She stares at him for a moment, then licks her lip and looks back up at the sky, blinking rapidly as she shifts, as she half-turns away like there's any way out of this. She can feel his fond determination through the string that binds them together; she knows he can feel the swell of confused emotion that keeps welling from all the tender places he's poking her. She feels stripped bare and sore, her face cracked open when she finally looks back over at him. "Why do you have to make me say it?"

If she doesn't say it, she's still got plausible deniability. She can just ignore it. She can pretend she doesn't see it and nothing has to change and she doesn't have to look those feelings she's been shoving away in the eye and accept them. "If I say it, I can't go back and un-say it. And if I say it..."

She exhales, heavy, as something else, a sadness she hasn't wanted to acknowledge, seeps gently into her chest, like cool water, soothing and aching in equal measure. "If I say it, things won't be the same between you and me. You know that."

And even though his string isn't fully heart's blood red, that doesn't mean that loss is any less wrenching than all the others she's known. He might not go anywhere, but it'll still be different. Some door will shut, some distance will grow, it'll be different. "Maybe I don't want to say something that'll change everything. Maybe I want to keep us."

It's so childish, and she knows it, and saying or not saying it doesn't actually matter: it's already changed. Maybe that's why the thought hurts so much.