Before You Leave Me

5. Two Ghosts

"It's true that I haven't..." I mock her with a squeaky tone.

She rolls her eyes at me and looks at the city again.

"Are we going out tonight?" she asks, turning to me.

"Do you want to?"

I'm surprised. Vic was never the going out type. For her, nothing beat a blanket and a nice movie on a winter night.

"Sure" she shrugs her shoulders and takes the last sip of the tea.

"Don't you have a flight to catch tomorrow?"

"Yeah, but I'll have plenty of time to sleep on the jet"

"The what?" my cigarette falls from my hand at the surprise.

"The jet" Vic repeats, a shy smile appearing on her face; "One of the perks of dating a member of the world's most famous boyband. I insisted on going by plane, but I had to do three stopovers till I got the Brisbane. It was a day and a half of traveling. Niall is pigheaded and wanted me to get there as soon as possible"

"Fancy" I smirk, taking out another cigarette and lighting it up; "So we'll go out tonight then"

Vic smiles triumphantly.

"Can't wait for it"

"You sure you don't want to go home?" I ask some hours later as we exit the pub where we've had dinner and a couple of beers.

"When did you get so boring, Dan?" Vic asks with a wide smile, "I told you I wanted to go out tonight. Unless you don't want to"

"You kidding? I haven't gone out in so long" I laugh, "I'm just having trouble believing that you want to party"

"You know nothing, Juan Daniel" Vic teases.

She knows I hate being called by my full name. I hate it with a passion.

"Say that one more time and you're sleeping in Hamburg's airport. No party included."

Vic laughs loudly and follows me to one of the city's clubs.

Low lights, loud music.

That's how I'd describe the club. It's been one of my favourite in Hamburg since I arrived to the city. There are a lot of clubs I still want to go to, but with Vic with me, I wanted to make the right choice.

"This is cool" Vic breathes out, giving her coat to the cloakroom attendant and dancing her way to the dance floor.

She's changed.

I know I've said this a million times, but you know nothing about Vic. You might think you do. But you don't. You don't know what she's been through. You don't know the kind of person she was. If you had, you'd said that she's changed too. Because it's true. She's changed. She's changed a lot.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

January 31st, 2014.

I see her walk up and down her room, making her way to the desk, turning around, walking to the door, turning around and back to the desk. I can't remember how we ended up here.

All I know is that she's not okay. That something is not right.

Vic walks past me for the nth time, back to the desk. But this time she stops there, and stretches out her arm.

That's when everything starts occurring in slow motion.

My mind flashes back to almost a year ago, when I took her hand and she winced. I don't even know why, I looked down at her hand. And I don't even know why, I spotted that tiny cut on her index finger.

"What happened?" I asked, looking up at her.

"Paper cut" she lied.

She tried to hide it, but I knew her way too well. It was a lie. I brought her hand closer to my eyes so I could see the cut better. She tried to pull it away.

"It's a bit deep to be a paper cut" I said, raising my eyebrow at her; "Vic..."

"It's okay" she said looking away, "It didn't even bleed" I swear I heard her mutter under her breath.

Now, back at her room, I see her stretched hand has grabbed the scissors.

I thank my brain for the quick connection it makes that lets me stand up, walk to Vic, put the scissors away and stretch out my arms before she breaks down with a loud sob.

She pushes me away and manages to walk a couple of steps before she falls on her knees and sits by the bed, bringing her knees close to her chest and hiding her face.

I've never seen Vic like this. I've seen her cry, I've seen her wounds after she hurt herself. But she'd never tried to hurt herself in front of me. She's never cried like this in front of me.

I sit by her side, not knowing what to do, or what to say. I see her shake and I can't take it anymore.

I stretch out my arm in silence, sitting her between my legs and letting her head rest on my chest. I surround her with my arms and bring her closer to me without saying a word.

She sobs and holds me closer, burying her face on my t-shirt and sniffling loudly. I hold her tight but she keeps shaking, tears streaming down her face, unstoppable.

"Shh..." I say, running my fingers through her hair; "I'm here..."

She sobs again and I hold her even tighter.

"I'm here..." I whisper.

We remain like that for over an hour, until her breath calms down, her tears run dry and she closes her eyes and thanks me with a little smile.

"Don't thank me" I say, standing up and helping her up, bringing her closer to me one last time and kissing her forehead, "I love you" I say.

She smiles and looks up at me.

"I love you too"

We spend the rest of the afternoon baking butter cookies with smiley faces on them, like nothing happened.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

February 20th, 2017.

But something happened.

That day I realised Vic was broken.

I knew that she was broken before, because I was broken too. It was one of the things I loved most about our relationship: it felt like somehow our broken pieces came together perfectly.

That day, however, I realised I had been lying to myself. I had thought I'd be able to stop Vic from hurting herself, that I'd be able to make her whole again, and she'd do the same with me. Then we'd both be whole together.

But she was broken.

And, worst thing was, she didn't want anyone to fix her.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

[A/N: Tadaaaa!!

Told you I thought the story through... the inspiration is coming back and I couldn't be more thrilled!

As for that connection that had to be made on the previous chapter... If the whole situation didn't look familiar, you might want to re-read If I Let You Know...'s epilogue.

Feedback is always appreciated, yada, yada, yada, happy weekend!

All the love, x.]