rot

They say that light hangs timeless in an eternal now.

They say that each glimmer of starlight is a glimpse of grace; that heaven lurks among those twinkling pinpricks and only light will ever be truly saved, in that eternity lingering between emission and absorption.

They lie.

It's obvious if you have the nose to smell it. Few do, and fewer bother.

Florence kept on looking at her arm on the drive home, glancing down or running her fingers along the carefully sutured line where Arlene had opened her up. And that place at the base of her palm, where her tendons curled into her hand—

"You doing okay, Flor?"

Thorn, sprawled out in the driver's seat, their arm dangling out through an open window into the cool night air; body language as open as ever. A sharp contrast to the concern in their voice.