afflicted

14

Realizing she'd been staring up with her mouth open like a fish, she snapped her head back down. Azriel's eyes were on her, watching. He didn't break the eye contact like he usually did, though. This time he kept looking, something sad and longing in those hazel eyes of his.

"What were you thinking about?" He asked her, voice quiet.

She chewed the inside of her cheek.

"I was thinking that I wanted to swim through the stars here," she said, words timid and shaky as they came out. Something about his shift in energy had her on edge.

He chuckled. She closed her eyes and hummed at the sound. She loved when Azriel laughed. It tugged strings in her heart that had been long forgotten. It simultaneously warmed something in her barren chest and cracked it in half all the same. Loving Azriel was painful, but she had a feeling it always had been. Perhaps it always would be.

"And now?" He asked, and she reddened, realizing she'd been staring at him.

She looked him over for a long moment, eyebrows knit together as she thought. Her eyes fell to the flames, and she fiddled with her fingers in her lap. The words felt like they might choke her. She wanted to spit them out so badly but feared their consequences.

"I-..." She began, but stopped herself, chewing on her bottom lip as she gave a humorless laugh and looked back up to the stars for guidance. They just winked back at her, offering no solace.

"Tell me," he prompted her.

She nodded, sighing as she finally looked back at him and the pain lingering in his expertly carved features. She despised herself for causing that pain, for betraying his most sacred trust. She was his mate and she'd betrayed him entirely. Just because she couldn't remember it didn't excuse it.

"I feel like I've missed you forever... like my heart recognizes the beating of yours and wants to go home but can't. My body aches knowing that I did this to you. Knowing I hurt you like this," She spits out before she can stop herself. He dropped her gaze, looking into the flames.

His expression was unreadable, and she immediately regretted allowing the words to spill out. She shouldn't ever expect his forgiveness. He was doing more for her than he ever should just by keeping her alive, especially when it endangered him to do it.

"I miss you too, Callie," he said, the words barely audible.

Her eyes snapped up, but he wouldn't look back at her.

"I'm so sorry, Azriel," she whispered over the heat of the fire.

"I know you are," he nods, looking down at where his scarred hands interlocked in his lap. His hair fell in his eyes. Something inside Callie pulled tight and threatened to snap. A tear leaked down her cheek and she quickly swiped it away. It was not her place to cry, not her place to hurt.

They sat in ticking silence for a few moments more before he stood. His hands covered his face before he dragged them roughly down.

"Fuck," he said under his breath, kicking a rock by his feet aggressively enough to leave a dent in the tree it smacked into. "I can't do this." He was shaking his head, pacing back and forth on the dusty ground. He placed his hands behind his head, opening his lungs and attempting to slow his panicked breaths.

"I didn't mean to upset you, I-"

He cut her off with a humorless laugh, continuing his pacing and reckless breathing. She'd never seen him like this, never seen him so tense. She regretted saying anything, regretting him finding her, regretted meeting him. His life would be perfect if she'd never clawed her way into it.

"Please sit down, Az," she whispered, but he continued on as if she hadn't spoken.

"You know I waited over 500 years for you?" He snapped out, but his words seemed more aimed at himself than at Callie. He wouldn't look at her. "I would lie awake at night wondering why my brothers had found women who completed them and yet I was still as I'd always been. Alone. I'd convinced myself you didn't fucking exist, that I was some fluke, that I somehow hadn't deserved-"

"Az-"

"Then I found you and I-... I-" His breathing was erratic, unhinged. Callie's eyes welled with tears. "Fucking hell, Callie."

Tears were streaming down his face now, and he made no moves to wipe them away, as though he couldn't be bothered or hadn't noticed. Callie's chest tightened and her own tears began to fall.

"I'm so sorry," she whimpered. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly.

"I found you and I fell headfirst for you, and now I-... Callie, I don't know how to fucking live without you. You changed everything. You ripped me wide open and taught me I didn't have to be alone, and now all this love, all this yearning... It has fucking nowhere to go. Because I can't trust you. I don't know how to trust you anymore. Are you satisfied with the fucking mess you've made of me?" He threw his hands up, eyes burning with passion as they still spilled his hurt down his cheeks. Azriel didn't show emotion and he sure as hell didn't cry. And yet here he was.

"Tell me what to do," she begged, barely keeping her own weeping from her voice. She'd never felt something so raw, so painful. Was it enough to love each other when you've caused each other so much pain?

"And here I am. Fucking powerless against you just like I always have been," he said, laughing again. He scoffed at himself.

"I'm sorry," she repeated quietly.

He turned, coughing through his sobs as he struggled to pull air into his lungs as if he'd forgotten how, like she'd stolen that from him too. His hand landed on his chest, and he bent over, his other hand on his knee to hold himself upright as he heaved wheezed breaths in and out.

Fuck, was he having a panic attack?

Callie jumped up, her own fears and hurts immediately forgotten. She pried his hand from his knee and from his chest, pulling him into her and burying her face in his chest as she held onto him for dear life. With no hesitation, he held her against him like letting her go meant death. His huge hand held her head to his chest and he held her with an unrivaled fierceness while also holding her like she was something precious and breakable.

He leaned down, face buried in her neck as he cried, two months' worth of pain and loneliness finally pouring out of him. His knees threatened to buckle, so she allowed them to, falling with him and holding him as tightly as she could. She ignored the rocks digging into her knees.

It could have been hours or minutes that she held him, but eventually, his shoulders stopped shaking and his breathing evened out. She closed her eyes and savored the closeness of him, the smell of him, before he pulled away and ultimately retreated back into his shell. She emotionally prepared herself for it.

He stilled, his breathing deep and slow. For a moment, she thought he might have fallen asleep, his face still buried in her neck, but then he shifted slightly, tugging her closer until she was straddling his lap, legs wrapped around his back.

He breathed in deeply like he wanted to breathe her in.

"Fuck, I've missed your hugs," he sighed, and then she was crying again, too. She wasn't sure how long they held each other that way, but at some point, he lifted her and carried her to the blanket he'd laid out just inside the mouth of the cave he'd set up camp next to, and laid her down next to him.

Within moments, his snores filled the air. She'd never heard him snore, nor had he ever fallen asleep before her. Perhaps with the weight momentarily lifted from his chest, he found a moment of rest. The thought of it alone threatened to crack her chest back open.