I open the door and you're there which is surprising and not. There's an
awkward moment and I step back to let you in but you reach forward,
your thumb along my jaw and it fits like it always did and my head tilts
into your warm fingers like it always did; our open palms and eager mouths
and matching eyes are mirrors, and here we are. You say, I realized I love you. Then I
realize something for myself, which is: this is not real. My real life
is not a story, because stories aren't real.
Nothing against stories but the thing that is missing for me is the part where they break from the existing narrative. The thing that is missing for me is when somebody says: I don't want to be a story. The thing I don't get is when he says he's prince charming, when she says she's actually a princess; when they shed the toadskin and the ragged dress and instead of stepping into something new they step into the promises that were made to them by people who were frankly untrustworthy. I'm not saying we have to go all fourth wall on everything; I'm wondering why people keep building the same walls.
I mean, listen: I'm biased. If I step into the story and stay, we know perfectly well what happens. I chop off my heels to try to be what he wants and when he finds out he doesn't say, oh the sacrifices you made for me. When he finds out he says, hey actually I think I love your your sister; let's turn the carriage around and get her. So I have maybe less than the usual desire to participate. I'm acknowledging that. If you think I didn't want him; if you think I didn't burn for the prince same as everyone it's because I lied about it, because I knew how it would go and where it would end.
So yes I am predisposed to hating the walls, hating the story, hating all of that; out of self-preservation if nothing else. I see that. I used all my power of myth and wore out my dancing shoes, sewed nettles with my bleeding hands, and then ran and escaped across the bridge of one hair instead. I never expected a white horse or your prodigal love. And I took myself out of the story long ago.
Nothing against stories but the thing that is missing for me is the part where they break from the existing narrative. The thing that is missing for me is when somebody says: I don't want to be a story. The thing I don't get is when he says he's prince charming, when she says she's actually a princess; when they shed the toadskin and the ragged dress and instead of stepping into something new they step into the promises that were made to them by people who were frankly untrustworthy. I'm not saying we have to go all fourth wall on everything; I'm wondering why people keep building the same walls.
I mean, listen: I'm biased. If I step into the story and stay, we know perfectly well what happens. I chop off my heels to try to be what he wants and when he finds out he doesn't say, oh the sacrifices you made for me. When he finds out he says, hey actually I think I love your your sister; let's turn the carriage around and get her. So I have maybe less than the usual desire to participate. I'm acknowledging that. If you think I didn't want him; if you think I didn't burn for the prince same as everyone it's because I lied about it, because I knew how it would go and where it would end.
So yes I am predisposed to hating the walls, hating the story, hating all of that; out of self-preservation if nothing else. I see that. I used all my power of myth and wore out my dancing shoes, sewed nettles with my bleeding hands, and then ran and escaped across the bridge of one hair instead. I never expected a white horse or your prodigal love. And I took myself out of the story long ago.
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