what { love } is // alicia
Mar 24, 2021 18:45:26 GMT -5
Post by Stare on Mar 24, 2021 18:45:26 GMT -5
Alicia Klare loved Benedict Nolan.
That was a simple fact. It hadn't always been that way, of course. In the beginning Alicia had convinced herself that she hated him. Hated his smirk, hated his money, hated the way he made her knees weak. In the beginning Benedict Nolan had found a flaw in the armor she'd so carefully constructed around herself and she had been determined never to forgive him for it. It hadn't lasted, of course. They'd been drawn to each other again and again until finally - finally - Alicia had accepted the weakness that Benedict exposed in her. Because that was the price of love, the risk one had to take.
She'd gambled, and she'd lost.
It was foolish of her to believe that happiness could exist in a place like Panem, and even more foolish to believe that if it could, she would be the one to have it. Stupid. She'd been so damn stupid. A part of her, hysterical and frantic and broken, wondered if the reaping was rigged to find the happiest people in each district and rip them apart. Alicia wouldn't put it past the Capitol. As the Games drew on, and she watched each day with an increasing sense of dread, she realized that she wouldn't put anything past the Capitol.
"I love you," she'd whispered one night when the camera had focused in on his face, pressing her fingers against the staticky screen of the old television in her family's living room. The image lit the planes of her face in the darkness, catching on the streams of tears on her cheeks. Alicia had felt as if she were choking on the words. "I - I love you. I love you."
She'd repeated the words as if they could bring him home, as if they could protect him from the gruesome ends that other tributes were suffering. She'd said them until her voice was hoarse and raw and she was slumped against the screen, no longer watching. Just sobbing.
Miss Klare, is it?
I want you... just you.
I think we both know each other better than that.
Alicia, I love you.
Alicia had been so stupid to think that love could ever end in happiness. Love was weakness. Love was pain. Love was a late night spent clinging to a sweater, burying herself in the smell of him, alternating between crying and desperately gasping out all the things she hadn't had time to tell him, only to watch the boy from Two and the girl from Seven round on him the next day. Love was watching him break, watching him bleed.
Alicia Klare loved Benedict Nolan.
On the tiny screen in her living room, miles and miles away from her, Benedict Nolan died.
Alicia screamed, and screamed, and screamed, until she couldn't love anymore.
That was a simple fact. It hadn't always been that way, of course. In the beginning Alicia had convinced herself that she hated him. Hated his smirk, hated his money, hated the way he made her knees weak. In the beginning Benedict Nolan had found a flaw in the armor she'd so carefully constructed around herself and she had been determined never to forgive him for it. It hadn't lasted, of course. They'd been drawn to each other again and again until finally - finally - Alicia had accepted the weakness that Benedict exposed in her. Because that was the price of love, the risk one had to take.
She'd gambled, and she'd lost.
It was foolish of her to believe that happiness could exist in a place like Panem, and even more foolish to believe that if it could, she would be the one to have it. Stupid. She'd been so damn stupid. A part of her, hysterical and frantic and broken, wondered if the reaping was rigged to find the happiest people in each district and rip them apart. Alicia wouldn't put it past the Capitol. As the Games drew on, and she watched each day with an increasing sense of dread, she realized that she wouldn't put anything past the Capitol.
"I love you," she'd whispered one night when the camera had focused in on his face, pressing her fingers against the staticky screen of the old television in her family's living room. The image lit the planes of her face in the darkness, catching on the streams of tears on her cheeks. Alicia had felt as if she were choking on the words. "I - I love you. I love you."
She'd repeated the words as if they could bring him home, as if they could protect him from the gruesome ends that other tributes were suffering. She'd said them until her voice was hoarse and raw and she was slumped against the screen, no longer watching. Just sobbing.
Miss Klare, is it?
I want you... just you.
I think we both know each other better than that.
Alicia, I love you.
Alicia had been so stupid to think that love could ever end in happiness. Love was weakness. Love was pain. Love was a late night spent clinging to a sweater, burying herself in the smell of him, alternating between crying and desperately gasping out all the things she hadn't had time to tell him, only to watch the boy from Two and the girl from Seven round on him the next day. Love was watching him break, watching him bleed.
Alicia Klare loved Benedict Nolan.
On the tiny screen in her living room, miles and miles away from her, Benedict Nolan died.
Alicia screamed, and screamed, and screamed, until she couldn't love anymore.
