Stone Circle And I end the story that we didn’t even get to start

Are you okay? he asked.

Are you okay? echoed the ghost of her mind, sweeping her ever into the darkness. Laurel looked down, out of breath, and then slowly raised her head to look up at him, her face a mixture of held back emotions; anger, loneliness, grief, hatred, self-loathing.. but at the top of all of them, a film that lay across the complex different emotions that clearly agonised her, was fear, plain as day to see.

As if realising that she was displaying her feelings for everyone to see -- What would they think?! -- Laurel looked away, regained control over herself, managed to fight back the feelings and bring back the hard woman that he somehow thought he loved.

But she hadn't answered yet.

She'd answered in some way, but she hadn't really answered yet.

Laurel bit her lip, not sure what to say. The truth? What a laughable thought. She didn't even know what the real truth of it was, complex as it was. So what then? Lie? Smile? Pretend? But she couldn't, not anymore, she didn't have the strength left to fight, not without Indra.

Tell him what you want.

All she could think was, I can't do this anymore. All she thought was, I just want to die. All she could fathom,

.. I'm scared..

But when she opened her mouth, she said something else entirely: I want you. The words surprisingly soft because she knew that to keep up an act she needed to make it count, make it sound like something. She looked up at him, her eyes softer then. That's right. You want him. Laurel wasn't sure if this was some kind of test -- to see if he would fall for it so easily again, to see if that was all it was to him -- or if she really wanted him, if the dark voice in her head was right, or maybe this was all just a distraction so she didn't have to tell him

I'm afraid

She could just pretend everything was okay, instead.