Disclaimer: I own very little and definitely not anything on the BBC.
Authors Notes: Apparently I'm all about repetition. A companion piece to Running. Please feed the author.
Holding On
By Chaimera
He could feel her absence like a gaping wound in his chest. It was like someone had punched through and pulled out his insides. Despite the blood induced haze that surrounded him the few days leading up to everything that had happened, when she had been ripped from the world, from his world, everything became crystal clear.
The pain he had felt when she had gone had been so intense. It was worse than when Herrick had staked him. He could feel his soul being torn in two and it had brought him to his knees.
The realization that he could have prevented it if he had only been there, if he had only noticed her growing loneliness, made it impossible for him to recover.
When Annie had disappeared through that door, dragged away from him, his chest had screamed with pain, and it hadn't stopped since.
He was sure that George and Nina thought he was wallowing in guilt and self pity. He was positive they didn't know the very real pain he felt everyday she wasn't with them. He had vowed to get her back and they were all trying. It was the only thought that kept him sane. He had to hold on, for her.
Mitchell was sitting in his room on the ground floor, listening to Nina move about upstairs. His hands were wrapped around a cup of coffee, long gone cold, while he stared at the stone floor and listened to the static on the radio for any hint of her voice. So immersed was Mitchell in the static and trying to ignore the gaping hole in his chest that he didn't notice the door appear across from him.
What he did feel though, was the sudden disappearance of the pain in his chest, just as a prone form threw itself across the threshold of the door. He knew, without even having to look up that she was here. He was paralyzed with shock and fear. Fear that she would hate him for not being there for her, or for what he said to her. Fear that she may be unrecognizable from the woman he knew only months before. He didn't move. He didn't even look up.
Until he heard her scream.
His head shot up and he was across the room before he had even registered he was moving, the coffee cup left shattered on the flagstone floor.
She was clawing at the stone floor, being dragged back by some invisible force in the darkness behind her. He flung himself at her and grasped her hand, pulling with all his strength. She looked up and he was horrified to see the look of desperation and near defeat in her eyes, but as they stared at each other, her dark eyes became determined and her other hand came up to clasp his forearm while he held on with all his strength.
He had to hold on.
She thrashed out at the force behind her, kicking with all her might and suddenly, the force pulling her back into the darkness was gone.
Mitchell lost his grip on her as the opposing force disappeared and she flew across the room, hitting the opposite wall and landing in a heap. He watched as the door, her door, swung shut with a thud and then darted over to where she lay. His hands were all over her, checking to see if she was whole. He knew it was pointless but as she slumped beneath him and gazed into his eyes, he noticed the circles under her eyes, a faint trace of blood by her mouth, bruises on her wrists. His heart ached.
"Annie?"
She smiled at him, but it was a pale imitation of the smile that used to light up his day. She raised a hand to his face and he closed his eyes when she touched him.
"I made it."
He couldn't help but grin at her, the happiness that he felt inside, the wholeness, making it impossible not to do so, but he was still worried. "Yeah. You did. I should get…"
He was a second away from running out of the room and shouting for world to hear that she was back, she was home, no matter what shite house they were in at the time, when she stopped him.
"Not just yet. Can I rest?"
"'Course you can. But he's going to want to see you."
His thoughts drifted to his best friend, who had been coping well on the outside, but Mitchell could see his friends' guilt, feel it nearly as keenly as he felt his own.
"I know. Just…" Her voice broke and he couldn't stand not touching her for one more second. He swept her up in his arms, cradling her close as he took the few steps to the bed, laying her down gently. He lay down next to her, not willing to be any distance from her yet and reached towards her, hesitating at the thought that she may not want to even touch him. Not after he failed her so badly.
She closed the gap between them, burying into his chest as if trying to hide inside him and he wrapped his arms around her, his face going to the crook of her neck, inhaling her familiar scent. In that moment, the sorrow that had been a part of him for the last few months swept through him and he couldn't stop the tears that came.
"I couldn't find you." His voice was raw as he murmured into her skin. He hadn't been able to find her. Hadn't been able to mend the pain that had become what kept him going, what kept him holding on.
She threw an arm over him, pulling him even closer and sighed.
"That's ok. I found you."
He nodded. She had found him and the missing piece of him had slotted back into place and he would keep holding on to her.