"do you think there's a right way to love someone?,"

the question is to him, pretentious. everything she'd ever said had been pretentious to him in all fairness. he's always felt the same distaste for her question. his inability to distinguish their sincerity left him anxious ast the sound of her voice. there were two option in the faux-blondes mind.

the first was that they had been honest questions. the whole way through - she must've meant everything she said. or that the whole time she had been teasing him - insincere and sarcastic in hopes to catch him saying something dumb. he likes to believe the latter. everything is easier that way.

either she is plainly honest or honestly a liar. he's more comfortable with the second idea. if everything she'd ever told him has been honest he'd have to think and he hates thinking about her longer than necessary. maybe, in a way - that's also why he's always hated her questions.

he thinks on it anyway. thinks long and hard about what loving someone means and then the wind catches. a gust of storms past as the air grows wet with rain and warmth. summer rain is different than spring. the humidity makes his skin sticky. anticipatory in whats to come - the brush of wind relieves him. his eyes drift towards her. she's stood next to railing of the bridge. her eyes are shut. she's wearing that stupid skirt that makes her thighs stick out so much that he always has to put a coat around her waist. the sienna of her skin glows, like magic. straight black hairs that blow in this gust of wind like it has been called home.

and for a moment - a fleeting, ephemral moment, he catches her smiling. it is not bright, or wide. but subdued like morning dew, refreshing to his vision. her eyes are closed as she feels the wind on her skin and she is smiling so beautifully that everything inside him is crumbling. like a sandcastle. the realization that you have loved him the entire time crashes like a tidal wave at the highest point of noon.

his chest seizes. lungs shaking as the feeling washes over him so wholly. he had denied for so long, rooted the denial so deeply (or at least he had tried) and in the second she is beautiful, he had fallen apart completely. that she had loved him so much that whole time. whatever love is, whatever it feels like, and whatever question she asks about it.

all of it came down to her. unable to stop to thumping of his heart, he scoffs. comes up behind her as the wind pushes her skirt up. he'll have to tell her soon. before this all ends.

but for now, he stands behind her. even on her tiptoes he doesn't reach his shoulder. he pulls his skirt down with a huff, red to the tips of his ears and grateful she won't turn around. too lost in her own word. in that moment he sighs.

"that's a pretentious question,"