The Housekeeper (Ruby Rose/Terra Juana fanfic)

EIGHT

I woke up slowly, lying face down as usual, but that time I wasn't hugging my pillow... I had my head comfortably leaned on the shoulder of a stranger, my arm enclosed her waist and my leg was tangled with hers enjoying the heat of her body. My confusion only lasted for a few seconds before I remembered that I wasn't in my bed. 'Who's this? Mmm... she's Ruby...' I decided to cuddle a bit closer. My prediction got confirmed when she spoke:

"Good afternoon, babe." Her hand stroked my hair slowly.

I just smiled in response knowing that she could feel it. This wasn't half bad, I could get used to wake up like this every morning although it'd be even harder to get out of the bed to start working every day. Yawning, I extended my arm towards the other side of the mattress, looking for... nothing, I couldn't feel anything and sheets were cold. Suddenly, panic burst in my chest forcing me to jump. Kneeled down in the middle of the bed, I shook my head looking in every direction frantically while my lungs struggled to get enough fresh air.

"Terra," I mumbled, feeling like suffocating. "Where is she? Where?"

Ruby was sitting next to me and I grabbed her arms digging my fingernails in her flesh. My heart was racing and threatening with pounding out of my chest, I gasped for air but it wasn't enough and started hearing a ringing in my ears that was muffling noises around me, I couldn't hear what Ruby was telling me, my head was about exploding in pain... I felt dizzy and small white sparks were dancing in front of my eyes. The edges of my vision turned black and cold sweat coated my skin. 'I'm going to pass out,' I thought clearly, my overloaded brain still retained a bit of rational consciousness but it wouldn't last. I started shaking uncontrollably till someone puts their arms around me and I could smell a distinctive perfume, fresh and soft like a forest soaked in rain. My heart got its steady pace back slowly and my brain was able to think properly again.

"Calm down, amor, I'm here..."

My ears worked again and I realized that the rhythmical sound that was echoing through the room were my own sobs. Tears ran down my cheeks and landed on Terra's shirt on her shoulder where I was leaning my forehead. I was hugging her so hard that my knuckles hurt and had to force my fingers to move one by one in order to release her. Finally, I raised my head and looked at her right into her eyes, her face expression was cautious while she checked if I was in my right mind again. I felt exhausted and my voice was barely a whispering but she had a vampire sense of hearing, luckily.

"Where were you?"

"I was bringing our breakfast," she pointed at a tray on a table where some steaming cups of coffee and tea, glasses of juice and a bag of cookies were waiting.

"Breakfast... of course..." I felt embarrassed suddenly because I'd been unable to think of something so obvious before freaking out. "I don't understand what happened..."

"You've had a panic attack." Ruby answered handing me a wet towel to wipe my tears away.

"But why? I thought I was going to have a heart attack." I rubbed my face on the towel awkwardly and stared at them confused.

"It's the bond," Terra answered. "It's not sealed completely and it's a bit unstable. When you realized I wasn't by your side, your brain assumed I was gone or vanished and you got very scared. It was a natural reaction, not rational. I'm sorry, babe, we'll make sure you know where we are at all times, okay?"

"What does 'it's not sealed' mean?" I started to feel panic flooding my chest again, my heart hurt because I was afraid of losing them: the feelings associated to this bond were too intense and overwhelming for a human to deal with them.

"Calm down, we aren't going anywhere. The problem is that you've drunk our blood but we haven't tried yours yet. That will close the loop and put things between us in their right place finally."