“Sorin."

“Amber?" He stepped back. He stepped back… “Why are you here?"

“It's a full moon tonight. A blue moon."

“That's… sad, Amber."

I shrugged, gently. “I've known since I came up with this it would be either the most courageous or saddest thing I'd ever done in my life." What I hoped was a winsome grin flashed across my face, impenetrable. “Inaction, on the other hand, was impossible."

He paused. He paused! He considered. And he shook his head. “No."

“Hear me out?"

“No, Amber. You cheated on me. I gave you a second chance. We healed, but healing isn't enough. We're done."

“You healed. I purged my demons and paid my dues and tried to heal. Hear me out."

“What could you possibly even have to say?"

“Ah, that's a yes."

He pinned me with a look. I loved it, but didn't let it show - the grin dropped, the ears came back, and the eyes narrowed. For both of us, really. “I'm moving soon."

“Not here."

“Nearby, potentially; and regardless, if you say no, you'll never know the difference, whether I'm here or not."

“That's not fair."

“Neither is hollowing a man out and leaving him when you're done."

The words left me before I was fully cognizant of them. His voice was perforated when he retorted, “I did what I had to. I told you, Amber, I'd grown to resent you. It would have turned into hate."

“This isn't that year. Neither one of us is who we were before."

“I can't. I can't do this, Amber; I can't keep hating you."

“You did the right thing, back then. Leaving me."

“… You just said…"

“It doesn't matter that it wasn't fair. It was what was best. If you were to loathe me then, and onward, we would never be able to repair. I made one round of self-actualization, yes, but it took losing you to have the other. To finally learn what it really meant to hate myself. To not live for myself. For me to come out of that cycle." I snorted hard and snarled. “I'm getting off track. I made you something." I reached into my backpack.

“Why."

“Because of how long I loved you. Because I wanted to do the right thing, finally, rather than just something I felt sort of good about. And this is the right thing." I proffered him the sword, fully inscribed and divinely enchanted. Silver pommel rolled to spherical perfection by hours and hours spent learning the metallurgy to do it; leather-wrapped grip and ironwood hilt, both hand-wrought by yours truly. Only the blade itself was not my creation, but the scrollwork inlaid into it was mine, and the balancing was a collaboration between myself and a smith I had gotten to know. A hand-and-a-half sword like from medieval times, fully capable of shattering demonic influence in a single blow and sharp to the touch, besides. And he would know that that meant it could kill me twice.

“Amber…" He started to take it, seeming as he did to have lost command of himself. His eyes roved the piece. Then, he realized there was meaning in his receiving the sword. He stepped back again, as though scorched. “No." His voice was husky again. “No. You won't do this to me."

“Let me."

“This is dangerous. You need help. You need to let me go. I did love you, Amber, but I can't anymore."

“You know what we do for one another. To one another. With one another."

He choked for just a moment. “And that's why. That's why I can't do this with you again."

“I have one last ploy. Rule of three, and all." I let the sword lower gently to the ground by my side. Hundreds of hours spent on that. Well, at least I had learned some new skills.

“Don't."

“You've left me no choice. Sorin, in year and change I've been without you, I haven't met a single other person of your spiritual stature. I've felt no compulsion like the one I feel to be with you." Vigor began to build in my voice. It had to, or else I would destroy the opening refrain. “You are the one I want and the one I need, and I will bypass any barrier to have you again. So."

And I sang. I poured out lyrics from a song of the same passion and determination I felt for him; that said everything I needed to say and had the benefit of song-crafting behind it. I wasn't the greatest tenor in the land, but I could put these words together in these notes and I could sing to him that I would love him forever, come what may.

He let me get through the entire thing, even when my voice cracked. I watched him soften, as I sang, and I had to grasp my heart in my hand and push forward, not retreating from strain and fear, but taking hold of it and pushing through it as I had been teaching myself to do for years since learning what fear had done to cripple the person I had believed myself to be for so long. I stepped towards him, and he didn't step back, and the last lingering note of the song fell.

He was seated by the time I finished. His hands were clasped together, and he was looking at me, eyes wet, but there was no certainty, there. There was no brewing passion, no leaping return of faith and joy. “What do I do?" he asked, helplessly. It broke my heart. This was our exchange when he left me the first time. This time, he continued. “How am I supposed to respond, when the asymmetry is still there? No matter how I love you, this? I don't know if I can feel this. I don't feel for you what you feel for me. I move slowly, and like you said, that erodes people. I'll only hurt you."

My heart pounded, timpani in my chest. I had to lie to him for this to work. And I didn't know how he would respond to that. “Sorin… I don't know if any of what I've said is true when applied to the person you are now." I sat down across from him, non-aggressive. I gestured haplessly into the air. “These are… things as much for me as for you. The love songs and romantic musings of a boy who lived over a year ago. I'm not who I was, and you're not who you were. I don't… love… you. I love who you were two years ago, thereabouts."

“And that's it? Just by saying that, I'm supposed to forget what you did to me? How you lied to me, for so long? So many times? I don't want to hurt like that again. What you did to me…"

I met his eyes, and interrupted him very carefully. “What that person did to you, the person sitting before you now abhors. That man drug you through coals, and when you took him through the same, you had every right to do so." I tried to let silence give that weight for a few moments before following it with, “You know I've changed, Sorin. You saw me changing even while I was with you."

“But this is a marriage proposal! That's what you're doing! Don't you see that? You're asking me to marry you!"

“NO. No I am not. I am asking you to go on a date. And ideally after that, another date. I might be completely at odds with the person you are now. You might have dug hard into those pugnacious ideals I hated so much. I might be even more listless and wishy-washy than I was before and that might disgust you. And if that's the case, we don't see one another again. I… lose you forever. Again. And you're free of me forever. Again."

He was quiet for a very long time, pondering glassy-eyed into a distance that I was hoping was closing. “One last why?" he whispered.

“Because I want to burn for you, Sorin. I want to stand side by side with you and never back down against a universe full of beauty and horror."

“Yeah," he breathed, looking down. His eyes glanced at the sword.

I waited.