"Im so glad you came back"

Rayla haunted him.  This had to be yet another dream where she came back and they fell back together and he was left feeling hollow and alone and miserable in the morning.  He hated how much he still loved her.  It would be so much easier to move on if he hated her.  But, he couldn’t.  Even if he was mad at her, he now understood that she had desperately needed closure and she wasn’t going to get it staying in Katolis.  He knew that now.  That didn’t mean that being without her didn’t hurt.  

Rayla looked at him with slightly hurt eyes.  It didn’t make him feel better.   

“Fine.  What do you want to talk about?”  He rolled his eyes and strode over to the mirror.  Sources, if this wasn’t a dream….

“Anything, really,” she said.  “I’m so happy to see you again, Callum.”

She sounded happy.  Why did she sound so happy?  And anything?  She was going to talk about anything?  When she’d been off Lady Justice-knew where doing Sources-knew what after leaving him in the middle of the night on his birthday?!

Needing something to do with his hands, he started trying to move the mirror around.  Anything but this.  Anything but her sweet voice saying his name.  She was already pulling him back to her, like a siren from the stories Harrow used to read to him and Ez.  A spell so deeply woven into his soul that he’d never be free of it.  Of her.    

“OK.  So why are you back?  Did you find Viren?  Was he dead after all?”  He put a cloth on the mirror, refusing to look at her as she moved to come stand closer to him.  Couldn’t she just stay in the damn corner and talk from there?  Did she have to get so close that he could smell that slight wildflower scent that always clung to her?  He was going to go under if he wasn’t careful.  

But he wanted to.  He wanted to wrap her in his arms and kiss her and tell her that everything was OK because she was back and they could do anything if they were together.  But he also wanted to scream.

Rayla sighed.  “I didn’t find him.”

He turned around to face her, no longer able to control his annoyance.  “Oh.  So you disappeared for two years for no reason at all.”  He got up in her face a bit as she leaned back.  “And now you’re back.  Why?”

“I missed you.”  Rayla said it with such honesty he almost believed her.  No.  He wasn’t doing this again.  He wasn’t going to be her boyfriend and hold her…and kiss her…and…man, her lips looked so good.  Soft and just a little shiny.  Sweeter than any jelly tart.  He still remembered how she tasted.  What he wouldn’t give to fall back into her and just pretend that their life together hadn’t been upended by her leaving him.  

If she had stayed, maybe she could have been his fiancée by now.  He was old enough.  So was she.  Rayla would look stunning in a Katolian wedding dress, covered head to toe in gold, red, and cream.  A blushing smile on her face as they exchanged vows to the Paragons before their friends-No.  No.  He wasn’t getting lost in his fantasies.     

“That’s not good enough,” he finally said.  “You just left me in the middle of the night.  On my birthday, Rayla.  And the first thing you can say to me is ‘hey.  You look nice’?”  

She winced, looking slightly to the side.  “I know I hurt you-”

“Hurt me?  Oh, no.”  Callum laughed sardonically, shaking his head as he moved around the room to escape whatever she was doing to distract him.  “You didn’t hurt me, Rayla.  You destroyed me.  I was a mess when I saw that you were gone after you lied to me.”

“I left you a letter.  And I meant every word, Callum.  I loved you back then.  I still love you.”

“Oh,and that’s supposed to make me feel better?  That’s supposed to make up for you being gone for two years and just showing up out of the blue the day after my birthday?  You have a real funny way of delivering late birthday presents, you know that?”

“I deserved that.”  Sitting in the chair, she looked up at him in guilt.  “I was trying to protect you.  I wasn’t sure how long we’d be gone and I didn’t know just what Viren and Claudia were capable of.  I don’t regret my decision not to bring you with me because Ezran needed you.”

Ezran did need him, but still.  “Even more than you did?”

“No one will ever need you more than I do.”  

Callum stopped.  That was…unexpected.  It wasn’t an apology, but it was nice.  Maybe they could-NO.  NO.  Get a grip, Callum.  “That’s not good enough, Rayla.  Not at this point.  I-you-we.”  Releasing a groan of frustration, he ran a hand through his hair.  “I’m so furious at you, I could cry.  You left me!”

“I know.”

“Stop doing that!”  He rounded on her, glaring down at her figure as she wrapped her arms around herself.  “Stop just taking it and acting like if you just agree with me, this will all be fixed.”

“What do you want me to do, then?!”  She stood up from the chair so fast that it fell backwards.  “You want me to get on my hands and knees and beg you to forgive me?  Or to love me back?  I don’t beg anyone for anything, Callum.”

“No!  That’s not what I want.”

“Then what do you want?  An apology?  Oh, I’m sorry that I tried to keep my boyfriend safe.”  She rolled her eyes as she finished in a sarcastic tone.  “Guess what?  I’m not.”

“Then why are we even talking?  What’s the point?”

“Because I want to be in your life again.  And I don’t know how to do it.  You don’t want me to listen to you yell at me and you don’t want to talk and you don’t want me to beg.  So, what do you want?”

“I wanted you!”  Callum’s palms were up as his fingers curled.  She was so infuriating!  And aggravating.  And…and…she put her hand on his elbow.  And…was she leaning in?  Why did she have to come back so damn pretty?  Daring, strong, beautiful, smart.  She was so perfect.  

“I still want you,” she whispered before slanting her lips over his.  She was trying to distract him.  It wouldn’t work.  He had things to say and yell and-oh, oh, he’d missed this.  Her soft, pillowy lips were so familiar it was like coming home.  

She sighed softly as their lips moved against each other.  Strong arms wrapped around his neck as small hands played with his hair.  It was like she’d never left.  His arms latched onto her waist while she backed up against the wall.  

He didn’t care anymore.  She felt too good.  Dream, real, it didn’t matter.  He just wanted to drown in the love of his life.  

One of his hands landed on the wall next to her head, tilting his head to devour her more.  It wasn’t enough.  Her little tongue snuck past his lips to play with his.  The last time they’d done this, they’d be way too embarrassed to talk about it.  The last time….

Shoving himself off of her, his breath coming out in harsh pants.  Her purple eyes were hooded and full of hunger.  “Callum,” she whispered, “I missed you so much.”

He’d missed her, too.  Everything in him ached to hold her close and do whatever she asked of him.  Burning, all-consuming love reignited with such a fury that he didn’t know what to do about it.  He didn’t know what to do.

“You need to stay right there,” he said as he walked towards the center of the room.  The distance between them should clear his head.  “I need to think.”

“You can think next to me.”  

Why did she have to be so tempting?  Her legs were longer and her waist was more defined under that cloak.  He’d felt it with his own hands.  Her chest had been so soft against him.  Her body had changed and he liked what he saw.  It was hard not to think dirty thoughts when she looked at him like all she’d ever wanted was him.  

“No, I really can’t,” he finally said.  “Where were you?”

She groaned, leaning her head against the wall.  “In Xadia.”

“Doing what?”

“Tracking Viren.”

“Is that all you did?”  Silence.  “Rayla?”  Still no answer.  Her fingers played with the end of her cloak before she pulled it off.  Oh.  She was…she was hot.  That cloak was practically criminal hiding her from him like that.  No.  Stop.  Focus, Callum.  Focus.  “Answer me.”

“If you’re asking if I was involved with anyone, the answer is ‘no.’”

Not exactly what he’d been gunning for but he’d take it.  “That’s…that’s good.  But I still have no idea what you spent two years doing and you won’t give me a straight answer, so I don’t see what the point of us continuing is.  So, I’m going to bed and you can just…do whatever you’re going to do, I guess.”

He made his way to the door, ignoring the concerned look from Bait and the weird look he got from the creepy lemur-looking thing Rayla had brought with her.  

“I lost someone,” Rayla finally said.

Hand on the handle, he paused.  Looking back at her, he saw her eyes on the floor.  “What do you mean?”

“I went back to Silvergrove to see if they would unghost me and they refused.  Not even a letter from the Dragon Queen was enough.  And, they wouldn’t let Ethari see me.  So, I wandered around Xadia trying to track Viren and I ran into some assassins who were doing their own thing and I joined their group.”

So, she’d had friends.  That was good, actually.  It made him feel better to know that there had been people watching her back when he hadn’t been given the chance to.  No matter how much it hurt that she hadn’t chosen him, them, in the end, he still wanted her to be safe.  

“One of our group, Siobhan, well, let’s just say that she was obsessed with revenge.  I connected to her because we both lost our parents to monsters, but she didn’t want closure like I did.  She wanted to kill her parents’ killer and I tried to help her.  The monster was already dead.  So, she killed the kids.”

“Rayla-”

Shaking her head, Rayla looked up at him with teary eyes.  “They were just babies, Callum.  She kept calling it a monster, but it’d just been a banther.  She made me believe it was some kind of noble cause, that we were ridding the world of someone like Viren.  It was just a banther.  After that, I couldn’t stay and I wandered around for a few months before I realized that I wasn’t going to find Viren.  The trail had grown too cold.”

“So you came back?”

“I came back.  I’m never going to get closure and a part of me still hasn’t accepted that.  I believe he’s still out there, but I’m never going to find him.  Or Claudia.  They both eluded me.”

“I’m sorry you were involved in that, but I can’t just let you back into my life like nothing happened.”  Running a hand through his hair, he tried to find the words to explain what he wanted to say to her.  “You’ve hurt me in ways I can’t explain to anyone because I still love you.  I’m angry at you.  My head’s all turned around, I’m short with everyone, I hate my own birthday now.  I feel like I’m becoming someone I don’t like because I can’t let you go.”

“Do you even want to let me go?” 

No, he didn’t.  She was the best thing that had ever happened to him and their love was the stuff of fairy tales.  When he’d jumped off the Spire for her, he’d known in that moment that he couldn’t live without her.  And she’d made him do just that for two years.    

“I feel like you aren’t listening to what I’m saying, Rayla.  You keep focusing on the parts concerning us and not the rest of it.  I’m hurt.  I’m angry.  You are not coming back into my life to do what you did all over again.”

They stood in silence for a few minutes, looking at each other before looking away.  The tension was so thick he could have cut it with a knife.  “I don’t know how to make this better,” she finally said.  “I don’t regret trying to protect you.  But, you’re right.  I did ruin your birthday and I understand why you’re angry with me.  I just want you back, Callum.”

“You never lost me.  But I thought I lost you.”

“Didn’t you read my letter?”  Her eyes were wide in confusion as she made her way towards him.  He didn’t stop her from cupping his cheeks.  “You will never lose me.  I am irrevocably yours.”

“But you left.”  A few tears leaked out of his cheeks.  Her calloused thumbs lightly brushed his cheeks.  “Rayla….”  

“I’m so sorry that I made you feel like I didn’t want you.”

“You picked revenge over me.  What was I supposed to feel?”

“It wasn’t revenge.  It was closure.  I was looking for answers because I don’t know what Viren did to my parents or Runaan.  And it’s killing me inside almost as much as being without you is.  I’m not the same person I was when I left and I can live with not getting answers a lot easier now.  But I can’t live without you.”

“If you’re coming back, we have to go slow.”

“I can go slow.”  She leaned in again, stopping before she made contact with his lips.  “I can go as slow as you want.”

His eyelids lowered as he felt her breath against him.  “I’m still angry at you.”

“We can talk it out.  All the Big Feelings Times you want.”

“You can’t leave me again.”

“Never.”  

He closed the gap, unable to hold back from the promise of getting lost in her.  They needed to talk more.  They really needed to work through his feelings and what she did.  But kissing her felt too good and he didn’t have the energy to fight her anymore.  His heart beat louder in his chest than it had in a long time, her hand coming up to touch his chest right over it.  Everything in him felt so alive as she pulled back to the wall.