#367 words

The Way I Really Need You   [also available on ao3]

 “Maybe I’m a man and maybe I’m a lonely man
 Who’s in the middle of something 
 That he doesn’t really understand”

“Keith?” Shiro froze in the doorway, the second he’d noticed his bed was already occupied he could feel his arm begin to hum. “I could have hurt you,” he mumbled continuing forward once his racing heart agreed with his mind that there was no threat. 

“You told me…” the younger male quietly began, “you promised me you weren’t having nightmares anymore, but I can hear you, Shiro. You’re just a wall away and it kills me. I want to help you, I don’t care what you says so don’t ask me to leave. I won’t.” Keith was determined and he just hoped Shiro could hear it in his voice because even though he told himself it wouldn’t, he knew it’d hurt like Hell if Shiro pushed him away now. “I’m not going to let you keep doing this alone.”

Stopping at the edge of the bed, Shiro simply nodded before crawling in next to the other paladin. Instead of keeping their usual distance, he curled in; throwing an arm over Keith’s stomach and laying his head on the younger’s chest.He could hear every beat of Keith’s heart. It was quicker than he’d expected, but still constant. Calming. Lulling.

“Do you think they’ll ever stop?” Shiro asked of his nightmares, wrapping his arm tighter around Keith. “That someday I won’t have to relive it every.single.night?”

“Yes,” Keith’s reply was soft, but matter-of-fact. “One day. It’ll be slow, so gradual you won’t even notice until it’s been a week or a month and you haven’t woken once.” Keith had rested his hand on Shiro’s back, drawing circles with each breath, but now his hand twitched at an idea. Slowly, his fingers lifted away and resettled on the back of Shiro’s head, stroking the longer top portion of his hair. “And until then, I’ll be here every night to remind you all that is over and that you’re safe. Okay?”

Shiro nodded, his eyes already closing as he listened to Keith’s heart settle into a slower pace. “Thank you, Keith… Goodnight.”

Keith’s lips tipped up into a smile as he leaned and pressed a kiss to the top of the other man’s head, “Goodnight, Takashi.”

„Here she IS!“ said a man of somewhat indetermined age. Who had convinced her to… cook for him. While Matia was in kindergarten. Safe and sound.

While she waited at the market. Because that was a public place. And the smirky dude was less than trustworthy.

“Hello, Eric,” she said, nodding at the man actually driving the car. He returned the greeting with a long-suffering smile. He might be alright.

Unlike the man he drove around. That one just jumped out of the other side of the car: “I almost thought you wouldn’t come!”

“… I was early. By twenty minutes.” She said, deadpan.

“Weeeeell, yes! But most people are so distrusting of me that they show up half an hour early, even trying to avoid the agreed upon task altogether!” He sounded rather cheery, saying that.

Admittedly, the thought had crossed her mind, briefly.

… no use crying over spilled milk, the highly untrustworthy man was there, she had the shopping basket with her and the market was in full swing.

“So, lovely lady, what are we getting?,” he said, smiling wide, hands behind his head.

“You really don’t know what alak paneer and rice is… or halwa, do you?”

“Nope!” He said, cheerily, “I like surprises!”

She heard the door close behind her, and a sigh: “Lets just go,” he made an ushering motion, then turned to her: “Miss Jibril, correct? Excuse our lack of manners, my name is Eric Townsend. This is Mazin Ruthven, my employer”

“Mazin, please. We want to have a nice visit to the market”

After a withering glance at ‘Mazin’ Eric smiled kindly: “I am his bodyguard, it is not always an easy task”

“I… can imagine”

He shrugged, then gave her five ten dollar bills: “For the ingredients. Thank you very much”

Who really knew what this grinning man was up to… that he needed such a patient bodyguard for… that he could apparently even afford.

“So, what first? Is there a proper shopping list? To check off? Is it in the phone? On an actual notepad?” This grown-ass man looked genuinely curious. “Oh! Do you know the recipe by heart?”

So I’ve just recently finished watching the entire Breaking Bad series. And all I can say is…what?! Are you for real?! You’re going to drag it out over five series and just end it like that?!

  Loads of my friends were constantly nagging me like “come on Rach, you HAVE to watch it!” and I’d just be like yeah, yeah, give me some time. So I started it, and was ‘like holy sh*t this is actually pretty good’ and so carried on watching.

  It’s taken me a couple of months due to uni work and my part time job getting in the way of my free time, and towards the ending I was itching to find out what happens to Walt because everyone raved on about how good the ending was.

  So there I am, on the last episode of the entire series, literally clawing at my duvet due to my anticipation. Then it ended. And I just kind of sat there, mouth wide open. When the episode finished I double checked on Netflix that it was definitely the last episode, and it was.

  The reason why I’m so p*ssed about the ending is because it…just kind of…ended. There was a slight indication of what would happen to everyone, but I just didn’t get how the producers thought that this was an appropriate ending to, what is, a bloody brilliant drama series.   

  So I was speaking to my friend, and he said ‘well how else could it have ended?’ Fair point, it makes sense for the programme to end the way that it did, but surely it could’ve been a bit more dramatic? No one else seems to understand why I’m so frustrated, and obviously I’m not going to state what happens just in case I’m spoiling it for anyone out there.

  I completely understand that not giving the audience an idea of what happens to everyone after the series has finished means there’s room for a person’s own interpretation, but I want to know more! Don’t just leave me hanging, that’s not fair at all! But, at the end of the day, looks like I’m one of the few people that were disappointed with the ending.