Drip

Nemo likes wine.

He likes the way it glitters in the sun, and the warmth that follows deep into your belly, a heat that sustains and keeps him grounded. Wine, grapes, seeds. To him, all of them are life; a tale told in glimpses. And there is nothing Nemo loves more than life, quite honestly - even if he barely remembers his own.

And what is wine, if not memories?

To start off young, naive and ignorant of all the casual cruelty the world holds in store for you. A grape, plump and fresh, and ripe for the picking. To be something and to be someone. To know you are deserving of love, and all the kindness that it affords. He knows he was someone, once. 

To grow into your youth, to take pride in yourself and where you came from. To know. He had a family, he thinks. He watches the wine swirl, slowly, lazily. It has no where to be, nor is it missed by anyone.

Nemo knows that someone loved him once, loved him enough to burden him with the weight of living forever. The burden of an unwanted immortality, with no one to share it with. To be without anything; a wish once made in a fit of anger and passion, that a god took pity and delight in. He knows this happened, but -

Nemo likes wine. 

He does not remember most things, even after his crystallization as a Kyrlicht, and his eons upon eons in other realms. He knows he was a fighter, a lover, a confidant. He has been around longer than most, and he knows that he is on the very precipice of remembering, but do I want to? What has it ever helped me to know, when all I can do is simply forget? I am forever haunted by you - He tries to forget, tries to drown, but there is nothing to hold on to. He is at the very edge of a cliff, ready to fall into waters even deeper than those he's even seen before. Cold, unrelenting waters, dragging him into depths unknown. 

But, he considers, today I am whole.

He sips his wine, laughing in merriment with friends and loved ones. He can hide here, be safe for a moment in a shelter of those who know him, who recognize him even when he doesn't recognize himself. The reflection in the glass is foreign, and he can feel his skin tighten and warp just beneath the surface. Not today.