Intro
Yeah, I'm in a lot of physical pain right now xD I'm very sick and the healthcare system in the country Ic currently reside in is absolute garbage so I'm suffering quite a bit. It's been impossible to sleep so I wrote a thing about two people, inspired, as always, by a mixture of things I heard from people. Enjoy the only solace I get from my current level of physical agony: more mental agony xDDD
Yeeeeah, I'm not gonna read any therapy into that correlation. I KNOW I'm insane. And sleep deprived. Back to trying to sleep, wish me luck y'all xx
Story Thing:
She leaned in to kiss him, as if she did it everyday.
He smiled, just about waking up to see her next to him. It felt like home, the kind of home he'd
"Good morning," he said to her, almost tenderly.
She shivered. not with sexual desire, but with a sudden rush of bittersweet pain, love and hatred. Above all, there was angst. Old angst never really goes away, people just learn to push it aside and function like it isn't there. However, when those people are confronted by the angst, it tears them apart until they win the fight and push it all the way back into a corner of their mind in order to function again.
Looking at him made her want to laugh, then cry, then laugh again.
Some people would say, enjoy the moment. Think later. There will be plenty of time.
She knew she would pay for this tiny, stolen moment. And she would pay forever.
Or whatever forever meant for a human being with a finite lifespan, anyway.
She caught herself trying to turn away and forced herself to speak, "Come on. We're late. You have to get ready and shower and get to the station, remember?"
"Mhmm, I know I knowww," he pulled her in and kissed her again. She felt herself pulling away again, would she ever learn?
"Come on," she nudged him, "The train isn't going to wait for you!"
The thing is, she was worried.
The moment he got up, he'd be his normal self again.
He'd be stoic. He'd be reserved. Quiet. So so careful to not even be in her personal space when they'd be walking side by side.
All she needed was for me to reach over and grab her tight. Kiss her lips lightly once in a while. Hold her waist gently, to navigate her. Brush against her as if she was his centre and not gravity.
SO many things.
It hurt.
She could already feel what she was going to feel.
Out of the predictions she had made, based on their calculated actions according to the stimuli and data introduced, she knew this was the most likely outcome.
She had always known.
Yet, she let it happen anyway. She steered it into being, she helped carve it into a reality instead of avoiding it. Gryffindors, they say, were never stupid. The problem with them was always that they would always choose to ignore the fact that they were smart. Daring, nerve and chivalry may set them apart; but it's what made them so flawed when it came to their own selves.
She knew he'd be manoeuvring her into this exact scenario and she knew there were two possible outcomes. Unfortunately, the one she'd prefer had been more unlikely. And she was, as always, right to a fault. Her fault being that she assumed she could take the hit. She'd been battered so many times, did it even matter anymore?
She looked at him, asleep.
She wished they could stay this way.
But he'd wake up.
And he'd be a Mr. Darcy again, but she wasn't Elizabeth Bennet. She was Estella, torn between the truth and the iciness that surrounded the denial of her own truths. She needed a Pip, but she'd done exactly what she had been taught to do, she had pushed Pip away.
They say that you get more than one love in a life.
She'd had two.
And yet, this was the one that really hurt the most.
Why did he feel like home when they had spent years hurting each other?
Why did she never want to leave his arms, when she hadn't spent more than a very recent few hours in them only?
Why did she want to get lost in his words, considering his inability to ever talk to her unless they were in the same physical space. Even then, he barely spoke. She tried.
But she failed.
She, who used words the way an artist uses his watercolours.
She, who used situations the way a tailor wove his skilfully precious weaves.
She, who used herself as the light at the end of the tunnel, had failed to be his light.
Hearing his voice, made everything bearable.
hearing hers probably just annoyed him, she thought.
She shook her head, no assumptions, she promised. Never any assumptions.
She'd never know because he'd never bring himself to truly talk.
What was he afraid of? She could guess, but she wouldn't dare. They had already lost 5 years as a result of miscommunication and assumptions spanning more years than that.
She wouldn't do it again, not when her Pip taught her better.
She walked back to the bed and slipped under the duvet.
She let herself lie next to him, feeling his warm body that meant more than he'd understand.
She heard his heartbeat and realised how strange it was that she had been able to go to sleep in his arms.
It normally took a lot of tossing and turning and so many hours of insomnia.
She wouldn't think about it, she told herself.
She couldn't afford to.
Half asleep, he pulled her closer and she almost sighed happily.
And was immediately terrified.
Happiness scared her. Especially when she KNEW it wasn't real, or permanent, at any rate.
Maybe it was real, how was she to know?
It didn't matter because she'd never know.
She'd just be yet another girl he bagged.
Just a number.
A body to comfort him as he travelled alone in an empty hotel room with a successful career.
She was easy, she had never been able to say no to him. It was her favourite word to say to everyone else, but never him.
He'd probably count this as a win.
She'd let him, because he'd be able to shut the book on them permanently now that he knew. Or thought he knew, anyway.
It was time for her to shut it.
They could only ever be friends; if he felt more, wouldn't he talk about it?
If he couldn't talk about it, could they ever have worked?
She knew better.
The problem is, when she looked at him, she still saw that adorable little boy.
Sitting in the classroom, exchanging email addresses with her.
The first person to email her.
She fell in love with him the day she walked into that stupid classroom.
It took her a decade to admit it, but she finally had.
You can't undo love, but you can learn to move on.
Sometimes, she reminded herself, you have to move on.
Maybe they would never have worked, because they'd always see those kids when they looked at each other.
They'd changed so much since then.
But isn't that what we crave, at the end of the day?
Someone who knows who we were, and is willing to be with whoever we become?
Someone that can anchor us to what we lost and push us to move forward as well?
She could be so happy with him.
She felt that the first time he sent her a message on Yahoo! messenger. The first time he emailed her.
The first time she heard his voice on her dial up phone and asked her mom to drop the other line so she could talk in privacy.
It's the same voice that said, "Hi you" and rolled over her right now.
It maybe have sounded different, boys voices usually do when they grow up, but to her it sounded the same.
It wasn't the voice she had heard, it was the person the voice belonged to.
And she loved him uncompromisingly, unwillingly, unhappily, and it undid her completely that she would never be with him. That they could have been but they hadn't been ready then, and they never would be again.
She started kissing him, and she poured all he pain into the kiss. It was passionate and painful. She needed him to feel what she felt inside.
"Come on, time to get ready," she said, reluctantly and he heard a voice that was eager to get rid of him.
Would she regret this?
Did she already?
Was she ashamed.
Was she done with him.
He got up and asked her to come shower with him.
She would've said yes because she understood what that meant but her past had been difficult, and showering with him would have triggered an unfortunately unpleasant moment of PTSD. She didn't want to taint her memories with him.
Instead of explaining, she made up some excuse.
He gave up.
He went for a shower, and when he came back, she was already dressed.
They spoke to each other as if the last nights hadn't happened.
And they parted as if strangers, neither knowing what the other was truly thinking or feeling. Neither having enough courage to be honest to themselves, much less to each other.
Another series of senseless but utterly human mistakes.
It was just an insignificant amount of time, enough to ruin one of their lives for a very long time.
The question was, which one of them would it be?
-x-
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