Ella could hear his heart under her ear- a steady beat, never any flitting or bumping or hiccuping as hers had been and still was since that day.
And then came his question.
“Is something wrong?” he asked, pushing her shoulders back so that he could look at her face.
“Of course not,” Ella replied, a little too hastily. Even as she said it, her eyes, the ones she could never see the true color of, betrayed her.
“Ella,” he warned, his mouth twisting in that funny way when he was trying to be stern.
She shook her head, turning her face. “No really, Peter, I’m fine.”
“I can see your ears getting red, Ella. What’s wrong?”
Ella hesitated, biting back the all-too-familiar retort she had been yelling in her head for many years, somehow always at him. I can’t.
“Nothing.” she whispered, her voice soft but not soft enough. Peter could hear the note of sorrow in her voice, as he had since he met her and his world changed.
Peter closed his eyes, enveloping his world in the darkness and safety that it brought.
As Ella did the same, blinking away a tear, she never stopped to think that they shared the same darkness once the eyes were closed.
But Peter would never have his darkness haunted by a pale white arm, laying, already cooling, on the pavement. He would never hear a scream ripped from his lungs as if it weren’t his, hear it echoing and alerting the passers-by to her torment, her misery because the color was gone, faster than it had came. He would never feel the tears-her tears, as they rolled down her cheeks and dripped off her chin and splattered on the arm- his arm, the rest of his body below the car and lying there alone and cold and she wouldn’t dip her head to look at him because somehow, not seeing his face made it easier to imagine that it hadn’t happened.
But it had.
“Peter,” Ella whispered, her eyes still closed and her arms still wrapped around his shoulders, struggling to hold on.
He grunted softly, his chest expanding and pushing Ella away, briefly.
“What color are my eyes?” she asked, the darkness still surrounding her.
Peter was silent for a moment, but she knew he was still there because of the rise and fall of his chest against hers.
He answered, just as softly.
“I don’t know.”
Her breath hitched as she raised her head, her eyes meeting his. There was no color, but she could still see the steely grey, as harsh and cold despite the lack of hue.
Peter studied her face, trying to read her emotion as if words were etched into her skin. “I've never known.”