Hello hello. I was planning writing a few more chapters before I started uploading but I got too excited and decided that there's no better time than the present. Set after 5B, I'm just fueling my little obsession cause in Australia, we have to wait aggesss for the new season of TW to arrive here.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything. Like literally nothing. Not even my car. So I definitely don't own any of the TW characters.
Its funny how quickly your perspective of someone can change. One minute, you're riding shotgun in a police cruiser, wondering where the next dead body will show up. The next, you're riding shotgun in that same police cruiser, wondering when the driver is going to press his body against yours.
If you were to ask Lydia, she couldn't really tell you when that shift happened; only that it was sometime after our encounter with the Beast of Gevaudan. The night was still foggy, Valack and the trephination still taking a tole on her memories. But she could remember one very large, very hot (literally and figuratively) police deputy protecting her through the whole ordeal.
She hadn't worked up the courage to question him about it yet. She wanted to know the reasoning; whether he was doing it out of some weird military instinct, or out of some actual desire to protect her. Or, even worse, whether he didn't realise he was doing it at all, and it was simply the Hellhound taking over, knowing that she was the only one who could bring Mason back. Maybe he didn't even realise that he did it. That was the scariest thought. That he didn't even remember the reasoning himself.
Looking over at the deputy, she studied his features. His eyes were glued to the road, and hands locked in the traditional '10 and 3' position. True to his law enforcement role, he didn't break a single road rule, averaging 3 miles under the speed limit, and stopping for twice as long as necessary when stopping at a stop sign. It irritated Lydia slightly. Not that he refused to break any rules, but that he was driving so extraordinarily cautious for no apparent reason. She was a banshee for God's sake. If they were going to crash and die, she would be the first one to know. But still, he kept his arms steady. She looked at the veins popping slightly out of his bludging biceps. He had been working out. There was definitely a different air to Parrish these days. One of determination, and a fierce desire to protect. Maybe he does remember after all.
Plucking up the last of her courage, Lydia opened her mouth to speak, only to be interrupted by the deputy himself.
"So, are you going to stop staring at me eventually and tell me what's on your mind, or are you going to stay quiet for the rest of the trip?" Parrish glanced over and gave her a small smile; somewhere between flirtatious and genuinely caring, she couldn't pick it.
"Well I was just about to Deputy, before you so rudely interrupted me."
He smiled again, "Well go ahead Miss Martin. What's on your mind?"
She took a deep breath before asking the question that had plagued her thoughts for the last few weeks, "How much do you remember from that night? The night with the Beast?"
Parrish paused for a moment, crinkling his brow as he went deep into thought, "I remember bit and pieces. It's all a little fuzzy still, and I haven't managed to put together all of it yet. I remember when the Hound took over. I had this uncontrollable rage inside me. This desire, more like a need really, to protect everyone. And to stop the Beast before it caused any more damage. I remember when Theo was standing in that corridor, and the door literally melted away in front of my eyes. But I was so angry, so ready to fight anything that I thought would stand in my way of stopping the Beast."
Lydia tried not to show the disappointment on her face. Her worst fears were coming true in front of her eyes, and there was no escape, minus launching herself from the front seat of the moving car, which while tempting, wasn't exactly what she had planned for the afternoon.
"But then at the same time, I had this need to protect you more than anyone else."
Lydia's ears pricked up again, and she felt the well of anguish building up inside her chest slowly dissolve again, to be replaced with the breeze of hope.
"What do you mean, Parrish?"
"I mean, while everything was going on- with Theo and the Beast and everything else, I knew that I needed to protect you more than anyone else in that entire building. And I think part of that was because you were the only one who could break Mason out of the claws of the Beast, yes. But there was more to it than that, too. I just knew that I couldn't see you get hurt in that place anymore, that I had to get you out before anything else could happen to you. I have to stop anyone else from hurting you, Lydia. I just have this feeling."
Lydia paused for a moment, and processed what he was saying. He looked pained speaking it out for the first time, like maybe he felt guilty. No, it was more like concern, a deep, unwavering concern that this new information could potentially send her running in the opposite direction.
"Parrish, you said have to, instead of had to. Does that mean that you need to protect me now as well?"
It was now Parrish's turn to pause. He hadn't even realised the mistake in his wording, and it made him think. Ever since that night he couldn't shake the strawberry blonde out of his head. Maybe even before that night. Definitely before that night. He turned to her, and gave her hand a quick squeeze before focussing his eyes back on the road.
"Yes."
With that, Lydia felt her heart soar, and unconsciously, a grin began to spread across her face. The skin of her hand burnt with heat from where Parrish grabbed her, but she couldn't tell if it was from the Hound or from the fact that he finally touched her again after so many weeks. Not that it mattered anyway. She enjoyed the heat, and relished in the fact that he actually grabbed her hand of his own accord. Not to drag her out of Eichen House.
Looking back to the road ahead, Lydia directed the young deputy down a few more streets before they stopped in an alley way on the outskirts of Beacon Hills. She climbed out of the car carefully, fully aware of the fact that there was going to be a body lying around somewhere, and that she'd dragged Parrish out on some twisted game of Hide and Seek. Parrish subconsciously drew his gun, and began to pace forward into the alley. It was going on nightfall, and the cruiser's headlights were the only illumination providing any source of visibility. Lydia moved behind him, listening for the screams to alert her to the location of the body. It was only a matter of moments before she stopped outside a large, industrial dumpster. This was the place. This is where the body was.
She looked at Parrish, and back at the dumpster, "It's here."
Parrish looked almost amused, "Really? In the dumpster? That's almost too cliché."
Lydia shook her head slowly, "Not in it. Behind it."
Sure enough, when Parrish wedged the light of his torch down the side of the dumpster to check behind it, he was met with the crushed face of a young man. Grimacing, he pushed the dumpster aside enough that the corpse fell to the ground, making a sickening thump as it went.
Stepping back, Parrish shone the torch over his entire figure, and lifted a hand to call it in to the station, when Lydia gasped. He looked back at the teen, and lowered his hand from his radio.
"Lydia, what's wrong?"
"He's one of us, Parrish. He was one of us."
Parrish looked at her, his confusion evident across his face. Lydia looked back, and then back down to the young man.
"His eyes, Jordan. Look at his eyes."
Jordan slowly squatted down in front of the body, and took a closer look at the face, noticing a startling detail that he missed when he first found it. The young man possessed a set of shining, glowing, violet eyes.
Please let me know what you thought. Its a very basic Marrish to begin with, but there will definitely be more to come. I'm hoping to update this one pretty regularly now I'm on uni break, but a lot of my writing has fallen by the wayside recently so no guarantees. I'll chat to you guys next time :)