[RQ] make the ashes

Jude

I'll breathe you in like smoke in the backyard light
We used to laugh til we choked, into the wasted nights

Jude isn’t quite so blasé as Melita with throwing the baskets down - and wouldn’t they have to clean up the rocks a second time anyway? - but he decides it’s not going to be his problem (or decision). Sometimes being a background character even if only in his own head is a benefit.

He’s not expecting Flora’s boldness, and anger comes creeping in tendrils of furrows through his forehead and around his mouth - but not at her. How many people had Sohalia been airing their business to? Everyone but his dad, who would’ve known he hadn’t been home to receive letters? Melita’s comment interrupts the soft insidious voice of Noe in his ear, telling him he’s allowed to be angry, and he turns a sharp smile toward the Honeybee.

“Plenty, though if she was as forward as our resident blonde, maybe there wouldn’t be such juicy gossip,” he says with saccharine sweetness that burns against his molars. It’s a compliment to Flora and a diss on his ex at the same time, which reminds him - turning to the former, he flicks too-long curls out of his eyes to meet her fluttering eyes. “Yeah, I actually broke up with her. So I guess we’re back to ignoring anyway?” The poison feels weirdly good, as does the heavy handed dump of rocks he throws into his bag. “People trying to kill my lost brother and I in the wilds and reporting to her Dragoons is apparently a shitty excuse for not responding to letters. Who knew?” It’s muttered with all the petulant need for explanation that any eighteen year old jaded golden boy could muster.

It was the best time of my life, but now I sleep alone
So please don't wake me up, 'cause my thrill is gone