Disclaimer: I don't own anything. In my dreams I do though.
PLEASE READ:
First of all, I'm sorry it's so long.
Secondly, this story was based on an ask answered by HalebConfessions on tumblr. They were asked what they would want to happen if Caleb ever returned to Rosewood from Ravenswood, and I decided to write a fanfic of their answer. I changed the ending a little, but still tried to stay true to the nature of their answer.
ALSO…
For all intensive purposes, I made Ravenswood a town in Tennessee (too far for Hanna and Caleb to possibly have a functioning relationship). Just so ya'll know.
Okay, here we go! Hope you guys enjoy it!
"Hanna, are you sure you're ready for this?"
"Yes."
"If you're not, don't worry. I can tell Jake to tell Peter you can't make it."
"No," Hanna swallowed a rising lump in her throat as she fell back on her bed, her cellphone pressed to her ear, "I want to go."
"Han…" Aria sighed, "No, you don't."
Tears stung Hanna's eyes. She hated how her voice betrayed her; fumbling and cracking whenever she tried to make plans over the past two months. She used to be good at lying, but ever since he left she couldn't seem to muster the strength to conceal the constant pain she was in. "I…" Hanna trailed off, wiping a stray tear that slipped down her cheek, "You're right, I don't want to go."
"Do you want me to come over? Since Spencer's with Toby and Emily's with Paige I could come over and we could watch a movie or something?"
"No no," Hanna closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose with her index finger and thumb, "Go out with Jake. Tell Peter that I'm sorry. I'll be fine, I'm going to go to bed early tonight."
"Are you sure?" Aria frowned, "I can get together with Jake another day."
"I'm sure," Hanna moved her hand from the bridge of her nose to her forehead, "Really, go."
"Okay…call me if you need anything, alright?"
"I will," Hanna felt another tear begin to slide down her cheek, "Have fun, Aria," As she hung up the phone, Hanna grabbed her pillow and hugged it close to her chest. She looked to her desk; her eyes searching for the picture of her hugging him from behind that was usually sitting right where she did her homework. It wasn't there anymore. In the initial days of his departure she had, with tears streaming down her cheeks, shoved it in a cardboard box along with the rest of the mementos from their relationship and had stuck it in the attic. She missed it. She missed the picture. She missed the mementos. She missed him. And every day it got worse.
"Hanna," Caleb pulled Hanna into his chest, feeling her tears seep into his white t-shirt. He rested his cheek on her hair and let his own tears begin to fall as he felt her sobs shake her in his arms, "Ple-please say something."
"I…" Hanna's throat tightened as another sob erupted from her chest, "I…d-don't want yo-you to leave m-me," Her words were detached as sobs ripped, slicing the silence in her room, "I love you s-so much."
Caleb squeezed his eyes shut and tightened his grip on Hanna. His hot, salty tears poured down his cheeks as he felt her place a shaky kiss on his chest. "I love you too, Hanna, God, so much. Th-this is…" Caleb paused, inhaling a wobbly breath as he tried to find the appropriate words for the situation they were in. But there were no words. His father was taking him away from his home, his friends, the love of his life. And there were no words. "God, I love you," Caleb settled on, his voice trembling. He planted a kiss on the top of her head and moved his hands to her hair, where he began to softly rub the back of her neck. "I can't im-imagine my life without you."
"Don't le-leave me," Hanna said softly, lifting her head from Caleb's chest. Bloodshot and puffy, her eyes stared into his as her voice dropped to a faint whisper, "Please, Caleb." Her tears were ceaseless.
"Baby, you know I would if I could," Caleb's hands moved to her cheeks. He cupped her delicate face in his strong hands, his thumbs wiping away her flowing tears. "But Jamie is my legal guardian now, and he's leaving to live in Ravenswood…" Caleb's face twisted at the name of his new hometown, "…which means I have to go too."
"I hate this," Hanna gipped onto his shirt with all the strength she could muster and inhaled a jagged breath, "I ca-can't…I can't…"
"Can't what, Han?" Caleb lowered his face so it was close enough to hers that he could feel her hot breath on his lips. Hanna looked into his eyes as she continued crying. With a tenderness only someone with a deep, innate love for the other could give, he kissed her forehead, her nose, and both the dimples on her cheeks he adored so much. But he didn't kiss her lips. Not yet.
"Can't live without you!" Hanna wailed, throwing her arms around Caleb's neck and burying her face into his chest once again. Neither had said it, but both knew they were breaking up. This wasn't like the last time Caleb had left. It wasn't a trip to Montecito, where he would come back in a few weeks and everything would go back to normal. This was a permanent move. To a different state. In a different town. To a different school. With different people.
"I know," Caleb was certain he could actually feel his heart actually cracking in half as Hanna sobbed into his chest. He had never felt such pain in his entire life. It was like someone was sticking a knife into his heart and twisting it slowly, enjoying the way he suffered, "I know." He hugged her with all his force against his body. He hugged so tightly that after a few minutes of gripping onto her, he realized he was probably hurting her. "I want you to know how much I love you, Hanna."
Hanna moved her head up from Caleb's chest and moved her hands up to cup his face, as he had just done with her. Caleb leaned his head foreword so their foreheads were resting against each other. He stared into her eyes and began to memorize their brilliant shade of blue.
"You're the best thing that's ever happened to me, Hanna," Caleb started, moving his hand briefly from her upper back to wipe the tears trickling down his cheeks, "I fell in love with you the first time I saw you. You were everything I was looking for, and you quickly became everything to me. My entire world," Caleb inhaled heavily and shakily, "Every time we're together, I fall more in love with you. You've opened me up…" Caleb paused, a small sob choking his throat. Hanna stood up on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek, and he smiled at her through his tears as he continued, "I've told you things I've never told anyone and never will tell anyone. You've made me a better person, and there's no way I can repay you for that…" Caleb leaned forward and kissed her cheek gently, "I love you more than you'll ever know, Hanna. A-and I always will."
Hanna crushed her lips against Caleb's, the tears pouring down both their faces as they kissed with an intensity they never had before. Their kisses said the words neither could bear to say, and the words they would never get the chance to say. They memorized and rememorized the feeling of each other's lips, and when they finally parted and Caleb leaned his forehead against Hanna's once more, Hanna was left breathless and devastated.
"I love you," was all she could manage to say. She was never good at making elaborate speeches and with the mental and emotional state she was in, she could barely muster two words. "I love you so much, and I-I want you to stay," She bit down hard on her bottom lip, "But I know you can't."
They continued to speak in soft whispers and gentle kisses. They spoke of the future, if they would keep in touch, if they would remain friends, what would happen to them. After another round of painful sobs and passionate kisses, they decided to end everything. No communication. No friendship. It would be too hard, they rationalized. Too hard to speak to the other like nothing had happened. Too hard to speak to the other like they were actually going to see each other again. They continued to speak in these soft whispers and gentle kisses for all of what felt like a split second before Jamie called Caleb and told him it was time to leave.
Caleb hung up the phone and shoved it in his pocket. The tears were falling furiously down his and Hanna's faces. The front of his white shirt was soaked. He stared at Hanna through the tears, both knowing this was it. Forever.
"I'll never forget you, Hanna Marin," Caleb managed to say before kissing her one last time and hastily leaving her room. When he closed the door, Hanna reached behind herself for her bed, but just pathetically swiped at the air before falling to the ground and curling up in a ball, the sobs ripping viciously from her chest as she wailed and cried and screamed and cursed to God that he would do such a thing to her.
It was the end of her and Caleb Rivers.
Hanna truly did try to get to bed early that night, but like every night, her mind relentlessly replayed her last moments with Caleb. It had been playing these moments so endlessly that for the past two months, Hanna was lucky if she got over two hours of sleep.
She had deleted his number from her phone, unfriended him on whatever social media sites she needed to, moved all photos and traces of their relationship away from her bedroom, and asked her friends to never speak of him. She removed him from every aspect of her life possible, but she still saw him everywhere she went. He was in her every thought; his face was everywhere she looked. Because she couldn't remove him from her mind. And that was the hardest part.
After hours of tossing and turning, she decided to go to the Brew. Hanna could feel the night was turning into another sleepless one, and she would rather be out in public with some sort of distraction than in her bed where her mind seemed to be the loudest. So she got dressed, grabbed the keys, and headed out the door.
Hanna walked into the brew. Her body was tired and yearning for sleep, but her mind racing with thoughts of Caleb. She walked up to the counter, shook her head - as if that would temporarily rid her mind of thoughts of him - and began to order.
"I'll have a non-fat, decaf coffee please," Hanna said, her voice weary. She took a seat on the couch and buried her face in her hands, inhaling and exhaling deeply. She wasn't sure at the time of their breakup if time would ease the pain or not, but what she was fairly certain was that time couldn't possibly make the pain worse. But she was wrong. Because the pain she felt now, every day since he had left, only got deeper and more painful. She felt physical pain in her heart, she felt nauseous all the time, and, most of all, she felt sad. She hadn't smiled in months. She hadn't laughed in months. She wasn't goofy, spirited Hanna anymore. She was a shell of her former self. That's all she was. A shell.
"Hanna?"
Hanna lifted her hands from her face. She didn't realize that she had shed a few tears until she looked to her palms and noticed the dampness. She looked to where her name was being called. "Emily?"
"Are you alright, Han?!" Emily rushed over to Hanna and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. "What happened?!"
"I…" Hanna sighed as she felt tears sprout to her eyes, "I…"
"What, Hanna?!"
"I miss him, Emily," Hanna let the tears spill over her lids as she leaned her head on Emily's shoulder. She cried and Emily comforted her by patting her hair and rubbing her shoulder.
"I know," Emily said quietly, frowning as her best friend continued to cry, "I know you do."
"Everything I try to do to get over him…" Hanna inhaled a ragged breath as she wiped her tears away, "…doesn't work."
"Sometimes the only thing that helps is time." Emily said softly, patting Hanna's hair.
"I thought that too. But everyday the pain of missing him just gets worse. I don't know what to do, Em." Hanna leaned her head against Emily's shoulder and sighed.
"Have you considered talking to him, or maybe even seeing him?"
"No," Hanna answered immediately, a reflex reaction. She blinked and bit her lip before she opened her mouth to speak again, "I mean, I don't know. We decided to, uh, cut off all communication after he left. It would just be too hard."
Emily frowned and leaned her cheek on Hanna's hair, "Well, maybe you need to speak to him. Maybe the reason you can't get over him is because you left something unsaid. Maybe you don't have closure."
"We have closure," Hanna replied, her tone snarky, "We spent an hour and a half at my house crying and telling each other everything we felt."
"Well then…" Emily pursed her lips, "I don't know. Maybe you don't have proper closure. It should be getting at least a littleless painful by now."
Hanna lifted her head from Emily's shoulder. "So what do you think I should do?"
"Call Caleb. I know Ravenswood is too far to go see him -"
"Yeah, twelve and a half hours," Hanna said glumly, adding under her breath, "Stupid Tennessee."
"Exactly. So call him and see what comes out," Emily smiled sympathetically at Hanna, "You never know what you might be wanting to say to someone until you actually start saying it."
Hanna's eyes moved to the coffee cup sitting on the table in front of her. She didn't even notice the barista deliver it to her. Unblinking, she stared at the cup, her mind reeling.
"I think I'm going to call him right now." Hanna stood up and pulled her phone out of her pocket. Although she had deleted his number from her phone, she still had it memorized.
"Good luck," Emily smiled reassuringly at her friend, "If you need anything I'll be here."
"Thanks, Em." Hanna smiled back at Emily before turning on her heels and walking out of the Brew. She stood on the patio and, with trembling fingers, dialed Caleb's number.
It began to ring.
Hanna could feel her heart pounding against her chest. She suddenly felt dizzy and excited and nervous and dreadful all at the same time as she impatiently and anxiously listened to the shrill ring tone and braced herself to hear Caleb's voice for the first time in two months.
"Hello?"
"Caleb," Hanna blurted the moment she heard his voice. Immediately she felt a lump begin to rise in her throat as his voice, as sweet and gentlemanly as it always had been, processed through her brain. "It's, uh, it's Hanna."
"Hanna?"
Hanna could hear the blatant shock in his voice. She suddenly forgot how to speak.
"Uh, yeah…um…"
"Is something wrong, Hanna?"
Panic. His sweet, gentlemanly voice that only a moment ago was lathered in shock, twisted, and was now manipulated by fear. Now he was frightened for her. He thought she was in some kind of danger. In her mind, Hanna could match his exact facial expression and demeanor with the present tone of his voice. His deep brown eyes would be narrowed and his lips would be tugged down in a frown and he would be leaning his face closer towards hers, reaching his hand out to cup her cheek and asking her in his sweet, gentlemanly voice that was twisted and constrained by fear, if she was alright. And he would be promising her, as he moved his lips to her ear, that he would and could do anything to protect her, should he need to.
But he didn't this time.
He simply stayed silent.
Because he couldn't reach out to cup her cheek or place his forehead against hers and promise her warmth and safety. And he wouldn't, even if he wasn't twelve and a half hours away. Because she wasn't his, and he wasn't hers. He had no reason whatsoever to want, or need to protect her.
"No," Hanna replied after she thought of all of this. Her throat began to tighten and she felt her eyes begin to sting with tears. "No, I'm fine."
"Then why are you calling me?"
His voice wasn't snarky or impatient. The fear was still there, but now there was concern now, too. Hanna tried not to let her mind wander to what his facial expression and demeanor would be now, but it was nearly impossible. She could clearly picture his narrowed eyes softening and his thumb stroking her cheek and his lips still tugged down in a frown. She could picture all of this so clearly although it had been two months, sixty days, since he had left. And these mental images, stark with clarity, were what were sprouting the stinging tears to her eyes. She missed him so much. And hearing his voice just made it worse.
"I, um, I don't really…" Hanna bit her bottom lip as a lone tear streamed down her cheek, riding over the crevices of her dimple, "I guess I just wanted to hear your voice."
"Well…it's, uh, it's nice to hear from you. But I've got to go."
Detached. His sweet, gentlemanly voice was detached and etched with a pain that caused Hanna to feel more stinging tears stream down her face. She could picture his face now; his eyebrows crinkled, his eyes hard, his lips in a firm line and his hands moving away from her face, shoving themselves into the pockets of his jeans. Kind of like the way he was when he left her. Actually, exactly like the way he was when he left her. As Hanna thought about this the dial tone began to ring in her ear. And as she noticed it, shrill and uninviting, more tears began to fall down her face. He had hung up. And just like that, he was gone. Loosened from her grip, floating away in the breeze. Hanna had tried to talk to him, but nothing had come out right. Nothing had come out at all. She wanted to say so many things, about how much she missed him and loved him, about how she couldn't go a day, hell, a minute, without thinking of him - but nothing had come out. With tears falling furiously down her face, she shoved her phone back into her pocket and strode back into the brew. Emily stood up as she watched Hanna stalk towards her, her eyes swimming with trepidation.
"Oh, Hanna -" Emily began, prepared to comfort her friend.
"No, don't talk to me," Hanna retorted, her voice thick as tears poured down her face, "This was a mistake, Emily," She grabbed her coffee cup from the table and narrowed her bloodshot eyes at her best friend, "I didn't have anything to say to him. I can't believe I listened to you." On her heels, Hanna turned, hot with anger and sorrow, and stormed out of the Brew.
It had been two weeks since her call to Caleb, and Hanna wasn't doing well. The June sun beat down on her face as she walked from the Brew to the park across the street. She could hardly believe graduation was in only a few days. She had finished her last exam the day before, but Emily, Aria, and Spencer all still had exams until the next day. That left Hanna alone. And she didn't do well alone. Especially in these past two weeks.
She took a seat on the bench and took her phone out of her pocket, scrolling down her contacts to find anyone to text. But everyone was either busy with exams or busy with their own friends.
Or twelve and a half hours away.
Sighing, Hanna stood up from the bench and began to make her way to the Grille. It was nearing noontime and her stomach was signaling to her that it was time to get some food in its system. As she began to stand in line, she saw a boy a few people ahead of her with a head of long brown hair.
She recognized that hair.
It was hair that ended at the nape of his neck, two inches past his ears, almost at the collar of his signature green jacket…
Hanna squeezed her eyes shut and reopened them.
Yup. He was still there.
His back was turned to her, so Hanna hadn't seen his face. But she was certain…
"Caleb?" She said his name loud enough for him to hear over the lunchtime bustle. It took all her strength to not reach out across the people in line in front of her and tap his shoulder. "Caleb?"
He didn't turn around. A pang of rejection washed through Hanna, but she didn't give up. She maneuvered through the lineup until she got directly in front of him. Ignoring the complaints of the people she had just gotten ahead of in line, she began to slowly twisted her neck. Her heart was pounding like it was when she had called him. This was it. This was the moment she had been waiting for for two and a half months. That dizzy and excited and nervous and dreadful feeling twined and twirled through her veins.
"Caleb," she said for a third time as she turned around completely, preparing herself for his warm, deep brown eyes that she missed and loved so much.
Except they weren't brown.
They were green.
She didn't know these eyes. Or miss them. Or love them.
It wasn't him.
"Caleb?" the man said quizzically, "What?"
"I-I'm sorry," Hanna could feel the blood rush to her cheeks as she slinked away to the back of the line. She pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head. She was going insane without him. Literally.
"I saw him, Spencer. I could've sworn it was him."
Spencer popped a popcorn kernel in her mouth as she closed her physics textbook. "It wasn't him though, right?"
"No," Hanna sighed as she lay on Spencer's couch, "It wasn't. I think my mind is going into some sort of downward spiral or something. I mean, between this and exams kicking my butt…"
"Hey," Spencer touched Hanna's forearm gently, "Take it from someone who knows exactly what you're going through. This is normal. When I was in Radley, I saw Toby everywhere."
Hanna smiled a small smile at Spencer. "Yeah? I guess I just really, really miss him still."
"I know. Why did you guys decide to never speak or anything again?" Spencer furrowed her eyebrows, "It sounds like you guys chose the most painful solution possible. Maybe that's why with time, it's getting harder instead of easier."
Hanna sat up and ran a hand through her short blonde hair. "Well, we decided that if we couldn't see each other, it would be hard to still speak to each other like we had never been together," she began to frown, "His exact words were, 'I can't text you from Tennessee and ask you how your life is and pretend that I'm not still desperately in love with you.'"
Spencer nodded slowly, "Ah, I see. Well, that actually makes sense."
Hanna shrugged and rolled her eyes. "Well look how well it's working out with me," she chuckled darkly, "I've been lying on your couch like a potato the whole day, trying not to think about how I practically hallucinated yesterday."
"Hey, don't be so hard on yourself," Spencer patted Hanna's shoulder and looked down at her closed textbook, "Okay, Han, I really hate to kick you out when you're already down, but…"
Hanna looked at Spencer, who was staring at her textbook. "No, I get it. You need to study." Standing up, she took a handful of popcorn and shoved it in her mouth, giggling as a few kernels fell from her mouth and onto the floor, "Sorry, let me get those and then I'll be on my way."
"Hey, Han?" Spencer had already opened her textbook and was in the midst of making notes by the time Hanna had picked up the kernels and threw them in her trash across the room, "You're going to be alright without Caleb, okay?"
Hanna sighed, her stomach twisting at his name. She grabbed her jacket and opened the door, the warm night air brushing her face. "Yeah, well, I keep telling myself that, but so far I haven't proved it."
Hanna decided to take a walk around the park. The sun had just set and night had descended upon Rosewood, but because of all the popcorn she had just eaten at Spencer's, she wasn't particularly hungry for dinner. Her mom was working late that night anyways, so she really had no reason to go home.
She wandered aimlessly for a little while until she decided to go to the park's swing sets. She knew it would hurt, seeing as it was her and Caleb's favourite place to go when they had nothing else to do, but Hanna had come to realize that in order to get over him, she had to learn how to stop associating everything with him. She knew it would be hard, and that there would be pain and tears, but in the end, the reality was that Caleb was gone. And he was never coming back.
As she turned the corner to the swing sets, Hanna got a text. Pulling her phone out of her pocket, she read the message.
Hey. Want to make sure we're okay. Text me back soon?
It was from Emily. Hanna clicked her tongue and stared down at her phone as she kept walking towards the swing sets. Since her outburst at the Brew, she and Emily had been on thin ice. Neither had spoken more than a few words to each other, although every time Hanna looked at Emily, she could see pain and pleading in her eyes. Hanna inhaled a long breath through her nose. She knew it wasn't Emily's fault that her phone call with Caleb had gone so poorly, but she wasn't ready to text her back yet. When she got home, she would call her and they would work everything out.
Hanna slipped her phone back into her pocket and looked up. The swing sets were about thirty meters away, but she could make out the silhouette of someone already there, swinging alone. She couldn't see the face in the night, but the dark figure looked like a man.
Hanna narrowed her eyes and stepped forward, inching towards the swings. She wasn't sure if she should go anymore, seeing as being alone with a mysterious figure in a town as dangerous as Rosewood at night wasn't the best idea. The sound of the rusty swings creaking as the figure swung slowly, barely leaving the ground, was all that filled the otherwise silent air. The whole situation sent a shiver down Hanna's spine. As she turned to leave, her phone suddenly began to ring. The ringtone – her favorite song, Britney Spears' 'Hit Me Baby One More Time' - pierced the silence of the night, and the figure stopped swinging as it looked over to Hanna.
"Shoot," Hanna dug her phone out of her pocket. It was Emily calling. Out of her peripherals, Hanna could see the figure staring in her direction. She declined the call promptly for the sole reason of cutting her embarrassing ringtone from the air. She turned a deep shade of red as she looked in the direction of the figure. It was still staring at her as it slowly began to stand up from the swing.
"Oh God," Hanna muttered. It was coming towards her. Slowly it treaded through the sand, seeming to contemplate every step it took. Hanna cursed the fact that it was so dark and she still couldn't make out the figure's face. She turned and started to briskly walk away, but the figure began to speak. And the figure's voice made her stop dead in her tracks.
"Hanna?"
Sweet and gentlemanly.
Hanna felt as if someone had knocked the breath out of her.
"Hanna, is that you?"
It was him.
Hanna was sure.
Or was she? She thought she had seen him the day before. And she was wrong.
But this wasn't the back of his neck, his hair or his green jacket she was seeing. This was his voice, and she was hearing it. The same voice that she had called two weeks earlier. The same voice that hung up on her two weeks earlier. It was him. She knew his voice like she knew herself - inside and out.
"Han?"
His voice was closer, but still far enough away that she would have to walk a short distance over to him to see his face in the low nighttime light. His voice was a mixture of pleading and confused, and it caused Hanna's stomach to flop in nervous anticipation. Her heart was thumping against her chest like it never had before. Slowly, she turned around.
"Caleb?" she called. He was about fifteen meters away. They both froze as they stared across the park, frozen in a capsule of each other. Everything they wanted to say since he had left stood in the distance between them, paralyzing their limbs. Moments passed. Heartbeats. Intakes of breaths.
And suddenly, they were running.
Hanna crashed her body against Caleb's, wrapping her arms as tightly as she possibly could around his neck. She felt his strong arms hastily wrap themselves around her waist and lift her off the ground.
Caleb spun Hanna around, her legs swinging in the air. After a few moments, however, he stopped spinning and she took the opportunity to wrap her legs around his hips. She felt one of his hands move up to the back of her head and tangle in her hair while the other stayed secure on her back, holding her tightly against him. His lips were on her forehead, her cheeks, her dimples, her nose, her chin, her temples. He peppered little kisses around every part of her face, except her lips. He didn't kiss her lips. Not yet.
"I missed you so much," Caleb's voice was husky as he planted a row kisses along her jawline. "I can't live without you, Han. I tried, and I-I just can't."
The tears drizzled from Hanna's eyes as she listened to his voice and his words and felt his kisses on her face. She could feel her shirt dampen as Caleb dug his face into the crook of her neck and he let himself cry, too.
"I love you, Hanna," Caleb said, his words muffled as he cried into her shoulder. "I love you so much, and I missed you, and I c-can't believe that I'm actually holding you right now."
"I love you," Hanna breathed in reply. "I love you so much, Caleb," she rubbed his back with one hand while the other gripped onto his jacket with all the force she contained. "Why are you here?"
"I couldn't take not being with you. I was about to go to your house," Caleb pulled his head back from the crook of Hanna's neck and, for the first time in two and a half months, she was met with the warm, deep brown eyes she loved and had missed so much. "I made a deal with Jamie and my mom that if I could finish up high school in Ravenswood, I could move back here for the summer," Caleb leaned his forehead against Hanna's, just like he had done the night he left, "My mom's going to pay for me to rent an apartment down here for the next two months."
Hanna's jaw dropped. "A-are you serious?" Another bought of tears formed in her eyes and began to drip down her face. She smiled as Caleb tenderly kissed them away.
"Well, there is one condition," Caleb said softly.
"What?" Hanna inhaled through her nose, breathing in his musky scent, the scent she had missed so much.
"You have to come with me to visit her in Montecito for a week this summer," Caleb bit a small smile, "I told her yes, as long as you'd take me back." That pleading look was back in his eyes, mixed with a hint of pain and hopefulness.
Hanna was incredulous as she stared into his pleading, pained, hopeful eyes. Did he not know? Did he not know how much she missed him? How much she loved him? How quickly she would take him back? She opened her mouth in an attempt to form her inner monologue into words, but only a few incoherent stutters came out as her mind still tried to process the fact that he was there, in her arms, telling her how much he loved her and how much he missed her. So, instead of speaking, with a burst of burning passion and love, Hanna knotted her fingers through his hair and crushed her lips to his.
They kissed with a fervent intensity. It reminded Hanna of their kiss before Caleb left, but in a sense it was different. The same kind of desperation and complete devotion towards each other was still there, of course, but this time instead of Hanna feeling Caleb's lips droop into a frown during the kiss, she could feel his lips curl into a smile. And she was certain he could feel hers do the same.
She felt his tears drip onto her cheeks, sliding down along with her own tears as they kissed, gripping onto each other as if the entire world was burning and they were each other's only line of safety. And when they pulled apart and Caleb leaned his forehead back against Hanna's, Hanna could only find the strength through her sudden lightheadedness to whisper the four words she had wanted to say to him every day, ever second, since he had left.
"Never let me go."
Caleb let a few more tears slip down his cheeks, "Never," he replied automatically, his voice full with ardent reassurance, "Hanna, I'm so sorry."
"Don't apologize," Hanna wrapped her legs tighter around Caleb's hips, realizing that he was still holding her off the ground, "Caleb, none of this was your fault. It was no one's fault."
"I just…I was going crazy without you," Caleb's thumb began to caress Hanna's back as he still gripped onto her, holding her up and off the ground and as close to him as humanly possible, "I didn't mean to hang up on you a few weeks ago, but just hearing your voice unexpectedly like that…" Caleb closed his eyes and shook his head, "I lost it."
Hanna moved one of her hands from his hair to his cheek, "Hey, look at me."
Caleb opened his eyes. They were soft, abundant with love for the eyes that were staring back into his.
"Emily told me I should call you to see if we left anything unsaid," Hanna caressed Caleb's cheekbone gently, "She said the reason I wasn't getting over you was because we didn't have proper closure."
Caleb frowned. "Hanna…"
"No, let me finish," Hanna inhaled deeply and let a smile begin to tug up her lips. "But now, here with you, I know that the reason I wasn't getting over you wasn't because we left things unsaid," Hanna shook her head and twirled a piece of his hair in her finger, "No, the reason every day for these past two and a half months I've felt the most miserable I've ever felt in my life isn't because we didn't have proper closure…it's because we didn't have closure at all. Because we weren't supposed to."
Caleb began to smile again. Inching his face closer to hers, he softly kissed her cheek as she continued speaking.
"You see, Caleb, we were never supposed to have closure, because we were never supposed to be apart. Closure would have meant that we were over, for good," Hanna shuddered at the thought. "But I could never get over you, because I was never supposed to."
Caleb's smile grew into a beaming grin. Neither of them said anything for moments afterwards. They let Hanna's words of truth flit and twirl in the air above them as they gazed at each other, memorizing and rememorizing what it felt like to be in each other's embrace once again. Hanna took the time to look at Caleb, really look at him, for the first time in two and a half months. He looked better than she had imagined. His hair was cut shorter in the back, with longer layers framing his face. It was still long overall, but more styled than it had ever been. His face had some stubble on it, which made him look older to Hanna than he ever had. He had never let stubble grow in before, and as Hanna stared at him, unblinking, she questioned in her mind exactly why he never had.
Caleb finally set Hanna onto the ground after a few more minutes of each of them soaking in and marveling the other's presence. As her feet touched the pavement, he pulled her into a bone-crushing embrace.
"You're so beautiful," he whispered in her ear before pulling his head back and kissing her forehead, "So, so beautiful," he mumbled against her skin.
Hanna grinned. "You're not to shabby yourself," she traced her thumb along his stubble, "I like this."
"Yeah?" Caleb felt his cheeks turn slightly pink, "I was hoping you would."
"I do," Hanna's grin grew as she stood on her tiptoes and pressed her lips to Caleb's once more. As they deepened the kiss, Hanna could feel Caleb's lips turning up into a smile again. It made her smile, too. And when they broke apart a few minutes later, Caleb leaned his forehead against Hanna's one more time, staring into her bright blue eyes, a blazing passion burning in his brown ones.
"I'll never let you go again, Hanna," he said, repeating his words from a few minutes earlier. His voice contained a truth and a love that caused Hanna's stomach to twist in a way that made the entire universe feel lovely and peaceful and magical and perfect. And as she basked in the feeling of being in his strong arms once again for the first time in two and a half months, Hanna knew that despite the hardships to come in her life, the adversity to face and the pain to deal with, with Caleb there to take her in his arms and make her feel loved and cherished, she knew she could do anything.
I'm so sorry that was so dang long. But now…
I NEED YOUR GUYS' HELP.
So initially I was only intending on making this a oneshot, and then as I was writing it, I was only intending on making it maybe a twoshot…but now I'm thinking it might work as a full-fledged story? However I don't know if I'd be able to keep this up as a full-fledged story and my other story, Always With You (which I'm currently writing the second chapter for by the way!) as well. So, basically…I need your guys' advice on what I should do! Should I keep this as a oneshot/twoshot or should I make it into a full-fledged story and neglect Always With You for a little while? I will finish Always With You eventually!
Please review (and maybe answer my question heh)! Good or bad, I accept it all! Reviews keep me goin'.
Thanks for reading! Hope you liked it!
- coldplaysout