brb. (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
accelerate) wrote2016-06-14 05:21 pm
accelerate) wrote2016-06-14 05:21 pm
Entry tags:
( ENTRANCEWAY INBOX )
( ACTION | AUDIO | MIRROR | TEXT | VIDEO )
CALLING: BARRY ALLEN 🐻 ▓
[ haunted.mp3 plays ]
CALLING: THE FLASH ⚡ ▓
You've reached the Flash!
ACTION. | 🐻
[ he hasn't woken up beside iris in a long time — sometimes he suspects that'd been some sort of vivid dream in itself. there are moments where barry's not so sure what's real and what isn't. wonderland's made him wonder what's true and what's false — is this a part of the speed force? or something else entirely? — but iris' touch has always been grounding, and he finds even a mere brush of her fingers before they become solid and strong against his arm is enough to make him realise that this isn't him falling down a rabbit hole as he sleeps. ]
Sorry.
[ he glances at her, then his arm. avoiding looking at her, he doesn't particularly want to talk about this — he suspects patty may have told iris about the nightmares she'd confronted him about. it's not something he's wanted either west to know for the sake of making sure neither spend too much of their time worrying over him. ]
[ he forces himself to stretch, back arching, a foot bumping into her leg. ]
I didn't mean to. Guess your bed's just comfortable.
ACTION. | 🐻
[ her voice is barely a whisper, like anything louder than that will shatter the moment and he'll pull away again. her palm settles on the low of his back, and slips upward in soothing and circular patterns. iris isn't thinking of her conversation with patty, specifically, but much of what iris said during that conversation still holds true: barry can be guarded with his feelings. he believes he is protecting others from his pain by shouldering it entirely on his own.
sometimes joe will look to iris as though she is the answer, but she isn't, really.
the answer is lost somewhere in the pages of a book called the runaway dinosaur. ]
And you don't have to tell me, even if I wish you would. [ even if she thinks he really needs to talk to someone, and not just about his nightmares. it may not be her he can talk to, when all is said and done; she'll learn to make her peace with that if it's the case. ] But I'm here.
[ he knows that, doesn't he? ]
ACTION. | 🐻
[ after a long moment of being still, barry comes back to himself, and rolls over onto his back. lifting an arm to press the back of his hand against his forehead, he looks up at the ceiling and refuses to glance at her from the corner of his eye. ]
[ he remains like that, as though his hand on his temple will somehow shield him from her. the shadows used to scare him because of what they hid. now, he finds that he would rather disappear into them. and that's where he had tried to fold himself into, back when the singularity had formed, when ronnie had died and the city had almost gone with him. he'd effectively pushed her away for a good six months, but there'd come a moment where he felt her digging her fingers into his skin. he knows, in this moment, he worries of her unlatching them. there'll come a time where those he pushes away take it as their turn to leave, and barry, despite the hardships he's faced in being vulnerable, doesn't want that. ]
[ there's only so much patience he can expect from iris west, and he suspects he's almost used it all up. ]
[ voice quiet, ] I was just thinking about Zoom. I'm supposed to be the fastest man alive, but I can't — [ he presses his lips together and inhales deeply through his nose. his fingers shift against his forehead, but barry remains purposefully still. thinking is easier to say than dreaming; zoom haunts him wherever he goes, from the corridors to his head, but it seems much softer, like he's in control, if he so much as chooses to think on that speed demon. ] I couldn't run like I can run now. And I still failed at saving them. [ he shrugs his shoulders in an attempt to dislodge it all from himself. ]
ACTION. | 🐻
the shrug of a shoulder, the waving of a wand. sprinkle some magic dust and poof, all their problems solved. is it any wonder children cling so viciously to fairytales? a place where the hero does win the day and the villain pays his justly dues. a place where happily ever afters are possible, and nobody ever gives up on anybody. iris said she would wait for him, and she meant every single word. she wants him to have what he needs at any given moment. but it may also be there is nothing left to wait for someday. there's only so many miles you can run before you lose sight of the road ahead. this isn't, after all, a fairytale.
zoom was defeated eventually, but he left too much shrapnel in his wake. iris will choose to rebuild, each and every time. ]
We all made those choices together. As a team.
[ he needs to stop hogging all the blame. he needs to stop turning himself inside out, but things are never that simple. iris said something similar when wells placed the blame squarely on barry's shoulders. always the first to jump in defense, iris. the first to remind none of them are blameless. ]
Barry, I know ... there will be days ahead where things feel really dark. I know there are places you go that I can't always follow. But when you come back from them, I will be here to remind you you're not alone. That you can do this, when everything inside you tells you that you can't.
ACTION. | 🐻
[ thawne had come after him, chasing after a lightning bolt to strike him, running through time to destroy his hero's life — she speaks of a team and the choices they made together, but he knows that they had been forced to make those decisions because of him. a him who may or may not be dead, a version of him that he may be destined to become in ten years time. ]
[ he doesn't say it, though. barry may like to run from how he feels and be out of touch with how to process those emotions, but he knows if he says it to her, it's placing another grand world onto her shoulders for her to bear the weight of half of what burdens him. ]
[ remaining still, he looks up at the ceiling. her words stick to him, even though he may act as though he's stone and they're bouncing off him. it's on the tip of his tongue to confess to her what he had been intending to do — fill that void in his life by travelling back in time to save mom, and subsequently dad, because thawne had also filled him with the hope that if he had grown with two parents instead of none, he still would end up here, he'd still be with iris — but he bites it down with any response that may follow. ]
[ barry turns his head to look at her, fingers person against the side of his face. he thinks he nods his head, but, in truth, he doesn't quite know. doesn't know how long he looks at her, if it's for a short time at all, before he moves — toward her, instead of away from her. rolling onto his side, he lets his arm slide along her waist as he shifts toward her. pressed up against her side, he rests his head in the crook of her neck. ]
[ it's bold of him, but barry finds it feels right — he may not be feeling invincible, but he knows how he feels around iris. and, for now, he's so tired of running from her. ]
ACTION. | 🐻
iris could never close her arms, or her heart, to barry.
her whole body practically sighs into his the moment he moves toward her instead of away, iris wrapping her own arms around him to bring him further in. there is so much that she can't shield him from. there are so many ways in which she cannot rescue him, for all the other ways in which she has. she cannot protect him from his grief or his anger, but she can protect him from his loneliness, so long as he allows her. that's all he has to do: just leave the porch light on, and she can do the rest.
wordlessly, she sifts her fingers through his hair at the nape in slow, rhythmic patterns. her eyes close to push away the warm sting beneath them, feeling the brush of his nose across her neck. her heartbeat is steady and constant against his own chest, something clicking into place as their limbs tangle.
she doesn't know what. something, somewhere, for sometime.
iris says nothing for the rest of the night, fingers continuing their soothing strokes into his hair, the quiet enveloping them soon after.
for tonight, it's enough. ]