Leawrites

The call where he'd be asked to come home for just one more time. The pleading voice that sounded regretful only once a year before the slur of alcohol came through after ten minutes of make pretend. The play was always the same. The rules never changing for him though for her they always seemed to bent just enough for him to almost fall for it. He knew better, still he answered the phone every time it rang.

There seemed to be an anchor tied to his ankles and stuck into the gravel roads of his home town, tying him down to some anonymous reason as to why he couldn't let go of the one place that struck him in nightmares and made him wake up sweating on casual week days. The creak of the floorboards still echoing when the hockey house got too quiet. Angry faces reflecting in the sink when he looked at the soap pooling in the water for a moment too long. Words that felt like brand wounds on his skin hissing in the bonfires.

The screen of his phone lit up two days later, an unknown number appearing in the middle of his economics class. The low vibration shooting through his leg, making him jump in anticipation and fear. Eyes staring open wide ahead at the front of the class. He felt it before he read the name on the top of his screen. The wait was over, the storm was still brewing.

Pushing himself up, mumbling something about an emergency to his confused row of friends, he didn't look back as he pushed the doors to disappear into the hallway. The cold tiles sunk through the sole of his shoes up his spine as his finger hesitated before he swiped to accept the call he never wanted to get again but was always waiting for. Pacing the space that seemed to close in on him as no other sound came on the other end of the line. Furrowing his eyebrows, he spoke before he could hang up.

"Hello?" he asked, the words echoing through the empty halls. It all felt too big and too narrow, like a chain of mountains build around him till he could feel them on each side of his shoulders. Pushing him to hunch over himself, his spine shaping itself into a position that would require surgery to get straight again.

The silence hung heavy over him, the bad news already present in the grey sky above him as he stepped out of the uni building. A sob cut through the burden that was still invisible to him. It wasn't one he recognized, one he hated to hear and flinch at because it meant that a quiet part of himself was still stuck in that house at seven years old with red rimmed eyes and a heavy pounding heart the first time he'd seen her like that first hand. Eye to eye with the boy who he knew never deserved anything that happened to him.

Before he could speak up again and ask another question he was sure would lead to more irritation in his hazy state of mind, the unfamiliar voice spoke up. Quivering tone covering his ears in drumming silence and slow realization as his mind dissected the sentence word by word, analyzing the meaning behind every hiccup or stutter that would break the flow of line speaking.

"I'm so sorry," was the first thing said. The first hint after the slowly developing drops of rain fell down on him that something was wrong. Lifting his phone from his ear, he looked down at the number again. Counting the digits, repeating the one that appeared every year this time around and comparing them. They were the same, but the voice wasn't the same. It was a different person, someone who said 'I'm so sorry' instead of 'You weren't there last year, maybe you could show yourself this time around'.

"I can't even imagine how you must feel," came after. And in all honesty, neither could he. There was no guidance when it came to emotions, no instruction paper on how to react in certain situations. He knew what this was about, yet he couldn't react in the way that was appropriate for someone in his position.

"Poor boy," was what left their mouth before the dam broke fully. It was what most people thought but never dared to say out loud, it was the name that followed him around every street in a small town bound to die in the ash of rumors. It liked to hide in the shadows of cold Boston alleys and in the far back rows of crowds that never seemed to be there for him. Not a single seat reserved for someone on his name.

The world seemed to spin as he felt the flesh beneath his skin disappear, the layer of protectiveness and the guard he build in late night gym sessions and early practice gone from any possible view point. His chest closed off into itself, forming a new tunnel that directly pumped his pain from his heart up to his eyes and ears.

By the time he announced his newfound plans for the summer break, Tucker was already taking up half of the kitchen counter with ingredients for meals he swore would bring a new kind of sunshine in their free time. Tapping his fingers on the wooden platform, a nervous habit that everyone beside him seemed to catch on.

"What's up with you?" Garrett was the first to ask, the skin above his eyes pulling together in worry. The conversation on whether watermelon was more water than fruit died like a flame under glass.

The elephant in the room seized to a burning circus as Logan looked from the pattern trailing along the counter up to three pairs of eyes looking at him, waiting patiently. Their silence a silent offering for confession though all he heard were the words spoken on the phone and the thoughts that had long overstayed in his mind.

"I need to go back," he said, no direction where to but all of them knew. They could see it in his avoidant eyes and the fast paced movement of his fingers. "Over the summer, I won't be here then. Sorry, Tucker."

"No worries, man."

"Family stuff," he elaborated even when no one needed an explanation.

"We understand, truly."

He wasn't too sure who spoke anymore as the truth settled in his chest. Maybe it were all of them, maybe none.

He'd go back to the one place he never wanted to step foot in again because even when his dad was gone now he was still there to pull him back into the hell he took so long to dust off his jacket. Breathing out the adrenaline that came with fear each one of the guys around him patched up the crack in his posture by a simple hit on the shoulder, assurances falling from their mouths like insurance company advertisements that spoke too highly of themselves to be true.

The thought of accidentally ramming his car against a tree that stood too close to the street passed his mind every other mile, the temptation of running a red light and hoping for a car to crash into him visible in the way he stared at every red light that he stopped at. Always looking left and right, always doing everything the responsible way while he was on his way to do the most irresponsible thing in his life. The one thought still lingering, even after talking himself out of every other doubt and memory that resurfaced at the mention of the place: What if he saw what kept him bound to the places for longer then he wanted to? What if he saw her and she asked him to stay again? Would he say no again and leave without an explanation why?

He saw himself all those years ago: after moving to Boston for Hockey, after returning for the holidays that he spent more often than not at her place rather than his own, after watching her teary eyed in the parking lot that seemed to small to fit his dreams and too big to hold her openly.

It was the night he had told her about his plan. Going to Briar and not looking back, not even if she asked him to. He had told her that, the one person who always let him in was the first one he abandoned. He had told her, that whatever he might want for the two of them, nothing could ever compensate the mental danger he found when thinking about his gravestone sitting on the same cemetery as where the rest of this town laid. It terrified him as much as it fueled him to be better, to go further even when the road wasn't paved for him yet. He build it himself and all she could do was stare at him in disbelief.

Once there was a time where he would've picked her up, told her to pack the necessities and took her with him even when they had no place to stay. That time ended when she told him about her own plans for the future late at night over a bottle of wine that was stolen from his parent's cabinet. How her life was already settled in the same four walls that she grew up in, having to help around the house and go the extra mile for a good night. It wasn't forced on her, though she didn't do it voluntarily either.

The welcome sign still made him throw up as he passed it. The fields that grew on either side of the road, holding weeds and corn and the faint smell of her perfume. Flowers that he once gifted her were growing again in people's front yards or in the little green spots around town. The road was still damaged, his car still complained about it and he voiced it's pain when he hit another pothole. Kids were still gathering in the park and on the playground, screaming and enjoying a life they didn't know the consequences of yet.

It seemed like time had stopped for the people that lived there.

He had grown out of it but kept the clothes.

The garage was shut down when he passed it. All the metal gates pulled down and sealed at the bottom with a lock. Some of the oil he spilled there still stuck to the jeans he had thrown in the back of his trunk for emergencies. She'd worn them once when he came around for Thanksgiving and begged him to stop the car on the way back home from a party to go into the field and watch the stars together. She fell over the too long legs every time she tried to take a step, the fabric of her dress stuffed beneath the fabric of his pants. Arms clad in too much material as she held herself in his jacket.

With the pictures came the regret of not asking her to go with him back to Boston that day. It came the heartbreak that he never fully got over. Her laugh still echoed in the rustle of his sheets when he couldn't sleep. Every pick up line from a different girl at Malone's was a direct reference to a joke she made when trying to pull him from the tide of sadness that he drowned under one too many times in his youth. Everyone resembled her to a certain extend but no one ever was her, no one was ever able to replace her.

Parking the car outside the old, wrecked house, it looked worse than he remembered it. In his head some of the windows were damaged and the steps up to the door were only accessible if you walked on the right side of them. Now there was a hole in the front porch that looked like someone tried to fix it but no one ever got around to actually do it. One of the windows were broken in, the curtains drawn but the wind blew them aside every once in a while to allow him a peak inside. The tapestry still looked the same, his dad's old chair still stood too close to the TV for it to be healthy. His ghost still sat there, Logan could see it in the outline of his arm on the armrest and the reminder of his weight in the cushion. Feet propped up on the coffee table that seemed to have gotten a blow by the same stone that flew through the window.

Another pair of feet appeared behind him. The slow dragging sound of heels on cobblestone made his spine straighten and his mind to gather itself again against his better judgment. Against his own will he turned around, looking right at the one person he had hoped to avoid. Cowboy boots in summer heat. Loose hair messing up the smile she tried to muster as she met his gaze as it was brushed into her face by the wind.

"John," she mused and he didn't correct her. To her he was still the five year old who would force her to climb trees that she couldn't even see the top of and who would hold her hand when they were sitting on one of the branches and she stared into the open wide to not face how far above the ground they were. Legs swinging back and forth as they talked about everything and nothing at all.

Her name crossed his lips so easily as if he'd never spent a day not saying it.

The silence stretched between them like chewing gum split between two mouths. Eyes never leaving the other, comparisons to the person they used to know never crossing their minds. This was them now, both surpassing the old versions they were never too proud of creating.

"I'm glad you came," she said, hand already reaching for the doorknob. His eyes followed her every movement, falling into synchronicity with the breeze around them. She didn't open the door yet but she kept him from having to open it himself.

"I almost didn't," he confessed.

There was no shame in his voice as he said it, no reluctant sign of regret in his words no matter how harsh they might sound to the excluded ear. She understood his point of view, being the safe haven he came to when he needed someone to patch up his wounds without having to answer too many questions that only made him wince more at the pain that surged through his body.

Nodding her head, already having suspected that answer, she gave him one last second to pull away, turn around and go back to the life he chose instead of being stuck in the life that was chosen for him. But he didn't, he stayed. Head bowed down, eyes focused on the hole in the ground and the yellow and orange leather flowers decorating her boots as she opened the door.

Waiting by the entrance, her eyes focused on his contemplating figure, she reached her hand out just enough to treat into the outer line of his vision. Red painted nails that stood in contrast to the dead house. She wasn't the fire, she was the piercing force of life that seemed unattainable in a place like this. His own rough skin didn't look half as fitting as it did back when she forced him to take care of himself in between practice and hours at the garage. The hand creme she hid in his bag the last time he stayed for long enough for her to catch him picking at the dry skin around his fingers still laid on his bedside table. The smell too much like her for him to use it if he wanted to stay sane.

The floorboards creaked under their feet as they stepped inside, the old carpet loosening itself by the corners of the room, revealing too much of the life beneath. The tiles in the kitchen were half yellow, half white and almost all broken.

"They already started demolishing the house two days ago, but it's only downstairs as of yet. They want to take the whole thing down once you finish up here," she informed him, speaking loud enough for him to understand her but not too loud to disturb the spirits hiding in the walls. "I don't know how long you plan on staying-"

"Not longer than necessary," he assured her before she could finish her sentence, cutting into the one thing neither wanted to acknowledge.

"I assumed that."

Looking at the stairs, Logan stepped in front of her. Slightly treating and testing each step as to where the safest way up was before going one up. She followed him like a dancer followed the steps of a choreographer. Never stepping anywhere he didn't tell her to, never complaining when she had to change sides three times in a row.

Upstairs seemed even worse to both their eyes. The ceiling was rotten, the wood was molding and all he could remember was the sound of slamming doors and incoherent screaming. She only stayed around a couple times but every time she remembered feeling relieved the moment they stepped outside or entered his bedroom. The door to his bedroom was already taken out, the mount damaged and left hanging by a single nail. Old pictures were bleached out against the walls, small trophies from his childhood achievements either on the floor or fallen over on broken cupboards. Time was cruel to those that didn't get a repair every other year.

Squeezing his hand, she stepped in behind him. Leaving enough space so he wouldn't feel crowded, though standing close enough for him to feel her presence.

"I want all of it gone," he said. Him and the neighbor from two doors down, the one who called him sobbing from his father's phone, had already spoke about the business that needed to be done. All that he was there for was to decide what he still wanted and what could be thrown into landfill or put up on the sale section of charity shops.

"John," she tried to reason with him. A soft sigh pressing against her lips. "Are you sure?"

Turning towards her, his eyes flying over the ceiling and walls, the furniture and decoration as if he saw them for the first time, he had made up his mind long before he got that first call. He had decided it long before he decided to never return. Everything that was there was never his to begin with, it was from someone he couldn't remember, someone he didn't identify with. Everything he needed was back in Boston, back with the people that understood him and saw him for who he truly was, back in a house that actually felt like a home, back in a bedroom where he could fall asleep at night and woke without immediately wanting to be gone again.

"There is nothing of me left here." And when his eyes found her, how she looked at him with the same memories flooding her mind that he already relived again, he knew that he just told her his first lie.

Nodding, she accepted the place she put herself up for. Freeing her hand from his hold, holding her heart in her chest before it could jump into his chest once more. Stepping further in, boots leaving prints on the walked down floor, she counted the trash plastic bags she'd prepared a few days ago.

"We still need to pack all of this up and bring it somewhere," she announced to him. Handing him one of the sacks and starting to sort through old stuff that she still remembered vividly.

The old crayons they would spent hours with drawing out dreams and future that were too good for either of them to dream about, they landed in the trash bag. The shirts and hoodies she'd steal from him only to deny ever having them after they appeared in the washing machine as if they were never gone, they landed in the trash bag. The bleached out pictures, old toys, plastic trophies of fake gold, memorabilia of old hockey games he'd attended, they all landed in the trash bag.

By the time they finished up, the sun was already setting. Yellow turning into gold turning into orange and soon it would be pitch black. Her hair put up, his sleeves rolled up until he took the sweater off completely. Throwing it from the window down onto the hood of his car with a kind of precision she'd only ever seen in movies. It landed perfectly neat on the metal surface.

"Everything's already closed, I'll go by tomorrow and see what the charity shops around town will take before taking the rest to landfill. You can go if you want to, your job's done. Wouldn't want to keep you longer than necessary." She'd thought her words over a hundred times while they worked in silence as they worked before saying them, almost holding herself back, but biting her tongue only worked so many times before it started bleeding.

Watching the bags, that they'd thrown out the window too, stacked as a small hill of his past, it almost looked like one of the bonfires that Dean liked to organize.

"Does the fire place out by the fields still exist?"

His car stopped again in front of her house, the lights in the living room on, the television playing one of those late night gaming shows that no one watched for entertainment but rather to make themselves feel better by answering questions right and then telling no one in particular how they could do so much better than whatever bloke made out of pixels was sitting in front of them.

"I'll be right back," she said, door already halfway open as she turned to him again. His head leaned against the head rest, arm resting too close on the console to feel accidental. "Just gonna change."

Drumming on the steering wheel, Logan looked down the street. Humming the one song that wouldn't leave his mind, hair brushed out of his face, fingers moving nervously. He could see her dad sat on the sofa, her mom drying cutlery in the kitchen, their mouths moving in a canon that seemed so comfortably practiced and now executed with ease. Every night was their grand play, never a tragedy. Every once in a while one of them would turn or laugh or their mouths would open up further than before before they shook their heads and go back to what they were doing.

The lights in her room turned on, her silhouette appearing in his view. The shadow of her body catching his attention through the curtains. He could see her standing still, facing the mirror, hands in her hair before they moved over her face. He could see the exhaustion through a shield of privacy that did little to prevent him from staring. Letting everything fall from her shoulders before she took a deep breath and found her composure again, the action made him breath with her. Her head turned, in which direction he wasn't sure but in the next second she was gone from his view. Leaving him guessing what was going on in her head and he was almost ready to pull back from watching, his own creeps settling in before she reappeared again, arms moving up, hands pulling her shirt over her head and for a moment her was confident enough to think that she was doing it on purpose. That she'd seen—or at least hoped—for him to be as infatuated still as he was all those years ago.

Logan's mouth stood agape as he could see her curves more clearly now, the fabric left on the floor for longer than necessary on a normal night before she pulled another piece of clothing over her head, leaving him hanging once again. The lights turned off, the show was over and a second later she was already closing the front door behind herself. Cheeks still carrying a rose colour with them as she settled into the space next to him, clearing her throat as she didn't let her eyes look anywhere but straight ahead. Ignoring the slight gap between his lips or how she could feel him staring at her, his own gaze falling lower than he wanted it to before starting the car again and driving off.

Leaving her house behind, but the picture lingered. The intention clear as he moved his hand over the console, fingers brushing her thigh in the quiet of the night and the low hum of the radio. He could feel her tense under his gentle touch before she breathed out something that sounded like revelation and acceptation tangled up with fear finally being resolved. Second doubts flying out the open window as she leaned her head against the glass. Letting her own hand fall near his.

His gaze flickering between the road ahead and her hand that brushed his knuckles. The scab from a fight on the ice breaking her own skin. He let her feel his own decision by herself, leaving space for her to decide whether he was worth the complications for her. His heart pounding in his chest as he could feel her turn it over in her head. All the memories crashing down on both of them, her hesitant fingers calculating how long it would take to heal from cutting herself on him. The sharp line of his jaw tightening as he remembered how he left her the last time and here she was, still considering him after all that he'd done.

"You deserve someone better," he decided it for her. Pulling his hand from her reach, settling both on the wheel, driving saver now that he had made his decision.

And she let his words settle between them, her finger holding on to the ghost of his touch for a second longer before pulling back as well. The ease that returned between them after hours of working around each other was turned into something tighter than the corset she wore to prom so her date would like to look at her, barely being able to breath in order to please someone who wasn't attempting to make her feel good about herself in return. Logan was already gone again by then, leaving her to find someone that she didn't want but had to accept.

They set up the fire together, the same tension hanging between them, the knot in their chest tight enough to keep them close. It was holding them together, the unease that they both knew they were feeling. Nothing between them was ever one sided, nothing was ever something to be left unsaid in fear of the other not understanding.

They always understood.

He always understood when she talked about wanting to go to college and study something that would require her to travel in order to convince herself that the world was better than what it looked like from the room she never left. He understood when she said that she couldn't leave. He understood when she let him leave without trying to hold him back.

They always understood.

She understood when he moved to Boston early on. She understood when he called her after a bad match or practice or day and needed a few words from the one person that always seemed to believe in him, no matter how self-destructive he might portray the situation from his own point of view. She understood when he left and came back again to act like this time would be different but it never was. She understood every time he left because she wanted to leave to but only one of them was able to. She understood when he finished his grand speech of self-proclamation and a chance he couldn't throw out the window.

They always understood and it never lead them anywhere.

Taking the match from his back-pocket, looking back to see if she was standing at a safe distance before lighting it and throwing it into the pile of his old stuff, he didn't notice that he hadn't moved from his place until the flames were burning his eyes. Two hands guiding him backwards, into safe recovery, as he couldn't take his eyes off of the ever-growing flames of release.

Part of him, the part that stuck to his back with teeth and claws digging into his skin, was melting like wax under the heat. He felt his shoulders sacking, his body weighting only half of what he once was. The dagger drawn back from his neck. He was free and all he could do was stare with tears in his eyes.

Falling on the ground, she followed his every move, focusing on the flames reflecting in his eyes and the honesty falling from them down his face in long streaks of unraveling.

It was now or never. He would leave again, she'd been there one too many times to not identify the signs blindly. Holding invisible hands over her ears as she spoke to him

"Why do you think you aren't enough for me?"

Momentarily his gaze wouldn't flicker from the spectacle building to its climax before him. Lips parted in wonder, breathing out all the old air that still clung to his lungs. It was like he was resurrected, the hell he once felt trapped in now burning before him. His own hands dirtied by their ashes.

When his head did turn, he didn't look terrified by her question. He was certain of his answer.

"We've been here enough times for both of us to know how things are gonna go," he spoke softly. Whispering so low that she could barely hear him over the hissing flames. Her hair catching the red and making her look like his personal angel of death. "I don't want us to end like we did the last time. Not when there is nothing for me to come back here now."

Another lie, the second one in a day. More than in the 20 years before.

She always understood, she never questioned. But she could see the hidden desire in his eyes. His own questions that he bit his tongue to keep himself from asking, she could see the red stains of blood dancing on his skin from holding back too much of what wanted to come undone.

"You know, if you would've asked me that day to come with you, I would've said yes."

And as he heard her truth he choked on his own certainty. The conviction that all she wanted was for him to stay here with her suddenly tasting wrong. It was never about where she was with him, it only mattered if she was with him. And he had told her that he couldn't picture them together anywhere but the town where they were all that wasn't bad for each other. He made her feel like he could only want her if there wasn't anything better than dust and rotten wood.

"You always said-" He remembered the symptoms but not the sickness.

He remembered the way she sounded so worried every time she talked about all the things she had to handle and he understood her words at that time but now in hindsight it felt like they were speaking two different languages altogether.

"My grandma died a few weeks after you left. There was no hope left and then there was nothing for me to do; there was no reason left to stay . But the registration dates for college were already over and I couldn't apply anymore, so I got a job. And when I had the job, a year felt like too much that I've missed to try out again." Pulling her knees up to her chest, her head resting on her arms, she was now the one who couldn't tore her gaze from the fire. "I was in Boston that year over the holidays after hearing that you wouldn't come."

"Why didn't you-?"

"I saw you playing, you looked so different on the ice. Everyone treated you so differently and you acted so much more confident to how I was used seeing you and it made sense in that moment. I wasn't meant to be there, not in that hall or that city or in your presence because you were so much bigger all of a sudden. And I was still me, stuck in a town, living in her childhood bedroom because no job around was paid good enough to buy something of my own. I felt so dumb in that moment for ever thinking that you might actually want me there when you had all of that."

Looking back to where he still sat, his face morphed from the guy she used to know to who he was now. Not John, but Logan. Not the awkward guy who picked flowers from his backyard or climbed through her window late at night because he couldn't sleep in his own bed and hers always seemed to embrace him with open arms and good dreams.

"You should've told me," he said, brushing a strand of hair from her face. "I'm not someone else just because I act like someone else. I'm still me."

"You aren't. We burned all that you were and now we're nothing but strangers that once knew each other. We're merely acquaintances, old friends at best."

"Don't say that."

"It's true though, isn't it? I know nothing about you, Logan." And when she called him the name that everyone else grew accustomed to, it hurt more than any fist to the face ever could. She was adapting to him while he was still dancing around her. "I know a past version of you. I know the character on the ice that everyone else gets to see. I know the persona that is portrayed on fifth line. I know about predictions made by strangers. I know about bets and hypothesis and things that people mumble around here but I don't know you. I know nothing about you and you know everything about me because I never changed because I never got to get out of here."

The tears that took over and welled down her face, building streams and rivers over her skin. She breathed heavier with every words she spoke. Every truth, every confession another sin ripped off and forgiven.

"I loved you, at least some version of you. And the worst thing is, that when I saw you in the ring, how you put on your own show on your own stage with your own people, I still loved you. I loved this guy that I've never seen before, the one that everyone cheered for, because after every metamorphosis you went through, every change that required you to transform and adapt and change things about yourself, you still kept my heart in your chest."

"You still have mine too," he confessed, he could feel it beating in her fingertips. He felt it when she offered him her hand. When she laughed at a stupid joke and the sound alone made him smile a little wider in a dead town. He felt it when her fingers brushed his healing knuckles and they split right open again just so his blood could connect with his heart again.

"But that's not enough, is it?"

"Why can't it be?" He asked, hands cradling her face as he could feel her aching more and more. "Why does change have to mean that we aren't still the same people? Why does you staying here have to mean that you never changed at all? We're not the same people as back then, but I don't even want to be those people anymore. I want us to be us now. I want to know you again like the back of my hand and I want you to want the same. I want to wake up next to you and catch your eyes across the room. I want to see you at my games because you belong there. I truly believe that, I want us to belong together but I'm not the person you'd want to be with. I'm not the person people fall in love with for longer than the sun stays down."

"I always loved you in the daylight. When the sun reflected in your eyes and you looked like an angel in my sheets under the sun. I loved you every time you agreed to climb on the roof with me just so we could pretend to be somewhere else. You know that. You know all of it, you're still in those memories." Leaning her forehead against his, she could feel him swallowing down all the doubts that amplified themselves in the darkest corners of his mind over their time spent apart. "I love you, Logan. I still do, I don't think I ever could stop."

Angling her head up to meet her halfway, he could taste the tears on her lips. Broken sobs swallowed by his lips. She still tasted the same, they moved like they never parted.

Kissing her felt like walking. It was natural after learning it. An addiction he never got sober of, no matter how long he hadn't done it. And she sucked him right back into his compulsion. Tenderness turning into making up for the time they'd lost. His body moving her to lay down without hurting, hovering over her, one hand sprawled over her waist, the other one hold her face. Wrapping one leg around his waist, she pulled him closer, their bodies melting into one.

Parting to breath, he never left her untouched. Trailing kisses over her cheek and down her neck. Haltering over her collarbone, breathing against her heaving chest.

"Come to Briar with me, please. They're always looking for someone to work somewhere, we've got a house. The guys will love you. Hannah, Allie, they will love you. It'll be perfect. Just us and a new world to conquer. You can figure out what you want, you can still sign in. It doesn't matter. Just, please, come with me. I don't want to let this die again."

Staring at the sky she saw it, the future they pictured on her roof tumbling down in the form of shooting stars. Brushing past her as she closed her eyes and mumbled his name. Sealed and taken with the burning pieces of stone that held so much weight in people's hands that believed in them.

Picking up the hard plastic and letting her fingers slowly dial half of his number until she put it back on the hanger. The quiet sound echoing through the night like a scream by day. Walking a few steps before returning to her place. Back pressed against the wall, eyes closed to see him appear in front of her.

Noel still looked the same as when the band first left their little town down at Manchester. He still held her with the same delicate fingers under the covers after sneaking in through her bedroom window.

"Hello?" his voice spoke. So close and tired as if he was standing right next to her.

"Hello?" he tried gaining her attention again, his voice more annoyed now. It was a dream until she felt the cold plastic pressed up against her ear. "We don't buy any of your shite and if it's you, Gary, yer can fuck right off." And before she could speak to keep him on the line, the line was already dead. Noels figure fading from her peripheral vision and climbing back into his own bed over in London.

A bed she didn't know the smell of or how the fabric of the duvet felt on her sensitive skin. She didn't know whether the blinds were thick enough to keep the sun far enough to not wake her in the morning she could sleep in. She didn't know whether the other side of his bed was empty or for how long it would be. It felt like she barely knew him anymore.

The conversation from almost a week ago flooded her mind again. He didn't seem off, neither in tone nor in wording. He still laughed at boring stories from around their neighbourhood and complained about Liam with the same affection as he did back home. He still listened and hummed and threw in anecdotes of his own juvenile life. He talked when she grew tired and kissed her good night over the line. He said, that he missed her and love her in the same tender voice as when they laid side by side.

The second call came unexpected. His voice lower under the influence of his own mistakes and desires as he slurred words of regret that burned themselves in her mind the moment he said them out loud. "I don't think this is working. Can't help wanting yer here when yer there and I'm not gonna come back, love. We're too good to slowly let this run into the underground canals of this fucking country."

And then he was gone. His breath fanning down to her, running down her spine. Imitating the kisses he'd leave down her spine when she was still sleeping and he couldn't stop his lips from forming patterns on her skin. He needed to feel her and he wasn't too good for himself to show it openly and without remorse in her presence. Almost begging when she would push him off and mumble about wanting to go back to sleep.

The days ticked by like a bomb that couldn't wait to go off any minute that she had to sit with the pit in her stomach. Laying in her own trenches as she pulled his sweater over her head before going to bed before the moon was up completely. She still felt him in the questions that were left unanswered. His voice still lingered in the corners of her mind where he hadn't checked out of yet.

The final evaluation came on Friday morning, when a neat and crisp white envelope decorated the space in front of her door. Not pushed through the gap but close enough to feel the delicate print through the walls. The University of London. If they were meant to be how she always liked to believe, this would hold the answer as to where she'd wake for the foreseeable future.

Ripping the paper open, she read the letters printed with exact spacing twice before letting herself believe.

Packing enough for a weekend away, the sun stood at its zenith as she left the old run-down town behind for the first time with a clear goal in sight. Passing by fields and ruins, singing songs she'd want to hear from him instead, falling into daydreams of good and bad outcome. Pushing the bad ones away every time a streetlight turned green for her.

London wasn't what she always thought it'd be. It didn't feel as final as she always thought it would when she'd finally arrive in the city. The slip of paper where his address was scribbled on with bleeding ink at 2 in the morning from a few months back was now glued to her steering wheel. Searching for familiar landmarks and tourist traps, the pub he mentioned once or twice and the endless rows of shops he complained about. Noel never understood the significance such an addictive and useless way of passing time had in other people's lives until he fell into the trap of beauty himself. Though he didn't find it in clothes or shoes but in music and drugs.

Parking her car two streets away to give her time and space in case she wanted to turn around and walk away from the responsibilities she tied on her back with his help to keep the knot steady, a conversation she didn't want to have already played out in her head as she passed by parks and crossed streets without waiting for the light to turn green. She feared that if she stopped walking her feet would turn into concrete and she'd never find him from the spot she was tied to forever.

His window was closed, the street she recognized from pictures he'd taken from two stories high now laid out in front of her. With shaking fingers she pressed against the button that would inform him of her presence. Waiting, breathing, one two three four, the door stayed unlocked. Her finger found the button faster the second time she pushed it, the force almost locking the old thing in place.

The voice that boomed through the speaker was annoyed and unknown to her. It was rougher than Noel's voice and lower than Liam's. The complaints of the living in the house echoing out to her, the first impression was never a positive one in this city she feared. The sugar she consumed to keep her blood going now making her heart pound against her ribs so hard that she feared it might break them if she didn't get to hold him in a matter of minutes. At times like these, she felt like Noel's hands were the only ones that were able to keep her seams from bursting and her heart from falling out. But he wasn't around, at least not to her knowledge.

"What?" the unfamiliar voice spat with a familiar spite. It was the same one he used when she called a few nights back and she didn't answer.

Wrapping her arms around her middle tight enough so the words had no other way than up her mouth, she threw them up fast enough so no regret could follow in time to hold her back.

"Is Noel there?" she asked, eyes pressed close to keep the humiliation away from the real world if Noel turned out to be just as much of a stranger to the person on the other end of the line as he was to her these days.

The neoghbourhood felt eerily like a trap of embarrassment as she stood on the doorstep. Every window a possibility for eyes to watch her, every drawn curtain a hiding spot for the ghosts of her past to laugh at her without her knowledge of it taking over her legs and urging her to run. She stopped on his doorstep and suddenly her feet were concrete planted on cobblestone.

The line went quiet, a low rustle tumbled down to her as words were exchanged that she could barely follow. 'Some bird for yer, Noely.' The smirk evident in the voice that could determine her future. 'Again.'

"Shut up," Noel mumbled as he grabbed the phone. Exhaustion treating from his mouth into her ears, eyes opening in fear and recognition. 'Some bird for you, again'. How many girls did he have standing on his doorstep, ringing the bell with his last name in hopes of reaching him?

"What is it?"

How many voices had he heard on the other side? Was hers only one of many or still one in many? Did he even still recognize her by the pure utter of his name from his lips or did she need to spell out her name for the memories to come back to him? He broke things off but not because of lost interest of following and exploring a future together but out of inconvenience of their situation.

A window opened two stories above, a head poking out—one she'd never seen before. Smiling and waving down to her, chin resting on his hand as he inspected her from the angle where she looked like a different person entirely than when she was face to face with someone. Turning his head to speak into the apartment, he still spoke loud enough to be heard by her. "Oi, she's a pretty one. Better than those birds from the pub," he called out. The line going dead when she didn't answer again. Her throat twisting and tightening. The ribbon he neatly tied for her now making her choke.

The stranger was shoved aside by hands that were once a home to her when her own home seemed too foreign for her to stay there in comfort. Hands that had written her paragraphs and lines with the same delicate use of ink. Smeared at the edges when he was in a rush or neatly folded paper when he didn't have to be anywhere but with her in his own imagination. Eyes that she dreamed about seeing again found her with an ease that only love could control. The recognition she feared would never come flooding his eyes like a hurricane. Swapping over his eyes and straining his whole face in hostile nostalgia.

The other guy appeared next to Noel again, making enough space for himself to push Noel's chin up and keeping him from gaping down at her. "Don't start drooling before she's even up here, Noely G." He laughed but no one joined him in on the joke. Instead, Noel pushed himself off of the windowsill, disappearing from her view and leaving the two strangers to fight for themselves in awkwardness.

In a matter of seconds, the front door swung open. Noel in his leather jacket stepping out with unsure feet as if he couldn't tell the difference between whether this was a dream or reality. One hand stuffed in his pocket to keep himself from reaching out too fast for what their situation required.

"You're here," he mumbled, more to himself than anyone else. Her eyes dragged themselves over his face, inspecting him on any changes in appearance that would hint at the time spend apart between the two of them. "Why-How?" The rest of his questions was swallowed by his own bewilderment at having her this close again.

After the last time he dialed her number, he didn't believe to ever hear of her again. Not after his words stung on his tongue like poison on a wound. Not after he was infected with his own nauseous sickness and too afraid of passing it on to her if he kept her too close. So he strayed away, left her to cling to the only surface she had left in the ocean of their love. The promise he'd given her a year before. "If we ever have to part ways, under whatever circumstance that might come, don't give up on this until one of us can't breathe anymore. I know I won't, so please don't too."

And she didn't. She still held on to their invisible string even when the threat felt loose.

"Noel." She kept his thoughts from racing too far and dragging him too far along for anyone to catch him. "Can we talk?"

A whistle was heard from above them as she uttered those three words that no one ever wanted to hear from someone they loved. Nodding in surrender, he flipped his friend off before guiding her down the street and towards a place that was less observant and less stigmatic.

The atmosphere between the pair didn't loosen up the longer the walked, the numbness in their feet never fading, no matter how many steps they might take. Fingers brushing ever so lightly before one of them would scare away and push their hand into the pocket of their jacket. Out of sight, out of reach.

Settling down on one of the unoccupied benches by the little pond that slowly bloomed to life thanks to the rays of spring's sun reflecting on its liquid surface. Her legs were crossed, hands pulled together in her lap, fidgeting under the pressure that build up in her mind over the last few weeks.

He cleared his throat before his lips pressed into a flat line and something inside of him kept him from talking to her truthfully. The words he muttered drunk on the phone, they were the truth that he didn't want to believe in, no matter how clear the signs may have been. It were the words he wished to never have said but regret was a good disguise for awareness when you were still in denial.

"So you have girls on your doorstep regularly or…?" she asked, treating the topic like something delicate that could break at one wrong touch. Trailing off on the end of her sentence to leave him time to think when they both knew he needed none.

But how much of him did she actually still know and how much was a made up fraction of her fantasy based on memories from the person he once was?

New cities change people, both of them knew that that was a fact. But not every change has to be one of great impact, some are small revelations in a morning where you wake up alone and cling to a memory where once you held someone underneath the sunlight. Feeling awake before you had your eyes open simply because of the fact that you got to hold someone you loved first thing when consciousness took over sleep.

"They appear there but I don't let them in," he mumbled, feeling like he had to make his loyalty clear before explaining the situation in detail. Not wanting to let her guessing his feelings. "The nights when we play at some pub in the city, they like to ask around until they get an answer on your number or address and then they appear there in the morning or call you in the middle of the night. It's insane but you can't change it. People like to talk in this business and someone needs your address or number if you want to be available."

"You know, I won't hold it against you if you did let them in," she said, turning her head to look at him and making sure that he knew that she meant it. "I mean, we aren't really together anymore. You don't have to wait for us to be together anymore to get your pleasure."

"No, don't say that." Wrecking his hands down his face, Noel buried himself in his own shame as she uttered the words that could easily rip his heart out at the sound alone.

"It's true though, you said it yourself."

"I know what I said and I know that I didn't mean it. I don't want you away but we barely see each other and you've never had anyone besides me."

"What if I don't want anyone else?"

"You should. You shouldn't settle for someone like me. I'm not the type of person people want to spend forever with once they see what else the world has to offer."

Turning her body to face him, knees knocking against each other as she stripped herself off of any pride that she might still wear from having to pretend like his words over the phone didn't shatter her whole world into pieces and her back being too stiff to bend down and pick them up again.

"The last month that we spent apart was enough time for me to decide what I wanted, I put up with lonely evenings and phone calls at two in the morning without wanting something else before that and nothing about my feelings towards you have changed in that time since you moved to London. I met new people, I befriended people from different places and I like them, I really do, but they're not you, Noel. They never could be and that's what I want. I want you. I want to spend all my time with you and meet the people that are in your new life. I want to know you again like you are part of myself."

"We know how this ends though. We've tried it, this long distance thing, and look where it got us. We're sitting on a park bench barely able to say anything to each other in fear of saying the wrong thing. You might know what you want but it isn't this. And as much as I want you here, I know that it won't be possible. I mean, you've got responsibilities in Burnage and I have them here-"

"I'm going to London University," she cut in before he could say another word about an impossible dream.

His eyes snapped up from where they rested on the way his own fingers fidgeted in his lap. Staring at her in disbelief just like he did back at his flat, the moment when he couldn't believe that she was real. It was the same now, he still couldn't believe that this was the life he was living. That having her in his close proximity was going to be his future, one that was too good to be true. But she stared at him with a determination that told him that everything she was saying was true.

"What?" he asked again. Voice slurred in disbelief.

"I got in. Found the letter in front of my room this morning and I felt like it was a sign to come here. I don't think I would've if it wasn't for the confirmation that there's still hope. I thought, if I'm already going to live in the same city as you again, we might as well talk it out before we meet somewhere unexpectantly and it becomes this awkward moment where we are both with different people and realize that we have become two different people at the same time. I don't think I could've endured that."

"You're actually gonna live here?" This time, he cut her off before she could unravel too far.

"I am. Summer semester, four months."

And for the first time in months he let himself hold her without the fear of having her slip away any second. Wrapping her arms around her waist and burying his head in her neck. He pulled her so close, she fell into his lap. Almost straddling him as to not fall from his hold. A thousand little pecks landing on her neck and jaw as he let out all the love he bundled up and locked behind a concrete door the moment he realized that they wouldn't have the promise of a solid future. All the bumps in the road that they had to endure finally making sense in his mind. They weren't there to bring them apart but closer together on the long run.

"You think, that you can wait four months on me or do you still want to be broken up?" she asked, pushing his head from her neck, both hands on each side of his face to hold him in place and not let him duck in embarrassment of the public affection he gave her in that moment. Making him look into her eyes as he answered.

"I've been waiting longer than four months already, I think I can manage a bit more with something to look forward to. Especially something like that."

Setting her down to keep the stares at bay, he still held his arm wrapped around her shoulder. Pulling her into his side, his lips pestered to the top of her head. Breathing her in, mumbling against her hair every time he had something to say.

"You could move in with us," he offered once the thought settled in his mind. "Guigsy won't mind and my bed's big enough for both of us to sleep there even on bad nights when you don't want to face me. When the air's too hot and you force me out of my cuddling habit."

"It's not a habit, it's an obsession," she conquered. Hitting his chest to make him admit it.

"Alright, alright. Maybe it is, but only because of you."

"I can't believe one month of seperation made this more sappy."

She closed off from time to time, letting him guide her without complaints even when it wasn't where she was heading but eating only ever tasted as good as long as you don't throw up. And hunger comes again and again until starvation marks the end and right now, she felt like she was starving herself. Not allowing her common sense to take over in fear of it not being the right thing to do. What if he wasn't ready to talk yet? What if he'd never want to talk again?

Tossing and turning gave her reasons to dig her fingernails into her skin as if it was by accident. Leaving little red carves in her arms and legs and under her eyes, over her cheekbones or down her jaw. Biting her lips until she had to suck in the blood to keep it from dripping down on his side of the bed.

The fight wasn't bad, it wasn't a tragedy waiting to happen but the words felt hurtful all the same. How he had assured her on all her worst fears, pushing them further into her corner the longer they screamed. His voice always steady while hers broke and shattered in frustration of his composure. If only he would ever let himself say what he wanted to say in the way he wanted to.

It was the break-point of their argument. How his voice always sounded so professional lately when he told her he loved her or the way he barely let himself want her anymore. It wasn't neglect that she felt, it was change that she didn't want because it wasn't one that held truth at its core.

She tasted the bitterness in his tone as he finally snapped.

She felt him admire the blood dripping down her chest before guilt settled over his satisfaction at the hit. But before he could close the wound the door to their bedroom was already slammed shut. His own understanding of her coping mechanism leading him away from the entryway and towards the quiet living room. Listening to her shedding out her sadness on her own and the rustle of their sheets whenever she kicked the image of him in her mind.

When it was quiet, he thought it was over. No further sob, no deserved kick or fist against the mattress that would transfer it to his already sore muscles. This was it, he was sure of it.

Until the lock opened and he sat up fast enough for the room to spin. Eyes drained on the door-handle, waiting for the metal to move downwards to indicate that what he heard wasn't just a cruel prank that his mind played on him.

She stepped out before he could register the new darkness filling up part of the room. Eyes low as she wrapped her arms around herself, waiting for his upset tone and bored look at her figure. Though all she found in him when she looked up was worry and genuine regret. Not the kind you get when you heard someone was doing bad but when you could feel it twisting in your heart. Her pain was his now too.

"Amore," he whispered, the quiet of the night making it sound like a shout and she tensed at the sound. The gentle edge of his words sedating in the hour of day.

He noticed the forced errors in her face under the moonlight as she stepped back again, wobbling on unsure feet as he pushed himself up from the cushion that already bent to his discomfort. Stepping closer, brushing over the marks that her anger left behind as a reminder of her own decision. It was purposefully mocking him. Showing him just what he'd subconsciously done to her.

Tracing each line as if it were brushstrokes on a painting. His eyes following every movement of his thumb, the rest of his fingers treading through her hair, holding her down. Jannik felt his heart stop as she leaned into his touch without hesitation.

"I'm sorry," she said, choking down the remaining tears that were never meant for him. His eyebrows furrowing in confusion. The pale skin seeming almost ghostly if it wasn't for the shadows of his freckles and features that danced under the moonlight. "I shouldn't force you to act differently than you're wanting to just so it makes me feel better."

"No, no, no," he quickly cut her off. Catching the arm that tried to wipe away her sadness from beneath her eyes with his free hand and bringing it up to his lips. Mumbling against her bones so it would go directly through her skin into her veins and through to her heart. "I shouldn't behave how I did and you were right for telling me that. I've been so busy, after Roland Garros and now preparation for Wimbledon, I think part of me got stuck in work when all of me should've been here. Home with you."

"I don't ask you to completely lose your focus when you're here, I just don't want you to lose me out of your sight when you're focused," she redirected her words from before into a motion of comfort and understanding. It was coming from a place of worry rather than one of sadness.