Destruction

Authors Note: So this takes place during 3.08 It is an alternative ending sort of. Instead of calling up Cook and taking off, Effy decided to try again with Freddie. This is what might have happened…

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"Freddie."

"Not now Eff."

"Please."

"No, not now."

"I've never asked you for anything, not ever. I never ask anyone for anything so please, just this once I'm asking. Just listen to me." Effy begged and pleaded, relying solely on her new found emotions.

"I can't do this right now." He sighed, looking ridiculously tired and worn out. Effy had been waiting next to his shed when he returned home from the hospital. Leaning anxiously against the splintering wood and wearing an expression of undiluted desperation.

"I can't not do this right now." She countered. He looked at her hard for a moment, trying to gage what the best rout would be. What would be the easiest way to get her to leave? But before his thoughts could get any further, his heart took hold of his mouth.

"Just tell me one thing then, one thing." He finally spoke, looking at her through heavy eyes. She could feel his impending question like a weight being placed on her fragile shoulders. The importance of her answer was blaringly obvious. It could determine everything between them. Everything.

"Okay." She whispered hoarsely. Effy had completely given up on trying to seam unaffected and above emotion. The image of him looking at her with pure disgust and distaste, it was almost enough to send her under water; almost enough to keep her underwater until nothing was left.

"You said that you were fucked up that night, couldn't even think straight. Yeah?" He looked at her briefly, as if to double check. She nodded mutely, too petrified to even speak. "You said you were so fucked up, that you didn't even have the mind to find help for Katie." He continued.

"Freddie…" She begged.

"Your were fucking out of your mind that night. Is that right? Is it?" His voice was hard now, like the edge of a sharp corner. That night in the woods, she had pleaded with him to hit her, to make her feel. Now, every word he spoke felt like a blow to her state of being. She sure as hell had no trouble feeling anymore.

"Yes." Shakily, she answered his questions.

"So then, everything that happened between us…" He trailed off and looked away, running a distraught hand through his hair. It was quiet for a moment and Effy had trouble figuring out what he was getting at. She couldn't see the hurt behind his eyes. It wasn't that she hit Katie that he had trouble forgiving. It wasn't even that she left Katie there for dead. It was the thought of her being to high to even remember being with him that night. Too high to feel what he felt. "You probably don't even remember. I mean, do you? Do you remember fucking me Effy?" His words slowly evolved from broken and hurt to angry and bitter.

"No." She bit out, latching on to her own bitter feelings. His eyes snapped shut and his jaw tightened. Looking at the hard lines of his face, Effy realized that she'd never seen him look so unsettled. "I don't remember fucking you." The words felt dirty on her lips.

"I guess that's, that then." He choked out. As he turned to leave she began to speak. Her words weren't loud or overly emoted, but the power behind them was more uncensored than any words she'd ever allowed herself to speak.

"I remember feeling numb after Cook had his little prick fest. As I was walking through the woods I could see the trees scratching at my skin, but I couldn't feel it. I could hear the wind and I knew it was cold, but I felt nothing. The farther away I ran, the less I felt. At first I thought it was the shrooms but, well I'm not sure really…" She let her voice drift away as she pondered the tragic night. Freddie walked towards her again, never saying a word.

"Some bits of the night are blurry, you know? When I picture fighting with Katie, it's like I'm seeing someone else there, someone beside me. I don't remember what I felt, or if I felt anything after I hit her." Effy carefully let her frame lean against the cold wall of the shed and then eerily slide down. She trapped her knees beneath her arms and brought them to her chest. Freddie shakily looked down at her broken form.

"What else do you remember?" He questioned quietly. His earlier anger was gone now, fading into the black hole that Effy had revealed with her haunted eyes. Walking away from her was harder than it should have been. It was damn near impossible when she looked at him with pleading eyes and spoke to him with honest purpose.

"Some parts are really clear. So fucking clear I can almost taste it. I didn't know where I was going when I left Katie, but somehow I ended up in front of you. I remember that moment, the moment I saw you lying there all sprawled out like you were. I felt the wind then, just a bit but… it was something, you know?" She bit her lip nervously. Freddie crouched down next to her and took a seat. The dim lighting encased them with a sheltered sort of force. It was as if they were the only two people on the planet.

"I thought that maybe you were the answer." She looked up with wide eyes. "I thought you could…"

"Make you feel." He finished for her, searching her eyes with his own. She didn't nod in confirmation but, her face told him that he was correct.

"You kissed me." She told him, as if he didn't know the story. "That's when I felt everything. Everything all at once." Her voice took on a dreamlike quality, airy and light. "I couldn't tell if I was floating away or falling."

"I thought you said that you didn't-" He was about to question her previous statement of not remembering the sex. She cut him off before he could finish.

"And then you were inside of me Freddie. You were filling me up all over, in places I had never even known were empty. That's when I realized that I wasn't falling, wasn't even floating really. I was flying." She looked at him with glassy eyes. He couldn't breath, couldn't speak, couldn't blink or move a muscle. Frozen in her web of declarations, caught up in her blue oceans. He'd die in her eyes; he would drown and sink and die in Effy Stonem's eyes.

"Take my hand Effy." He ordered when the words finally were able to form.

"What?" She scrunched up her brow in confusion.

"My hand, fucking take it." He ground out. Reaching out, she snapped her own tiny fingers forwards and grasped his own. The swift movement indicated her uneasy feelings.

"Keep going. What happened next?" He swallowed hard and looked ahead. Her admissions, her mere presence, it was all driving him insane. Her hand holding his own was the his last effort to stay grounded.

"Well, I remember your breath on my face and your hand in my hair. I can still feel your lips sometimes, if I close my eyes tight enough. All the light weight shit I've never noticed before, not ever. Cook's hands don't make me feel anything. His cock doesn't make me feel full and whole. It's just a cock. It just makes me feel numb. And that was fine before, that was what I was looking for. But now you've gone and ruined everything. Did you know that?" She raised the volume of her words and squeezed his hand frantically. "You've gone and ruined me for anyone else. I know what it feel like to have everything and to be everything. I can't ever go back to how things were before. I don't remember fucking you Freddie, because we didn't just fuck. I can't be who I was before because you were inside of me! You were inside of me and completing me and that's never going to go away!" Effy let the tears leek from her large eyes, not bothering to wipe them away.

"Good." He whispered. She snapped her head to look at him in disbelief.

"Excuse me?"

"You crawled up inside of me from the first moment I saw you. And every single second since then has been pure fucking hell. Looking at you and hearing your voice and knowing that you weren't mine, it was torture. I knew what it'd feel like if we were together. But I couldn't make you see that. And now you know what I've known all along. You know that we were made to destroy each other Effy. You did me in a long time ago, and I guess now I've returned the favor." He stared at her hard.

"I'd say so." She whispered.

"Now what?" He questioned.

"Nothing. You hate me remember." She reminded, moving to pull her hand away from his. He held it firmly, never budging.

"Not as much as I love you." Hearing him say the word love, actually hearing him say it, was enough to send her over the edge. Sucking in a deep breath and wrenched her hand free of his grip, she shuffled a few inches away from him.

"No." She choked hysterically.

"Eff…" He spoke with wonder.

"No, no, no. Fuck, no!" She yelled.

"Bloody fucking hell, what's your problem?"

"You can't do this to me. You can't say that you bastard." The wild look in her eyes left him almost speechless. Only moments ago she was quiet and earnest.

"Say what? That I love you? I think we're a bit past that don't you Eff? I might not have said it before but we both knew I felt it." He explained.

"Your face, at the hospital… you hated me Freddie. You looked at me like I was trash, garbage." She covered her face with her hands in desperation. She was desperate again. Just as she had been when he first came upon her, leaning against the shed.

"I know that. I know I hurt you." He tried to take her hand again but she wouldn't budge. Her muscles were rigid and strained.

"Don't do this. Please don't do this."

"Do what?" He questioned.

"Don't look at me like you hate me one minute, and then tell me you love me the next. It's too much…" She cried.

"I can't help it. I can't not feel those things for you Effy. I hate you for what you did to Katie, for what you put me through all year. But I love you for everything that you are. Everything." His words were honest.

"Fine then. Hate me if you'd like just, stop loving me."

"Can't."

"Why not?""I just can't."

"Fuck."

"Do you love me too?" He questioned quietly, this time he was able to take her hand. The shock of his question had left her unprepared.

"Yes." She answered simply.

"Then I think we can figure this out." He soothed, lacing his fingers through her own. She looked down at their interconnected fingers.

"How." She barley whispered. He shrugged with less worry than he'd held before. His demeanor was less tired now, he was more relaxed and at ease.

"The how isn't important Eff. We love each other and I think, well I think for now that's everything we need." She considered his words for moment before accepting the situation. Her head slowly fell to his shoulder and he breathed in the scent of her soft hair. A small smile appeared of his lips for the first time in days.

"I love you." She said sleepily as her eyes closed and her breathing became even. It was the first time she had ever said those words and meant them in that way. He could feel every nerve in his body standing on end. The thrill of her words ran through his veins.

"I love you." He repeated to her sleeping form. And, he did love her. He really and truly did. They had completely destroyed one another, and probably would do so again. But as long as they were in love, there would always be a way to put the pieces back together. Lucky for them, they would always be in love.