The Anatomy of Emotion

Chapter Fifteen

"You say you don't want anything more, but then you tell me how much you miss me, and write your name on me, and kiss me like you're starving. I think I at least deserve a reason why you keep pushing me away."

"I told you, it just won't work," Maeva looks away from him.

"I don't understand why you think that. What could you possibly see going wrong?"

"That's not—"

"Don't you dare tell me it's not important," Corin snaps his frown back on her, "you just don't want me to know. What is it? The touring, the groupies? Do you really think I would fuck up a chance to be with you by sleeping around?"

"No, you would never do that," she still won't look at him.

He comes back toward her, "then tell me what it is! Damn it, Maeva, I just don't understand what you think you're doing. I'm not asking you to give up your life for me, I'm not asking you to become the inseparable girlfriend. All I'm asking is for you to stop toying with me."

"I'm not toying with you!"

"You are!" Corin growls down at her, "you give me everything I want—which isn't all that much, and then you snatch it away! What are you hiding from?"

"I'm hiding from everything else you want!"

"What?" He steps back, "there's nothing—"

"Yes there is!"

She has maxed out her middle register, and he can see her eyes glistening, the muscles in her knuckles and her jaw straining, trying to make him understand.

"You want everything! You want me to be just obsessed as you, like in that fucking song!" Her hand waves at her laptop on the sofa, at everything crackling between them, "and it would be so easy, Corin! You would be sweet and patient, call me every night on tour, and teach me about feelings, and it would happen like that!" She snaps her fingers.

"Well what's wrong with that?" He shoots back, "all I need is what you can give me. You heard the song, you know how I feel, you know I won't push you or hurt you, so what is your problem?"

"You are going to hurt me!" The tears make a thin shimmer on her lashes, "you're going to ruin me!"

"I..." he moves away, all the heat of his anger doused by her weeping black gaze and fallen shoulders, "what are you talking about?"

Maeva's eyes harden beneath her tears, "I'll end up giving you as much of my heart as I have left, and you'll take care of it, and everything will be pretty. But what happens when your bipolar gets ugly? If you're on tour and I can't be there to help you? It's going to happen, you know it is. How do I know I'm not going to love you, only to be destroyed when you finally kill yourself?"

Corin just blinks at her, her words running a loop in his head. When you finally kill yourself. Not a possibility, not a risk, a surety. The scars on his wrists itch, his throat closes. It feels like a tickle of thought at the back of his head first, black and spiny, but it gets bigger the more she talks.

"...I'll never know, and I'm not going to live in constant fear like that!" She puts her streaked face in her hands, "do understand now, Corin, does it finally make sense to you?"

He swallows, throat too tight to say anything. She looks up from her hands after a moment, and his head is not so swallowed that he can't see her begging him. To scream at her, to comfort her, to tell her something to fix it. But he is too dead for that. He doesn't remember how to hurt or help. Just thorns pricking his thoughts, his itchy wrists, his tight throat. Any of the things he might say to ease her worries are lies. I haven't thought about killing myself in a long time. A lie, she would know it's a lie. You make me better. A ridiculous lie, a manipulative one, love doesn't fix this.

Finally, he has to break her gaze, and he looks at the white sofa instead, her sketchbook and laptop stacked neatly on one cushion.

His words barely make it through his throat and out his mouth, "give me my shirt back."

Maeva's eyes widen, but she strips out of it and hands it to him. He sees her sit on the sofa and tuck her long legs up to her chest, but ignores her. Puts his shirt back on, meticulously rolls up the sleeves perfect crease by perfect crease. Fights to breathe with each one.

He hears Maeva crack with a sob as he heads toward the steps, pictures her pale shoulders breaking over her knees. Whatever he feels about it is dulled by the knot of black in his mind.

Corin takes each step a little faster than the last, stumbles off of them and catches himself on the doorframe. His breaths tremble as he remembers all of the things that have happened in the past year. Kisses, drawings, words and lyrics.

Starting his car is slow, turning the key one degree at a time. Pulling out onto the road is even slower, shifting a centimeter at a time. Hitting the accelerator is fast.

He is hyperventilating by the time he reaches Alex's flat, imprisoned by her scent on his shirt.

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A/N: Thanks for reading! Tell me your thoughts on all this drama in the comments!

Song Credits: None