Sapphic DD December 2024: Original Fic
Dec. 14th, 2024 04:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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problematicfemslashMedium: Fanfic
Summary:
i.
It takes them a while to accept that their mother isn't going to come back for them.
Roze struggles the most. She spends her days inside of the cabin, buried underneath her sheets, her small wings frozen in statuesque stasis against her back. The snow globe their mother trapped them in displays one scene in the realm of reality: a snowy winter in a vast eternal storm, an old wooden building pressed firmly into the center of the plot. It is far too small, with one bedroom and a queen-sized stone-hard mattress that takes up most of the space. They have to share it when they sleep.
There is no night here--it is eternally day. It's funny; they don't get cold, but they do get tired. They're still figuring out how the dimension works. Outside of the globe they have the ability to shift between dimensions, to create pocket dimensions of their own and traps of their own and mischief of their own, but they are powerless within the globe. The magic binding them to it is stronger than anything a faerie can comprehend. The lack of hope grows inside of Roze like a gaping bone-baring wound, turns Viridia into an even hungrier thing. For a while, Roze is fucking delusional.
She foams at the mouth like a bad dog bitten rabid. Viridia holds her still by the shoulders, her mint skin folding over Roze’s light pink dimensionflesh.
“You have to know she’s not coming back for you,” she breathes, her face so close to her sister’s. Viridia watches her own face reflected back at her in bright gradients of coral, tears flooding from white eyes. “You have to understand, Roze. You have to know she did this on purpose.”
Roze’s voice scratches, diamond-against-diamond. “She couldn’t,” she says—her voice is naturally at a shrill-high pitch, and the combination grates against Viridia’s mind in a way that only salts through the ache. “She would never do this to us. It has to be a mistake.”
Roze pulls her in, wets Viridia’s sheer top. As Viridia strokes her back: “Come on, let’s go to sleep,” she whispers. “It’s night somewhere out there.”
ii.
They hold each other at night, Roze’s back to Viridia’s chest and stomach, curled up in the shelter of her sister. It doesn’t happen often in their kind—some kind of genetic fuckery with twins—but Viridia’s hair has streaks of salmon, and Roze’s hair is littered with streaks of mint. It is as if they were merged together in the womb and separated by miracle. It is as if they were destined to be conjoined. It is as if specks of their soul are scattered throughout each other. So: of course they are going to hold one another at night. The world is big and huge and scary when they are apart—even when their world is confined solely to one plot with mid-sized acreage.
It doesn’t even have to do with the fact that they have nowhere else to sleep--they could sleep facing away from one another, fetal position cold, but that would only leave them empty. They have to be together. They have to be together. There is nowhere else left for them to go. They wouldn’t want to go anywhere else.
iii.
After their first month in the globe, Roze finally begins to understand that their mother isn’t coming back for them. Viridia brings it up without thinking—Roze, I’m pretty sure… I’ve been keeping track of time and I think today might mark a day since we were trapped here.
The cabin gifted them a few useful things: an empty journal, a pen, and two books.
Roze stops her. “How do you know?”
Viridia gives a sad, sad smile. She’s burying herself alive, inhaling the dirt. “Because every day, at a certain time, the books reset. Whatever I write in the journal is erased. The stories change up. Yesterday it was War and Peace, today it was Emily Dickinson poems. I’ve been counting it. Today marks 31 resets.”
Roze peers up at her sister, watches Viridia’s hands brush through her long, half-shaved hair. “But why would the witch…?”
“I don’t know,” she replies. “Maybe… it’s our mother’s magic. I feel close to it. Maybe that’s how I noticed.”
A small, protesting gasp from Roze’s lips. “You’re the one who said she didn’t care.”
“Yeah,” Viridia says, her gaze shifting to the side. “Maybe I was wrong.”
Roze takes Viridia’s hand. They cannot face each other.
“No,” Roze breathes. “No. You were right.”
iv.
The first time Viridia kisses her sister, Roze lurches forward, leans into her—leans into her counterpart, her everything and her only—but shows off her cowardice in the end. Parades it around the plot like she’s proud of conjuring disharmony between them.
Roze had accidentally tripped over Viridia on the porch swing----it was all Hallmark, all trite rom-com gibberish, really. Viridia just couldn’t help herself; she’s lonely, frustrated. She can’t seem to get herself there, when she has the bed alone.
Roze inevitably leapt away in fear, stumbling back into the cabin. Now: When Viridia tries to open the door, it’s locked.
Oh.
That wasn’t there before.
“Roze,” she calls, from outside. “Roze, please. How did you lock that? There aren’t any locks on the door.” After an extended period of silence: “Please let me in. I’m so sorry. I just. We can talk about this—”
“It was just there when I walked in,” calls a soft Roze voice from the inner cabin. “I don’t know. But I can’t let you in. I need to deal with this on my own.”
“And where the fuck do you expect me to sleep?”
No answer. Well.
Viridia tries to drape herself over the porch swing. It works for a while--Viridia is able to close her eyes, get half-comfortable with her position even if half of her body is hanging off of the end. In her mind she imagines: her sister forgiving her, her sister understanding the cruel reality of the situation in all of its depth. In her mind she imagines: Roze’s eyelids, lined with sparkles of glimmering silver, batting bruises into her to seduce her. In her mind she imagines: Roze, and nothing more. In her mind she imagines—
She imagines that it is getting cold out, and then she realizes that is actually getting cold out.
“Roze,” she yells, a desperate fury. “I’m freezing. Please.”
She hears faint, intermittent wails from underneath the door—Roze can hear her—-but Roze does not save her. They were supposed to be together always. Every night Roze sleeps in her arms, falls into her clouds of rest at the sound of her sister’s gentle breath, the rustle of snow outside.
It is the natural conclusion of their predicament. They don’t have anyone else to rely on. They are stuck.
It isn’t supposed to be cold. Viridia isn’t dressed for cold; her top is sheer, cropped, sleeveless. She wears a long patchwork skirt, various strips of black and gray sewn over each other. Pulling the waist of her skirt over her shoulders and curling up sole in the womb, she wonders if she can die here.
Something like hours later, the door to the cabin opens. Viridia is only half asleep, gradually crumbling into exhaustion. She jolts awake to the sound of her sister’s gasp— “Oh my goodness,” Roze chirps. “Viridia? Are you okay?”
“I’m—so cold.” She stands, her legs trembling, almost collapsing at the threshold. “I can’t — believe — I can’t believe you did that to me.”
“I’m so sorry,” Roze says. “Can you forgive me?”
Roze helps Viridia into the cabin, her arm snaking underneath Viridia’s to keep her stable. The energy of her skin is completely frozen--as if solid. The touch—is she imagining this? She must be—is almost inviting. She sits Viridia on an armchair, her hand rubbing over Viridia’s exposed, warmer flesh.
“Can you forgive me?” Viridia asks.
Roze sits at a nearby chair. “I was a little freaked out,” she says. “Like, it’s just… weird, you know?”
Viridia nods. “I know.”
“But I want to try.”
v.
Viridia’s multi-forked tongue traces constellations into her sister’s wings. “Relax,” she whispers, massaging away the tension in Roze’s shoulders with hands that now burn. “I’ll take care of you.”
She kisses the back of Roze’s neck, runs a finger down her sister’s spine. With one hand, she strokes Roze’s left wing, rolling her tongue over each ridge in the other. Roze begins to melt beneath her, turning into some mythological potion of desire. Like molten gold. Like liquified love.
Like blood.
