AN: Well, here's the start of the next few stories that I work on that will all probably be in that angsty type of genre because I have a lot of sad songs in my music library that deserve to have some inspiration taken from them. So I decided to try something new with this one shot by changing the point of view of the story from the person who actually is the victim to the person who becomes the victim by love-grown association (which will make sense as you read it). It's kind of vague as far as characteriztion goes but I think the reactions kind of suit the situation. Anyways, I hope you guys enjoy.
One Hunderd Apologies
She was gone again. Disappeared into the night without a trace as if she'd never even been there in the first place. He thought that he would have gotten used to it. It happened a lot. It just so happened to occur in that month more than others. But it wasn't the frequency of the event that bothered him. What bothered him was how fast it happened. What bothered him was how fast everything was able to change.
"I feel perfect."
The words listlessly trailed out of her mouth, slipping into his ear without any trace of doubt. Stagnant, one hundred percent confidence within what she had said. Those words should have assured him. They should have fueled him with righteous pride, given him the idea that he was doing something unbearably right. Instead, they chilled him to the bone, slathered him over with an incessant sense of fear. He froze, he panicked. Because all perfection had ever meant to her was that everything else was about to go to hell.
His grip around her tightened as he drew her in, making effort to be closer. No, not just closer, closest, no gaps of space between her, pulling her tighter than could ever be comfortable for either of them. Yet she allowed him the pleasure, melding into his hold until it was nearly impossible to tell where one of them ended and the other began. Her head nestled between his chest and the crook of his arm, she gave him a reassuring look. Her eyes held promise, as if it would be better this time, as there wouldn't even be a 'this time'. Fingers from her spare hand locked together with his, light pressure indicating what should have been a comforting squeeze.
"Fuck." The curse was the only thing he could give to fill the silence as his world began to spin. His stomach churned, the acid brushing up against its wall, screaming at him with an infallible vengeance. He hated this part. "Please don't do this to me." The words sounded flat and empty even within his own ears.
She didn't answer. She never answered. Because any sort of condolence she could give to him would be nothing but a lie. But, maybe, that's what he needed. Maybe all he needed was for someone to lie to him and tell him that everything would be okay. That she would be okay. That lie would never come.
"I'm sorry."
That's all she ever said. That's all she could ever say.
The next morning she was gone. Bed left empty, apartment left cold. He didn't go out looking for her. He was too angry to. Angry at her, angry at himself, angry at the world that had cursed him with the shit luck that caused everything to turn out like this. He didn't do anything but wreck things. He threw all of her possessions, his possessions, their possessions (because at some point everything had begun to meld past the single ownership phase) until all that red hot anger began to meld into something productive. He unleashed the fury, drained all the blood stained ink from his heart, and then left it there. He put it where it'd be impossible to miss in his one last act of unrequited rage.
And then, just like every other time, she came stumbling in. Silent. She was absolutely silent as she performed every single 'task'. Jacket hung on the hook, shoes left by the door, bag placed on the counter in the most methodical fashion. It was as if she didn't even see him. As if he didn't even have a place within the order of everything in her mind.
But he could tell when she'd seen it. Breath hitched, retracting into her lungs at top speed as she emptily gazed at the canvas. She stayed like that for a moment before that gaze morphed into a glare, until that glare fueled her anger, the anger that she rarely ever lost enough control to tap into.
"Why?" It wasn't a question. It was an accusation, so bluntly and purposefully stated.
He snorted, feeling the frustration that had been creeping under his skin all day, licking at his mind to get out. "You tell me. Oh, wait. That's right. You never feel the need to tell me shit."
She didn't look at him, just glared even harder at that painting, fist clenching. "That's not true."
"Is it?" He growled. "Look me in the eyes and tell me that what I'm saying is a fucking lie."
The seconds bled into minutes drowned in deafening silence. Painful and tense silence. He could feel it clouding the air, pushing against the pent up aggression within his brain that grew with every single word that was left unsaid, until he heard the sniffle followed by the cry of frustration as she stormed into the bedroom, slamming and locking the door behind her.
"I'm sorry."
And it wasn't an apology.
"Where does all the anger come from?"
It's one of those questions she asks that he can never find an answer to. Not that he ever wished to actually give her one. But he knew that was what she wanted. Something logical to hold onto. Something to explain all the hurt away.
He doesn't know what to say. So he doesn't say anything. He just takes her hand in his and chokes down the bile that rises in his throat as he realizes how useless he really is. Because he can't do or say anything to make her feel better. He couldn't be the one she relied on to cheer her up when she wanted all the problems to go away. All he could do was sit still and watch, scared shitless that she'd never get better.
With that thought in mind he has to leave, hand slipping from hers, lips mumbling something about getting ice cream from that vendor that he'd seen earlier on their walk. He just couldn't handle the intense hatred that was bubbling up. Hatred that wasn't aimed at her, but rather at himself. He'd boil over. And he didn't want her to be their when he did.
So he hid himself away like a coward in his moment of weakness, shouting to the heavens, cursing them for every single thing that was wrong with the world. But the only thing wrong with the world was her. Her broken smile, her locked away anger, her empty eyes, and her endless tears.
An hour later when he came back with the ice cream cones she was still there, eyes staring out into a view that he'd never be able to see. A view that no one ever should have to. This time around it was his turn to say those words. They were the most painful and agonizing pattern of vocal structure to ever come out of his mouth.
"I'm sorry."
Because an apology was never good enough.
He was in her brothers' home. He couldn't understand what had driven him to visit the two people who put him on edge the most. He knew the reason. The reason was her. And she was what he couldn't understand.
"She's going through a hard time right now."
That was what they were constantly reminding him. That what she was going through was hard. That it wasn't her fault. That it wasn't his fault. That they could do nothing but try to cope with it. But he knew what the real underlying message was. The truth that no one would ever want to say. And that truth was that it was always going to hurt.
She'd been gone every morning when he woke up. They'd fight when she came home until they ended up curled around each other spouting streams of endless apologies and promises that felt like lies. Promises. Fucking promises that were always broken when he'd wake up to find that she'd left hours before. He'd get angry, pissed off and lash out at her when he she came back home and the vicious cycle would start all over again. It was becoming a habit and such a habit was his enemy.
"How do-how do you to deal with it?" He hated to ask. But he had to know. He couldn't take the fact that they were able to handle something that he couldn't.
The two of them gave off a bitter chuckle, on that sent chills down his spine. They weren't supposed to be like that. They weren't supposed to be bitter. They were supposed to be eternally happy-go-lucky to the point where it made his stomach turn. They weren't ever supposed to feel as torn as he did. Then again, life has a way of fucking over every truth you put your trust in.
"You don't." He didn't recognize which one of them had answered. "You just have to hope that everything will one day fall into place."
Hope. He was growing to hate hope. It was the one thing that he'd never allowed himself to feel. Because once you get your hopes up for something, you just set yourself up for the disappointment that follows those hopes not being fulfilled. "I don't think I have any more of that to give," he answered, finally.
There was a pause. A lag in conversation as all persons involved took his words in.
"I'm sorry."
Because an apology was never satisfactory.
"I'm not sure if I can keep doing this."
The words came so out of the blue, almost unnoticed by him until the weight of them sunk in. And he was surprised that he couldn't believe that she'd said that. Surprised, because those words had been on the verge of coming for a while now. Surprised, because he couldn't believe that she was the one who'd said them.
"You're not sure if you can keep doing what?" he asked gruffly, silently praying that she wasn't hinting at what he thought. He wanted her to be talking about anything else.
"You and me," she answered simply, bright eyes boring deeply into his, stripped of emotion, but obviously waiting to gage every single one that he'd pour out. And obviously she saw them. "It's not you…it's just…I don't think I'm being very fair to you. I feel like you're being punished for deciding to be with me. And…and I just don't want you to have to hurt anymore."
Ironic. Every word she said was tainted in his mind by a bitter sense of irony, because she didn't want him to hurt anymore. She didn't like the pain that this relationship was causing him. Well, he didn't like it either. He didn't, but there was that masochistic part of his body that thrived on it. It thrived on the torture that he felt every time she broke down in front of him. It thrived on the anguish that fueled his veins when he knew he could do nothing to lessen the pain that she'd been cursed with. It thrived on the fact that he held her a little too close to let her go despite all the hell that it brought him.
So he said the only thing he could think to say, the only thing that he knew didn't matter. "I love you. I know I don't say it a lot, but I love y-"
"Please don't." She pulled away from him, drawing back and rising to her feet. "Just don't say it again. Because that's the problem. We love things we shouldn't and…and that's what hurts. And…and no one should have to hurt anymore."
"I'm sorry."
Because an apology could never take away the pain.
He wasn't sure how long it had been since he'd last seen her. He'd stopped counting after he realized how much the numbers made his head hurt. Not just his head. The numbers hurt everything. They hurt because all they were was a solid reminder of everything that he'd lost.
All he wanted to do was forget. All he could ever ask for was to forget. But losing a memory was hard. And he had over one hundred of those to let go of.
She plagued his mind, flooding through his head, sinking her claws into every crack and crevice, threatening to rip him apart if he ever tried to push her out. She drowned him. So he did the only thing he could. He drowned her. Flushed her out and brought her to life in an alcohol induced haze in which she spoke to him, touched him, felt him, and was there with him.
"I want to get better." She said that to him every time, her fingers curling around his, allowing him to feel so unbearably sane. Allowing him to feel so unbearably alive. "I will get better. For you. I'll do it for you."
She smiled up at him and his heart clenched, collapsing on himself in a flurry of emotion. Wordless. She took all the words out of his mouth, left him without needing any possible reason for them. Pointless. She stripped them into a pointless stream of patterns. All he needed was her. Her there, then, and forever. There where he could forget about how sappy it all seemed and how fucked up everything else was. All he needed was for her to be there.
And then she was gone. Washed away in the white that brushed into his vision. The pain crashed into his body, leaving him barren in his thoughts, the only company coming from her voice replaying in his ears. She said two words. The same two words she'd told him one hundred times over.
"I'm sorry."
Because in the end an apology was all they had.
AN: Make what you will of the ending, since I really left it open for you guys to interpret on your own (I'm starting to like doing that). I feel like this could kind of be like a prelude to the prologe of my other story The Third, but I suppose the ending of this kind of kills that idea. Anyways, feel free to review with your opinion and tell me what you think.