"Jade, come on it was only for a few minutes." Chris cried out as he ran after his girlfriend. She kept her back to him though as he ended up trailing after her only seeing her long black and red streaked hair. The girl he was following was not in the mood to listen to what he had to say. So, he had to run after her. It seemed that he was always running after her.
On his journey to quickly grab Jade's arm his mother as well as his Aunt Phoebe just looked at him as if he were crazy and shook their heads at him. He knew what he had done was wrong. It wasn't like he could undo it. It had been a spontaneous reaction to the event at hand and he had really screwed up.
This time Jade had had enough of him dropping her off in odd places with odd babysitters that she didn't know. Hell, she had just realized the family secret and here she was very pissed at him. Rightfully, of course, but he couldn't change what he had done. He could only apologize profusely and hope she would look beyond that.
"No way, Chris. Not this time." Jade replied as she turned to face him fully and he stopped in his tracks. Her deep blue eyes were sparking with a fury that he wasn't very sure he wanted to deal with. He stopped fully for a second as he looked into her eyes. He swore he heard Paige in the background.
He heard her whispered words to his mother and aunt, "Hell, half no fury then a women's scorn."
He also heard Phoebe's giggle. He didn't bother to look back at them. They were all out of the way hiding somewhere where he couldn't see them. He had no privacy in this house. It was enough to make a guy go crazy sometimes especially with all the estrogen in the air.
He hated knowing that his aunts as well as his mother knew what he had done. Hell, they had been there when the fire demon had been vanquished and when he had realized what he had accidentally done. His look when he had realized where he had sent Jade would be priceless and remembered throughout the history of his family.
Hell, he should just have framed it and sent it to them for a Christmas card or something because he would never hear the end of it.
"What do you.." he started.
She wasn't supposed to remember last time. It had been too brief. Plus, his mother didn't even know what 'up there' was like so how could Jade possiblly remember? She wasn't even magical.
"What do I mean? I remember Chris. I remember being up there with the Elders. The Elders, whoever the hell they really are. You had them baby-sit me, but obviously they didn't like me much so then you had to just leave me down in hell for awhile." she replied as she wrenched her arm out of his grip.
Crap, she did remember. How he didn't know. Right now though he had to stop her from walking out of that door. If she did there was a chance she would never come back into his life and he wanted her there. Ever since the first time she had enrolled at his high school and came into his biology class like she had owned the place he had wanted her in his life.
She had been beautiful and confident, as well as strange and beautiful. She had been everything he had wanted. Hell, she had even been okay with his secret. Until now of course.
"It wasn't literally hell that you were in." he said as he tried to buffer the truth.
"Oh, well the you deal with a firey pit of brimstone below you and we'll see what you have to say then." she spat back at him as she folded her arms over her chest in anger.
He had screwed up big this time. He knew it. He had accepted it the moment he had brought her back to him.
He hadn't meant to send her to hell. It had just happened. One minute they were kissing, the next a demon had appeared in the Manor and had thrown fire at them, and then he had orbed her straight as far away from him as possible to save her life. Of course, the whole fire part from the demon had really not been wasted on him since she had been incidentally orbed straight onto one of the rock ledges in one of the pits of the underworld hell.
Chocolate, flowers, and a magical getaway wasn't going to help him now.
"Okay, all you have to do is calm down and listen to me. I am really sorry. Jade, I'm so so sorry." he said begging for forgiveness.
"Chris, you sent me to hell. I am expecting way more then an apology." she yelled at him as she rolled her eyes and took a few more steps from him in anger.
"You were in danger. That was the first place I thought of to..."
Phoebe sipped her coffee and raised her eyebrows. "God, he's not doing so well in there." she whispered to her sisters as they watched from the corner of the kitchen.
"You're telling me," Paige agreed.
"Oh, shush. It doesn't help that we are listening into this," Piper chided her sisters as she pulled a chair up to them and sat down.
"Did you get it?" Paige asked.
"Oh, yeah. Popcorn for Phoebe. How that goes well with coffee I will never get. Strawberries for me, and Paige, the chocolate ice cream is gone so you have to settle for vanilla." Piper replied.
"No chocolate ice cream!" Paige cried.
"Settle. Since someone forgot to put it on the grocery list." Piper replied with a look.
"We really should talk to Phoebe about that. I guess a person never is really housebroken." Paige replied with a turn of her mouth, heaven cast brown eyes, and a quick gulp of vanilla ice cream.
"Shush, You guys, she's got a point." Phoebe declared waving her arm in their direction.
"So, what? When did you think 'Hey, I think I will orb Jade to hell. I'm sure no one will come after her there'?" Jade asked as she impersonated his voice.
"Look, you just don't get it." Chris replied in frustration as he looked around the room from some kind of inspiration or some kind of a diversion.
"Exactly. Explain to me why you had to orb me to hell, Chris. Orb, that's what you call it right? That's your lingo, isn't it?" she asked him.
"My power just saved your life. Would it kill you to be a little more considerate?" Chris replied defensively as he folded his arms over his chest also in anger.
"Okay, then let's trade places. Maybe, I will be pacified then knowing I can ship your ass anywhere in the world for free. Hmm. That sounds so good right about now." she told him.
"Can I explain myself or are you going to overreact the whole time?" Chris asked her.
He knew he was setting her off a little bit more. She gave him a look that could kill. Then, she flicked her wrist at him to go on as she took a few breaths of air to calm herself down a bit.
"I don't know if I want to hear your side right now. I am a little too angry at the moment." she told him in a voice as well as a calm state of mind.
"Well, sit down shut up and listen for once alright. Please?" he told her as he pushed her gently down onto the white couch.
"Why? So I can make it easier on you to orb me somewhere else. Hey, I guess hell just wasn't good enough. Why not the bottom of the ocean this time? See how long it'll take for me to suffocate and drown." she replied as she tried to get up but he pushed her back down.
"Okay, being way too overdramatic here." he told her.
"Right." she drawled as she stared up at him angrily.
"Okay, I am sorry. But I've had enough." Chris told her as he used his telekinesis to keep her mouth closed. "Okay... Okay. I .. I sent you there because I couldn't send you 'up there'. You had one thing right. The Elders don't like babysitting. And well, I had no where else to send you. I had a demon who just appeared out of no where and you were here. I panicked. I'm sorry I sent you to hell of all places, but I knew you'd be safer there then you were here. I mean look at it this way... you're an innocent that was orbed somewhere safe. Demons would never expect you to be orbed to hell. It's ingenious." he told her as he found a niche to play at. He gave up as his gaze settled over her 'I don't know what you take me for, but I am not taking your crap' look. "Look, I don't know how many times I can possibly say that I'm sorry until you understand that I mean it. I was trying to protect you that's all you need to know." he told her as he stopped trying to keep her mouth shut and waited for her response.
She shook her head. She stayed quiet for a long moment and he didn't know how to take it. She wasn't exactly the quiet type.
"Jade?" he asked.
"Oooh, what do you think she's going to do?" Phoebe polled her sisters.
"Well, she can either kiss and make up with him or walk out of the door." Piper offered the two case scenarios.
"Or she could scream at him, wack him to a pulp with her shoes, and then tell the world our secret." Paige added in a fake peppy voice. "Your choice."
"Always, the voice of reason," Phoebe told Paige sarcastically.
"Someone's got to do the job." Paige replied flexing her arms as her sisters rolled their eyes at her.
Phoebe looked back at the scene and started to poke Piper fiercely as Jade went to get her black jacket lying over the chair and put it on in the extended silence.
"Jade, come on. Say something. Anything. The silence treatment technique stopped working when we were kids." Chris said softly as he watched her.
He wanted to stop her. He wanted to just get her to stop and realize he hadn't done it on purpose. He couldn't though. She was pissed. If he was in her shoes he would have ran out of the house the minute he had been orbed back.
"Alright, Chris. "she replied.
"Alright, what? You forgive me? You understand? There is no way in hell.. no pun intended.. that the girl I know would have miraculously stopped overreacting to this whole situating." he told her as he watched her move gracefully.
She gave him a slick side glance and stepped back for a moment.
"Jade, I was trying to protect you. That's all. You're powerless. I can't protect you, myself, and then vanquish a demon at the same time. I would have to look out for both of us and it's safer to orb you somewhere else then deal."
She bit her lip as a sad look passed into her blue eyes.
The sisters looked at one another. They all had seen that look before. It was the look of giving up. It had happened in their own countless failed relationships. It was the look of someone who wasn't able to deal with real life let alone someone else's magical excess baggage too. They all knew this was only going to end badly.
"Alright, your silence is killing me."
"You're right, Chris." for a moment hope filled him and then she went on " I am sorry to be such a burden." she said.
"No, Jade. That is not what I am trying to say." he told her as he stopped her in her tracks from making any random attempts towards the front door.
"Chris, that is exactly what you are saying. So, I will cut to the chase. I am human and you're.. Well you. I can't be on your level I can only be your innocent in your eyes. I don't want you to be looking over your shoulder worrying about me every time something bad happens and I sure don't want to be orbed to Timbuktu next time so.. "
"No," he protested. He could see the hurt in her blue eyes as it passed into him. He couldn't believe she was doing this. He couldn't believe this was ending this way. She pressed her fingers to his lips and smiled sadly as she looked into his blazing green eyes.
"You know that this was inevitable the minute we kissed. I knew it when you first told me your secret. I just was trying.." her voice faded off.
They both had been trying to pull it off. When he was growing up his mother had said love was hard. He had never thought it was like this. It was tearing him apart. He didn't want to lose her, but he knew what she was doing was right. She would always be his first worry. She would always be in danger.
She had no powers of her own. She had nothing but her own mortality to fall back on and even that was short lived. It didn't matter that they were in love in the end. It only mattered how they were going to end up without each other. This way she was choosing to be alive.
"Don't do this." he said softly as he laid his forehead over top of hers.
"Chris, what else can I do. I release you from me. Alright? I will go be a regular human innocent in your terminology and I will live a normal life. You can stay here and fight off demons. Save the world on a daily basis humbly without any credit and I will keep your secret for you." she promised so lightly that her words barely met his ears in the stillness of the room.
For a moment as he held onto her it felt like the world had stopped. He didn't have that power though. If he had the power to freeze time he would have frozen her long ago.
He didn't want to lose her. She had been the first person who he had actually told his secret to who he had trusted enough to do so. She was the first person who he had cared about that wasn't a family member and here she was just leaving him like this. It wasn't right.
"I promise I won't orb you to hell next time. I promise. You can pick where I can orb you." he tried to keep her.
"Chris, shut up and let me go." she told him as she gave a small bittersweet laugh to his suggestion. She gave him a small kiss on the lips as she did and hugged him to her hard as if she could just keep him there in her arms forever.
He realized there was one flaw in her that he hadn't seen before. She was too much of a martyr.
"Not without a fight." he told her.
She laughed again through tears that fell down her tanned cheeks. "Chris, I can't be a super witch I wasn't made that way. I'm sorry. "
He was speechless and near tears. He had never wanted her to be a super witch. He had never wanted her to be apart of the hell his family had to go through daily to survive as well as save the world. He wanted her to be as far from that as possible. Of course, wanting that and then living it were two separate things.
"You don't have to be. You just have to be here with me. "
"Shhh. Maybe, in our next lifetime."
Chris felt her pull away from his arms. Again, he felt hollow as he saw her start to go towards the door. Everything was moving so fast for him. He didn't get how she could just be in love with him, then angry with him one minute, and the next she was leaving him. Only a minute before all of this had happened they had been kissing as he'd led her to the door.
She had been going home. They were going to meet up the next day to practice for the part of the Shakespeare play project that they had together in English class.
Now, here they were. She was saying goodbye to him. She was breaking up with him. He was losing her right after he had found her and found someone who could be trusted with his secret.
He wasn't going to give up though. He promised himself that one silently. He wasn't going to let her go without a fight. Not when she as one of the best things that had happened to him.
It was then that a demon had shimmered in. He hadn't known. He had been too distracted with the world moving so fast around him as it changed rapidly as he watched her go to the door. She had had her hand resting on the doorknob. He had caught up with her.
Jade had took a breath and looked back at him. She had had tears in her eyes. She was about to say something. At the time, he had hoped it was just that she was going to say it was joke or something like that. Instead, she just looked at him for a long moment. Her dark blue eyes fading into his as he had started to move towards her again.
Then, her sky blue eyes had moved to a spot behind him in surprise as her mouth had opened. Whatever she had been about to say to him before was gone as she called out his name in warning. "Chris!"
He hadn't even had the time to turn his head it had happened so quickly. Just as her words had made sense in his mind a fireball had come flying out of no where. It hadn't been aimed at him though. It had barreled forward and rammed right into Jade's chest as she cried out.
She flung back jarringly and hit the stained glass doorway. Her eyes were still filled in shock. Her pale pink lips were still open from crying out his name. Then, her body slunk slowly to the ground as he saw her eyes darken in deaths grip.