Pacifier

🥀Sam💔

"But..." she sniffed losing her breath, choking on her tears, her whole body shaking and shivering with the strain of her heartache. It must have hurt everywhere. That hollow, heavy pain all over her. All consuming.

"Elle," i said a little firmer this time, deciding that I wouldn't do as Van had told me, that just this once I was going to break my rules for her. Put emotions first. "Cmere," i sighed hugging her even tighter against me, "cmon lie down properly your gan hurt yourself like this," i said using my own legs to untangle hers, knocking her foot with my ankle so that she was lying flat against me, tangling our legs to warm hers. To make her feel entirely secure.

I stretched for the remote, turning the volume down on the news, the subtitles on so that I could read it, work things out in my head whilst allowing her to ignore it.

"Close your eyes for me lass," i said, "gwan do as your told, close your eyes," i said again, letting my other hand rest on her back, stroking a soothing line down her spine with my knuckles.

I was trying to be calm, breath calm for her, so that she might feel the slow rise and fall of my chest and be soothed by it.

"I can't," she said shaking her head, her face buried in my jumper, her tears slowly soaking into the fabric.

"Yes you can sweetheart," i said, knowing already why she didn't want to shut her eyes. Knowing that even if she wasn't going to tell me herself it was because she could see it, she was picturing it, the scene the police might have stumbled upon. The things her grandmother might have seen in her last moments.

"But..." she trailed off, shuddered again. Broke my heart again.

This poor girl had been given up, sent away to protect her and simultaneously cut off from her whole family.

"I left her on her own," she said, her voice muffled and then drowned out completely by her tears, tears which broke her voice and scratched her throat. She was going to cry until she lost her voice, cry until she made herself sore. Her lips, her eyes, her throat. Her muscles would ache with grief for weeks.

And there was nothing I could do but hold onto her. Hold her chest to my heart and hope she could hear it beating. Hope that if i held her close enough to me she would just feel it - the love I felt for her - and know she wasn't alone. Know that I was going to do my best for her.

"Elle don't do that," i said, sighing softly, "don't blame yourself," i stroked her cheek with my thumb, "if you'd been there you'd be dead now too," i said knowing I was right, the worst thing was that she knew it too. She didn't even argue she just nodded her head.

"I know," she sniffed, "but at least..."

"Oi, no," i said quickly, cutting her off, refusing to allow her to finish that sentence. Refusing to allow her to say that out loud. "I mean it Della no, you do not deserve to die... Especially not at the hands of a Reid," i tried not to grit my teeth but the idea was abhorrent. The idea of her alone in that house, she'd have fought the reids the way she had fought me, but she would have been tiny and they'd have tortured her grandmother in front of her before they'd forced her to watch her murder. That would have been her punishment for the fire in her, the fight. Then they'd have killed her too and she'd have become another statistic. Another victim of gang violence forgotten by most in a week or two.

The thought made me sick but it didn't phase her. Didn't stop her speaking. Even if her words were only whispered.

"Neither did she," she said softly, quietly, her eyes blinking, fixed on the wall. She wasn't doing as I'd told her at all.

"Elle lass," i said, fingers entangled in her hair, she wasn't going to listen to me but I said it anyway, "you need to sleep,"

"I can't," she whispered, her shivering had subsided now but every now and then a sob would escape and shake her momentarily. I would rub my hand over her arm and she would shift to get comfortable again. I would wonder whether she could feel my heart beating.

I was trying so hard for her, to remain calm for her. To remain gentle.

All I really wanted to do was kill each and every man responsible for her pain, Billy Reid and his men, the police who hadn't done enough for her grandmother or for her, who had always dismissed their fears, perhaps even Van, for allowing this war to get so out of hand.

Della really was the first person to matter to me for a very long time. It had just taken until now, seeing her in so much pain, to realise just how fond of her i was. Just how much i cared for her now.

"You're exhausted you need to try, ill be here i wont move," i tried to reassure her but i knew it wasn't that she feared. She feared, just as anyone else who has experienced this kind of unforgiving grief, that she would never find peace again.

"I can't," she said again, and though her crying had at first subsided, she was beginning to tremble again. Her voice, her body, her fingers as she reached out for the remote.

She picked it up from the side of the bed and looked up at me. It took me a moment to realise that she was handing it to me.

"What do you want on?" i asked, trying to work it out from the look in her eyes but the look in her eyes was simply a lost one. She was reliant on me entirely, she had no idea anymore.

And then she surprised me. Really surprised me.

"I want a hug," she said before she started sobbing again, wrapping her arms around my neck and pulling herself into me, tight against me, shocking me so that for a moment I was still, completely confused.

"Ey shhh," i breathed, the smallest of shocked sort of smiles as I wrapped my arms around her too, sat up and let her wrap her legs around my waist, burying her face into the crook of my neck. She cried and cried, sniffling and sobbing as I shushed her and soothed her and struggled to change the chanel over her shoulder.

"salright little one its gonna be alright, a promise you," i mumbled knowing that I couldn't really promise her that, making a vow to myself that I would give my life if I had to, if it could secure her safety and her happiness. Vowing to myself that I wouldn't leave her side until I knew that my promise had been fulfilled.

"I want me brother," she sobbed her fists balled up and gripping my shirt. Breaking my heart with her words, because I knew that her brothers was the least safe place for her now.

"I know lass I know," i said, kissing her hair again, wishing I could take her pain and carry it myself. Drain it from her and absorb it so that it was my bones that ached with it. "When it's safe little one a promise,"

But she wasn't listening to me anymore and she wouldn't. Not for awhile.

Not until she'd drifted into a tormented sleep, not until she'd woken up and continued to lie by my side, her head resting on my chest or my shoulder.

She wouldn't listen for the rest of the day when I told her she needed to shower and eat, she wouldn't listen when I made her a brew and told her to drink. She couldn't listen.

Deaf and blind with grief. Lost for a day.

As I lay beside her, hand on her back drawing little patterns through the cotton of her t-shirt, i tried to plan my next moves. Tried to work out where we could go from here. How long we really had, how long I could let her grieve like this for before i had to force her to move. Force her to runaway with me again, even deeper into our isolation.

I knew we didn't have long.