In the midst of war and chaos, Eve struggles to find and keep her true love - but also herself.
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Eve and Regulus desperately wish to find their way out of their siblings' shadows - but they might just find that the darkness is the best place to be...
"Sometimes Eve gets heavy. Her legs feel like someone has placed weights on them and her arms are glued to her sides, face buried in her pillow and body covered in a pile of blankets, as if lousy cotton covers will protect her from the cruelness of the outside world."
(trigger warning for allusions of mental health and depressive episodes.)
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EVE WAKES UP ON YULE day to snow.
The world outside is painted white, completely and utterly pure at seven in the morning, and for a long moment Eve stands at her window, blanket around her shoulders, and watches the stillness.
It's quiet. Snow absorbs sound, Eve had read once, and she thought then that it was fake but now she's positive they were all telling the truth, because Merlin, it's more silent than it has been in a very long time. She doesn't even think she can hear herself breathing.
There's a pile of presents at the end of her bed. Three green ones rest on the top; they're emerald, with silver ribbon, and the paper shimmers from the light of the outside snow, and Eve knows without a doubt those ones are from Regulus.
She wants to open them. She wants to tear into the paper and lift the box tops off like they're made of glass; she wants to go running into Barry's room and jump on his bed until it ends in a pillow fight with fluff in the air and laughs filling up the empty space.
Instead, she climbs back into bed. Tucks herself into the covers like a butterfly in a cocoon and hopes that when she climbs out she will have transformed into something beautiful.
An unmeasurable amount of time passes; the outdoors are painted in too much white for Eve to truly see how much the light has changed, but even if she knew, she wouldn't have gotten out either way.
There's static in her ears, muffled like she's seven years old again and holding her breath underwater, forcing herself to stay deep until her eyesight begins to blur and James pulls her back up, up, away from the darkness and into the Light with him.
James.
Eve didn't realize how much James had helped her, before. She had been blinded by jealousy; she was selfish, so selfish. But then, so was he.
Sometimes Eve gets heavy. Her legs feel like someone has placed weights on them and her arms are glued to her sides, face buried in her pillow and body covered in a pile of blankets, as if lousy cotton covers will protect her from the cruelness of the outside world.
Eve was good at pulling herself back up. But James was always there to help her when she couldn't do it alone.
The bed dipped by her waist, but Eve was too tired to startle in surprise. She just tipped her head up a bit, but when she saw the familiar soft blue eyes and wheat-blonde hair she relaxed again, tucking her head back into the pillow.
