( BELOW ARE A BUNCH OF OUT-OF-CONTEXT SNEAK PEAKS INTO MY UPCOMING MARVEL AU, SWAN SONG )

There is a bird at her window. It's light blue, small and pale, Harper doesn't know how to describe it. It perches on the sill, thin legs scrambling for balance. Harper doesn't move. Her bare legs dangle from the white sheets, loose tank top fitting over her shoulders. It's rare she is allowed to bare so much skin. Normally, thick turtlenecks, cotton long sleeves, and hewn jackets stifle her form.

Here, where nothing else is allowed to live, she can reveal the bruises, the ugly grey scar slashed across her dark throat. Here, she is allowed to breathe.

Harper watches the bird closely, but doesn't make eye contact. It's so small, so fragile. She knows that one look could be enough.

It's been 30 days since she's had a single incident. 30 days of restraint. 30 days guilt-free.

Today won't be the day she breaks that streak. Harper shifts on the bed, throat tightening until air is trapped in her oesophagus. She rises, legs half asleep. Daylight streams through the ruddy window, painting light across her face, shining against her curled hair. She moves like a mime across the room. One leg forward, stiff and comically slow, as if the next step forward could be a drop, sinking right into the tiled floor. Harper thinks that if she puts her hands out, her fingers will caress an invisible wall. A barrier.

Good, she deserves to be trapped.

When she finally gets to the window, the bird squawks. Harper flinches. The bird is quivering now, its wings flapping but taking it nowhere. Harper stops moving. The bird continues to shriek, moving across the sill, but it can't remember how to fly away.

Harper's eyes widen, veins bulging in her forehead. Her throat constricts, and a fresh, purple bruise sprouts at the base of her neck, right above the middle of her ribcage. A flower blossoming, it's sharp thorns digging into her once-healthy bones.

The bird finds her eyes, and she narrows them in strain. "Go." her voice is thin, rasping. She's holding everything back.

The bird flies away, wind carrying it up and out of sight from her. Once the small creature is gone, Harper lets out a breath, and the plant on her bedside table wilts.

She takes a moment to compose herself. Whenever it happens, it's like her body is unravelling, skin sliding off her bones, muscles uncoiling from her skeleton. It hurts to pick up all the pieces. Sometimes she wants to leave herself unspooled, thinks maybe this is how it should be.

Harper turns to get some water.

⸻

As the day passes, restraint comes easier. The bruises still ache, but only when her scarves scratch against skin the wrong way, only when she presses a thumb to the centre of the purple-yellow purgatory. On days like these, her eyes take the brunt of it. Circles of loose skin over skeletal cheekbones, red veins encircling dark irises. Water pools in the corners on bright days, as if light is the real enemy, not what's resting inside her. Harper understands. Everything that's happened since the blip has been in darkness.

Sometimes she feels she never left that dust filled inferno.

That her life after the Snap was the same as it was during. Nothingness.

⸻

Harper lies on the bathroom floor in the Portland hospital, body convulsing and breath hitched as her bottom lip snags on the pristine tile.

The ground smells of rubbing alcohol and faded sickness, the stench assaulting her senses and bringing up old memories. If she could move, or at the very least twist her neck, Harper would try and get away from it. It reminds her of the time she spent sitting on a floor just like this, day in and day out, insomnia creeping up her shoulders as they waited for the day her brother would die. And the day that verdict came, she ran back in here (not Here, exactly, but a place miles from where she currently resides. At this point Harper can't tell the difference). For a second, she wonders if this is the floor of the hospital her brother died in, if the clear liquid pooling around her eyes, nose and mouth are the same as when she screamed from the lifeless touch of Samuel's hand in the hospital bed, his blank eyes staring at her, full or terror, not for the fact he was fading into oblivion, but of her.

I would never hurt you, Harp.

Me neither, Sammy.

She lied, and she didn't even know it.

Harper turns onto her back, legs crumpled beneath her. Her clothes are soaked through from the rain, grey hood cool against her neck, ice on her hot skin and bruises. To keep from making any noise, she stuffs one sleeve into her mouth. Adrenaline rushes through her body, Harper's never felt anything like it. Her lungs expand to the point of eruption, legs convulsing. Her brain is no longer in control of her body, only exhaustion, and impact. It's the only way she can describe it. Impact, again and again and again. The strings holding her together are cut through, and for the first time since it happened, Harper is hit by the truck from the street where she lost everything.

A gasp escapes her, loud and echoing in the empty washroom. She covers her mouth tighter, but now the sobs are uncontrollable. Outside the locked door, the rush of a dozen pounding footsteps fix Harper's gaze on the entrance. There's a shout, muffled voices of doctors, nurses, officers, and him.

Harper closes her eyes, but all she can see through the pitch dark is the man, eyes wide with fear as she reached for him. Stop, she yelled, please. He rushed back on his hands and knees, taking them further onto the stone bridge, and Harper followed him (what a stupid thing to do). Stop, stop, stop. He didn't stop. He threw himself off the edge.

There's a knock at the door, and Harper startles, back straightening. She stays on the floor for a couple seconds longer, then sits up, wiping the sweat from her brow and the saliva pooling on her lips. She's never been one for vanity, but Harper stifles a little as she stands and looks into the mirror. Harper Cain is hollow, from the inside out. Her neck is bruised, her scar itches, and blood splatters her clothes like icing on a cake. Curls plastered against her skin, she is insomnia crafted into flesh.

Harper's eye twitches, and she takes one more breath before pulling herself back in. She chokes on the power this time, so potent that bile rises to her throat. Only when she feels the bubble of heat press into her ribcage does Harper move. She pulls up the collar of her hoodie, turns, and opens the door.

Two police officers wait on the other side.

"Excuse me, Miss." She resists the urge to scoff at their formality. "We need to ask you a few questions." As they talk on either side of her, a group of nurses rush past them, pulling along a bed with an IV attached. Harper's breath hitches, and she almost lets the bubble release.

His eyes are glassy, bandages wrapped around his torso, and when his half-dead stare meets hers, the man she chased uses the last of his strength to raise a bangled finger, and points right at her.

"Yes." Harper hears herself speak. "I'll tell you everything."

She needs to get out of here.

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NOTE:

this fic is taking over my life i swear-
comment your thoughts on these sneak peaks, i want to talk. let me know if you're excited.
more updates like this coming soon!!