𝙘hapter 𝙩hirty-𝙛ive
❛⠀sweetheart, you're no fun⠀❜
waking up used to be something that ROISIN MCLOUGHLIN dreaded. she hated the thought of facing a new day, trudging through the motions just to accomplish nothing yet again. so she would stay in bed until baby begged her for food, trying endlessly to fall back into the abyss of nothingness that soothed her as she slept. it was horrible. the inky tendrils of her withdrawals tugging and tugging and tugging tirelessly at her weak body.
then she started to get better. rehab wasn't her first choice, but the centre in london was bright and beautiful and a place for healing that roisin didn't realise she needed. they taught her discipline and gave her the means to fight back against her addiction: something she never thought she would have. and when she flung open those double doors and left that place of sunshine behind, she felt new. whole. excited to wake up because it meant that she had a chance to prove herself.
the internet hated her, and it hurt, but she had her brother. the girl who broke her heart was still lingering in the back of her mind, but that was okay. she had imane and imogen to distract her. she met corpse. axel. a part of her always knew that he was special - she just always thought that he would be special to someone else. she wasn't good enough for him. until she realised that she was, that they were good enough for each other. that they needed each other more than they had ever needed anyone before.
of course, there were lingering thoughts in their mind that berated them, yelling obscene lies that clouded their judgement for a while. roisin would believe that axel only liked her because she was some sort of mystery to him. because he couldn't quite figure her out, like a rubix cube scratched from years of use that had never been completed. and once he figured her out, he would realise that her colours weren't as bright as he thought they were.
but that night at the edge of the city... she revealed tormented parts of herself for him to untangle like unkempt headphones and once he was finished, he didn't run away. he ran with her, alongside the pain she had felt. roisin knew that he wasn't going anywhere. that he was falling in love with her.
axel worried about many things daily, but there was one thing they had in common. they could all end with roisin gone. leaving him as fast as she came, realising that the guy she had known for a few months at most was nothing but a living, breathing wreck. problems with his eyesight, with his joints, with his eating habits and voice. with his family. his mental state, his anxiety, his cripplingly low self-esteem. she didn't have to put up with that. she had guys and girls lining up for miles to date her, all of them endlessly better than him.
what axel didn't realise until the morning after was that roisin didn't want anyone else. she didn't want the pretty girl with a perfect life or the handsome guy who could give her the world. she wanted him. he couldn't understand why, but the way she gazed up at him against the background of tangled bedsheets... he knew. she was falling in love with him.
all they did was look at each other. he was memorising the soft curve of her nose and the dainty arch of her brow, her rosy cheeks and gleaming chocolate eyes. tracing his fingers across the tattoos on her shoulder, a cherub with a fractured wing and a balloon stretched close to its breaking point. a shattered wine bottle. she was thinking how wonderful it was to wake up to this. to his unruly, dark hair falling into his sleepy eyes. to his tanned chest - darker now that they had spent time outside or lounging in bed in full view of the sun. axel couldn't remember the last time he had left his house without feeling anxious before he met rosie.
"you know how i told the girls that i had wine in my house for aesthetic purposes?" she said softly, not wanting to break the bubble they had formed.
"and frankie berated you?" he replied. his voice was deeper in the morning. it sent a shiver down her bare back.
"yeah." she glanced away from him. "well, that was a lie."
axel stayed silent. she wanted to talk, he knew that, but he wasn't one to push.
"i had it because i... well, i guess i liked knowing that i had power over it. it made me feel like i was in control of myself and my addiction. i didn't realise that olyvia would pop up and shatter all i'd built at that moment. i just..." she paused for a long second. "i think i wanted an excuse to open it up, to- to drink. and she just happened to show up at the right time."
when rosie fell silent, she rested her head back onto his chest, where it had been as she fell asleep the night before. the soft rise and fall of axel's breathing under her cheek made her feel warm, and the beating of his heart under her fingertips reminded her that this moment was real. not something she had desperately dreamt up. not even her wildest dreams could live up to the night she had spent with him and the morning she had blissfully woken up to.
with one hand drawing patterns on the length of her side, his arm cradling her body, he let the other gently tuck strands of unruly blonde hair behind her ear. rosie turned her head ever so slightly, pressing a kiss to the palm of his hand with her eyes closed sleepily. he smiled. he smiled so much that he thought his cheeks would burst. maybe it was the wrong time to be smiling, but with her in his arms, it was impossible to keep a straight face.
"i'm going to help you get through this. whether we have to go to a hundred AA meetings or spend another year in rehab, i'm going to help you. you're not alone in this."
"that's not your job, axel." she sighed.
"i know it's not my job. but i really like you, rosie, and i want you to get better. need you to get better... if i'm allowed to be selfish about this."
"what do you mean?"
"i mean that now i've got you, i physically cannot let you go. it's selfish, but i need you."
"simp."
"you're impossible." he chuckled.
"you like it."
"i hate it."
"that's not what you were saying last night."
"i-" a blush bloomed across his cheeks like a flower in spring, and roisin raised her head just to see it. "that's not fair."
"hey, i'm just saying!"
"if you're going to keep making sex jokes, i'm going to pretend that last night never happened."
"sweetheart, you're no fun." roisin heaved a long sigh, followed by a breathless huff when the boy below her shifted. he had a hand resting on her shoulder, keeping her in place, but he sunk so his head was resting on the pillow beside hers and twisted so they were facing each other.
it was amusing, how both of the young adults reached forwards at the same time; rosie's fingers carefully brushing his curls from his face and axel's lingering on the sprinkling of freckles over her cheek. she wanted to see his face better, solidify that this wasn't some crazy lucid dream and relish in the glimmer in his dark eyes, the glimmer that was reflected in her own. he wanted to do the same, check that his hand wouldn't phase through the rosy planes of her face and instead feel the warmth that told him she was real.
"how are you feeling?" the whisper of her voice against his skin made him shiver, so she pulled the duvet tighter around them. "mentally, physically, about me, the works."
"you just want compliments, don't you?" he joked, grinning as she rolled her eyes. she didn't deny it. but he knew that she cared more for him than she did about anything he had to say about her. "i'm okay. i've slept the best i have in months- years, probably. it's hard to feel anything negative when i'm with my girlfriend."
"yeah? you're sure? how about your eye? your voice?" she pried, noticing the small flickering of his eyes from hers. she took the breaking of eye contact to shyly ask: "did i... bruise?"
the abrupt rumbling of his laughter like an approaching storm made her frown around the heavy blush on her face, dropping her hands so they were tucked into her body and wriggling away from him. "forgive me for worrying. god, axel, i was being serious!"
"i know you were. baby, i-i know." he laughed a little more, but his slender fingers were grabbing at her shoulders and pulling her closer as if he were worried that she would completely untangle herself. "i'm sorry. i'm okay. okay?"
"sorry." roisin let him cradle her against his warm body, weaving her hands around his back gently. "i'm sensitive."
"i know."
"okay, fuck you. that's gross, axel! my god, man. read the fucking room. get off!" she squirmed at the innuendo until he caught her chin in steady fingers, tilting her head to press a warm kiss to her lips. immediately, she stilled. eyes fluttering closed, she sunk into his embrace - completely unable to fight against him when he held her like that, so kind and reassuring and feeling so much like home that it made her physically ache.
she could only hope that he felt the same. until she pulled back softly, and he followed her lips like she was the last drop of water in an endless desert. then she knew that he felt the same. especially when he lay his forehead against hers, eyes still closed as he took a shaky breath and whispered, so quiet that he wasn't sure if he actually spoke or if it was a figment of his imagination.
"do you believe in soulmates?"
"i used to. not anymore."
"not even with me?"
"i think we get some say in who we share our souls with." when she smiled, she felt his lips quirk up, too. "and i choose you."
"i choose you, too."
"sappy. gross."
"i fucking hate you."
"no, you don't."
"no. i don't."