'Where has my soul been
Lost in limbo alone drifting.
Empty desolate expanses
Where rivers once flowed across my heart.'
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Logan carried her through the streets to her home, the bike was safe where it was what he held in his arms was more important. She'd tried to get him to put her down when they reached her building, but he just ignored her. Deaf to her complaints and jagged words he carried her to the place where she was living.
The scents of death and drug use were everywhere on her floor, she didn't have his senses but surely she knew how dangerous this place was? Taking her keys he opened the door one handed while keeping her up in his grip.
The view that met his eyes wasn't good but he could see where she'd improved on the shabby decor, trying to make it a place she could live in.
He finally put her down on the small sofa, she curled up on herself hands gripping her skin, head bowed. When she looked up at him it was through her hair, the two white streaks framing her face.
"Thank you," she halted and closed her eyes to his presence in her room. When she opened them again her face was streaked with salt, "For everything Ah never said 'thank you' for, all the times Ah bugged you into doin' somethin' you never wanted to do. For bein' there when everyone else thought it was okay."
Logan was just stood there, looking at her, through her and she knew she was wilting under his scrutiny. His silence made her want to fill it, her home was small and hs presence in it made her realise just how small her world had become in more ways than one.
Still his silence goaded her, she reacted to his solidity, his life, breathing the same air she was. She needed to talk to him, to tell him and it hurt, everything about this hurt.
"You heard didn't ya?" Marie raised her eyes to see Logan shift his head slightly, an affirmative nod in her direction. "God....why did it have to happen now? Why did those idiots decide to attack today, so close to where Ah was?" She wanted to get up, to pace, to let out the emotions that were struggling to express themselves without her exploding.
"Ah mean Ah was *fine* here until Ah saw you...." she paused lifting her eyes to look into Logan's own. His body was humming with tension and for once she didn't know how to read him. The things flashing across his gaze were frightening to her, his depths were showing themselves to her. The things she'd only ever dreamed about as a childish teenager were here, now, in her room.
It was her decision, she could reach for them or let him leave. When her silence dragged on his eyes dulled and he moved toward her door, his hands reaching over her to the doorway. She caught the shake in his arm, what he wouldn't show on his face was being shown in his body. Disappointment, hurt, pain, rejection, her senses weren't as sensitive as his but she could still see his pain across his skin. The pain she'd put there.
She caught his hand before it touched the handle, gripped it with her bare hand, turned herself toward him and saw the confliction in him. The way he'd torn himself in two for her again, flying out of the sofa he'd put her in she grabbed him.
Held him tight to her, plastered herself so close to him that she could feel every breath he took through her hair.
Loneliness is nothing compared to realising what you've been suffering; the nights you've made yourself smile when you've been dying inside. His touch on her body made the world snap back into focus again, the things she'd compromised on for her 'freedom' her 'normality'. She heard his breath shudder out of him, feeling the emotion in his blood as it passed through his body. The way he breathed her into himself as if she was the air he needed to live.
"Marie...I....I missed you." His words were lost and wrapped up in her hair, the image of him dancing with death now had a different image to her mind. She'd been death walking, an untouchable thing; yet not an unloveable thing. He'd loved her in his own way, he'd come after her, found her when she wasn't even aware that she'd been hiding.
She'd felt the wetness seeping into her neck but she never mentioned it, the way he held onto her, holding her so close to him, crushing her into his hard planed form. As if letting her go would dissolve her entirely and leave him with nothing but dust. Her voice found the words that had been in her throat for years, the ones she'd shared with the priest.
"Ah love ya Logan, Ah've missed ya so much Ah never even thought about it till Ah saw you today. All of 'this'", she waved her hand behind him to her small home. "Means nothin' without you *somewhere* in mah life. Ah know that now an' Ah'm sorry it took me so long to realise it. There is no 'normal' for me or you, there's only us."
Logan just rested his head on her hair, clutching her to him and letting the things he'd been keeping out flood through him. The care, the need, the concern for her being, the love pour through his mind. Salt cleaned the passage of them across her form, as he held her to him he felt her relax into his grip. She trusted him still, cared for him still, the words he'd heard from her lips in the church. She saw him as her saviour, the thing that had kept her going and she'd turned her back on him, thing was he'd never told her a reason not to go, not to leave. The words just fell out in the end, after being locked up for so long they just fell like leaves in the autumn. "I need you kid, I've never needed anyone.....all the time out there in the world I never needed anyone. Not till you. After you, everyone was someone." He pulled her head up to look into his face and saw her red face looking back at him, an apology on her lips.
"No. You didn't do anything wrong Marie, you reminded me how to *feel*, you didn't mean to but you did it." Her fingers reached up to touch the track of salt, her touch reminded him of where they were and the stink of the place made his stomach turn.
"Come on, we're leavin'." He pulled her with him out fo the door and left the door wide open, wherever they were going it wasn't back here. They'd made a choice together, now it was time to move with it.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
A choice has to be made, one that is difficult for all concerned but it's time for the truth from both sides.