A/N: Hi everyone! It's new story time :D
This idea has been in my head for a month now (I think) ever since I read some beautiful Olicity fics.
So, the inspiration comes from Olicity fics that are in no way connected with this fanfiction other than that they gave me an idea for it, and the title from Florence & the Machine's song Heartlines. The titles of the chapters will be the lyrics from the song.
This is unlike the stories I've written before so I really hope you'll like it and give me some feedback. The story won't be long, I'm planning maybe five chapters in total.
Disclaimer:I do not own Sons of Anarchy or anything related to it. I am not making any profit from this transformative work. Written for entertainment purposes only. My characters are my own.
Excuse the mistakes and typos.
Happy reading :3
Heartlines
1. Oh the river, oh the river, it's running free
And oh the joy, oh the joy it brings to me
The day was too hot to bear, with only light breeze that came up occasionally. The blazing sun was burning through the asphalt and people seemed to have hidden from the insufferable heat in their comfortable, air-conditioned homes.
Meanwhile, Jake was sifting through the numerous boxes in the garage, trying to find his favourite football jersey.
His father had it framed for him and it always hung in his room, on the wall opposite his bed. But when they were remodelling the house, he had to store all his things in cardboard boxes and put them away, along with all the other boxes from the kitchen, living room, and his father's bedroom. By the time the works in the house had been done, the boxes somehow got mixed up, and now he had no idea which box contained which items.
Most of the things have already been returned to their rightful places within the house, but some stayed in the boxes after his grandma made sure his father didn't return 'the junk' as she call it, back in just to clog the place again.
Jake was already exhausted, having spent a good portion of the morning opening the cardboard boxes only to close them with disappointment because there were just too many things in them and he was already getting anxious.
His back hurt from having to constantly move the boxes he'd already looked into and put them atop of one another to get to the ones he didn't.
Piled among the stack of gigantic boxes was one much smaller. Jake couldn't remember what it held or where it belonged to, since it had no label. He frowned in confusion, wiping the beads of sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand. He pulled at his t-shirt collar a few times in an in vain effort to cool himself.
Taking of the sellotape, he opened the box slowly, curious as to what he would find in it.
The box contained the American flag, neatly folded next to a pile of what seemed to be old journals and a small metal box.
Jake assumed the flag was the one given to his grandmother after his grandfather John died. He used to see it hanging in his father's room in the club, back when he was five or six. Since they moved into their current home, the flag disappeared and Jake always wondered what had happened to it. Guess he got his answer.
All the journals had black leather covers, worn out from what he assumed were years of frequently being opened and closed. They all had that peculiar smell of old leather, mould, and his father's cologne, the one he said he'd been using since he was a teenager because it reminded him of someone. Jake had no idea of whom.
Picking up one of them, he opened it slowly, careful lest any of the pages were torn and fell out. The inscription on the first page said Summer, 1994. He sat on a lawn chair leafing through the pages, noticing the yellowish colour of the paper and the fading ink on it.
Stopping at one page, a paragraph caught his attention, and so he began to read, his eyes darting over the sentences.
...
Today was the worst fucking day ever. First Gemma yelled at me for being late to pick up the stupid cake for Clay's return from hospital and for not sleeping in my room.
She goes on and on how my relationship with Tara won't do my any good and that it will jeopardise my chances as a prospect. I hate how she always meddles in my business, especially between Tara and me. I keep telling her it's not her fucking business, but it's like the only fucking voice she ever hears is her own.
We had a fight again and I swear I was about to tell her to go fuck herself and leave me be, but then Bobby came and I really didn't want to continue arguing with her.
After I stopped by the cake shop, I went back to the clubhouse only to find fucking Kyle drooling all over my girl.
I had half a mind to throw the stupid cake in his face and beat the shit out of him. Tara was definitely uncomfortable; her lips were set in a strained smile as she tried to push the son of a bitch off of her, but he just wouldn't move.
I strode towards them, my hands already balled in fists, ready to smash his fucking head. The only thing that stopped me from actually doing so was Tara that managed to wiggle herself out of his grasp and hook her arms around my waist. I kept my eyes on Kyle as I circled my arms around her. I swear that little shit looked like he wanted to fight me, and oh, how I wish he had tried something.
For the past month he's been teasing Tara, trying to flirt with her like she was one of the shithead croweaters that hang around the clubhouse. He actually thinks his dick moves will work on her. Fucking idiot. I guess the mad look in my eyes convinced him to move along because he left us alone...
He turned a few pages.
Tara. Jesus, I swear she's the only person that can calm me these days. It's like every little thing just sets me off and I wish nothing more but to beat someone, something. I hate this whole situation. Mom is not speaking to her; she even forbade Tara to come to our house so we mostly crash at her place since her old man is almost never home.
To be honest, I feel more at home when I'm with her, in that small bedroom of hers than in my own home. She grounds me.
Whenever I feel like just giving up because the pain for Tommy and dad is just too much, she's always there to pick me up and show me the way. She's my light.
Fuck, I sound like those sissies, but it's true. I've never been happier than when I am with her. It's like... It's like one of my dreams.
The handwriting here became sloppy and almost unreadable that Jake had to strain his eyes to read it.
I feel like I'm locked into that coffin with Tommy, only I'm alive and he's dead. And I keep gasping for air, I keep trying to break free, but I can't. I'm too weak and there's no one to help me. There's no one to get me out of there. I feel the earth swallowing me, pulling me further into its darkness.
I shout, I yell, I pound against the lid with my fists as tears start to fall down but no one hears me, even though I can hear them.
It's like a constant buzz of voices in my head and I want to focus, I want them to hear me.
There's no one and I want to give up because I have no strength left to fight. And then I hear someone scratching at the lid from the outside, their hands hitting it as they try to... do what? And I realise that they are trying to dig me out.
I shout, thanking God or whomever for sending that person. I hear their voice clearly. Unlike those other voices that are so distant and unrecognizable in the cacophony of all other voices, theirs is clear.
It's a soft voice of an angel who wants to save me and just when I think I'm dying, the lid is being opened and this huge ray of light appears before me. I close my eyes because I can't look at them. Their light is so pure and I feel unworthy to look at them.
But just then I feel small, delicate hands on mine as they try to pull me up. I get up, still unwilling to open my eyes lest they'll leave me here, alone again.
"Open your eyes, Jax," they say and I realise it's a woman's voice.
And God, it's the most melodiful voice I've ever heard, one that makes the blood in my veins rush to every limb of my body, making it come alive and my heart pounds against my chest with such force I fear it's gonna burst out of my chest. The voice is soothing, caressing me, enveloping me in its safety.
I oblige and as I open my eyes slowly, I'm faced with her.
Tara.
She's my angel, my saviour.
The soft palm of her hand caresses my cheek as I look at her in wonder, lost in the sight of her. The long white dress she's wearing flutters around her feet creating an illusion that she's floating on air, her wavy brown hair cascading down her back as a silky scarf.
The fear I felt just moments ago is replaced by joy, pure joy. It's like her hands hold some kind of magic because I immediately feel at peace.
I don't even realise that I started crying until she leans closer and her lips brush against my cheek. She traces kisses down my face until she reaches my lips.
Pausing, her eyes lock with mine and her hands intertwine with mine. Then her lips are on mine and I close my eyes, tasting the saltiness of my tears on her warm lips, and her. And it's the best fucking taste ever.
She tastes like happiness, hope, and... Love.
Anyway, that is one of me recurring dreams, but Tara... her lips taste even better in reality. She's the one that pulled me from the ledge, the one that saved me.
...
Jake gazed at the words written on the paper, his hands slightly shaking as he processed what he'd read. He felt tears pricking his eyes, the intensity of those sentences being too much for him.
He never knew this Tara. However, from what he read so far... His father seemed to have been head over heels in love with her.
Jake never heard Jax talk about Tara or any other woman in a romantic sense. He knew the story of his mom and him; Melissa was always honest with her son, especially when it came to her relationship with Jake's father.
However, this? This was something people read in romance novels. Jake could hardly believe this was written by his father, and yet it was his name written on the first page of every journal, and his name mentioned alongside this Tara's.
He took another journal and flicked through a few pages before something caught his eye. Frowning in concentration, all further search of his jersey forgotten, Jake started reading again.
...
When I went to that bridge, I had a clear intention of ending my life.
It was all too much for me: too much pain, too much guilt, too much thinking I could've done something to stop my brother's death, to stop my dad from going on that bike and ending up in a ravine.
It's stupid to be thinking about it because Tommy was bound to die. It was the fucking family flaw that took him; one that can take me or mom any day now too.
Every time I close my eyes I see his bike making that turn, toppling down, and the explosion that follows. I hear his screams as the fire starts to consume him, and I imagine his semi-charred body lying there. It's crazy because I wasn't there, I have no clue what went down exactly.
Still, I think about it a lot and then I cry.
Alone. That's the only time I can cry. When I'm alone I know there are no eyes watching me, waiting for me to break down and show my weakness. Because, in this world, in this club life, you aren't allowed to show weakness or you're labelled a coward and laughed at.
My mother feigns concern, thinking I don't know that she's giving me fake smiles and crap advice by day; that she feigns mourning dad's death, but fucks Clay by night in the same bed she used to sleep with my father.
I sat there for awhile watching the water, its currents giving me an odd sense of calm. Guess I wanted to give myself a chance to change my mind. But it was hard because I couldn't erase those awful images that had somehow found a way to haunt me over and over again.
So I just sat, smoking a cigarette and imagining Gemma scolding me because of it, saying how I'll die if I continue smoking. I wanted to laugh at the craziness of the moment. Maybe slow and painful death by cancer would be better than what seemed as a quick death the filthy water below me might have provided.
I thought of my friends, Opie and Donna. In this fucked up world they were the only ones I trusted completely. Yet I was unable to utter my feelings, my doubts, my fears to them. I felt like a coward for hiding my true feelings and instead pulling on this mask of indifference.
And that was the first time I heard her voice. Well, her sobbing to be exact.
I tossed the cigarette bud in the water and turned my head towards the sound.
She was sitting not far from me, her arms wrapped around her body like she was trying to keep herself together. I swear I've never experienced something like this but... her sobbing and choked gasps awoke something in me. Her face was hidden by a curtain of her hair and my fingers itched to touch it.
I got up and as I approached her, I noticed she was shaking. I stood there for a moment, unsure what to do. And yet there was something... this weird feeling in my gut that wouldn't leave me alone. It pulled me towards her and I couldn't look away.
So I sat beside her and waited for her to look up. When she sensed my presence, she lifted her head and the look in her eyes made me want to cry. She looked just as defeated as I was; her eyes reflected the same ache that was in me, and again! There was that pull.
I think she sensed it too because just as I reached my hand to clasp hers, she reached for mine. Some sort of understanding passed between us. Our eyes were locked on each other for a few moments as we held onto each other's hands, assessing the other person.
Then we both looked away at the same time and she leaned her head on my shoulder. The faint smell of vanilla enveloped my mind and it went blank.
I thought of nothing else, no one else but her and I in that moment, on the bridge where moments ago I wanted to end my life.
Hours passed and we just sat there in silence. There was no traffic on the bridge that day, oddly enough.
At some point I took off my zip-up hoodie and wrapped it around her small frame, my arm coming around her shoulder to pull her closer. Her arm came around my waist as she nested her head on my chest.
When the sun started setting she started laughing and I looked at her in confusion. She turned her head up towards me and said,
"It's my first sunset. It's my first sunset and I'm sitting on a bridge with a stranger."
And my lips curled into a smile at the sight of her face adorned with dried tears. She was so beautiful. She is beautiful. But there was something in that moment, that place that made everything I ever believed in tumble down.
"Hi. I'm Jax."
When she smiled at me I felt those stupid butterflies Donna keeps talking about in my stomach. It was so genuine, unlike anything I've ever seen in my sixteen years of living on this Earth. It was warmer than the sun and so kind.
"Hi, Jax. I'm Tara."
"There, we're not strangers anymore," I said, at the same time feeling like we've never been stranger in the first place.
From the moment I saw her my life changed. She saved me. She always saves me.
That day I was supposed to end my life.
Instead, that was the day I started living it.
...
Jake closed the journal, his cheeks wet with tears.
Who was this Tara? How come she meant so much to his father, yet he never once mentioned her? And his father wanted to kill himself?
Thoughts swarmed in his mind raising numerous questions. As stubborn and determined as he was, Jake did the first thing that came to his mind.
Wiping his tears, he sat up and gathered the journals. He packed them back into their box and left the garage. It was only when he was outside that he noticed it was already dark and that his father's bike was parked on the driveway.
He closed the garage door and went into the house, not sure about what he was about to do, but somehow knowing he had to do it.
He had to know about this Tara and her relationship with Jax.
(There, first chapter done. So, comments? Also, melodiful – a word Emily Bett Rickards came up with during Stephen Amell's Sinceriously campaign. I thought it appropriate to describe Tara's voice :D )