(I own nothing!)
(I don't own Inception or 'teardrops on my guitar' by Taylor Swift.)
Drew looks at me
I fake a smile so he won't see
What I want and I need
And everything that we should be
I watch as Dom speaks to Yusuf about the compound, making sure that there won't be any mishaps. It's been two years and countless jobs since the Fisher job. I moved to LA after Miles offered me a job, turned out that the job wasn't working for him but for Cobb. The only reason he gave me for lying was that Cobb didn't have the balls to ask me to work for him, which Miles told me…in front of Cobb. I don't think I have ever seen Cobb that mad, or Eames laugh so hard he fell out of his chair, in my life.
I jump as his ice blue eyes flick up to meet mine. I give him a small smile, he nods and the corner of his lips twitch up in return. It's not much, but it's enough to send my heart fluttering.
Dom and I have taken to spending time together after work. And it was slowly killing me inside. We would walk in the park and my hand would reach for his, but I didn't dare take hold. He wasn't mine. He thought we were just friends. But I want more. I want to be able to say to the strangers staring at us that he's mine. So I date and try to find someone to build a life with, one with a white picket fence and 2 ½ kids. But I can't leave him because while I want the fairy tale, I need Dominic Cobb.
I'll bet she's beautiful
That girl he talks about
And she's got everything
That I have to live without
It was two weeks later that my heart shattered. Dom came in smiling, this wasn't that strange, but he wouldn't stop, even when Arthur threw a stapler at Eames's head. Finally after Arthur threatened to commit him to an insane asylum, he told us. He had met someone. And from the look in his eye I could tell that this wasn't just a crush.
Drew talks to me
I laugh 'cause it's just so funny
I can't even see
Anyone when he's with me
We are sitting on his porch watching his kids build a sand castle. He's telling me about one of his old jobs. I listen, acting as if I'm watching the kids but I'm really watching him. He hasn't mentioned her and I'm grateful. But his eyes tell me that she's not far from his mind.
"Dom, I need to-" I shriek and jump at the sound of Arthur's voice. I had gotten so lost in Dom's eyes that I hadn't heard Arthur walk up behind me, and believe me for all the man is graceful, he is not quiet.
They stared at me. I started to laugh, it was funny just how pathetic I am. Falling for the guy that I saved from his dead wife, the same wife I shot in the head, even if she was only a projection. I stood, still laughing, and walked away. Arthur called after me since I apparently was the one he needed to talk to. But I didn't stop because if I did they would see I had stopped laughing. I felt a tear roll down my face.
He says he's so in love
He's finally got it right
I wonder if he knows
He's all I think about at night
I hung up the phone. Dom and I had been discussing the next job when the subject inevitably turned to her. I didn't even know her and I already hated her and her perfect guts. He told me today that he loves her. He needs her more than he needs Mal. He needs her more than me. He didn't say the last part but then he didn't need to.
I wonder what he would do if he knew how much sleep thoughts of him stole from me. All the nights the only thing next to me are blankets and pillows moved to one side of the bed in a lump, in an attempt to feel less alone, less unloved.
He's the reason for the teardrops on my guitar
The only thing that keeps me wishing on a wishing star
He's the song in the car I keep singing
Don't know why I do
I felt a teardrop hit my guitar as I strummed the tune of his song. The song wasn't about him but every time I hear it I think of him. All the times I would sing along to this song in the shower or car, imagining I was singing to him.
I rolled over in bed to look out the window at the night sky.
"I wish that he was mine." The words are soft and are swallowed by the dark. I wonder if the star can hear me. I snort and turn back to the wall. It's not even a damn star, its Venus. The irony nearly kills me, the irony or the broken heart.
Drew walks by me
Can he tell that I can't breathe?
And there he goes, so perfectly
The kind of flawless I wish I could be
The latest job is done and we're closing up the warehouse. Arthur and Eames are fighting over something or other and Yusuf is packing up his things.
"You did good." I turn to see blue looking back.
"Thanks, you going home?" He nodded and plastered on the best smile I could manage. Would I ever be able to really smile again?
He smiles back before turning to leave and I can't breathe. He's perfect and I'm not. I can't do this anymore. He's at his car before I call after him.
"I quit."
She better hold him tight
Give him all her love
Look in those beautiful eyes
And know she's lucky 'cause
These are the thoughts in my head as the silence surrounding my announcement resounds around us like a gun shot. Arthur and Eames fall quiet and Yusuf stops packing, but it's Cobb who I watch. I want to see his eyes one last time. He stops and turns.
But I chicken out and run to my car, my tires squealing as I pull out of the parking lot. I just hope that bitch knows just how lucky she is. She had better hold him tight every night, love him with everything she has, and look into his ice blue eyes and see all the love that he has for her. Do everything I would do if he was mine.
He's the reason for the teardrops on my guitar
The only thing that keeps me wishing on a wishing star
He's the song in the car I keep singing
Don't know why I do
The song comes on the radio as I speed away for him. I don't sing along this time. This is a song for lovers, halves of a whole. I am neither and never will be. But then my lips move out of habit and I wonder. Could I ever love someone else? The answer was there before the question was finished forming. No.
So I drive home alone
As I turn out the light
I'll put his picture down
And maybe get some sleep tonight
The drive takes longer to get home than normal because the apartment in downtown is no longer my home, my home is across town by the seas shore, where two kids play every morning while their father and I sip coffee on the porch. But that can't be my home any longer, it's going to be hers soon and that thought kills me.
I'm also afraid that he might be there waiting for me, demanding an explanation. I lied and walked away from him once, I couldn't do it again. But my fears were put to rest as I walked into a dark and empty apartment. Why should he come here? He has her after all. I walk to my room I think about what could have been, you know, if the world was even remotely fair?
I change into my white linen, spaghetti strap night gown and crawled into bed. I turn over to turn off the light when my hand lands on a picture. It's of me and Dom, I'm holding James in my arms, Phillipa riding on her father's shoulders, one of Dom's hands holds her steady, the other is around my waist holding me in close for the picture. We look like a family. I loved them like they were my own. But if things were going like Cobb said, they would have a new mother figure soon. She took everything from me. The one thing I wanted and she had to take them. I threw the picture across the room. The glass shatters and falls to the floor like the tears on my face.
I flick off the light and close my eyes. Tomorrow I'll buy the first airplane ticket out of here.
'Cuz he's the reason for the teardrops on my guitar
The only one who's got enough of me to break my heart
He's the song in the car I keep singing
Don't know why I do
Sleep for me that night is like a child who doesn't want to go to bed, the more you try, the more it evades you.
Why am I like this? I was always strong, Ariadne the fearless, never backing down from anything. But the thought of never seeing him again or worse seeing him with her, it broke my heart. Only Dominic Cobb had the power to do that.
The song wound its way through my window from a party on a nearby roof. Its melody choking me and the words stabbing at my heart, I curl up into a ball trying to block it out. But the tears fall onto my pillow and my heart aches as my traitorous mouth hums the tune.
I feel sleep creep into my mind with promises of dreams, dreams where he is mine. I want it, to live a dream where I don't hurt so much. Maybe I'll move to Mombasa and sleep to wake up like the rest of them. Or have Yusuf put me under and then just make my way back to limbo. They wouldn't care.
Dom has his kids… and her.
Arthur and Eames have their arguments.
Saito has his company.
Yusuf has his cat.
I have nothing.
*BANG!BANG!BANG!*
I jump at the sound of someone trying to break down my door with their fist. Snarling I rose from my bed, pulling on my sheer bathrobe, to go give the jackass a piece of my mind and if he was really unlucky a piece of my fist as well. I stormed over to the door as another round of obnoxious door raddling banging started. I threw open the door.
"Who the fucking hell do you think you are? It is two in the fucking morning! So, it's a little early to be dealing with stuck up pompous assholes who think they own the fucking world! And-" My tirade abruptly ended as I got a good look at the person I was screaming at.
All I saw was blue.
Holy shit. I had just spent the last three minutes cussing out my boss. Well my ex-boss, but none the less standing on the other side of the door was a slightly stunned-looking Dominic Cobb, his hand still raised in a knock. Then it hit me that he might not only be stunned from the cussing, it might also be because I was wearing a bathrobe that hides nothing and a night gown that hides even less.
So I did what made sense.
I slammed the door in his face.
"What do you want? I told you I quit, I'm sure Miles can easily find you another Architect." I said through the door.
"Ari," I winced at the nick name his kids had picked for me. "I want to talk."
"There's nothing to talk about."
"Ariadne, open the door." Well there was no way in hell that was happening.
"No, now go away. I need my sleep for my job interview tomorrow."
"Open the door right now, Ariadne."
"No." I turned and noisily made my way back to my room, where dreams of him not banging on my door, at what was now going on 2:20 in the morning, lay waiting.
"Ariadne, I'm going to count to three."
"Dom, I am not one of your children!" I screamed at the door, I didn't care if the neighbors heard; they were probably already awake from the banging.
"One!"
"I'm going back to bed! And I'm not opening the door!" I walk into my room and flop on the bed. Why can't this be like every other job where you quit, you get your things, you get the hell out of there, and that's that?
"Two!" I rolled my eyes what was he going to do? Pick the lock?
"Three!"
*CRASH*
I jumped off of my bed and ran back into the kitchen. He didn't pick the lock; I mean why bother when you can just go through the door?
"You kicked down my door?" I'll admit it was a redundant question since he was standing in the wreckage of what had been my front door.
Dom looked at me.
"I gave you fair warning."
"You counted to three! That usually means a time out, not that you're going to break down my damn door!" I'm yelling at him at this point and so he yells right back.
"Why the hell did you quit?"
"That is none of your fucking business!"
"I'm your boss! So, yes, it is my fucking business!"
"You're not any more. Now get out!" I'm in his face trying to push him back towards where my door should have been.
"No!" I can feel the pain in my heart. He had to go. He needed to live his life even if it was without me.
"Get out!" I have gone past yelling and am screaming at him as the pain hits me in waves. "Get out! Get out! GET OUT!" I'm beating him with my fists now, but he grabs my wrists effectively stopping my wild swings.
"Ariadne, what is going on?" I finally stop hitting him but I don't look up, I won't, I will not let him see me cry.
"Don't you have a date with her tonight?" I snarl trying to regain my anger so I'll stop crying.
"Her who?" I could hear the confusion on his face.
"Your girlfriend, the one you won't stop talking about!" It comes out as more of a sob than a shout but I can feel the flames of rage start to flicker back to life.
"Ariadne…"
"Why are you here, Cobb?"
"Ariadne, you quit without warning and stormed off without so much as goodbye or at least an explanation!"
"Well next time I'll remember the two weeks' notice, and here's your goodbye. Goodbye, Cobb, have a wonderful life." I said pulling away from him. "Now please leave so I can get some sleep. I'll send you the bill for the door in the morning." I turn and walk back to my room. I sit on the window sill and look out at the city light's, they're so different from Paris it's hard to imagine that they come from the same light source.
I heard footsteps carry Dom into the room; he stopped just a hair's breath away.
"Have you ever loved someone who you couldn't have?" Dom was silent as the question hung in the air, suspended by the pain in my voice. "The one thing in this world that makes you want to go on living and you never even get to hold them in your arms," I draw a shaking breath that rattles in my chest. "Because someone else was more brave or bold and they got the prize before you even started the game. To look at that person every day and feel better just by seeing them, only to have that taken away because then you remember that when you leave it's not you that they'll hold in their arms tonight?"
I turn to look at him. "I know how that feels. So I can't work with you anymore." I turn back to the stars, so far out of my reach, just like Dom.
"Why? Is it Arthur? ...Eames?" I can hear the trepidation in his voice. My head shakes a no but I can't tell if it's an answer or from the crying.
"Because I can't walk into that warehouse every day and watch you walk past me, or have lunch with you knowing that you could never be mine, Dom. I'm not that strong." I can feel the air shift as he moves but whether he's moving towards or away I can't tell.
"Yes, I know how that feels."
"How can you? You have your girlfriend…"
"I never said that she was my girlfriend. I said that she was the most amazing girl in the world and that I love her." I feel his hands on my turning my, as he tilts up my chin. "And maybe it's time to be brave and bold."
"What if someone's in line before you?" I had to know if this was real, if I really had a chance.
"That's what guns are for, sweetheart." Then he kissed me and I pulled him onto the seat beside me. He held me in his arms and felt at home, if anyone tried to take the spot I was in right now, there would be guns involved.
Finally we pulled away to breath.
"Dom?"
"Yeah?"
"You're still paying for the door."
He's the time taken up but there's never enough
And he's all that I need to fall into
Drew looks at me
I fake a smile so he won't see
I'm sitting in a lawn chair on the porch on the 4th of July, watching our kids run around the lawn. We weren't married yet but Dom had been acting secretive so that might be changing soon.
Dom was currently over at the grill with Miles talking about something that had Miles ecstatic. Arthur and Eames were over by James and Phillipa 'helping' them with their sand castle and arguing over structure, design and lord knows what else. Yusuf was helping Miles wife, Grace, with the drinks explaining the importance of how to correctly mix lemonade.
I sighed and looked back at the one thing I needed in life. I had fallen for him so hard and he had been right there to catch me. Sensing me looking, or just having impeccable timing, Dom turned and smiled at me, I smiled back but it was forced. Shit he noticed. A worried look came over Dom's face and he started to make his way over to me. Crap now instead of having all day, I now had five seconds to think of how to tell Dom that he was soon to be a father of three. Oh happy day.