Oneshot of Naomily's relationship in series three from Emily's perspective, based loosely on Kate Voegele song "Manhattan from the sky" which I love. Hope you enjoy :)
Manhattan from the Sky
It's like extreme dating, Emily thinks of her relationship with Naomi. Its hard and challenging and really not for the faint of heart. But it's something about the rush she gets when Naomi lets her in that forces Emily to continue. As if chasing Naomi is like jumping off a cliff or scaling a wall, scary at first and difficult to master but well worth it once you do.
The walls Naomi has built are the most daunting that Emily has ever witnessed, both high and fortified to Trojan standards. And Emily just knows that inside must hold some special treasure worthy of such defenses.
Emily tries digging under the walls sneakily, trying to assure Naomi that she just wants her friendship. But Naomi sees right through it and is always there waiting on the inside of her tower for Emily to break through, only to force her back out and cement in the trench for good measure. Next Emily attempts forcefully breaking her way through the walls with angry words, declaring that her first thought when she sees Naomi is not "I want to fuck that girl". This approach proves affective for a brief time, as if Naomi is thrown off by the amount of force someone as small as Emily can wield, and while Naomi is slightly stunned Emily can make her way in. But alas Naomi regains her composure and Emily always finds herself thrown back out. As a last ditch effort Emily tries sky diving in, flying overhead with Naomi getting fucked off of pills, spliff or vodka. Joking and laughing with her while floating around in bliss and even being able to sneak a few kisses here and there. But when they parachute back down Naomi always seems to get grounded again, like she comes to her senses and once again Emily is left back out in the cold, her lips still tingling from the memory of Naomi's kisses.
Somewhere along the way Emily decides that maybe persistence is the key. To make small dents in the wall when possible that would go unnoticed by Naomi until it was too late and the damage was too substantial. So she pulls back taking some pressure off of the blonde, watches her from afar, flying overhead and peering down. And its ridiculous because all Emily can think of is how beautiful and perfect Naomi looks when she isn't being spooked. Its like when she feels her walls aren't being threatened Naomi has the time to focus on cleaning everything up, really making herself shine. Neat and tidy is what comes to mind when Emily looks down at Naomi's fortress, like everything has been stuffed into closets and placed aside allowing Naomi to project her usual aura of cold indifference to the world.
Emily wonders to herself how much effort and energy it must take for Naomi to keep everything tucked away like she does. Because despite Naomi's best efforts Emily knows her, she knows that on the surface Naomi seems fine but underneath is another story. From her brief moments of being permitted to walk around Naomi's mind Emily knows that her walls are hiding a mess that she tries desperately to shut away. The worst part is Emily knows that if Naomi would just let her in that she could help. She could help Naomi clean up the mess rather than brushing it under the rug in hopes that no one will notice. She knows Naomi is just afraid, afraid of depending on someone, needing someone. And its frustrating at times because in order for her to show Naomi that she isn't going anywhere Emily needs to get close to her. But she can never get close enough before Naomi bolts, running as fast as she can in the other direction.
So Emily sticks to her approach, continues making small little cracks, still small enough to remain concealed but large enough that when placed together Emily can feel them making a difference.
The first time Emily notices light appearing through one of her cracks is at the lake. It's a small hole, just enough to see through but she can feel it. Can feel the warmth emitting from Naomi when she pulls back from the blowback and looks deep into Emily's eyes. And Emily can see in, as if Naomi's crystal blue eyes aren't just stunning but the gateway to her soul as well. It's Naomi who kisses her this time, Naomi who pushes her weight forward pinning Emily to the blanket, breathing heavily until Emily flips them over. Taking control of the situation, desperate to reward Naomi for finally giving her something and as she does Emily can feel her crack in Naomi's wall crumble around the edges and grow bigger.
Sometime in the night Naomi makes a desperate attempt to mend the breach. Boards it up with wood and rusty nails, not perfect and no where near as strong as before but enough to make her feel safe again. And as Emily watches her walk away after yelling at her to be brave she can see the board shaking with want to fly off and let her back in. But Naomi being stubborn as always forces it shut and keeps walking.
Its later when Naomi shows up at her house that Emily sees how much damage she has really done. She almost feels bad because Naomi just sounds so terrified of letting herself feel anything. Feels herself chipping away slowly again on another spot as she holds Naomi's hands through the cat flap saying that they could sit like this for a bit.
Emily backs off a little again after this because despite her desire to get through to Naomi, to make her feel everything that Emily had been feeling for sometime she doesn't want to break her. She feels she can go slower now; making small blows when she can because she knows the effect she's having. It's as if she can feel how much Naomi really wants her to see inside and can feel how much the realization of this fact has really sent the blonde for a loop.
So they go on Katie's camping trip, they drink, laugh and have a good time, and Emily allows herself to relish in the glow Naomi emits when she feels comfortable. By the end of the night Emily can feel another gap breaking in Naomi's stone with much less effort than she had put in before. She feels Naomi grab her hand under the sleeping bags they had zipped together. All of a sudden Emily feels warm, almost burning because Naomi has shuffled impossibly closer and is radiating this heat, which makes Emily melt even more than she had already for the blonde. Her lips are just about touching Naomi's when JJ bursts in the tent mumbling something about being scared and asking if he can stay with them. Emily wants with every fiber of her being to scream no and tell him to fuck the hell off because she feels she may have just lost another chance, another moment with Naomi. But when the boy falls asleep Naomi roughly pressing their lips together takes Emily off guard, and its urgent as if she had been dying to do this for sometime now. In the morning after several hours of "wriggling" Emily can really see the progress she has made. She watches as Naomi sleeps with a gentle smile looking like a rose that had finally opened up and bloomed causing its thorns to no longer be the focal point but its beauty taking over. The gap in the wall is nearly big enough for Emily to fit through now, just a little bit more and Emily knows she will be in. When she wakes up to find Naomi making her way out of the tent Emily quickly follows, needing to search Naomi's eyes and see if the connection was still there. And when Naomi smiles at her and plucks a leaf out of her hair Emily is left a little bit in awe. She can see that Naomi has patched the hole with tape, quite flimsy in comparison to what lay before it, and Emily wonders how much longer it could possibly hold.
When Naomi sees straight through her Katie disguise Emily feels her heart leap. She can see Naomi looking her up and down telling her she looks nice and Emily can feel Naomi's boards rattling again. Naomi makes one last effort to hold it together, muttering something about Cyprus and being friends. And as she turns around to walk away Emily can feel her trying and failing to cover all the cracks at once. When Emily raises her hammer and delivers one final blow in the form of "I'll miss you" its like Naomi is running in circles mending one hole while three others form until she gives in. Stops in her tracks and finally lets her feeble fortress fall. She turns around and storms towards Emily, and Emily's breath hitches as her back hits the cold metal of the lockers. She quickly forgets about the discomfort when Naomi kisses her hard, and passionate and desperate as if she's clinging to Emily for dear life. Needing something to hold onto now that the floodgates have been opened and the current is threatening to wash her away.
Emily allows Naomi to drag her home, to urgently undress her before quickly melding their bodies back together. Emily becomes like a life vest, letting Naomi cling to her riding out the storm, keeping her afloat until everything passes. Naomi collapses next to her panting until she catches her breath and as Emily does the same she cant help but notice the smile on Naomi's face like all the ice has melted away revealing what was always there but hidden. And when Naomi turns onto her side beginning to run her fingertips up and down Emily's arm Emily thinks the war is finally over, that a detente has been reached and the coast is clear. So she spills it all, what she had been wanting to say to Naomi for a while now but didn't for fear of the blonde running. Emily tells her that she wants them to be together like for real, that she wants to tell people, asks Naomi to go to the love ball with her.
She never expected to look over and see Naomi building a make shift tent, climbing inside it in some sort of pathetic attempt to keep the red head out once again. This becomes Emily's breaking point because its to fucking ridiculous to handle for her at the moment, that after all they had been through in the last couple hours alone that Naomi was still trying to fight it. Trying to pretend that she didn't want Emily inside. So Emily gets up, decides that if Naomi wants her space so badly that she would give it to her. Because she has spent the last few months chasing, diving, rolling and what ever other maneuvers were required to avoid Naomi's defenses and quite frankly she was tired, exhausted actually. It was time for Naomi to make some effort if this was what she really wanted because Emily honestly didn't think she could do it anymore.
Emily doesn't expect Naomi to look so broken when she walks away, fights hard against every impulse in her body that was telling her to turn around and comfort Naomi, to pull her into an embrace and somehow make her smile again. But it wouldn't do any good, it would just start up the vicious cycle again, like Emily is taking one step forward and two steps back and Naomi is constantly looking for some sort of shelter to hide herself away. No she had to be strong this time, she had to walk away and leave Naomi to sort out her issues by herself for once.
As much as she hoped for Naomi to come running back to her it still took Emily by surprise when Naomi rang her the next day, sent her constant text messages and voicemails. Emily wanted to answer to respond but she had so much going on with Katie that she didn't think she could handle it if Naomi was just building her up to break her down again. Then there was the fact that it felt nice to be chased for a change, to know that Naomi was seemingly desperate to get in contact with her for whatever reason and Emily couldn't figure out for the life of her what scared the blonde so much about it.
Katie guilts her into going to the Loveball with her Freddie and JJ, and Emily realizes quickly how awkward things had become between her and JJ since their one off, not to mention Katie knew now and she had a pretty good idea that it wouldn't be long before everyone did as the older twin could never keep a secret. She thought about Naomi finding out, wondered how she would react, if she would even care at all. The answer comes quickly however when she sees Naomi standing at the bottom of the steps. Emily's first thought is how beautiful Naomi looks, feels her heart swelling at the thought of Naomi showing up for her, to show her that she wanted this as much as she did. This thought quickly fades when she catches the glimmer of hurt in Naomi's eye's, her mind races trying to figure out what was causing the blonde pain. Seeing the look of distain Naomi was casting towards JJ it didn't take much for Emily to figure it out, she didn't get a chance to speak before Naomi came out with it, the words spilling off her lips so cold and sharp that they cut right through Emily. Naomi is off and up the steps before Emily can explain and Emily doesn't know what is worse, that Naomi is walking away from her again, or the fact that she could tell Naomi cared, she could see the tears glimmering in her eyes as she walked by as if she was finally admitting that she cared but Emily had let her down.
Emily turns in the other direction, needs some time to compose because the last thing she wants to do is break down in front of Freddie or JJ, and knowing her sister she knew Katie would probably just tell her to suck it up and enter the spirit of the party. What she intended to do was storm into the school, find Naomi and not let her walk away until things were explained, until she knew that that night with JJ meant nothing. Emily searches the gym frantically for peroxide hair, decides to try the halls and finally hears Katie and Naomi's voice coming from a deserted classroom not far down. She stops suddenly in her tracks outside the doorway, hears Naomi confess that it was Katie who told her about JJ and worse of all hears Katie respond in a harsh tone that she deserved it. Emily feels it then, the anger bubbling up inside of her feeling like it she might explode. It only takes one look to Naomi's left cheek, seeing the livid red mark that had undoubtedly been left there by her sisters hand for Emily to snap. She turns to walk away, hears Katie chasing after her with excuses and Emily realizes she's had enough. Feels like a complete hypocrite for scolding Naomi about her walls when Emily was just as bad, allowing Katie to shackle her and toss her in a prison to play the part of the perfect twin and accessory to make Katie feel good about herself.
So they fight, for real this time nails scratching and hands grabbing hold of chunks of hair. And as Emily pushes Katie onto the dance floor Emily sees fear in Katie's eyes, and realizes the older twin never had any idea how strong Emily could be when she wanted to be. Emily takes a calming breath and stands up offering a hand to help Katie up. Decides its time to show Naomi she can be brave too, show her that if she can be brave enough to open herself up that Emily can be brave enough to finally step out of Katie's shadow. Emily strips off the purple dress revealing a black outfit underneath and its like symbolic, like she's shedding the layers that Katie had built up around her all these years. Decides since she has done this much she had might as well take the last jump, so she runs forward as fast as she can and jumps telling katie that she likes girls, no she likes a girl, no she loves her and praying that Naomi catches her. And when she looks over and sees Naomi's outstretched hand beckoning her over Emily knows that she's made it, that she some how managed to jump far enough to land in Naomi's arms.
They are walking out of the school hands intertwined, swinging between them when Naomi finally verbalizes those three words that Emily had been dying to hear. Emily looks away with the biggest grin she had ever worn and responds with "I know", because she does know. Through all Naomi's confusion, running and walls the one thing Emily was sure of was that Naomi cared for her. Thinks that she can understand why someone would hurl themselves out of a plane or off of a cliff because if the rush and sense of reward that they get is anything like hearing Naomi mutter those three words she knows it more than worth it.