Chapter 6 Nebulous #2
A photo of them, right after her memories had been wiped.
Her grey eyes were dull as she stood beside him.
In the photo, he didn’t smile. It had been New Year’s Day, and his parents had just wiped the memories of their son and his Soulbond—at least, they thought they had.
His memories had never been wiped in the experimental program they used on Rin.
A blessing. Or had it been?
Because now, Kit had to pretend.
His mother’s brown hair was perfectly styled, with fake blonde highlights.
Her lips were painted red. His father… Kit shuddered.
The man was large, with brown hair shaved close to his skull.
His brown eyes were dead, and faint freckles were scattered over his nose, just like Kit’s.
It made him want to scrub them off his face.
Kit sat on the edge of Rin’s bed, tugging the comforter up to her chin and stroking her white hair away from her face. She slept so peacefully all the time; he envied it.
She stirred, and he watched as she woke up and realized that he was watching her.
"Kit?" she murmured, eyes closed.
"I’m here, Rin." His fingers lingered on the curve of her cheekbone. "Right here. You fell asleep on the couch, so I carried you to bed to keep your neck from getting sore."
Rin hummed, finally blinking up at him. "What time is it?"
He glanced at his watch. "A little past midnight. Go back to sleep, Rin. You—you need it."
Absently, she rubbed a hand over her chest, brows furrowing.
"Do you need some more pain reliever?" Before she could respond, Kit was already reaching for the small pill bottle at her bedside, next to a room-temperature glass of water. She started to reach for the glass, but he tutted under his breath. "Let me take care of you, sprite. I need to do this."
She let him place the lip of the glass against her mouth and tilt it back, then he placed the small white pill on her tongue, and her lips wrapped around it, warm against his fingertips. His stomach twisted.
Fuck.
His body had never known pleasure in this life.
He had never known her body in this life.
But he had in their past lives. In the first, just once, before she had fallen ill in their tiny village and died.
In the second, he had her, over and over again.
In the Stars, against the domed window, on their shared bed, on the kitchen table, on the run from his father in alleyways—they had both been insatiable.
He wondered if she’d still make the same pleased noises when she shattered on his tongue.
Her throat bobbed as she swallowed the pill. "Thank you. My chest still hurts a bit. From the electric shocks, I guess." She shrugged it off as if getting your heart shocked back to life was normal.
"How are you so calm about this?" Kit couldn’t help but ask, voice barely audible.
Her head shifted on the pillow. "What do you mean?"
"Death," said Kit. "How are you so calm about it. How is this so easy for you?" He had always wondered—why she never seemed fazed by the Nova in her heart, the invisible clock ticking.
The very thought made his throat dry. She would be taken from him too soon again in this life, and he couldn’t do anything about it. It hurt, it burned, it made the familiar feeling of consuming dread well up like ocean waves inside him.
The moonlight filtered in through her sheer, white curtains, making her whole room feel like a hazy dream. He could say anything, do anything, and it wouldn’t matter in the morning.
The side of her large shirt slipped off her shoulder, dangerously low, where Kit could almost see the soft pink of her nipples, where they brushed against the material.
His fingernails cut into his palms as he stared; he hated himself for noticing.
He wanted her so badly—but not just her body.
He wanted to love her, to know her, in this life.
"I’m not scared of it. I mean, maybe a little bit?
" Her voice was quiet and tinged with sleep as the pain reliever started to take effect. "But it’s just something I’ve had to come to terms with.
We all will—it’s just a little sooner for me.
" She grew quiet, and Kit just stared at her, drowsy and beautiful, no matter what she did.
Her grey eyes met his, and her hand inched closer on top of her thick blanket, the tips of her fingers brushing his. His pinky twitched, desperate to touch, but fear always held him back from crossing that line.
"I imagine dying is like getting a new shirt."
The air conditioner kicked on, a soft hum as it rustled a small piece of her hair and forced it into her eyes.
"A shirt?" Kit reached forward to tuck her hair back behind her ear, fingers dancing along the side of her pale face.
Nodding, she shakily exhaled. "A shirt, yeah… Imagine you have a shirt you love so much, and you’ve been wearing it for years.
There’s little holes at the bottom, and the fabric is worn around the hem because of how many times you’ve worn it.
Finally, you realize you have to buy a new shirt, because you can’t keep wearing the same one, even if you want to.
So, you do. You throw away your old shirt and buy a new one, and somehow you end up loving that one even more.
It fits better. The color’s brighter—not worn away by time. "
Rin paused, leaning into his hand. "The old shirt didn’t die… It was just traded in for something even better. When I think about death, that’s what I envision. Like putting on a new shirt. And it makes it all easier."
Kit was struck speechless by her and her mind. "You’re extraordinary," he breathed. "I love your—your mind, your thoughts."
"I’m not," said Rin. "I’m weird and quiet and sometimes a little too cold." She laughed, just once, the sound colored with bitterness.
He couldn’t stand it. "You’re perfect, just the way you are." Her eyes were red, glistening slightly with unshed tears in the dim light. He wanted her laughs to be genuine. Tapping against the tip of her nose, he whispered, "I happen to love your shirt."
She bit her lip. "I’m only a Soul within a body, and this body isn’t my own. I’ll get a new one, one day." One of her small hands came to rest on his upper thigh, hesitant. "So will you."
His throat grew tight with emotion the longer he stared at her. God, he loved her. And he couldn’t seem to keep the weight of it out of his eyes.
The pools of grey in her eyes darkened. "Kit," she breathed. Her fingers flexed against his thigh. His palm trembled as he cupped her cheek, every nerve ending lit with hunger and guilt. He tilted her face up like it was the last time he ever would—because maybe it was. "We shouldn’t. You’re my—my brother. "
But she made no move to push him away.
Kit couldn’t take it anymore. The ache of remembrance.
In the darkness of her bedroom, for the first time since they were kids forced by a trivial dare, Kit pressed his lips to hers, a ghost-like brush, not even a full kiss.
She sighed against his mouth as he leaned over her. He pulled away, too soon. He felt like he could have a thousand years, a thousand lives, with her, and it still wouldn’t be enough.
Kit pressed his forehead against hers, just existing with her, clinging to this small, fleeting moment in a sea of time.
"I love you, Rin," he said softly.
Her eyes searched his. "As a friend? As a sister?" she murmured.
He didn’t answer, and she didn’t press him.
Eventually, she fell asleep, the pain reliever coursing through her veins, and Kit hoped that when she woke up, she would think it had all been a dream.
But he had never been that lucky.
Rin couldn’t look at Kit the same way, knowing what his lips tasted like now. Even if it had been just that—a taste.
The kiss they had both stolen when they were younger had been swift and slightly messy, definitely awkward, as their peers teased them. Nothing like the kiss he had given her two days ago, while she had been under him, on her bed…
Her lips tingled with the memory of it.
And her gut clenched with the utter wrongness of it. He was her adoptive brother; he could never be anything more—even if, in the darkest, most quiet hours of the night, she found herself staring up at the ceiling, tracing the stitching in her fluttering canopy and wondering.
Wondering what more could be like with him, wondering if the butterflies she felt in her stomach whenever she was around him would ever abate. She doubted it. They only grew with every passing day, like her body was begging for him.
Rin’s hands paused on the mug, hovering by the cabinet as she stared at nothing.
She wanted Kit. The startling clarity of it nearly made her stagger backward, and her fingers tightened on the handle of the mug so it wouldn’t slip from her suddenly limp fingertips.
Her bruised chest ached with each movement, and she braced a hand on the kitchen counter by her hip, feeling the cool marble against her palm, grounding her.
Her tangled white hair fell over her shoulder—she hadn’t bothered with brushing it, knowing she wouldn’t be allowed to leave the house for the next few days as she recovered.
Kit was insistent on seeing her well, as was Lucien.
The window above the kitchen sink let in the flickering light of early evening. Shadows mingled, playing tricks on her mind.
Staring out at the window and the quaint, perfectly manicured yard, she saw thick trees, a small flower bed with trimmed hedges that kept the entirety of the yard encased in privacy, along with the high stone fence enclosing the property.
Kit’s parents spared no expense in their house; they certainly had the funds for it. She had never wanted for anything in five years of being here, except the one thing she knew she could never, ever be granted—her family back. And, maybe, a small part of herself whispered that she wanted Kit, too.
Among the deep shadows at the back edge of the house, she saw it.
A breathless gasp escaped her.