Eli -
I didn't think she'd climb in the taxi. I really didn't. When her fine ass shimmied into the back end, I thought I may lose it right there, taking her in the back of the bright yellow car.
I barked out the address and rested my arm on the back of the seat, playing absentmindedly with her hair. I just couldn't keep my hands to myself.
"You have a place here too?" Her voice was a little more quiet than usual. Was she....nervous? With me?!
"It's not really mine, I'm just using it for tonight. You remember Tommy?" Her pouty lips curved downward into a frown.
"How could I forget?" She deadpanned. "Please don't tell me we're going to his place."
"Nah, it's just a friends of his."
"I'm surprised he has any of those."
"Any what?"
"Friends." She smirked and I laughed loudly. She was cute when she was annoyed.
"He's not so bad." She looked at me sideways. "He grows on you..."
"Like a disease." She argued, but her smile covered her face now. Fuck how I missed that smile.
"Well I guess it's a good thing he won't be there. It's just you and me, babe." I teased, but she swallowed harshly and looked out the window again.
***************
I switched on the light switches and lit a few candles across the flat, even going as far as to flip on the gas switch for the fireplace as Avery used the restroom in the front hall. The penthouse apartment was really too much for one person. It was comprised of five bedrooms, six bathrooms, and took up the entire floor with sweeping balcony views of the Eiffel Tower.
"Wow." Avery's small voice joined me at the windows, and I jumped a little. "So this is how rich people in Paris live?" She giggled and I looked at her sideways. I would give it all up for her. The lifestyle, the money, the cars, the clothes, if it meant I just got one more shot with her. I wondered if she knew. Of course she didn't. She still saw me as her former best friend that had fucked everything up.
"I'm sure your place is nice too." I offered politely, trying to be present with her in this moment.
"Ha." She muttered unwrapping her croissant and I followed suit, amazed that it was still warm. "My apartment is the size of the bathroom up front." She tossed her wrapper in the kitchen trash and offered to toss mine as well. "But it's cute and I love my roommates, and it's in a good area."
"Doesn't sound so bad." I shrugged and she smiled, crossing the kitchen to join me again.
"It's not." She tapped her croissant against mine and took a large bite.
"Cheers!" I smiled and took a generous bite feeling the fluffy bread melt in my mouth. Fuck this was good. "Wow."
"You like it?"
I nodded emphatically and took another large bite. We stood in silence, staring out the windows, eating together while standing a few feet apart. It felt so natural to stand here with her like this. Like these past four hundred days apart had never happened.
"I'm sorry." I blurted, breaking our peaceful silence.
"For?" She studied me through narrowed eyes as she sucked some sugar off of her index finger.
"Everything." She sucked in a breath, but I barely noticed over the words rapidly falling out of my mouth.
"I'm the worst kind of idiot there is - a complacent one." She shook her head, but I ignored her. "I never really knew what I had until it was gone. You're my best friend, my lover, the only person that's ever really mattered, and I never told you. I never treated you like I should." Her whole body was shaking now, tears pricking the corners of her eyes, but I couldn't stop. I had to keep going.
"I threw it all away over some stupid night I can barely remember, with a girl that never really mattered." I grabbed for her hands and she let me. "After you left that night I threw up, I cried all fucking night until I could barely breathe, and only then did I realize that I had to change. So I did, I changed. I didn't drink, I didn't smoke, I didn't sleep with anyone, I meditated, and prayed, and went to therapy. All in hopes that when I was here, standing with you in this moment, that I could somehow be worthy of you." I could feel my tears running down my face, a sensation all too familiar lately.
"But it still doesn't feel like enough. I still don't feel like enough for you. No matter how much work I put in, or how much I want to be what you need, I worry I'll never be." The first tear fell down her cheek, but I could barely see it through my own blurry vision.
"Don't you see, kid? I love you so fucking much it hurts. It's like when you left, so did a part of me, and I'll never be complete without you." Her tears fell more quickly until her tear stained cheeks matched my own.
"Please, just give me another shot. I just need you. I love you. Please. God, I love you." I was rambling now, but it was all I had left. The promises of a broken man.
"Elijah." She said softly, and I waited for the blow. "I just....I just....fuck I need some air." Her small body shoved past mine and out the double doors onto the veranda. The Eiffel Tower shown brilliantly through the now open doors. It was a beautiful backdrop for the most beautiful woman, leaning against the railing in my jacket, attempting to breathe.
I was slow to approach her, not wanting to startle her as it began to snow. Small white crystals dotted my jacket on her slim shoulders and swirled around us in the night sky.
"Aves." I pressed when I was close enough that she could sense my presence.
"Don't." Her voice was small, but not resolute. If she had sounded certain I would've never touched her, but the small waver to her voice only egged me on.
"Don't what?" I pressed and turned her to face me. Her tan cheeks were flushed and her emerald eyes were cloudy with fresh tears. I'd never seen her look so beautiful.
"Don't look at me like that." She insisted, her voice a little more forceful.
"Like what?"
"Like you're in love with me, when I know you're not." I fought the urge to shake her. Had she not heard anything I'd just said?!
"I already told you. I am in love with you, and I know that you still love me too."
"You're wrong." She tried to turn back to the Eiffel Tower, but I caught her upper arm, twirling her back so her small ridiculous braids fanned her face. The look of shock in her eyes the moments before I bent down was invigorating.
I slammed my lips to hers, throwing everything I had into the kiss, pulling her body flush against mine with one hand while the other curved around her chilled cheekbone. I moved my lips over hers, begging her to match my frenzied rhythm, and after a few devastatingly still moments...she did.
Her fingers moved to my dress shirt, fisting themselves into the fabric as she nipped at my lower lip. I responded in kind, tugging her lip into my mouth.
She tasted ten times better than I remembered. Like the sweetness of heaven with the flames of hell burning every inch she touched. I pushed my tongue into her mouth, twisting easily with her own in a dance that only we knew.
It was in that moment that her fingers that had been clutching at my shirt pushed me away. She gasped into the winter sky. "You can't just do that."
"Do what?" I took another step toward her, but she held up her hand.
"Kiss me." She wiped the back of her mouth with her free hand.
"Last time I checked you were kissing me back." I crossed my arms. "Tell me you didn't feel it. That you didn't want it."
"I didn't feel it. I didn't want it." Her voice held no conviction.
"You're a terrible liar."
"Stop fucking acting like you know me!" She shouted. "I'm not the girl you remember, and you don't just get to kiss me when you feel like it. You lost those privileges."
"Fine. Tell me it's over then." I insisted stepping toward her and this time she didn't step away. "Tell me you don't love me."
"I don't..." She turned toward me, her expression determined, but I watched her resolve slowly slip as I stared down at her expectantly.
"I don't..." She tried again.
"I'm listening." I taunted. "You don't what?"
We stood like that for several moments, in a standoff, the snow coating both of our shoulders like battle stripes. She bit her lower lip, a fire igniting in her eyes that was so hot and so deep, that it may just burn us both alive.
"I don't love you." She bit and turned, but I was already catching her arm again, turning her back and her legs wrapped around my waist easily. "Fuck you..." She hissed as I kissed down her throat and she ripped at the buttons of my dress shirt.
"You don't mean that." My voice was raspy as she peeled my shirt clean off on the veranda. We had a bad habit of getting naked outdoors.
"Yes, I do. Fuck you Eli. And fuck me for still loving you..."