#hawks cheating

Love is an unyielding force, depending on the person. Some people love hard, others have what I call an inkling of love. Meaning the love is there, just not enough to make them stay or leave. Or some have no love at all; they fake their emotions just to gain a means to an end. So how do I classify the person who threw away three years of a perfectly good relationship?

Here we both stand in our (his) apartment; his eyes are downcast on the floor. He's silently begging for the floor to open up and devour him whole. My body moves on autopilot as I walk away from him, feet leading me to his den of sin. Our bedroom was once a source of comfort for us, now I'm hastily reminded of him fucking another woman on the sheets I painstakingly picked out, a nice burgundy color for fall.

As I hastily pack the essentials: clothes, toiletries, and a few comfort items, all harshly packed away in my purple suitcase. I feel the warmth of his body enveloping me; hands circled my waist, pulling me against his heaving chest. Why is he crying? Isn't this what he wanted?

He wanted an open relationship, he wanted other people, he wanted sex on his terms. None of which includes me, so I'm leaving.

"Please don't go," he begs. Funny for years I had been trying to get him to open up to me and now all because he couldn't keep his dick in his pants he wants to have a breakthrough.

I forcibly pushed him off of me, I refused to feed into his crocodile tears.

"I'll be back sometime next week for the rest of my stuff," I reply venomously.

He screams for me to wait, but I'm already at the door. Fist clenched tight around the doorknob. I take a long breath before turning back to him. He's so beautiful, a cheating bastard, but a beautiful teary-eyed bastard.

"I refuse to be a fool for you anymore."

I refused to listen to his cries and pleas as I opened my gate to freedom and closed it behind me; trapping him in his den of sin or now his gilded cage of guilt.

||||

The first three days were the hardest; when I first left the apartment I wandered aimlessly until I got hungry and hunkered down in a café. It was like God was playing a cruel joke; there were couples everywhere, being cute and loving. It makes me sick, so in between drinking my too-sweet macchiato I called Junko, my dear friend, to let me stay at her place through this whole ordeal. I didn't have to wait very long before a familiar face was decorated with comical makeup (clown core is what she calls it.) Bustled through my section of the café.

"I know I'm supposed to cry with you, but this all-nighter setting spray."

I fucking died at her response, classic Junko; a fashionista to the end.

After leaving the café we went to a nearby convenience store and loaded up with everything: junk food, alcohol, and eye drops...for when we smoke "cigarettes" on the roof of her apartment building. During the walk, my phone kept vibrating in my pocket; I kept receiving calls from Keigo and ...Miruko? I was very tempted to throw my suitcase case and phone over the bridge, just a big fuck you to the birdman with Hella mommy issues.

A blood-curdling scream ripped itself from Junko's throat, startling the fuck out of me.

"From experience, if you don't scream or cry, your thoughts and emotions will cloud your mind." She said with a jovial look etched into her clownish-looking features. "I rather scream than do something stupid, like throwing a 40,000¥ phone into a river."

She's right. So for a good half an hour; I screamed into the indigo/orange mixture that was the sky over Mustafu.

"Fuck you Keigo!!!"

My back welcomed the plush bedding of Junko's guest bedroom when I fell backward on it. Back lounging on the softest and not cum stained sheets; did I allow my eyes to close. I didn't allow my mind to dawdle on birdman and all his shortcomings, instead, I thought about-

"You wanna smoke a bowl?" Junko inquired while standing in the doorway.

"You might wanna pack that bowl nice and tight." I meditated while staring at the colorless ceiling. My night ended with me and Junko smoking a bowl on the roof of her apartment building staring at the ever-changing hues of the sky,...yeah I'll be alright.

||||

I don't remember much of day one at Junko's, day two I spent most of the day hiding away and thinking. My relationship with Keigo had red flags from the beginning. His crude personality manifested when the two of us would have fought and in the end; when he got knocked down a peg, would lead him to hide or fly into the night.

Funny, he can insult me, but when I raise my voice I'm being unreasonable.

With my collection of parental issues; I swallowed my pride and apologized. Every single time I would come crawling to that mother fucker his eyes glowed darkly with amusement. Another red flag was the gifts; Keigo expressed early on that he was a gift-giver, and it never sat right with me. One day a Givenchy dress showed up on my doorstep; Keigo was adamant that I wear it to a charity function. The next gift was a necklace he quietly placed around my neck while I was distracted. Lastly and the most shocking, a forced threesome. We had talked about fantasies and whatnot; I jokingly mentioned that I wanted to have a (hypothetical) threesome with him and another Pro hero, you know as a joke.

" Keigo, what is this?"

"A gift for patching me up last week."

"Such a loving girlfriend, Yasmin.” Miruko passionately murmured. Her desire-filled crimson eyes bore holes into my frame. Yes Miruko is a beautiful and intimidating woman, but

I couldn’t stop the chill that ran through my body as I watched Pro Hero Miruko saunter over to my direction, all dressed in expensive-looking lingerie. The necklace that Keigo gifted me before, fitting comfortably around her neck. Tucking a strand of stray hair behind my ear, her lips were on my left earlobe; hot, wet, and hungry. I felt Keigo’s bare chest against my back as his tongue seriously licked my right earlobe.

My thoughts are a mess; my pulse is racing faster than a speeding bullet, my body is racked with tremors, and my throat is dry. Why would he do this? Am I not enough for him? Does he want someone else?

~~~~~~~~~~

The first month was the hardest. You barely ate or drank anything, tending to spend most of the time either crying yourself to sleep or staring blankly at the ceiling. Showering and basic hygiene were out of the question, not like you really cared at that point.

It took you a week to muster enough strength to call in “sick” to work. You guessed you needed some explanation for the sudden and long absence. Your boss, bless that sweet man, was so understanding. He said to take as much time off as you needed to get better. “You can’t do your best work if you aren’t feeling your best! We can handle some of your work while you're gone, just get some rest alright?” He also mentioned that he had come to the office earlier looking for you. You thanked him and hung up the phone to continue brooding in your room.

After a while, you figured while you were still up for it, you could fill others in on your condition. Your work friends felt relieved to know you were still alive, even joking about how they were picking up the slack. You laughed with them, not having the heart to tell the truth. Continuing to scroll through your phone, you eyed the name in red on recent calls.

98 missed calls from ~Birdy~

Someone was desperate. You checked messages.

273 messages

You were sure some of those came from other friends and family worried about you, but you knew where the majority came from. He was so desperate to talk to you. It made your insides churn. He had ripped your heart out with little to no remorse and had the gall to try and contact you. Sighing, you clicked on the name. 

Block this number?

He doesn’t deserve you, not anymore.

This number is now blocked.

You put the phone down and rolled back into your blanket cocoon to continue your sulking. You needed to get your life back together. It was going to be hard, but it had to be done. You were not letting some stupid man steal your happiness. If he really loved you, he wouldn’t have cheated. Tomorrow would be the day to change. You’d start tomorrow.

~~~~~~~~~~

It actually took you 2 weeks to coax yourself out of the house. The final straw was when you ran out of food. Your supply had only lasted so long because you weren’t eating much, but it had eventually been depleted. What’s worse, when you came home and the smell hit your nose from the doorway.  It was a pungent, horrid thing. It made you wonder how you had even lived in here this whole time.

You broke down in tears by the door. That’s it, you were going to get things done now. You put away the groceries and started from the living room and worked your way in opting to take this a section at a time. Today you would put all the surface level trash-wrappers and tissues and the like in the disposal and take that out. 

You spent the next few days this way, cleaning the many layers of gunk. It was kind of therapeutic in a way, cleaning out the filth from your home and life. Slowly but surely the progress you were making became apparent, even the smell had dissipated. 

Now that your place was clean, you decided to work on yourself. Again starting off small, you got yourself to eat at least two meals a day and drink more water. That part wasn’t as hard as you thought it would be. Your appetite wasn’t what it used to be, but it was a start. The color in your face was starting to return, and that brought a smile to your once solemn face.

By the end of month 3 things had gotten better, you had resumed work like nothing happened. Everyone was relieved to see you back, though they noticed how off you seemed. No one mentioned it assuming it would stop eventually, they were, sadly, sorely mistaken. 

Still struggling with the feelings your relationship had left, you felt hollow, a shell of yourself. The spark of passion for daily life had become nothing but a smoldering pile of ash. You needed something to give you that spark again. What better way to do that than going back to your old side job. You hurriedly grabbed your phone.

~~~~~~~~~~

Vigilantism. Hawks had never been a fan of the act, always shot the topic down whenever it came up. 

“Leave the saving to the professionals, love dove.” he would always say. Never openly disliking their work, but advising against the act. It was illegal after all. Good thing you worked in a boring old office every day.

To be fair, you only moonlighted a few times a month and even that had decreased after you two started dating. You had briefly considered giving it up, starting to put more trust in heroes. Seeing your boyfriend come over after an especially good day at work beaming with pride after a solved case filled you with hope. 

The competence of heroes and the police had nothing to do with your re-entry into the rouge business. You trusted them to do their jobs, you just did what they couldn’t. Big corporations with ties to criminal and villainous activity made up a majority of your targets.

They were untouchable due to their influence over both the media and key political figures. If anyone tried to out them, let’s just say no one will be hearing from them any time soon. That’s where you come in. Taking down the pretenders, villains in disguise.

You looked back in the mirror, eyes still somewhat hollow. Two months back in the game had made things bearable. It didn’t fix you or replace the hole in your heart, but healing was on its way, it had to be. 

You looked yourself over once more as the sun set in the corner of your eye. Taking one last deep breath to mentally prepare for tonight, you quickly grabbed your purse and headed out the door.