd already lost. It seems impossible that she's actually getting some of it back.
She left shortly after that song. She needed to be alone with what it made her feel, at least until Anna came back. Right now she's full of enough whiskey to set the whole town on fire, but she feels stone sober. ]
Yeah. We are. [ Her voice catches, and breaks in a sob. ]
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What do I have to do... [she says it slowly, like she can't let herself have nice things for a moment even though she really, really wants to. she doesn't know what she's doing. she's never known what she's doing but she is running even more blind than usual on this one and it's something that they are going to have to figure out together.] To be the kind of person you feel safe loving?
[she could just say "i love you". she should just say that she loves kainé. but she can't let herself have this right now, for whatever stupid, fucked up reason. life would be so much simpler if she could just be selfish when it matters.]
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But it never had been quite like this before, has it? Even when she'd lived with Grandma, she'd still been apart from the people around her. She'd barely been a teen when she lost her, but now she was a grown woman. She nuzzles into the crook of Anna's neck, sighing. ]
Just... tell me if you're gonna do something stupid.
[ She finally brings herself to lift her eyes, show Anna a face made weak and ugly with weeping. Her voice is soft and uncertain. She's so afraid, but she's even more scared of letting this go for good. ]
I don't know. It's hard. Talking about shit. But if it's for you, I'm... willing to start.
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[she says it with absolute gravity, the kind that bends and warps the universe to bring two specific people closer together. the days of her picking up her sword and using it as a solution to all her problems are over. she's finally seen what happens to those who live that way, and maybe she's just the kind of person who needs to live it firsthand no matter how many times the memories flood back to drown her.]
No Lehmann's ever been good at talking. [she says it quietly, like it should be something that kainé already knows, but moves past it easily, like it doesn't matter if she doesn't.] It's what's killed every relationship I've ever had. But I'm going to get better at it for you. I promise. I'm not... I'm not going to go around doing stupid, impulsive stuff anymore.
[and if kainé is uncertain in her softness, ugly with her tears, then let anna be someone who brushes back her hair, cups her cheek, speaks with the certainty that only life can give. let the tears rolling from anna's eye glisten with promise as she fights back against her tightening throat.] I can't live like that anymore. Not when I have someone so important to come home to. I already knew what I was fighting for, but now I know what I'm living for.
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Good. Because I'm still learning how to live too. I'm still getting used to it, and I fuck up a lot. I guess that's what you get when you convince yourself you're a monster for so long. [ She laughs, short and bitter, but not letting it linger. She leans her cheek into her hand. ] But that's not what matters right now. Because I wanna be here with you. I... I love you. You've made me into a better person. For the first time in a while, I'm really fucking happy, and it's because of you. So, uh... I'm gonna keep trying. And you better call me out when I'm being a jackass too.
[ She must sound like an idiot, right now, but this is what she committed to, isn't it? She can bare a little embarrassment. She doesn't think Anna is going anywhere just on account of her being awkward. ]
Ah, hell. Wanna fuck?
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[anna laughs, mostly at herself for being so goddamn easy and obvious. she wants her body to jump right to that electric passion that she's used to, but she can't get there quite as easily as she once did. which, given everything that they've lived through lately, can't be an enormous surprise. it'll take her a bit longer to get her motor running, but it still runs.]
I love you, Kainé. So fucking much. And I wanna spend more time talking with you about this stuff, 'cause I need to figure out how to give you everything you need from me and it's not gonna help if I just sit here taking guesses. But right now... [she slides her hands down kainé's sides.] Right now I can fuck with some reunion sex.
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[ It takes a little longer for Kainé to get into the mood too. Also not a surprise. She happily takes things slower in the beginning, but it's hard to say that the lovemaking that follows is any less intense for that. Kainé lets herself tell a story of love, of the two of them, with touch.
And afterward, she's content to lie with her body nestled against Anna's, two bodies who had been separated from humanity, fractured, made whole. Rejoined. Kainé rests her head on her shoulder, holds her hand in hers. They have a new humanity, better than the old one. ]
...That was good. I love you.
[ As though she hadn't said that enough times while they were having sex. She'd held affection at arms length for so long, afraid of it betraying her or leaving her, as it always seemed to. She's glad that she's braver now. ]
I'm so glad I'm here.
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[there in bed, her android body on full display and feeling as though she fits within it for the first time in too long, her beloved pressed against her, anna feels her black box heart slowly pulsing and listens to their breathing, and she holds kainé's hand a little more firmly.]
I love you. Thank you for coming back.
[she doesn't know what to say for a long while, so she doesn't. her thoughts are bubbling up, though, as the chemicals slowly leave her brain and her body comes back to its baseline. she's not sure how long she's silent before she says something.]
So, uh. Shit, I don't know the right way to say this. The sex is fucking amazing, but, like... maybe it shouldn't be the first thing we jump to if we can feel a serious conversation coming? [she has no idea if that's even a reasonable ask, and couches it however subconsciously with a compliment.] Fuck, you're real good at it, though.
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Anna isn't wrong, though. Kainé huffs a quiet little laugh. ]
Yeah, I know. We got pretty far this time, at least. The talking part of it, you know. [ She sighs softly. ] We... were just afraid of it right? Or maybe I was, or just too unused to it. But we can talk now. I'd really like it.
[ She doesn't sound upset at all. Contemplative, yes. She'd come to that conclusion as well, more or less, even before things broke. She'd tried to bridge the gap, but... maybe it would be easier now that they have a better idea of what they want? She dares to hope. She feels right now like she's finally able to rest after a very long labor. ]
…Hey. This probably sounds fucking dumb, but… could you teach me music?
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[the thing that she's more enthusiastic about is the follow-up question. she looks over, down, and smiles so big, and there's a puff of laughter to match kainé's.]
Are you fucking kidding me? Yes. Absolutely. A thousand times yes. [she breathes out, letting her chest fall a little. it's not fair how badly she yearned to hear kainé's voice around the house again.] I already love hearing your voice. I'll help you with anything you want to learn. [she shifts herself upward just a little, just enough so she can comfortably see more of kainé's face.] What were you thinking? Any kind of instrument, or do you just want to keep singing?
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Singing. Maybe, uh… guitar?
[ All of these instruments are pretty new to her. She barely knew anything about music before she got here. Having something like a hobby was a luxury she could never afford. Everything she did, she did because it helped her survive and fight another day. ]
I want to play with you. If you're okay with that. The first time I heard your music… it did something to me. I don’t know. It made me realize there was more to live for.
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[but kainé sees her.]
Yeah. Yes. I'll teach you anything you want to learn. [her brain catches up with the rest of her body in the middle of the sentence, and she realizes that she's holding kainé closer and the hand that's not in her hair is holding her hand and it's a beautiful tangle of limbs that would set her heart fluttering if that were something it still did.] And I want to play with you. I want you there on stage with me instead of just in the audience.
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Impossibly, she makes somebody happy. She isn't fighting from a distance for people who despise and fear her. She's right here, warm in the embrace of somebody that she has no reason to keep away or shut out. ]
Good. I want these hands to do something that isn't killing or just what I need to survive. I want it to be with you. I'll probably suck ass at first.
[ Kainé laughs, and drapes an arm across Anna's torso, half-hugging her to herself. ]
...I'm gonna fix up the garden, too. Plant new stuff.
[ The Lunar Tear she'd arrived with was long dead. But there are other blooms to nourish. ]
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I want to help. I tried keeping mushrooms here last year to help with corruption, but they all died out before you got here. [the people she was growing them for had vanished, too. so maybe that was one metaphor she wasn't keen on repeating.]
You know, about a year ago, when I first got here... there was this ritual down by the graveyard. All I had to do was plant a flower and offer it some of my blood, and it would bloom or wither forever, depending on... you know, what direction my life was taking. [she doesn't talk about how it had looked for most of the summer.] I could dig it up and transplant it here. And we could grow some other stuff together, too.
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It's time she let that go. This her body. She'll do what she wants with it. And that means plenty of protecting, but also plenty more. It means playing instruments and cooking and holding her lover, and making less excuses about it being something she shouldn't do. ]
Mm. I'd really like that. Just some flowers, vegetables, that kind of shit.
[ She pauses. That doesn't mean she's really knows how to do a lot of those things yet. She has to keep walking that path, step by step. ]
Shit. It's ain't like I'm good at it. Only really started when I came here. We'll have to learn how.
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I noticed we're doing a lot of stuff we're not good at. When's that ever held us back before? [she squeezes kainé's hand, then shifts her body a little to hold her closer, to keep her nearer to her black box heart.]
Sucking at something is the first step to being really good at something. [she totally came up with that herself.] Maybe we'll screw it up, but we'll learn, and we'll get better. Same as always. Let's grow a goddamn garden.
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Yeah. I want to do that. I want it really fucking bad. [ To surround herself with life, instead of death, even in this bleak world. ] Let's fuck things up. Let's figure shit out. Hell, let's even ask for help.
I wanna learn everything you can teach me.
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I'll do my best. And I know I can learn from you, too. I want you to help me grow again... and we really are gonna take this place by storm. We're gonna flourish.
[no more death, no more destruction. no more tearing the place down. build it all back up better instead, dammit. they've got this.]
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What sort of songs do you think I should sing?
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[anna is about to get into some stupid specific bullshit that she is going to try to help kainé understand as naturally as possible, but she knows she's gonna sound like an excited little idiot the whole time.]
There's this singer from back home, Alissa White-Gluz. I didn't listen to a lot of her stuff before she moved over to front for Arch Enemy, but she used to be in this band called The Agonist, and they put out this pretty killer album in, like, 2009 or something like that that had some of the most brutal songs I'd ever heard. Just really heavy guitars, killer solos, and then Alissa comes on and she's growling and screaming her head off and without even missing a beat she's hitting you with the most gorgeous clean vocals you've ever heard. Like it's second nature to her.
[she's babbling. but she's not even at the part that made her think of this particular singer.]
And then right in the middle of all of this... she takes an entire song to just pull it all back. And it's just her voice, alone, doing a beautiful version of a piece from Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. It's this solo aria, and it's so operatic and it's so professional, and you'd barely believe the person who sang it is the same person you've just heard screaming rage and pain and anguish in both your ears at 200 beats per minute. [she's been looking up at the ceiling this whole time, but she tilts her chin down towards kainé as she comes to the end.]
I think you could do that.
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God, you're such a fucking nerd. [ She kisses Anna's collarbone, and rests her head back on her chest. ] Have I heard this lady before?
[ It's a sign that Anna really understand something about her. Reframes her in a new way that seems surprising even to Kainé herself. She's smiling again just thinking about it. How her world grew through that excited babbling. How much has Anna's grown? Can she ever repay her for the person she's become? ]
But... thanks. I don't think I'm that good, but... I just wanna sing with you. Maybe do a few of those metal growls too. That shit's badass.
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I've played a couple. You know "Thank You, Pain"? I was into it a lot, uh... before the whole Reckoning bullshit. Kind of stopped vibing with the message as much. [she falls silent for long enough to notice it.] Anyway, I think you are that good. And I'm not just saying that because I know that you're good with a bunch of other stuff that I like a lot. You have the kind of voice I could follow into the darkness without being afraid.
[she looks up at the ceiling and feels her face go red from the neck up. she had not meant to say that part so candidly, but here she is.]
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Mm. It's a good song. I like that kinda music. It's angry. And it's not gonna pretend it's not. I don't want you to act like it never hurts. [ It's not enough for Kainé just to bury her sorrow, when it digs itself up out of the loose soil and continues to haunt her. ] But hell, they're all just songs to me. You have a story, a feeling for each one. It's like the songs grandma used to sing to me. The stories she'd tell.
[ It's a good thing that Kainé is lying down, because that compliment could have knocked her ass out cold. How can she be that somebody else when she barely knows how to live herself? No matter how many times she hears things like that, it makes fire rush to her cheeks. ]
Sound isn't light, dumbass.
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I fucking love you. [she holds her girlfriend a little more tightly and tilts her head back down to kiss whatever part of kainé's head she can reach.] You are such a fucking delight to have in my life. And I think we're gonna make some stories together with the music we listen to, and the stuff we make together.
[she calms down just a little to bring it back to something real, something a little less romantic and more about herself as a person.]
I spent a long time not knowing how to relate to my own feelings if I didn't hear about them in a song first. So I just have about a fifteen year head start on you. You'll get there.
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Have you ever written lyrics? I'd really like to see 'em. I like hearing you talk about what songs mean. I can never figure it out, but when I listen to you, I feel like I'm starting to.
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I was working on some stuff with my friend Ortus. He's an actual-ass poet, way better than I've ever been. But I've never written stuff on my own before. I've always been... too afraid, I guess. [no reason not to be honest about it. she's already as physically vulnerable as she can get.]
It's easy to hear my feelings through other people. It's hard to put it down myself. I mean—hell, Ortus wondered if I was going to write something about you when we started talking about it. I figured you'd rather eat rotten meat than listen to me try to write a sappy love song about you.
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Yeah, it's... hell, you know I'm not really good at knowing what I'm feeling. Much less knowing what to do with it. [ She takes a deep breath. ] I'd listen, though. I would.
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You would? [she echoes it like it's really actually a surprise.] Man. Maybe I should try it, then. I'm not good at poetry or anything... but I wouldn't mind putting myself out there if it's for you. Might be a little weird to ask you to sing on it with me, though. [unless...?]
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Of course I would. I love you. [ There's not a shred of hesitation. ] Dunno if I'll be ready to sing it any time soon.
[ She's still easily embarrassed, after all. ]
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I love you. [the words rumble through her throat and she likes the way they feel, how readily they come.] And when you're ready to sing with me, you're going to sound beautiful. I already know it.