A/N: Hi everyone! I wrote this story a while ago but never came around to publish it. I'm posting it now because I haven't updated my stories in a while - I'm working on them - and, you know, I thought you guys would like to read it. This is just a one-shot set after the finale; I wrote it pretty fast, which is something new for me so, if it sucks, blame that.
I'm currently working on another story, - I'm reaaaally taking my time on that one - it's only going to be a two-shot but it's pretty long so yeah.
Hope you guys like it.
When you love someone but it goes to waste
Could it be worse?
...
When Joel left, another hole had been opened in her heart. Not like the one Wade had opened once, a long time ago. No. It was different and smaller and, somehow, bearable.
When Joel left, she didn't spend her nights wondering if he was thinking of her, if he was hurting just like she was. If he, too, had bad dreams about the way things had ended between them and if he still felt the love he so proclaimed to have for her, in hot summer nights and cold winter days. No. She would turn off her light and slowly doze off into a dreamless night. (At least, not about him.)
When Joel left, she didn't waste her nights roaming around the lake while emptying yet another bottle of generic wine and gazing at the stars, wishing he was there with her. No. She'd spend her nights around Lavon's, watching reruns of NFL games and arguing with him about whether or not the new player of the New York Giants had been a good acquisition. (She was a firm believer that he wasn't that good, but he was hot so he wasn't that bad, either.)
When Joel left, she didn't spend three entire weeks crying whenever the thought of him came to her mind. No. She had cried for a night or two, and then she got up from bed - pies now decorating her nightstands - and moved on with her life, because Joel wasn't coming back. (And all the feelings she might have been hiding for over a year resurfaced when she took a glance at the house across the pond and saw him.)
And then, three months after him leaving, - and a month after her (oh, so public) declaration of love to Wade - she can't help but sense a feeling of hopelessness take over her, leaving her lost and unsure.
Wade hadn't been supposed to fight it. No. He was supposed to take her in his arms, like so many times before, and tell her that he loved her, that he wanted her - them - back. But, somehow, he had made the decision to not make it easy on her. Not even when she stopped by the gatehouse with the new Halo game. (And he didn't invite her to stay and play with him. Not even the strip Halo version.) Not even when she offered to buy him dinner. (And he told her that he felt effeminate by her proposal.) Not even when she baked him - well, bought, to be honest - a cake. (And he uttered a thanks and left, taking the entire cake with him.) Not even when she practically gave up and showed up at the Rammer Jammer in a short, low cleavage dress. (And he told Wanda to cover up for him while he did some paperwork in the back.)
She had promised him - and herself - that she wasn't giving up. That they'd be together again someday, no matter how long it took. Well, it's been a month and she hadn't planned it to take so long. Feelings of rejection begin to smother her, and even though she tries her best not to, she decides to take some time to think. To figure out if the desire of being with Wade again was a lost cause. To really understand her feelings for him, and to know how far they could take her. And she thinks that maybe, if she puts some space between them, he might realize how close he wants to have her.
And that's what she does. She puts space between them. Again.
She manages to not go anywhere near the Rammer Jammer for an entire week. His side of the lake is off limits. When he enters Lavon's kitchen, she leaves Lavon's kitchen. She doesn't offer him video games or cakes and her short dresses remain intact in her closet.
She doesn't even know if it's working because she can't bear looking into his green eyes in the short and few moments she runs into him. And every time she walks away from him, she has to tell herself that it is better this way, that maybe he doesn't have feelings for her anymore, and that's alright. (And she's not going home to cry and eat chocolate ice cream while watching Notting Hill, or anything.)
She asks Lavon about him, sometimes, but he never gives away too much. He's fine, he tells her, but that's not what she wants to hear. She wants to know if he's hurting like she's hurting, if he wants to be with her as much as she wants to be with him.
But she guesses a he's fine will have to do.
There's some nights where she can't sleep. She tosses and turns in bed, trying to get her mind to draw a blank and allow sleep to take over her. But his face and his words keep popping up in her head, awakening her and tiring her, and... And destroying her.
You and I, we tried to make this work - we tried for a long time - and it just... it just didn't. And no small part of that was my fault.
No small part of that was hers.
She and him, they hadn't tried to make it work. He was wrong. They never tried. He walked away when things got hard; he let another woman slip into his arms, a place that used to be safe and hers. They never tried to make it work after that. Not even when he drove all the way through Alabama and she walked away. From him and from, possibly, any chance of them ever finding their way back to each other.
She let out a frustrated sigh, sitting in bed. The clock on her nightstand read 04:28. Great. It's just what she needs: another restless and sleepless night. Brick will be ready with a bunch of comments on how bad she looks when she gets to work in four hours and a half. Just great.
She finds herself in Lavon's kitchen in less than three minutes, carefully taking his pancake pan out of the cabinet and trying to keep the noise from reaching his room.
Wade had been the one to teach her how to make pancakes. He laughed all the way through it because, as he said, even a monkey can make pancakes. She smiles a little at the memory. Things were so easy, back then. They fought a lot, because that was kind of their thing, but they were never strong enough to—
"Uh, sorry." She turns around immediately, accidentally dropping the wooden spoon on the floor, startled by the familiarity of the voice. They study each other for a while, eyes scanning each other's faces like their seeing each other for the first time in a very long time. Finally, he breaks the silence, "I was just grabbing something to eat."
She nods, words refusing to leave her mouth as he motions toward the fridge and opens it.
Her hands grip the counter top so tightly, her knuckles were turning red, now matching her cheeks. She had promised herself that she would confront him whenever she had the chance; whenever they were alone, in a safe place without prying eyes and murmurs. She would tell him everything she had been holding deep inside her, ask him all those questions she wanted to ask. Or just yell at him for being a jerk. Well, easier said than done, huh?
"I'm making pancakes." She says instead, eager to end the silence. He closes the fridge to look at her and she clears her throat. "There's plenty if you want some."
"Yeah, okay." He sits down on a stool as she keeps staring at him. His hair is a mess and his cheeks are still red from just waking up and, when he yawns, she thinks it's adorable. (That's when you know you're in too deep.) She snaps back to reality when he takes a deep breath, looking back at her. "Couldn't sleep." He explains.
She turns her back to him, trying to give her full attention to the pancakes, "Yeah, me neither."
"You alright?"
"No. I mean yes —", she breathes out. "Just stress, I guess."
"Hum."
They fall back into silence. Wade supports his hand under his chin, and lets his eyes wander over his ex-girlfriend's body. Her hair is loose, covering her shoulders and she's apparently still wearing that skimpy little shirt that he loves so much. Wait, are those —
"Are those my boxers?" She turns back at him, a deep crimson now covering her cheeks.
"No." She answers fast, eyes wide open as she does.
He smirks, "So you wear boxers, now?"
"Yeah, you know, I'm just trying to keep up with fashion. You wouldn't understand." She blurts out, glancing up at him and seeing that smug smirk on his face.
Wade nods, "I was just missing that pair the other day."
"I'm surprised you keep up with the underwear you own. Since, you know, you don't have a drawer to keep them in or anything." She snaps at him, completely forgotten about the reason that had led her to Lavon's kitchen.
"Funny."
She bites on her lower lip and turns her attention to the floor. She'd never admit it to anyone but she enjoyed keeping some of her ex-boyfriend's... souvenirs, when their relationships reached their end. (She lies, she doesn't keep her ex-boyfriends souvenirs. It's just Wade. It's just him.) She's not proud of it - far from that - but she can't help it. If he's not there with her, then she needs something to remind her of him. Anything. Even a pair of stupid - and once disgusting before she took care of it and washed them for about ten times - boxers. Or his black hoodie - that he keeps looking for, to this day. It's easier to fall asleep when his smell surrounds her.
"How are those pancakes coming?" His voice guides her away from her thoughts.
"Hum—", she stares into his eyes, closing hers when her thoughts begin to overwhelm her. Do it. Say it. This is your chance. Just say it. "Why have you been avoiding me?"
He shrugs, looking down at the counter. "I haven't."
She snorts a laugh, "Right. I just wished that you would've stopped me. Told me to don't botter, because at this point... at this point, I'm feeling that all I've been doing for the past month was a colossal waste of time. You don't want to be with me anymore, and that's fine. But don't make me waste my time."
"Zoe, I... I told you that we didn't have a future together. You've said it yourself: we're too different to make it work. I really should've listened to you, because you were right. We would never be able to make a relationship work, no matter how hard we try, no matter how much we change. It is a waste of time."
"You're a jerk, you know that?"
"I've been told."
"I know you. You're always so afraid of destroying the things that make you happy that you end up destroying them yourself. You can't even let yourself be happy because you think you're not worth it. Is that what this is about? Are you trying to push me away so you don't hurt me? Because, news flash, it isn't working. I'm hurting either way, Wade. You're hurting me." She manages to tell him while trying to keep tears from falling down her eyes. She's done with crying; she's been doing it for far too long.
He stands up, shaking his head. "No, that's not what this is about. Maybe at first, yes. I didn't want to hurt you so I let myself slip away from all this drama - and I'm sorry if you're hurting anyway, Z. Really, I am. You know how much I—" He looks at the floor then, letting out a breath, and she follows his gaze almost instantly. "When we broke up - what I did - it didn't just destroy you. I hated myself for hurting you and for ruining our relationship for such a messed up reason, too. Still do, sometimes."
She nods, because she knows. She knows it's not something he's proud of and she knows it's something he wished to take back. And she knows he hates himself. More than she ever did. (She never relly hated him, anyway. She couldn't.)
"The thing is, Zoe, we're not good together; we never were. We fight and we say and do horrible things to each other. I don't want to get back into that kind of relationship. I'm done with it; I'm done with hating myself for cheating on you and I'm done with hating you for going to New York and coming back five months later with a new boyfriend. I'm done, Zoe. It's not good for me and it's not good for you."
"I know what's good for me, Wade. And I also know that we've changed; we have both been in relationships with different people, relationships where we both got hurt, yes, but also relationships where we both found a chance to be in a healthy commitment with someone— Joel, he's so different from you. And that was okay for a while, when I didn't want anything to do with guys who don't plan for the future or don't give a single crap about almost anything." He smiles a little. "But then he left, and you stayed. And you're... you. You're a pain in the ass and infuriating, and I hate you most of the time; and I can't even begin to comprehend why I love you, but I do." She takes a step toward him. "You and I, we might not be good together, or easy. But I don't want good, I don't want easy. I want you."
"You never want easy." He says, staring up at her beneath his eyelashes.
She bites the inside of her lip, summoning all of her nerve to utter the words she'd been meaning to ask him for a month, now. "Do you still—"
He doesn't need her to finish, "Yes, of course I do."
"Then, why not?" She takes one more step closer to him, her hands falling down at her sides.
He shrugs, "I don't know. Are you really sure you want this?"
She rolls her eyes and does the only thing she knows will prove to him just how serious she is about it - about them. Her hands curl around his neck and pull him down, closing the already small distance between them, and her lips find the familiar way to his. The kiss is hesitant and slow at first because it feels like they haven't been able to touch each other in a very long time; it feels like they are now rediscovering well-known paths they used to cross and the familiarity brings them a pleasant feeling at the pit of their stomachs. Wade turns them around, trapping her between him and the kitchen counter, refusing to let her lips escape from his. It's no longer a hesitant kiss, now. No. It's heated and electric, and it's them.
They pull away when their lungs scream for air. He rests his forehead against hers, their eyes closed, and their rushed breaths mixing together.
"I'm sure." She says, bringing her hands down to his hips, and he can't help but smile. A smile she hadn't seen in a while.
"We'll argue a lot."
She shrugged. "And then we'll make up a lot."
It's his turn to press their lips together, letting out a breathy laugh when she smiles to the kiss.
He doesn't know if it'll work, this time, because there's no way of knowing that. He doesn't know if he'll hurt her again or if she'll regret her decision and take back her promises of wanting him and only him. He does know he loves her, though. And that's enough, for now. At least, he knows she loves him too.
"Hum," a familiar voice forces them to break away from each other. "I'm not even going to ask you two why the hell you're making out in my kitchen at five in the morning, or question the fact that there are burned pancakes in my stove, - that I'm sure the two of you will offer to clean - highly increasing the possibility of a freaking fire in my house. I'm just going to kindly suggest you two to get the hell out."
Her face turns a deep crimson as she purses her lips together, swallowing her laughter. Wade, on the other hand, stands next to her with a big smile on his lips, proudly refusing to let go of her waist. (She's not complaining.)
"Oh, and... congratulations." Then, holding back the smile that forces its way onto his lips, he turns around and walks back into his bedroom.
(About freakin' time.)