let's say we trade heartbeats //Potato&Opal

[gamemaker kelsier]

P O T A T O E A R N E S T

He wasn't certain of how he had found his way up to the roof. When he'd first arrived, the idea of even being as high as the Eleventh floor was absolutely terrifying. It wasn't natural that the ground should be so very far away from him, when he'd been raised to see earth as more of a business partner than just something to be trod upon, something to raise buildings on. Where he was from, Earth was far more sacred. However, the people here were strange, disjointed things that would often say one thing and then mean another and liked to cover the natural face that Ripred had given them with makeup.

Yes, Ripred. He'd found as the week progressed that no matter how hard he tried to banish his god from his heart and mind, she'd wormed her way back in to brush the hair back from his forehead and whisper blessings in his ear. He'd taken to praying again, taken to blessing the food given him like it was a gift and not the veiled message that it was.

He was trying to enjoy his last few days on the good earth but failing rather well at it. Grimly, he shifted his weight back so that he was no longer sitting so close to the edge and the glimmering lights all around became blocked off by the certainty of the roof he perched upon.

He was waiting for Opal Shore to appear, the woman of his dreams and the one reason that he was still alive today. Some might call it an exaggeration, but for him it was one hundred percent true. She had given him a reason to keep going.

As he waited, he pulled a chain from around his neck. It didn't have much on it, just the wedding rings of his parents, the ones that had been handed down from Earnest to Earnest. He was the last Earnest alive it seemed, he had to pass them onto someone. It might as well be her. He knew that she would appear up here eventually. They hadn't been far apart the past couple days, they seemed to have a sixth sense for one another.

He put the chain away and waited.

[cass]

O P A L
{ i'll keep you safe and
w a r m }

It was on the roof where I was supposed to be meeting him. This week had gone by too fast, the time I had spent with him had not been nearly enough to fill the void that would soon open, like a gaping wound that no doctor would be able to stitch back together. But I was trying my damned hardest to not let those feelings invade my thoughts at the moment. So instead I sat on a cloud of pure bliss and joy, the three words he had spoken to me echoing in my mind like a lullaby. At the moment they were the only things keeping me from breaking, it was the feelings And emotions that came from such a declaration that prevented the despair to fall into place.

The elevator rocketed upward, I had never actually been on the roof of the building before. In all honesty I had not even realized there was an access point to the roof, maybe I would have looked outwards, upon the top of the world, gazing at all beneath me, had I known that it was up there. The freedom that comes with such perilous heights was beautiful, and now, thanks to Potato, I would get to view the world with him.

The days leading to his release into the arena were inching closer and closer, every second I could spare away from my own tributes was spent by his side. When he wasn't talking to other tributes I was there, I was helping him, teaching him and talking to him, anything to be near him, anything to help him survive.

The elevator dings as it comes to a stop and the doors glide open with no sound at all. Tugging the jacket tighter around my body I look around, eyes searching for him immediately. The wind bites at my exposed skin, and my hair flies wildly around my face. Standing not so far away is the dark silhouette of Potato Earnest. A smile tugs itself onto my lips and I move forwards, towards him, he's at the edge of the building facing away from me.

I use his momentary lack of visibility to my advantage, sneaking up to him I move behind him, then I snake my arms around his torso, wrapping them tightly around him in a hug. Pressing my check against his back, I just want to bury myself into each little moment I have with him, just like this one; peace, quiet and time with just the two of us.

[gamemaker kelsier]

P O T A T O E A R N E S T

The idea of happiness being anywhere but the distant past was a hard one to grasp. Where his childhood had been sixteen years of bliss, he'd found that the more he aged, the more the world had begun to caught up with him. In a world like this one, happiness was not something that everyone was entitled to. It belonged to the ignorant or the wealthy. For the longest time, Potato had belonged to the first category. Now that he knew more about life in general it was like all the happiness had been slowly siphoned out of him. They'd taken his fields, his garden, his Ma, Pa, Sis'.

Now there was Opal.

Potato couldn't pretend to understand the grand ideas that his sister would excitedly whisper about as they stargazed on summer nights when he was only twelve years old and hadn't blossomed yet. He was her favourite bowl to pour information into mainly because no one bothered to listen to her otherwise. She'd go on and on about fate, about the stars aligning to meet one fateful day every hundred years or so, about great lovers who lived hundreds of years back.

Potato didn't know what the heck his sister was talking about most of the time but he knew now that everything must have been about her because this was the love people wrote plays and poetry about, the love that was doomed from the start. It was beautiful to behold and people hoped for the happiness, the kiss at the end, the happily-ever-after but it wasn't going to come, not this time. He knew it just as certain as he knew the sun rose each day and that if you cared for the plants that grew in your field they would grow.

He chose to love her anyway.

AS she wrapped his arms around him, he leaned into her, laying his neck on her shoulder so that he could turn and kiss her cheek easily. "Beauty, ain't it?" he asked, gesturing at the wide world around him. It wasn't his type of beauty, certainly, he preferred endless trees, endless greenery. However if h had only a few days left, a view like this was more than acceptable.

Warmth grew and traveled along his veins as he turned to hold her in his arms, something that he appreciated more because he knew that every single moment he was holding her was leading up to the moment when he would have to stop. How do you tell someone that when your sister spouted poetry and song lyrics to sing at you for your whole life, suddenly you knew just who the songs were always about. 'I love you' wasn't enough becuse it didn't cover it.

'I breathe for you' and ''you are the light of my life, my reason to smile' were far more meaningful, but Potato could never even pretend to be eloquent so he ahd to settle for, "I love, love, love you, Miss Opal Shore," and he buried his face in her jacket.

[cass]

O P A L
{ i'll keep you safe and
w a r m }

There was nothing no one could say to me to make me love him any less, there was nothing he could do to make me stop loving him. Not a single thing. There was no one else in this world I could love as much as I loved him (I didn’t have parents, I didn’t have a family, and all I had was a few siblings who did not sure a single bond with). In all the stories I had read, in all the songs I had listened to and the poetry I had heard there was no one as perfect as he was, he was my prince, the knight in shining armour. And maybe that’s just some, lost girls dream, but it was the one thing I had always wanted.

I felt so incredibly safe in his arms, I felt like even in this chaotic world, no one could hurt me. And I’d like to think that even when I am not near him he will still be protecting me. That the feelings I get in my body, my heart and my veins will remind me of the feelings, the safety and the security he gives me. Because when he is gone I want to know I’m not going to be scared again.

There was no one as kind, sweet and genuine as him. As he tells me how beautiful the world is around me I pull myself away from his embrace for a moment to gaze upon the world around me. That was the kind of beauty I could look at once and say ‘yeah, it is nice.’ But the type of beauty that left me in awe, which left me breathless and wondering what I was going to see next. No, that kind of beauty was the one of the natural type, with plants, leaves and an endless row of trees.

It was in Potato’s garden, watching the strawberry plants, it was in the dirt, it was watching the bees fly, collect pollen and create more. That was real beauty and I knew we both agreed that nature was more breathtaking then these buildings.

"I love, love, love you, Miss Opal Shore," and with that comment he buries his face in my jacket. I don’t think I could ever grow tired of hearing those words. If truth be told he is the first person to ever say them to me, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I love him too, I love him so much. I’ve never said that to anyone before and I am so glad he is the first one I have ever said it to.

”I love you too, I love you so much.” I breathe.

[gamemaker kelsier]

P O T A T O E A R N E S T

He didn't have to hear her say it back because he knew that it was there, always hidden behind her teeth, ready to come out of hiding just for him. The words that he had been raised on were sharp on the tongue when put into this circumstance. They tasted different to the soft, melt-on-your-mouth words that his mother used to whisper to him every night before blowing out the candle. They didn't mean less, nor more, just different. Entirely different, in the sharpest, most terrifying way possible.

He would bleed for her if he had to, he would stand in front of any sword and take any beating for the love that he clung to. That was terrifying, it was like looking into a pit so vast and black that he couldn't see the other end. It was like faith, believing that there was a light at the end even as he was free falling. He had to believe that Ripred was there, just as he had to believe that the Love he felt was there. This love was more than faith, it was knowledge it was smart, it was enlightenment.

When he was holding her like this he could forget that the edge of the roof was only a metre or two away. He could forget that in three days or so he'd be heading into his death. He could forget it all because the only thoughts she ever elicited in him were those of love, of the garden he left behind and a summer's morning, sharp and swift. He wanted to hold onto that for the rest of his life, however long that may be. He wanted to find the eons he had left inside the safety of her hands.

He pressed his forehead to her's, refusing to shut his eyes in the proximity of her gaze, He didn't feel inadequate when they were together, he didn't feel like there was any reason to be sad anymore. The truth was, she made everything better and had been doing so for a long time. He had held on to the dream of her memory for so long now, although their brief meetings had never been long, he swore he knew her better than he knew himself.

It was improper.

If her father had been here, if he'd had the time, he would have gone to see him and asked him, palms sweaty and knees weak. He would have looked that man straight in the eyes, voice as firm as it could be and asked him. It didn't matter though, he never would have been able to without the games. They never would have met. So asking on a roof in the darkness of the moon was as close to proper as he would ever get. It was as close to proper as he could be. Ripred would understand.

"Marry me," he said simply, voice firm. "All's I gots ter offer is an empty field an' a one room house. All's I kin give is ther few days I got left but they were yer's anyhow. I was always yer's anyhow. Marry me, 'cause I love yer an' I wanna spend ther resta my life with yer."

[cass]

O P A L
{ i'll keep you safe and
w a r m }

Ever since I was little I’ve never dreamed of ever getting married. The idea of spending my life tied to someone had never crossed my mind; sure it had become a passing thought every now and then. Quick questions of whether or not I’d ever kiss someone hold them and tell them I loved them. But ever since I had been a young child I had always assumed I’d be alone, after all it was what the other kids always said, they always told me how ugly, disgusting and horrid I was.

And it wasn’t until I had returned from the arena that I started thinking that maybe I would find someone. That maybe at the end of all this pain, misery and horror there was a light, that there was something there, happiness joy and everything that filled little girls dreams. I had never dreamed of such trivial things, I had never been that little girl into unicorn’s, princess and magic, it had always been the garden and me. But now I wanted to be a princess, I wanted to be wrapped in his arms, held so tightly there was nothing that could make me feel scared.

I knew this was real. I knew that if I pinched myself I’d still be standing here with him. I don’t know whether or not it is a blessing or a curse in the end. The first time I had ever felt this happy and at the end of this tunnel there could possibly be devastation. It was going to end sometime, and for me it could be within the next few days. I don’t think I was ready for that.

It was so hard not to think about it too much. And it was so incredibly difficult not to think about what was going to happen. Not with it weighing down on me, not with it surrounding me, not with it everywhere I look. I couldn’t look away from it, there were signs all over the place, everywhere I looked, every sign, building, and inch of this place was a memory of it all and was another reason for me not to forget about what was going to happen to him, to us.

His forehead is pressed to my own, and he stares into my eyes and I look into his. I didn’t want to look away. I had n reason to. Then as though it is the easiest thing to say, he says "Marry me." He says it like it is so simple, like it isn’t a question. And it shouldn’t be, because how could it be? And my heart skips a beat and my breathing quickens. At first I want to ask him to say it again, but before I can respond he continues. "All's I gots ter offer is an empty field an' a one room house. All's I kin give is there few days I got left but they were yer's anyhow. I was always yer's anyhow. Marry me, 'cause I love yer an' I wanna spend ther resta my life with yer."

”I don’t need anything, but you. You’ve given me everything I could ever dream of and more in these few days. Of course I’ll marry you.” I say, my hands holding his head. I bite my lip, eyes shining, brimming with tears and I think, I think that this is perhaps the first time they have ever fallen because of happiness.