.Natalia.
"Let's just, not assume... look at you, you're already upset." Harry mumbled, an unsettling tone matching his voice and the soft glow of his eyes, the subtle light of the room enhancing his features as his tongue made a tiny move to lick his lips. I sat there in silence while every beat of my heart counted my time processing this whole conversation.
Something inside me needed to know exactly what was being said, I felt I was about to turn into a shaky, frightened-out-of-my-mind ball of anxiety. So with a mind full of questions and a heart filled with fright, I turned in my seat, surprising him as I stayed awfully close to his side of the couch, not wanting to miss a thing.
"And the letters?" I asked him suddenly. He encased my wrist in his long, slim fingers and moved his head slightly in negation, like not wanting to go there. "I really want to know about those."
He sighed, as his fingers played then with mine, they looked even longer without his rings, the soft warm skin playing a small comfort on my nerves.
"Mum freaked out on those so bad," He smiled as he said it, but there was a gleam of cold steel behind his thin smile. "I figured out at some point that the person wanted to just ramble on about some weird... obsession..." He spoke at once, sternly and briefly, before I had time to open my mouth once again.
"There must be a motive, though." My voice shivered as I felt like interrupting that part. "Well yeah, I'm obsessed with medicine, but that doesn't mean I'm going to be cutting people with scalpels to satisfy some insane and deep desire, this feels like something way darker... like some serious serial killer material."
"If her purpose was to kill me, she would've done it, that day."
"It's still twisted, Harry, she probably has a mental illness..." The tips of my fingers were now tracing his own; his hands were gentle and I was silently using it as a diversion for him to carry on with this midnight talk. I had a really bad habit of writing on things when I was upset, sometimes I used a pen to write on my arms or hands and sometimes I used my fingers to trace words everywhere. Now distractedly I began to trace words on Harry's fingers, and I couldn't think of anything else but the warmth that seeped from his skin to mine. "The one in my suitcase, what was the message?"
His expression said it all, "You will regret it."
Oh wow, what the fuck.
I took a deep, meditative inhale—the kind I used just before going into the O.R. or when I was about to handle a difficult patient—and let it out slowly, almost shakily. "But if she... if it was... that was meant for me."
He stared at me, his eyes finding focus as he licked his lips slowly again, deliberately trying to diverse the message intended, "Don't take it so literal, it could be only for me."
"No, no, Harry." My mind began to race once again. I was for sure touching some fibers, and just the thought alone scared the shit out of me. "You don't understand... I am not helping the situation, what if she is raging mad about me being here? What if she wants to get back at me for this?"
"I don't think..."
"She knows I'm here." Worry washed all over me, and my voice, the bitterness rising. "I've heard her talk, she has this delusion of people taking you away from her."
He simply nodded and with a last gentle squeeze, released my hand. "You see? This is why I wanted to keep this all for myself." After that, he stayed quiet a couple more minutes, until I had no choice but to lift my head so I could study his expression, and what I saw in his eyes wasn't horror or outrage, but genuine concern.
"What were the others about, uhm, the old ones?"
"Just a bunch of nonsense, pictures, uh, strange poems."
"Did you opened them all?"
"I did," His words instantly produced the image of him getting those disgusting things, and my pulse sped up at the thought of her not giving up. "All of them, but there was one that I can't really, forget."
I felt my forehead wrinkling with distress as I waited for him to elaborate, if he wanted, maybe.
"She, uhm, wrote..." Harry ran his hand through his hair, disheveling it even more than it was before. He laced his fingers at the back of his neck, clenching his jaw firmly. "God, I can't even say it." His eyes were fixed on the wall behind me, right by the window. In a painful twist of fate, he looked as if he was looking at a ghost and I twirled my body around, but of course there was nobody there. He was probably just remembering.
"Okay, you don't have to... don't say it, maybe we should just..."
"She actually wrote that it was a turn on, you know, uh, watching me being so damn scared of her."
What the fuck!
I nodded with my head, too afraid to speak or even acknowledge such a psychopath. My lips tightened in a line and I wondered if he actually talked about all of this stuff on his counseling sessions.
"I'm so sorry I made you say that, let's just... oh my god, this woman is a freak, she's fucking sick."
"This conversation went too far." Harry gave me a fleeting glance and quickly looked away.
"I'm going to be having nightmares tonight."
"You won't, you'll be safe." He was calmly scratching his nose, and I wished I could feel as composed. "But we should probably go get some rest. It's late."
"Yeah, I'm still sleeping with the lights on." I said, my stomach tightening with apprehension.
He stood up to get rid of the lights and as soon as he walked out of the room without another word, I found myself silently following Harry upstairs. My eyes were roaming to the muscles of his back, visible through his simple shirt that had tiny holes all over the place, and how he wore those bulky grey pants that were hanging low on his waist. Baggy clothes that couldn't even disguise his lean body.
After some very lame faint mumbles of goodnight, I walked in silence into my bedroom, wondering about her, though... Who was she really, and what she'd been through to act or think that way. I pondered if maybe she was hurt badly or if there was a deeper ground there, something we were unaware of.
The room felt chilly and lonely, my attention drawn to the fact that the curtains were still open and the bedside lamp was still off; and as I crossed the room to close the thick fabric of the drapes, there, between the heavy raindrops, was a huge flash of lightning and nothing but pitch black night. Then I wondered how we were supposed to survive to all of this, if she wasn't going to give up that easy.
We were in deep shit, both of us. We already had enough scars and souvenirs on our bodies, and I was barely hanging on by a thread as it was.
My clammy left hand went to my forehead, the bits and pieces of the conversation waving into small flashbacks of noise. Pressing my lips together, I fought back the tightness in my throat and wondered why the hell I felt like crying.
And then it hit me.
There was no way I was sleeping on my own, my heart was still pounding hard from fear.
I was nervous as I made the short trip to his room, standing outside his door for a full five minutes, trying to build up the nerve to knock. Now this was stupid. I was fucking delusional, I was a grown ass woman acting like a frightened toddler.
Finally, when I couldn't stand the anticipation any longer, I blew out a breath, pulled my fingers into a fist, and knocked against the door. The sound echoed through the hallway, oddly loud in the silence as his muffled voice cut through.
"Come in."
So damn stupid.
Yet, I found myself opening the door slightly to find a really gorgeous cozy-lighted room that smelled just like his clothes. My heart was beating loudly and now, I realized, it wasn't from fear, it was from excitement. This was actually the first time I was looking at something so intimate from him, I thought, as I stared at the beds linens that were carefully folded down to show where his spot on the bed was.
"You okay?" He was now leaning by the bathroom door frame, a deadly gorgeous smirk on his face and his toothbrush hanging from one side of his lips.
I shook my head, my hand nervously rubbing the side of my shirt.
"What is it?"
Stupid!
"I know we meant it as a joke, and I don't really want to sound like a whiner, but I was thinking if you could, maybe..." I squeezed my eyes shut and took a deep breath, getting myself under control, but also bracing for disappointment. "I can't sleep on my own, I'm too damn scared."
He was stunned by it, he really was.
"Well, you kept asking stuff." He chuckled, then disappeared into the bathroom again.
Was that a no?
Fuck, that was a no.
"Would you like, uhm, something warmer?" He asked just as I was contemplating the idea of going back to my room in ugly defeat. The sound of water stopping and the light being turned off, making me smile a little. "You can stay here with me."
"That would be great."
His answering smile caused those cute dimples to pop out, then walked across the room where his belongings were neatly placed. He opened a drawer and rifled through it before pulling out a thick colorful sweater and cheekily threw it to me on top of my head. I unfolded the fabric, checked the design, which surely was fun, and smiled even wider.
"Ah! So it turns out, you're not as brave as you look, doctor."
I stuck my tongue out to him, trying to pass my hand slowly through the wooly sleeve and then the rest of my body, the richness of the material was making my eyes fall in exhaustion, as a small comfort was placed in my chest.
He moved to his side of the bed as I was chucking fancy decorative pillows from their place on the massive bed, then slid into the cool cotton and closed my eyes in relief, trying to find a position that suited me. And yeah, clearly, his bed was a thousand times better than mine.
"What are you laughing about?" He chuckled loudly and he turned to face me where he was sitting on the bed. Oh great, now I looked like an idiot. "I thought you were scared."
"I am scared... I'm just happy I don't get to die tonight."
He nodded and made his own way inside the covers, lying face down as he flicked the light off.
For the next minutes, there were only sounds of him moving like a child inside the covers, making a huge deal out of finding a sleep position, and I was biting my cheeks to keep from laughing.
"Goodnight Harry."
His head turned to me on the pillow.
"'Night." In the end, after my mind had run a few hundred turns around the hectic day, I felt my eyes slowly closing in, the drowsiness making me almost miss the last words of the evening events. "Just so you know, I'll always protect you."
***
Love you all. TPWK.🌸