❗️Warning❗️ *mentions of suicidal ideation*
***
I didn't believe the woman in front of me.
She had lied.
She definitely wanted to kill me.
Her killer legs were on display, as well as the lethal slit in her skirt that teased the smallest bit of extra skin underneath those black tights.
Wait.
Were they tights, or were they sheer thigh high stockings?
God, if you're up there, I swear to you I'm trying.
I told her that I didn't want to go all the way tonight because I was worried about how she was doing after the interview with her father the night before.
But if she was wearing thigh high stocking tights and no underwear underneath that skirt...
I shook my head.
"Wine, as requested," I said as my mind finally stopped wandering enough to actually close the damn front door and stride to the kitchen where my beautiful girl was sitting on top of my countertops.
I gulped down the wavering bits of restraint and handed her a bottle of semi-sweet white wine and watched as her face screwed up in a blanch, twirling her glass a bit more before taking another small sip.
"It's terrible."
"It's white wine," I said dryly, eyes still firmly latched onto her legs, and she seemed to notice that was where my thoughts were going.
"Well, why don't you escort me to your living room and pick a movie. I'll even be nice and let you decide what we're watching, since I just came over without asking first."
"You don't even have to ask, Elodie. Just maybe a heads-up next time--there was a three day old pizza box on the counter and a cereal bowl in the sink that I'm pretty sure was molding before I finally washed it out."
Her twinkling laughter filled my ears as she set her glass down and reached for me with her arms, draping them over my shoulders as she brought me in for a hug and settled her entire weight on me.
My breath hitched as she rested her cheek against my shoulder and I realized that this was a hug for comfort, not for other things, that the thing between my legs was desperately begging me to act on despite the fact that I most definitely wanted to keep tonight as platonic as possible.
But as her body wrapped itself around me like I was her everything, I realized that would be a very hard decision to stick to.
"Elodie, are you okay?"
She sighed, a weary, bone-deep sigh that someone her age shouldn't have been capable of.
She should've been able to remain young in the way that her age suggested, not already exhausted by life's trials. She probably hadn't even had to deal with the IRS yet, and that was a whole other demon on its own. I'd told her as much and she just laughed me off.
"I'm okay. I found out recently I like hugs. A lot."
"Oh? And who exactly taught you that you liked hugs?"
I pretended to be jealous, but if I was honest with myself I knew I didn't have that right--to claim territorial nonsense over her when we hadn't even defined what we were to each other.
I knew what I wanted to be with her, but I didn't know what she wanted, and that was the scary part.
"Taryn, actually. I think I've made a new friend."
"Oh? What will your other friends say? I haven't heard about them in a while, are you ignoring your friends to spend more time with me?"
"Well..."
"Elodie."
"It's not my fault. Dorian is...very angry with me right now."
"Why? Because of the article?"
She hid her face in the crook of my neck and her breath tickled my skin, her sweet and floral scent flowing up and damn near making me drunk on just the smell of her.
"He...likes me, but I don't feel the same way. I guessed he'd felt that way for a while but I didn't want to be the dick that made assumptions, you know? And then Lan basically confirmed it but I still didn't do anything to set him straight. So, the article was a shock, I'm sure."
I tried to pull her out of my neck to get her to look at me in the eyes, but she only shook her head, tightened her arms around my shoulders and buried herself into me deeper.
I'd never seen this side of Elodie, this vulnerable, sweet, clingy Elodie. I was getting obsessed with this version of her, just like I was obsessed with every other version of herself she'd shown me so far.
"You're not in charge of someone else's feelings. If he's really your friend, he'll come around. You didn't ever do anything to intentionally hurt him, did you?"
She pulled back then, a sad stark reality on her face.
"No, of course not."
She plopped her head back down on my shoulder again.
"I'm just trying to live my life, be happy, move on from my past. It's hard when Jay keeps popping up and ruining everything, but I decided this afternoon that I wasn't going to let him control my happiness. Because you're right--I don't have control of someone's feelings, but I also don't have control over their actions either. I don't blame myself for what my father put me through all those years ago, and a year and a half ago when he came back and hurt me again."
"Wait. What do you mean? Jay mentioned something similar in that interview, but I haven't had time to ask you what that meant."
"Remember when you and Eli broke up that fighting ring downstairs under the studio I was training at? For Krav Maga?"
"Of course I do. You were almost unrecognizable, bruises all over your face and-"
The words died as they tumbled out of my mouth.
"That wasn't from the man you were fighting, was it?"
Her mouth quirked up in a small smile as she pulled away from me once more, still keeping her delicate arms wrapped around my shoulders as if in a silent promise to not back away from the truth that she was giving me, the ugly reality she'd endured for so long.
"He'd found me earlier that night, and I was too scared to fight back. He left me beaten like that in the alley, but somehow I got up. Somehow I got a taxi to the studio, and I followed the noises down to the basement. Leila freaked out when she saw how badly I was hurt, but I ignored her, pointed to the biggest looking guy I could find, and insulted him, told him I was pretty sure he fought like a pussy, and then there was nothing Leila could do."
I sat silent as she repeated her story to me, finally letting me in through those massive walls that she'd placed between her and anyone who tried to come close.
"At first, I planned to just put up enough of a fight to land me in the hospital, knock me out unconscious, hopefully kill me, but then something changed. I stopped feeling sorry for myself as the rush hit me, and then I had this adrenaline out of nowhere. It felt so good to be so close to death. To control my own life for once. I had my leg up ready to kick him square in the balls when you and Eli came storming in."
She huffed out a watery laugh at that one.
"I thought you were going to be the one to kill me in the end. I was still seeing red but then you were there grabbing my face and looking over me, and...well, you don't know this, but I was kind of a goner for you even then."
Her cheeks reddened and she looked away but I reached up and grabbed her chin in the exact same way that I had that night--not too rough, not too softly--and gazed right back into her silver lined hazel eyes.
"Um, then you went to see Eli and tell him you were going to take me to the doctor and that's when I ducked out the side door. I didn't care how pissed off you were going to be, I just couldn't stand all your emotions. The pity, the anger, I couldn't handle you feeling sorry for me. I ended up on a random bridge after walking and walking and walking. I stood on the ledge, watched the water under me, knew that the current and the cold would kill me as soon as I jumped in. I don't know what stopped me in the end. I was going to do it. Maybe it was Eli and V, maybe it was even your face in the back of my mind. I don't know. But every day I'm grateful for whatever it was that made me climb back down the railing and put my feet back down on the ground and walk away."
I was shaking by the time she was done talking.
Pain. This woman in front of me had gone through so much aching, obliterating pain that it was a wonder she stood in front of me now.
How many times had I worried about her, desperate to know how she was doing? Especially after that night.
"When you'd disappeared that night, Eli went to a whole new level of anger that I'd never seen, but I wasn't mad. I understood that you needed to escape, but I didn't know what you'd been planning to do."
"It wasn't like I was planning it, though. I just wandered and ended up there. I think that's why I was so addicted to the thrill, to putting myself as close as I could between my life and death, because it was one of the only ways that I actually felt alive."
I swallowed down a knot in my throat even as her hands trembled on my shoulders.
"And now?"
"Now..." she started, pulling a pink painted glossy lip into her mouth.
"Now, I have better coping mechanisms. I haven't put myself in any real danger since that time I went free climbing alone. It's been about a year since then. I still like to thrill seek, obviously, but the fun way, like roller coasters and cliff jumping with everyone. Exercise helps, like the rock climbing gym I joined, and training at the studio with Leila helps clear my mind. I haven't wanted to hurt myself since that night, but sometimes it creeps up on me in the middle of the night, like an intrusive thought. Just like, what would happen if I did this or that, but my therapist says those are normal."
"You see a therapist?"
"Virtually, once a month. Eli used to force me to go in person once a week, but my doctor said it wasn't needed so often and that I didn't need the psychiatrist Eli was trying to push me to go to. My doctor doesn't think I need medication. I don't have PTSD or flashbacks, but it's definitely better than it used to be when I was just getting out of that situation."
"Elodie...I am so-"
"Please don't say you're sorry."
"But I am. I am so fucking sorry that I didn't see it, that I couldn't help you. That I blamed you for being reckless when in reality it wasn't your fault--you didn't ask to be beaten like that. And then you felt like you had to...you felt like you were alone, that you didn't have anyone in your corner."
"It wasn't your fault. It was because of two shitty parents who didn't care what happened to their daughter. But I wasn't alone, I knew that. V was there, and Eli was there too much, he cared so much that he didn't know how to act with me, when to be overbearing and when to back off. He did the best he could. And I knew you were there, too, even if it wasn't in the way that I might've wanted at that time, but I refused to let you see how I felt about you then. It would've just made things worse anyway."
"And you know you're not alone now, right? That I am here and I will always be here for you no matter what. I don't care if you tell me you just want to be friends or if you say you never want to see me again. You promise me that if you ever feel that way again, you'll call me?"
"I promise."
Her words were a prayer and her own salvation. She'd saved herself from the darkness of her past and I had never respected her more than I did in that moment, hopeful that the pride I felt for her swelling in my chest was shining through my eyes.
Her forehead dipped down to touch mine and that electric current that ran through me and extended to her grew taut, pulling at the edges and demanding that I close the distance between the two of us, but I held firm, allowing her the next move.
"So...you're not freaked out that I had a huge crush on you back then?"
That was what she was worried about?
"I'd be insulted if you didn't."
"And...now?"
My heart threatened to tear out of my chest and rip itself in two right in front of her just so that she could put it back together with her own.
"Now?"
"If I said I still...if I said I liked you, maybe more than I should, you wouldn't be freaked out?"
"Elodie, if you didn't like me as much as I liked you, which is definitely more than I fucking should, then I would be freaked out."
Her chest hitched, like her lungs got stuck on an inhale that her body refused to let her gulp down.
"You...you like me?"
"Too much. I'm not even sure it's a matter of only liking you anymore. You're all I ever think about, Elodie. I want you in my bed every night and every morning. I want you in ways that Eli should kick my ass for. I just want you."
I waited patiently on the metaphorical edge of my seat, desperate to make sure she felt the same way about me that I did of her.
Finally, she answered, and my body wanted to roar it's happiness.
"I want you, too."
***
A/N:
It's HAPPENING!
EVERYBODY STAY CALM!
Cute the scene from *The Office*
What did you guys think of this chapter?
What do you think is going to happen...next? ;)
What do you WANT to happen next??
Until next time my lovely readers,
Kristen :)