Chapter Text
Sometimes I wonder if you feel about me the way I feel about you, my dove.
Love? No. It is not love. Not yet. But it will be.
Perhaps you would look at me in that queer way of yours if you can hear these words, my dove, but it is true, and I am not ashamed. You ought to understand. To withstand the infection, I am required to maintain exceptional mental fortitude. A consequence of this clarity of mind is that I am not afforded the privilege of self-delusion, of self-ignorance. I know myself, my thoughts, my wants, my needs. And when one has all the data, the inevitability of one’s course becomes painfully clear. Causality, my dove. I will fall in love with you, as inevitable as the comings of the tides, as the rising of the sun, as the waltz of the stars, as the trajectory of my bullet. All that is needed is time and proximity, and I will become yours, more completely than I already am.
And what of you? I do not know, nor do you. Your path, with the benefit of the unknown, is not inevitable. I can make it so. If I say the right words, no more than the truth, I will have you, as surely as I will become yours. But I will not do so, dove, not before you.
Why? Because I have lived with lies and necessity my whole life, and I want at least this be true, to not come to pass merely because it is needed. I want the choice to be yours as much as it is mine, because my choice will have already been made. Perhaps you cannot find it in yourself to accept what I am. Perhaps you will have found another to give your heart to. Perhaps time would destroy any chance we could have had to even make the attempt.
Or perhaps, finally, even I may find something unsuspected, and there may still be something beautiful and true for those like us.
We do not repent. We do not regret. Be true to your cause and make no apologies. And when you have an answer, I’ll be waiting. Whatever your choice, I will be satisfied.
Still, I hope you will feel about me how I feel about you.
Sleep well, my dove.