[for kat]

[formicine]

Blue has never been much for birthday parties. This year, thinking about who she'd even invite if she had one just seems like a recipe for throwing a notebook at the wall or crying in the kitchen, but it also seems like a year to celebrate making it through -- for Kat, too, honestly. With a few weeks left before school starts, weather muggy but getting cooler and breezy, it seems like a good time to just relax.

She'd texted Kat as the birthday girl, i have decreed that we're treating ourselves with a picture of a couple bottles of rose she'd then brought home, and every intent to order absolute trash food and the most ridiculous that Filmfix has to offer and get cuddles.

Comments

[formicine]

Blue watches Kat's reaction -- she doesn't look upset, and it makes sense that she'd be thoughtful, and lets herself try to settle in her head while Kat mulls it. She smiles, though, a little relieved, when Kat assures her she's not out of line.

"I'm sure it does," she says, nodding. "And I think it's good that it's not who you are, in a way? That no one thing is, for either of us, I mean. But I can tell you miss it, the way you talk sometimes, and I just --"

She returns the sideways smile. "I want you to be happy, whether that means dancing or not, you know?"

[swerved]

If she's honest with herself, Kat isn't actually sure what that would look like for her. Not in a super depressing way — she's moved out of that phase, at least — but just in a straightforward way. She had one thing she loved for all her life, one path she pursued. Even if she had the work done that would be needed to make it possible to dance again, she doesn't know if she could ever get back to where she was. Doing it purely as a hobby might help, but she's had such a hard time finding something she wants to do in the absence of dance, not sure what might satisfy her the same way.

Then, of course, she can't help but wonder if she's selfish for wanting that at all when so many people don't get that; they just get jobs to get by. Maybe she doesn't need a calling. It's hard, though, to go from having one to not.

"Yeah, I get you," she says, smile still in place. "I think I'll always miss it, too. No matter what happens, you know? There'll always be that... might have been."