she asked "do you feel safe?" her voice gentle, curling around my ear before the words softly entered into my mind, leaving kisses along the path they travel to my brain
kisses that bloom into flowers, taking root deep into gray mater, the flowers grow behind my eyes, leaves and petals pushing at my eyelids, bursting to get out before falling as liquid drops of silver that bleed out around my eyes and into the real world, the real world where actions have consequences and people can feel safe. I meet her eyes with my own, liquid silver and flowers and thorns and tell her "no"