Rogue~ B. Bradshaw

26: TALK

Bradley stayed quiet debating the words Maverick had just told him. He so badly wanted to share his newly found feelings but he didn't want to push her away even more. The only thing that was standing in his way from telling her were the recent events that had unfolded. Iceman had just died, her father had just died. She didn't need to hear his feelings for her, she needed someone's shoulder to cry on.

"Just think about it alright. I haven't seen her happier when she's with you. I hate to see her like this. Just please think about it." He ended the conversation and walked away back towards Ice's grave.

Looking at his dad's grave Bradley continued to sit there, just staring at his gravestone zoning out thinking about everything. In the end of his thoughts he decided that he was going to fix his damage, not tell her his feelings but go make up for what he had done.

He put his hands in the soft blades of grass and hoisted his body up to go make his way back to where Ana probably was. Still by Iceman's grave.

Back at the gravesite everyone was leaving including all the naval aviators. Ana stood there ignoring everyone walking past her and she continued to stare at her fathers grave crying. A warm hand grabbed her cold frigid hand interlocking their fingers. Ana's puffy eyes looked up to see who it was. It was Hangman. Immediately when she saw him she began to cry even more, he then stayed silent and pulled her into a hug. Her face was nuzzled into his shoulder with her arms wrapped around his torso. One of his hands were in her head of hair and the other on her back, eyes looking off into the distance.

Instead of talking the two stood like that for what seemed like a couple minutes. Just hugging while Ana cried her eyes out even more. He just stood there for emotional support.

Feeling the need to say something  Hangman muttered, "I'm so sorry about Iceman, I know how close you guys were."

Ana pulled away out of the hug some more to look at Jake, "I just miss him so much already." She went back to balling her eyes out into his shoulder while he wrapped her into a hug yet again.

"I know, I know. It's going to be alright." He comforted her and continued to stay in place in the hug. He didn't want to leave till he was sure she would be okay.

But unfortunately that was cut short, in the middle of them still hugging Bradley came into Hangman's eyesight walking towards the pair of them. But annoyed. Soon Jake could tell he was needing to talk with Ana so he slowly parted from the hug while saying, "Ana someone's here to see you."

Ana spun around slowly wiping her tears with her pointer fingers. Even though she knew Ice wasn't going to be standing behind her she desperately hoped he would be standing there with open arms. Oh how she would do anything to see him smile opening his arms up for a hug from her.

But instead when she turned around she saw a Bradley Bradshaw with the look of guilt and his hands tucked in his pockets. Silence filled the cemetery.

"I'll leave you guys to it." Hangman stated rather dramatically and he turned around to leave. When he was walking back toward the main road he looked back to check and make sure she was okay.

Ana stood there with her legs crossed, biting her lip and looking the other way from Bradley not wanting to make eye contact. She knew if she would look at his sorry face she would instantly forgive him, and she didn't want to, but she did. Carefully Bradley slowly waded over to Ana to only be two feet away and he reached out to her face to make her stop biting her lip. Softly he put a bit of pressure under her lip and she seemed to get the message and stopped biting into her lip. With her anxiety biting her lips had been one of her bad habits, usually if no one would stop her she would bite it till her lip would bleed. And Bradley knew of this and would constantly try stopping her from doing so. After Ana stopped biting her lip her watery gaze turned and looked up to face his hazel eyes and she got completely lost in them for a moment. Her eyes looked back down to the ground again and right back up at him still looking down at her. Right then and there from that look the two had forgiven each other, or more of Ana forgiving him.