I didn't sleep when the lads got to the hospital, they wanted me too but I couldn't and I knew I wouldn't be able to no matter how hard I tried.
"I had to get you know..." I tried to tell Van when it was just the two of us sitting with Saffy, waiting for the others to get back from their "cigarette breaks" and the shops where they were buying food. "you know..." i tried to say again hoping he would get the jist but he didn't seem to understand, just waiting there patiently for my confession. Because thats what it felt like. It felt like I was confessing to some sort of crime.
"I was really high when it happened," i finally said, I'd never have felt so guilty for being high before, "and then when it happened Kitty was freaked out and Matty was no use at all and you know... It had to be me that was I dont know,"
"responsible," nodded Van as if he knew the feeling all too well.
"Yeah and I'm not... Thats usually Saff," i said wondering how hard he found that to believe. Still he didn't question it. "And it was so scary and I was so tired and I could feel myself coming down you know..." i started hoping he'd catch on and understand and I wouldn't have to tell him anymore because for once it was embarassing and I felt nervous. As if he hadn't seen me when he'd arrived, glazed and full of static ekectricity, numbed to the world with a runny nose, sniffling into my sleeve. As if I wasn't still sniffling into my sleeve. "So I had to you know, hold back the tide..."
"You mean?" he frowned, "how much have you taken Fliss?" he sighed suddenly understanding, suddenly a little sullen, surprising me with it.
"I don't know," I shrugged, a lot I guess but... "
"Don't take anymore," he said, hugging me into him, his chin in my hair, I could feel his concern radiating from him, "We'll get yous somet eat and i don't know, whats gonna help?" he asked, out of his depth. Sometimes I forgot that I was the girl who'd introduced him to all this. That before me he hadn't thought twice about cokeheads and how to sober them up. He'd never really needed to until he'd met me.
That was it. That was thw guilt and the discomfort. That was where the confessional feeling had come from.
"Am sorry Van," i said softly frowning when he shook his head and spoke just as softly as me.
"Don't worry about it Fliss, not now alright," he said kissing my hair, kissing my forehead. My heart fluttering a little, was it him or the coke or the come down imminent. I couldn't have told you then. "You need to sleep babygirl," he sighed, "you need to sleep," but I couldn't so I didn't and I wouldn't until we got to their hotel after Saffy had been checked out and the sun was beginning to set a little too early in the afternoon for my liking.
I didn't sleep until he picked me up in his hotel room and carried me to the bathroom, another kiss to my forehead as he placed me on the counter beside the sink and stepped foreward, between my legs, held me against his chest.
"Right," he smirked looking down at me with all the tenderness in the world, "I've brought you this far you can manage the rest yourself," he chuckled when I stuck my bottom lip out. Pouting up at him with a wine.
"No, I'm tired, I can't do it," i yawned dramatically, "its no good, you'll have to help," said smiling to myself when I saw him swallow down the lump in his throat at the thought. "Van please," i said a little softer, looking up with these deep, pooling eyes which were saying please to.
He sighed, head tilted to the cieling momentarily. When he met my gaze again he was smiling too, one of those soft, lustful smiles, his mind already one step ahead of him. Imagining what he'd be looking at a moment or two from now. Imagining what he'd be doing in five minutes time when the shower was on and our bodies were concealed by the steam. Our lips pushing together, brushing, tongues and teeth colliding, a lethargic kind of fuck.
The kind of fuck that could sooth all the aches and relieve all the tensions. The sort that had you melting into one another, that had you quivering like the droplets on the glass of the shower door. That had your emotions refracted like the image of your bodies pressed up against one another, your legs around his waist, your arms around his neck. Your lips slightly parted, moaning into his neck between kisses and mumbles of loving sentiments. Your back cold, pushed up against the wall.
And then after, the little trail of kisses he left all over me, washed away by the water before his lips had really left my skin. The little whispered in my ear, the tender way he looked at me when he held my face in his hands and he talked to me with all the care, all the serenity in the world. Still breathless and glowing with it.
"I don't ever wanna lose you Fliss," he said between breaths, still smiling but suddenly a little less carefree. I just smiled up at him, pressed a kiss to his chest, the shower still on, droplets catching in my lashes when I blinked up at him.
"What do you mean?" i asked but he just smiled, shook his head, ran his hand through my wet hair. Tilted his head down to kiss my nose before he switched the shower off and wrapped his arms around me, pulled me in close to shield me from the cold about to hit.
"I don't ever wanna wind up in the hospital waitin for one of yous to be alright ever again," he said, swallowing down a lump in his thriat, suddenly vulnerable. More vulnerable that I'd ever seen him before, "its scary Fliss," he said quietly, pushing my hair from my face, lifting me up again, carrying me out of the shower, only placing me down to wrap me up in a towel. "It gets scarier every time," he said, breaking and making my heart all within one moment.
I'd never been cared about by anyone that much before, never been loved the kind of way that grows deeper and deeper every day. And yet it was heartbreaking to hear.
Id never had to worry that someone was worrying before. I wasn't used to the idea that the way I loved my life might be infringing on someone elses happiness.
"Van," i said softly, catching him as he passed me, wrapping my arms around him, my towel falling to the carpet as I placed a kiss between his shoulder blades and then another on his neck.
"I promise you," i said with a small smile, almost sad, trying to find his fingers, trying to play with them and unwind him, trying to communicate how much I really did mean it. "You're never gonna have to, i dont want it to happen again either,"
He turned around then, looking at me from under his eyelashes, almost uncertain. I wasn't sure he'd ever shown someone his sensitive side like this before.
"Babe..." he started to speak but I didn't want him to say anything else or question my honesty, so I stood, tiptoes and pushed my lips to his, kissed his jaw and his nose and his lips once again. Felt him smile against me.
"I'll stop taking them if I have to," i said softly but he shook his head.
"I don't wanna change you..." he started but I just shook my head.
"I'll do anythin," I said resting my cheek against his chest, smiling as he placed a kiss in my hair.
"I just want yous to be safe babygirl, I don't want anythin to happen to you,"
"I know," i said softly, kissing him again, unable to quench the intense love I was feeling for him. Looking up at him once again in the moment our conversation ended, just sort of desperate for him and in awe of him. Wanting him to turn me around, push me down onto his bed, hover above me, another scattering of kisses along my naked body. Another sordid display of affection.
There was nothing either of us could really say and in that moment, when he held my body to his, I felt him shake before he oressed his forehead to mine, mumbled something about how precious I was to him.
"I love you so fuckin much," he breathed, his eyes were closed but when he opened them mine were dewy and blinking up into his. I wanted to kiss him but something inside told me not to. Told me just to wait, just to treasure being there, in his embrace, the tenderness, the subtle passion which had us cocooned, together in a moment of gentleness, ephemeral and precious.
I wanted to tell him I loved him too, that he meant the world to me, but I could tell he was hesitating to say something else. Hesitating to tell me how he really felt.
"What?" i asked with half a smile, his breath on my cheek as he drew me in a little closer. So that we were stood cheek to cheek, our temples touching. As if he thought that was enough. That I'd understand. And i did.
"Van," i whispered, "when I'm with you everything is always alright," i said. It was sentimental and stupid but he liked it. He split a grin, i felt his dimple poking into mine.
"Yeah," he breathed, eyes blinking shut, "thats a good way of putting it,"
I didn't want to leave him, ever, though i knew i would in less that a couple of days time. I knew he would have to leave me and fly back to ireland or onto LA and that when I saw him next hed have recorded a whole new album and have changed, he'd be about to spiral into another two years of touring and sleeping on buses instead of in hotel beds, with me.
I knew that we would be busy too, but we would be at home, and we'd be barely the rose buds, closed and green, a day from the stem in comparison to the lads.
They were going to go places and we were going to just sit back, watch them from afar or over the screens of our phones.
I wasn't sure I was ready to miss him like that. I wasn't sure I'd ever missed anyone like that before.
"What are you thinkin about?" he asked later that night when we were lying next to one another in the dark and I had thought he was asleep.
"I don't know," i hummed biting my bottom lip in when he placed a kiss in my hair and his tickled my cheek. His arm was limp and heavy when he wrapped it around me, pulled me in closer to his side. He was half asleep, i almost felt guilty for waking him. "I just haven't been sleepin much lately," i said quietly, rolling into his side. Closing my eyes, nuzzling into him. Not wanting to tell him how I was thinking about his 3rd album and all the things it was going to mean for him. All the things it was going to mean to us.
"baby you need to sleep" he yawned, his words mumbled over the skin of my bare forearm.
I smirked, leant up to kiss his jaw as I took one of his hands in mine and played with his fingers.
"I know," i whispered, "but I'm not gonna get to be with you like this for ages and you know..."
"Fliss darlin," i wondered how awake he really was when he said it, whether he'd meant to get so sentimental with me, "when we're done with recordin am gonna come down london an take over your whole week..." i took his hand from mine, used it to draw lines down from my shoulder to my elbow. It tickled but it was intended to soothe, to lull me to sleep. "And the only reason I'm even willin to go so long without yous is because every night i go out playin shows and all that, its all for you, so i can come home one day an fall at your feet..." he said kissing my back, my shoulder, my neck. Sleepy as he propped himself up on one elbow, looking down at me with his messy bedhair hanging down around his face, curtains around us to cut us off from the world and conceal our kiss.