Death's Angel
Part Two: Love Death
by Kagemihari
You're doing it again. I see you smiling, that cold, fierce Shinigami smile. I hate it. You smile like that
when you hate yourself, when you're feeling too much like Death.
It hurts to love you when you hate yourself. I'm always afraid you're going to kill yourself one of these
days. I hate the guilt I see in your eyes, and worse, the grim cruelty that
follows it. You've decided you're irredeemable as the devil himself, so you
might as well live up to it.
Those are the times when I know you're not going to be gentle, when our joining is fast and hot and
furious, and you leave bruises and broken skin. I don't mind the pain, I get
worse in any battle. But it hurts you to leave those marks, and god, love, I
wish you would stop doing this to yourself. Have you forgotten that I'm
stronger than you, that you can't really hurt me unless I let you?
You keep telling me that you don't care, and I've seen the sneer on your face when I tell you how much I
love you. You don't care at all, you say, and your eyes are so cold. You take
what you want from my body and give me that lazy smile, and you walk away.
You seem to have yourself convinced that if you never give anything back, never return my love, I have no
hold on you. But you need me, love, more than you think. I know you'd never let
me walk away, although you keep telling me that I should. You tell me you'll
let me go, and I think you believe it, but I know better.
You can't get what I give you anywhere else.
And I know you've tried, I know you go out and sometimes you bring someone else back with you, or you
don't come back at all. I know too, that it's rare, that you only do it when
you're getting desperate to prove to yourself that I don't mean anything to
you.
Because I'm the only one you really want, anymore, and that scares you shitless. I'm well aware that you
don't understand how or why you care, and you hate it. Oh, you hate it. You
hate me, for making you feel it. Yes, I know, lover. I know you hate me.
I know you love me too. But you don't know that, do you? You won't admit that, even to yourself. You don't
feel a thing, because you have it all locked away so tightly you don't even
know it's there. But I can see it in your eyes, sometimes, before you mask it
with that cold amusement again.
And it hurts, fucking breaks my heart. I see you hurt like that, and I
wish there was something I can do -- but I'm doing everything I know how to
already. I can't keep a watch on you 24-7, I can't stick to your side as if I
was part of you. I want to, I would if I could; I even think you would let me
most of the time.
But we're in war here, god, such a fucking stupid war, and the mission comes first. It has to. If I ever
want to be able to give you the time it will take to heal, we have to have
peace. We have to win. And if we lose, well... I suppose it won't matter much.
But I want to win. I want to fight and end this ghastly endless game. I'm ruthless in my war because I will
do anything to give you that chance at peace. A chance to heal that cold and
smothered heart of yours; the one you've hidden so deep that now you can't find
it.
And I'm afraid, so deadly afraid, that even that won't be enough. That even I can never reach you, not with all
the time in the world. That once the distraction of fighting the war is over,
you'll retreat more deeply into yourself -- or worse yet, vanish, and I will
never find you.
The very idea terrifies me. So I keep going, I keep giving, keep letting you lose yourself in me, hoping
that eventually I'll be too much a part of you for you to really go, and leave
me. God, don't leave me. I rarely let myself think about my other greatest
fear.
All too easily I can imagine, near the end of the war, you letting some OZ bastard kill you, so you don't
have to face the prospect of peace. I know as hard as you fight for that peace,
it would be hell on you to endure it. To not have the constant pressure of
missions and battles and strategy to keep you from hearing your own thoughts.
Even now, your cheerfulness and whirlwind personality sometimes has a manic quality to it. You chatter and
you grin and you never stop -- moving, talking, breathing, dancing, fucking,
laughing, working -- doing something to kill the emptiness inside you. If your
days were quiet and you never had to fight, I think you would go insane. Maybe
you are there already, and just dealing. Trying to, anyway.
I know, god I know if they kill you, you'll die with a smile. Not the Shinigami smile, the one that I
hate, not a smirk or any of your various smiling masks. A true smile at last,
one that I've only ever seen once in awhile, after you've fucked me so good and
hard that we're both drained and exhausted and barely conscious. A smile of
release, finding your own kind of peace. I hate to think that you would welcome
your own death with the same lover's smile, the same kind of relief as you get
from fucking me senseless, but I understand the need to just wipe everything
away.
Still, it hurts so bad sometimes to know that all I am is death to you. The little death you find in
the blackout of completion, of total satiation, is the closest you come in this
life to that perfect blankness of Death. The wiping out of all the memories,
all the pain, all the history of fear and loss. To forget for a moment the
dread of getting up to face another day. To lose for a moment the weight of the
future pressing down on you, dark, obscure, and hopeless.
Lately I worry the end may not come soon enough. I can see your frustration rising, your hate and fear as
you get more bright and sarcastic, and more cruel. Lately your touch is harder,
fiercer, less sensual and more passionate, more from anger than lust.
You used to save that rage for battle, Shinigami appearing in a fight. But you've come to see me as an
enemy too. I know that. You hate and fear the reactions I cause in you. You
don't trust it, you don't trust me, and you don't trust yourself. You hate the
way I love you, you hate the willingness I have to let you take me without any
cost to you. You keep looking for the hidden strings attached -- but there are no
strings.
You know there aren't, and you hate that too. You don't owe me anything, but you don't believe that. I've
given myself to you, and it was a free gift. You don't owe me a thing. That
terrifies you, more than anything -- no hold over you means you have no hold over
me, either; and you can't imagine not being in control.
You fear the open-ended offer I've given you; what it might cost you to accept it. You fear the gradual
wearing down of your defenses -- the only thing that has kept you safe and sane
for so long. You fear the helplessness of the emotions I cause in you, the
complete inability you have to erase them. The helplessness that makes you want
to flee or fight.
You say you run, you hide, but you never lie -- I've never seen you run or hide, or back down from anything
other than your own feelings; but you lie to everyone. You lie to them, to me,
to the enemy; but most of all, you lie to yourself -- although you have quite
succeeded in convincing yourself of it's truth.
I never know quite what will set you off; you attack me, verbally and physically, for any gesture of caring.
In public, you simply brush me off, carelessly. As if you were teasing. The
glint of steel in your eyes assures that you are dead serious; I doubt, though,
that anyone else would notice. When we are alone your eyes narrow, and you get
vicious, as if I really had threatened you. You try to hurt me with your words,
your fists, your body -- anyway you can.
I don't stop you. I know you are reacting the only way you know how to your fear of what you want so badly.
And god forgive me, but it feels good; it's a thrill to know I can get that
strong a reaction out of you. But I never want to hurt you -- hell, I just wish
to god there was a way I could get you to see that I'm not asking anything from
you, not really. That I'm not a threat; you don't have to be afraid of this. Of
us.
I wish there was a way to break through that empty space you protect yourself with. I wish I could find a
way to make you see that you care, to believe that it's okay to care.
But I don't think anyone can ever do that for you, now. So I take my emotions and
hide them as deep as I can, and hope they don't show too much. Keep this
relationship strictly casual, strictly business. You take me, touch me, use my
body -- anywhere, anytime you want to, as if you owned me. Well, you do. You own me.
And I love it, need this as much as you do. Love the way you need me, the way you
touch me, the way you're the only one who makes me lose control. I want it to
be you, I love that it's you I belong to. If I can't show it in any other
way -- at least this way doesn't make you hurt as much.
I'm your drug, I ease your pain in a mindless way without really helping the
situatiuon. I'm aware of that. But all I can do is love you, and I just wish it
didn't hurt you so much.
Because that's what kills me, love -- that nothing else about this causes you pain like
that does. Not my body, my hands, my words or lack of them, not even my
presence; you like that. The only thing that brings that pain-ravaged look of
fear and agony to your eyes is the simple fact that I love you, anytime I let
it show.
And it hurts! God, it hurts... the only thing I ever want to do is ease your pain,
and the reason for that is what hurts you most. So I simply watch you suffer,
and give you the only thing I can give. I feel a thrill of pure victory every
time I manage to bring that sleepy sated look to your face. I did that. I know
you never look that way for anyone else. I can't ever give up the chance to be
here for you and give you that.... I just wish it didn't hurt so much.
But for you, I will do anything. No matter how much it hurts me, or how useless it
is, finally. Including to pretend I don't love you, so far as I'm able. I try,
and I'm sorry that I still slip sometimes. When I do, I know I deserve every
insult, every bruise that you give me as you lash out at me. So terribly sorry,
love... never meant to hurt you... feels good when you hurt me back. I can atone
in that way for having caused you pain.
And this, this is how I really know you love me. That sheer blind rage that my caring sets off. You can accept it from from
people that don't mean anything to you. But when I care, it makes you mad. It
makes you scream and rage and want to run, or hurt something -- preferably me;
and that is because you care, almost against your will.
It's such a relief sometimes, to see it, to know that how angry you are is the
measure of how much I mean to you -- how much you're afraid of admitting that it
would hurt to lose me. So I can't help, sometimes, letting it show for a
bit... just to make sure you still love me. That I still mean enough to you to
threaten your defenses.
I'm playing with fire, I know. I'm playing with Death. One of these days, I'll push
you too far, and then...
But I have to know. Sometimes, it hurts too much to keep sliding by, pretending,
and I have to know before I can go
on. If I'm going to give up everything for you, I have to know that I mean everything to you. So I provoke
you, let you strike back; and feel that wash of warmth and relief as you react
predictably.
I never hear what you say anymore -- I watch your eyes as you attack me, and see
that fear and pain and desperate need to hurt me back, and my own pain subsides
in a wave of relief; and then the guilt kicks in.
I wish it was enough for me just to be with you.... I wish I didn't feel the need
to make sure you care about me, too. I'm so selfish, so selfish with you and
I'm so sorry. So sorry. God, I love you so much.
I deserve it, every little bit of pain that you dish out to me. I would pay with
my life for my regret that I've hurt you again. I wonder if that would make you
feel good? I wonder if it would finally end your pain to make me pay the
ultimate price. The idea is attracting me strongly of late -- I can feel how good it would be to die at your
hands. That would finally mean I've done it. I've let you take your vengeance
for the selfish pain I've caused, finally giving you real peace, a world
without me in it.
The only problem with that is then you would lose your drug, lose me, and that
would probably destroy whatever sanity you have left. I'm hanging on, hanging
on to life, to you; but...
I do have a Death wish. My secret fantasy. I want you to kill me -- you probably will,
sooner or later. All I have to do is make you mad enough to want to... we've
been close, a couple of times lately. It scares me, how easy it is, how close
it is.... how badly I want it.
I'm trying not to, love, I know you need me. I know my being here does help you, if
only for a little; but I feel so fucking useless when I realize how little.
Only for those brief instants when I can help you forget. But I want it... I
want it so bad.
Sometimes I'm as crazy as you are I think.
I love Death.
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