You knew, funny that you always knew but never really allowed yourself to admit it. The knowledge settled in the back of your mind, it lingered in the deep breaths you took to still yourself, it buzzed in your heart no matter how much you tried to drown out the noise. What you tried so hard to ignore, what you smiled away with reassuring words of, “no, it’s okay. I’ll be fine,” couldn’t stop your eyes from seeing what your heart didn’t want to feel.
It was debilitating, the observations that you made and how they, little by little, became far to difficult to ignore. Friends who you cherished, laughs that you had from inside jokes so deep it was hard to find the root of them anymore. Interactions that made you feel warm and listened to started to feel like sheets of papers left to compost in the garden. Several relationships dwindled; fewer and fewer until one day, it was only you.
A single lonely flower that no one wanted to claim.
“Well, well. Isn’t this an unexpected surprise.” A lush voice drifted down to you. Lifting your attention from the beckoning ground, you noticed the black boots and form fitting pants which directed you upward until you saw who was standing before you. Kaeya, with his hand on his hip, gave you a curious expression but you didn’t have the energy to give him one back. Instead, you let your eyes fall to your hands and pushed your nail into the pad of your finger. “No response today, that’s unusual.”
“I’m not in the best of moods right now, Kaeya.” You felt his energy shift and soon he was sitting next to you. The large windmill in the small garden continued to move even if, for a time, the conversation didn’t. The heat from the sun warmed your shoulders, pushed against your back until it became to uncomfortable you had to adjust and, when you looked up the path of vines stretching toward the sky, you sighed. “Kaeya …”
“Do you … do you get lonely?”
He chuckled, shifting his position to look at you but keeping his ankle locked onto his knee. “Not as often as you might think. I have plenty of people to bother me.” He spoke the last bit almost like an annoyance but it didn’t seem directed at you.
“Makes sense. I’m sure someone like you couldn’t possibly feel lonely …”
“Now, I wouldn’t say that.” He acted like he was going to continue, but you cut him off before he could. Your head moving to glance at him while your mouth turned into a frown.
“Am I unlikeable?” The way his eyebrows furrowed made your stomach unsettled and caused the words in your throat to spill out like a defensive shield. “There must be something about me that’s off-putting, right? Is it the way that I am or who I am? Is it … the way that I look?” Your jaw quivered, forcing you to turn away and bite your lip.
“Now hold on, what’s with this line of questioning?”
“Am I so unloveable that I’m destined to be alone?” A frustrating tear spilled from the corner of your eye and you pushed it away in the hopes that Kaeya didn’t see. It was unlikely since he was always able to see things even with half his ability taken by an eyepatch.
“Hey, wait a second.” He moved and so did you. The sound of his foot settling back onto the ground and shifting material under him as he adjusted caused you to slide away from him, but there was only so far to go on a bench of this size.
“Kaeya please, leave me alone … everyone else already has …” The sturdiness of your voice cracked and your hand moved to hold it together, fingers pushing against your throat and jaw as if to stop any shards from falling free. In an effort to hide, you turned away from him hoping that he would drift away into the wind but praying to Barbados that he wouldn’t.
“Y/N,” His normally playful tone turned soft and sincere. It wasn’t what you expected but desperately what you needed. “Something has taken your smile, tell me what it was.”
“I’m … I’m all alone, everyone has moved on to someone and here I am … still here like I’m stuck in place.” Turning your head sharply to him you gazed into his face and huffed at the expression he held. “What about me, Kaeya?” Your shoulders rose as you shook your head, a warm tear drifting down your cheek. “Why am I still alone?” You sputtered.
“I’m am. I’m unbelievably lonely …”
“Well then,” He began, sliding closer to you so his arm could rest against the back of the bench and his thumb could push away your tears. “Come be lonely with me.”
You broke. Somehow the acknowledgment, the breakthrough and the confirmation that you were lonely made your weak composure shatter. Still, you felt lighter somehow as you cried onto Kaeya’s outstretched arm. As you gripped onto his clothes and felt his hand run over your hair. As you adjusted and felt the proximity of his knees bumping into yours. Yes, you were lonely, but so was he and, together, you managed to find company.
A single lonely flower finally picked by hands who knew it’s name.