Trigger Warning(SA)
Blood was everywhere, a man was laying on the pavement dead. I just witnessed a murder, a man's life just ended right in front of me. I've never seen anything like this, never even seen too much of it on tv. I wanted to hurl, to run but I couldn't. My limbs were like limp noodles.
Once I got some of my bearings back, I realized that the murderer was trying to drag me back to the truck.
I yelled and tried to run away from Vicker, but he was too strong. He pinned me up against his car. I tried to fight back, tried to get him off of me, but before I could even come to terms with what was going on he was inside me ...
I scream because it hurt. I had never been with a man, like this. I screamed because I instantly felt dirty, and filthy from the inside out.
I screamed until he put his hand over my mouth and muffled them, so no one heard me...
Even though no one could hear, I couldn't hold them in.
"Hey, sweets wake up!" My shoulders began to shake violently, and my eyes slam open to a pair of familiar comforting green eyes.
Instantly sobs made their way to the surface. It was just a nightmare. Vickers wasn't here, he wasn't here.
I grab Harley and pull him as close to me as I physically can, not caring if I'm only in a t-shirt and his shorts. Not caring if this is the rawest form of me anyone has ever seen. I needed him to hold me, I need to feel safe.
He rolled onto his side and pulled my head to him; he strokes my hair as I ugly cried into his chest. His warmth and firmness incasing me from the outside world. He even wrapped his legs around mine to draw me in closer. "Shhh, sweets." He soothes me as if I'm a child, slightly rocking me back and forth. If only he could be here every time I had a nightmare, if only he could whisper away the demons every time, they decide to visit me in my sleep.
After a minute of me getting myself together the cries stop and we're left there tangled in each other. There wasn't an inch of skin that wasn't embraced by him, I want to stay like this forever. "I'm sorry."
Surely, he was already regretting promising my brother that he would look after me.
"What are you apologizing for?" He continues to stroke my hair. "For being human?" He leans in and nuzzles his nose and mouth against the top of my head.
"For crying all over your chest," I say smiling against his skin, clinging to him as hard as I can as if he was going to get up and run away the first chance he gets. My hand was splayed out on his back, I felt his muscles growing tense underneath my touch like he was restraining himself from moving.
"In that case. Your forgiven." caught up in his hot skin pressed up against mine, I let my fingertips grace his exposed back. I hear him suck in air to the point his lungs are full, the muscles growing even tenser. I rubbed smooth oval shapes up and down his spine, my hand has a mind of its own as it explores his flesh.
My lip's part when he shifts, so that his leg is between mine, hovering over me slightly, his forehead now resting on mine. Our breaths were ragged and uneven, tension building thicker every second. My core tightened at the feel of him between my thighs. "Stop. Now. Sweet's." He says through gritted teeth and my fingertips halt their war path. My heart is pounding so hard in my chest that I'm scared he can feel it. It's so loud I can hear it in my ears.
He makes the move to leave the bed, but I couldn't handle the idea of him leaving right now. I needed him right beside me, whispering away my demons.
"Stay." I try to make my voice firm, so it sounds more like a command, but it sounded more like a question.
He seems to be running the idea in his head before he settles back down beside me, I'm sure to keep my hands to myself this time. I didn't want to scare him off again, I didn't know what I was trying to accomplish anyways.
He pulls me back down to his chest and an I relax into his embrace. "Thank you."
He didn't have to wake me up, but he did. He didn't have to stay here to comfort me, but he did.
A part of me says that this is what friends are for but the smarter, more observant part, knows that just a second ago Harley was ready to take me then and there if I hadn't stopped.
Knowing that lit a fire on the inside, tempting me to edge deeper into that lake, his lake.
It didn't take long after listening to his heartbeat that I could feel myself going back to sleep.
~.~.~.~.~
"You open it," Harley says as he hands the envelope over to me. We had made a trip early in the morning to go get the paper that told us whether we had a niece or a nephew.
The apartment had been cleaned since the break-in and I grabbed enough stuff to stay for a few weeks. I didn't know how long it was going to take me to figure out another option, but I knew this couldn't be permanent.
The tingles would eat me alive, not bothering to leave any crumbs left.
My nerves had been on end while we were there as if someone was watching us the whole time but unlike the last visit, there weren't any Forefather members waiting to ambush us. I chopped it up to me being paranoid.
I had to go to work tomorrow, my worries have started to play out situations where he would kidnap me from up there. Harley insured that he was going to send one of his bodyguards to watch over the place while I was there.
It did make me feel a little better, but I knew the Forefathers had a lot of men, if they wanted to get me bad enough, they would. Whatever Harley's tattoo stood for has scared them enough to leave me alone temporarily.
He still hasn't come clean about what it means, and I knew he wasn't going to anytime soon.
"No, you open it up, Uncle Harley." He shot me a look with furrowed eyebrows telling me to never call him that again.
I thought it was cute, he was going to be a great uncle ai could feel it. He pulls the letter up closer to him and reads something from it.
"Well, it's a girl." He says emotionlessly, but I see the corners of his mouth turning up. He liked the idea of Finnic having a girl.
I shriek a little, not being able to hold in my excitement. I was going to have a niece soon. I was one of them, the kid that always wanted a younger sibling to look after, just like I do want kids later on in life. I love kids.
"So, what are we going to do for the gender reveal?" Harley asks me, we seem to have gotten back to our normal, despite the incident last night. I think we were both under the impression not to bring it up, ever.
It was kind of ironic because the only thing I was thinking about was what I could talk about. I kept catching myself watching the way his mouth forms words and letting my imagination run while with how those lips would feel on my skin.
I know I was crazy this was Harley, Harley walker. I needed to chase those thoughts away before they got me in trouble. I didn't want to hurt this friendship that we'd created, because even if the relationship was partonic, while my body thought it was more, I liked having him around.
I would burn in these thoughts before I voiced them out loud and risked freaking him out.
So, from here on out my thoughts were my own, but my words were guarded. My actions were restricted.
I was no longer going to try to hide the way I saw Harley from myself but that's as far as it would ever go. Only my mind would know how much I felt for him.
He was my friend on the outside, my forbidden thoughts wouldn't change that. Or maybe it was just me trying to get around the guilty feeling that would come from me lusting over Finnic's friend, Harley, the man that has looked out for me ever since I was a little girl.
How long before the thoughts consumed me if I let them run rampage in my head? It was a risky idea to let my imagination take over because then the hope for more would come when I'm not ready to date, he doesn't date, he's been bothered enough with all of my problems. Problems that somehow, I have drug him into unmeaningly.
No, I was going to keep these thoughts at bay the best I could, a few would slip now and again I knew that much, but most of them needed to stay dormant.
So, the battle for self-preservation starts.
"Maddie?" He snaps me out of my thoughts, and I realize I had been scaring him this entire time.
"Sorry. Umm ..." I thought about how Finnic likes football and Liz likes glitter. How we needed to tie those two things together somehow. "How about we have it at the stadium? Somehow incorporate football."
"Finnic would like that. What about Liz?" He was right to question it because Liz was a girly girl, she needed color and decorations.
"We can do fireworks. Small ones." Harley smiles growing a little excited.
"Ohh she'll like that. They would be doomed if it was just me."
"They would be doomed if it was just me. Kind of hard to buy anything when you're broke." I laugh a pathetic giggle. Getting humor from my predicament was the only correct way to cope. All I had was my funds for my bakery and the only way I would ever break into it is if it was an emergency. "Not to mention I have to start saving up for a new down payment on an apartment." I sigh realizing what a predicament I was in. There was no way I was staying in that apartment after what happened the night of the wedding. I would never feel safe, I wouldn't feel too safe regardless, but it would help a little.
"Why don't you just move in with me?" His words come out firm no sign of regret or weariness in them. This was something he had thought about for a long time, why was he just now bringing it up?
"I can't do that, Harley." I couldn't even think about putting the burden of having me here all the time on him. I already felt iffy having to stay here for a little while.
"It's going to take me some time to figure out what to do with the Forefathers. You're not going to be safe anywhere else, sweets. I'm not having your death on my hands." I glance at him trying to read what his motive was in all of this. I knew we were friends but to put his life on the line for mine seemed absurd. I had somehow got myself into this mess, anyone else would have expected me to get myself out of it.
"This isn't your fight to fight, Harley. I'm not your responsibility." I don't know why I'm trying so hard not to accept help, because this wasn't anything to play about. The Forefathers, Vickers would have my head for snitching on him.
I just couldn't accept this from Harley. He didn't deserve this, especially not on my account.
"Maddie wake the fuck up." His tone grew serious. "You walk out of them gates without someone keeping you safe, they are going to kill you. You're staying here, even if I have to tight you to your fucking bed." I wince at the use of language he chose.
He stands up growing aggravated by my unwillingness. He was right, I hated it, but he was right.
I was going to have to accept his help, even if I didn't want to. I was going to have to be a burden, even if I despised it with my whole heart. I wanted to be able to take care of myself. I couldn't rely on anyone because when they left, then what? Who was going to help me then? Myself.
Maybe that was some deep-rooted childhood trauma, but I couldn't just stop feeling that way with the snap of my fingers. Trust me if I could, I would. It was so stressful always feeling like you were a burden to everyone you care about.
I rub my hands down my face, feeling like I had made things worse. I decide to go to my room for a little while and let everything settle down between us.
I walk up the stairs and plop down on my bed, loving the way I sink into it. So much more comfortable than the bed at my apartment.
You're staying here, whether I have to tight you to your fucking bed.
I grow hot all over, and I stare at my wrist laying near the headboard. How would it feel to be tight to this bed, and Harley doing whatever he wanted to me?
A, B, C ...
I start screaming the ABCs in my head running out of those absurd thoughts. Get a grip, Maddie.
~.~.~.~.~
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