“Shh. It’s okay, flamma. It’s okay. Shh. You’re safe.”
Words penetrated into her consciousness, a litany of words spoken right into her ears, pulling her away from the black hole.
She resisted, keeping her eyes closed, wanting the numbness.
“My beautiful girl,” the voice kept whispering, seductive in its call, alluring in its lure to reel her back in. “So soft, so vulnerable, so hurt. You hurt, don’t you?”
She did. She hurt, and she didn’t know how to heal. She’d thought it had gotten better, but it had been an illusion. Would she ever get better? Would it ever not hurt?
“I will set the whole world on fire before I let anything hurt you again.”
The dark promise full of violence made the black hole take a step back.
“Give me your eyes, flamma. I want to see the fire in them. Show them to me.”
The two forces warred within her, the black hole pulling her to oblivion and the devil holding her tight, refusing to let go.
And suddenly, her hands were free.
That sent her eyes flying open, the sudden loss of the touch that had been anchoring her imbalancing her.
She blinked as he stood. Bending to pick her up in his arms and nestling her close, he began carrying her back to the direction of the house.
Jolted from whatever mental state she had gone in, she hiccupped occasionally, slowly letting her mind come back down to reality, unable to understand her heightened emotions or her overreaction. And she had overreacted, hadn’t she? She had found him fully clothed with a naked woman and done the first thing that had come to her mind—run. She hadn’t given him the benefit of the doubt, hadn’t waited to calmly let him explain exactly what had been going on, hadn’t even stayed to let him get a word in.
And then she’d screamed like a banshee and proceeded to have a mental breakdown in the middle of nowhere.
She’d been doing so well, so much better. She just didn’t understand it.
Embarrassed that he’d witnessed something like this again, witnessed how broken and imperfect she was, she hid her face in his neck, her body trembling in the aftermath.
Their walk back passed in utter silence, and she took the time to steady her heart-rate.
They emerged near the greenhouse just as cold, fat drops of rain began to pour.
“Hold on tight,” he instructed her before suddenly turning her so she was over his shoulder. World tilted upside down, she held onto his jacket as he sprinted back to the house, the torrential downpour soaking them both within seconds.
He didn’t stop under the porch, simply opening the door and carrying her inside, all the way to the master bathroom.
Slowly setting her down on the floor, he pushed her wet hair out of her face, looking down at her with a softness she’d never seen from him.
“Get out of the clothes.”
The instruction came on the heel of him pulling away, leaving her standing alone in the bathroom.
Confused, she did as he’d asked, dropping the wet clothes to a corner of the floor, before taking a shaky breath and splashing water on her face.
They both sucked at emotions it seemed, her with the excess of it and him with the lack. And she had to bridge the gap, or at least try to, so something like tonight didn’t happen again. Though, it probably would. Dr. Manson had warned her it could, but she had fallen into a sense of security, and it had caught her unaware. But she could hope it wasn’t as often, because she felt raw, her wounds that had been closing torn open again. And every time this happened, she would have to start from the scratch to try to stitch them together, each time making the scar deeper and worse.
Walking out into the bedroom naked, she found herself pulling on the silky bottle-green shorts and camisole set she’d put on the bed for the night before going out. Running her fingers through her hair, noticing the way they were beginning to fall more into their natural waves, she exited into the open living area.
The smell of the pasta she had made, what felt like ages ago, wafted from the kitchen.
Following her nose, she went into the space she had slowly made her own, and found him sitting on the dining table, shirtless in his sweatpants as he liked to be when he lounged around at home, his hair wet and gleaming in the low lights.
The plates she’d put in the oven were on the table, along with two tall glasses of water.
“Sit.”
Suddenly nervous, both because that was a meal she’d made and because of the breakdown she’d had, she quietly took a seat on his right, tucking her chin into her neck.
“What happened tonight?”