Chapter 7: Pride
Meliodas wakes to a crash in the kitchen. He tenses, expecting to be in his own house and assesses the situation as best he can as his sleepy brain reconnects. Elizabeth is soft and sleeping soundly in his arms. "I hope I didn't wake you!" Her father calls out, loud, as he crashes metal against metal. Meliodas chuckles, liking Bartra all the more. If Meliodas caught his future daughter wrapped around someone like him, he would strive to be this mischievous about it but probably fall short of the mark.
"Need help?" He yells back, over Elizabeth's sleeping face. She doesn't stir in the least from the noise. Bartra chuckles from the other room.
"I called your brother. He's heading over in a few. I need to be at the office this morning." His voice is full of mirth and Meliodas smiles at his lady's peaceful expression, understanding her father's worry. She looks so serene and he steals the softest kiss from her, his chest closing in on itself as he feels his heart beat fast enough to try and escape its confines. As gentle as he can manage he pulls away.
Her sleepy eyes open at his movement, they roam unseeingly around the room until they meet his green eyes and her satisfied smile crushes his insides to warm goo. "Oh." Escapes his lips as he wants to see that look every day, all the time, and he wonders if that's how she'll look after an orgasm. Meliodas grows hard and he tucks away from her, twisting to a seat and leaving the blankets behind for her.
"Good morning." He signs, having a hard time looking at anything outside of her. Meliodas watches as her bright eyes dim, she stretches prettily as she sits and then scoots away, her arms wrapping around her knees. Elizabeth's gaze falls on her letter to him while he is distracted by her nightgown riding up her creamy legs. "Are you okay?" He asks and she tries to smile.
Her dad pops in, waving for their attention and Elizabeth rises, offering to help. Meliodas can't stand yet, not with the situation between his legs. He listens, to her soft "good morning" in the dining room and to Bartra's laugh before he makes his way to their spare bathroom. After, he is in control of himself and when he enters the kitchen he is put on toast duty.
Midway through breakfast the doorbell rings and in one glance Meliodas recognizes his brother's silhouette through the opaque glass of the door. Bartra rises first and Meliodas stands but with one glance at Elizabeth he stays. She isn't eating and he thinks back, remembering her doing the same with dinner. Bartra and Zeldris share a handshake and the two couldn't look more different.
Bartra is in his suit minus his coat and leather shoes. His hair is combed back and his beard is well-kept, regal looking. He's sporting a cool smile, Bartra's eyes kind as he notes all the similarities between the brothers.
Zeldris is in torn and grease-stained jeans, he fumbles taking off his cloth sneakers in the entrance way as their house is too clean for him to touch anything. His hair is pushed to one side, held in place with his natural oils as he hadn't showered the night before. He cringes at his dirty wifebeater, looking over at his brother sheepishly as if sorry he is embarrassing him but Meliodas is focusing on Elizabeth again.
Bartra has spent a few hours with the two over the course of the few meals they have shared and he's noticed the sheer adoration Meliodas has for his daughter. Zeldris and Bartra have the same sappy grin on their face when Meliodas taps Elizabeth's hand. She is zoned out, jolts into awareness with his touch and flushes hot that all the faces are turned to her. Meliodas is the only one whose expression is deep in concern and she tries to brush his worries off.
"I'll clean up." She offers and Bartra is grateful.
"Now that Zeldris is here, I'll be heading out. I'll see you around dinner, Elizabeth. Text me if you leave." Her father signs, slapping Zeldris on the shoulder not knowing Meliodas' older brother doesn't know much of the language. Elizabeth told her father Zeldris signed to her and had made a wrong conclusion from it. Elizabeth takes the plates, put them beside the sink and as her dad passes she stops him.
She gives him a big hug. Bartra chuckles, returning the affection with gusto and kissing the top of her head. "I love yew." Elizabeth tells him, her voice saying those words affect Meliodas and he looks to his brother. Zeldris hadn't understood the muffled warbled words and with his eyebrows so high Meliodas can tell. Bartra goes, cheerily calling out "You and your brother are fine people, Meliodas! Don't let me down." The older man gives him a wink over his shoulder as he goes out the side door of the kitchen.
Meliodas helps her load the mostly empty dishwasher and rinse their cups and plates before he starts gathering his stuff. He tucks her letter into his front hoodie pocket, the thought of reading it burning him with anticipation. Meliodas has never received a love letter and he hopes it is one. He himself found it so much easier to express himself over paper than in person.
"If you don't have anything to do today, you are welcome to come with us. We'll just be hanging around the shop." Meliodas offers speaking and signing, Zeldris nods hopefully meeting Elizabeth's eyes. He too can tell something is off and when she gives a resigned sad smile, Zeldris tells his brother he's going to wait out in the car for him. He picks up his shoes and situates himself on the porch before going to his Impala on the street and starting it up.
"I don't want to get in your way." Elizabeth signs. "You'll be working." He isn't sure how to say goodbye and to prolong their time he thanks her for the food, for fixing his backpack and with a flush, he goes to the couch to fold his blankets. She helps, grabbing the long ends and their fingers touch as he takes them from her when they maneuver the fabric. When its folded he fumbles for any reason to stay in the room with her as she hasn't smiled yet. He wants her eyes to sparkle again.
"I like sleeping with you." He flushes as he signs, awkward as that's as close as he can get to express his feelings about having her close through the night. Meliodas knows it is too soon to show his cards, fears that if she knew how obsessive he has been about her for years that she'll run, any sane person would. He has so much to say but doesn't.
While, everything Elizabeth had to say is in her letter to him and she walks to the door, eyes filling as she tells him. "Thank yew for being my friend, Meliodas." He smiles, loving when his name leaves her lips but she opens the door for him and he knows their time is up. When he steps out she shuts the door behind her and he turns to watch her through the frosted glass as she walks away.
'I should have kissed her goodbye.' He wonders if she had wanted to. A cold fear runs down his spine and he pulls her letter from his pocket to peel open the side as he makes his way to the Impala. 'What if it's a breakup letter.' A rush of anxieties plague him, that he will have to live without her after he's had a taste of what life could be like.
Meliodas gets in and as soon as the door is shut he's speed-reading her letter. Zeldris pulls away, asking him if he wants a coffee as he already planned on stopping for Gelda. "She loves those Frozen Mocha drinks. She gets all glowy when she has one." Meliodas isn't listening though as his hands start shaking while reading Elizabeth's words. He skips, picking up phrases and in a rush Meliodas finally understands her.
The phrases that shout out to him, make his heart skip a beat. 'Free you from me', 'Cross me off your list' and 'please don't be sad about this.' He's a few blocks away and without a second of hesitation the letter is tossed from his fist and he opens the Impala's door. They were moving, not excessively fast as they were in residential but Zeldris calls out, shocked. "What the fuck?!"
Meliodas jumps from the car, stumbling with the sudden foot over foot running he had to do just to stay upright. He ignores his brother, shedding his coat to move faster. Meliodas runs with everything he has because everything he has is at stake. 'I knew something wasn't right and I left her.' He curses, a panicked throaty groan escapes him as he realizes how much he's missed and how hard he's failed her. 'She doesn't know how I feel, I told her only when I knew she wouldn't understand!'
He jumps her wall, bounds up the stairs and yanks the door open, grateful that she hadn't locked it. "ELIZABETH!" he shouts her name but the silence in the house is eerie. He takes the stairs three at a time, pulling himself with the railing and goes to her room as his first stop. Meliodas had left his phone in his bag on the floor of Zeldris' car but he spots Elizabeth's on the end of her bed. He dials 911, preemptively as he isn't taking a single chance.
That's when he hears the water turn on, a rushing noise from the bathroom up here. The dispatcher answers with a 'what is your emergency' just as he slams the door to her room in his blind panic to reach her. He tries the handle and shakes the bathroom door, the wooden frame jumps from the force. "LET ME IN!" He howls, using his shoulder as he steps back and rams the wood. The door splinters around the lock and Elizabeth sobs, loud and shocked but the barrier kept them apart until he slams into it a second time.
The wood splinters, breaking fully on the one side from the frame as he stumbles in a few steps. The phone goes flying from his grip, sliding across the floor but he pays it no mind as he takes her in. She's bleeding, her wrist sliced long ways, from her wrist to her mid forearm and his face crumples at the sight. Elizabeth is shaking, the bloody razor on the counter as she had a towel in her other arm, cleaning her own blood off the floor but trailing more behind her.
'Its soaked. I have to stop the bleeding.' He reaches for her but she flinches away, falling back and with solid smacks of her elbow on the side of the tub and her head on the wall, she sags to a sit. Meliodas kneels before her, roughly taking the wet towel from her with an angry snarl, forcing her gushing wrist into his grip to wrap it.
"Don't FUCKING leave me!" He demands, his swirling storm of wrath ignites with the repeated sparks of raw fear. "I won't let you!" Meliodas tightens the towel around her arm and ties the ends as best he can as he spots little orange see-through bottles by her hip. He shakily reaches for one but changes his mind as they were already ingested and Meliodas knows what he needs to do.
"Stahp!" She muffles, pushing him away with weak trembling muscles. Whatever she took was already taking effect or the blood loss was getting to her. "Don't touch meh."
"You're gonna listen to me!" Meliodas is harsh, pulling her toward the toilet and he opens the lid, forcing her face over it as he struggles to put his fingers in her mouth. She screams, wild and angry. He uses it to his advantage and ignores her bites as she scratches at his arm with her good hand, but his fingers touch the back of her throat. Vomit erupts and although his arm doesn't get out of the way in time, he uses his other to pat her back. "You made me do this." His voice is rough with emotion, heavy in wrath. He knows she can't hear but he feels wrong being so firm with her body, of holding her in place as he was and he wants to explain.
She's shaking as she wipes at her mouth, eyes wide and terrified as she pleads. "Let meh go." Elizabeth's bleeds through the towel, a drop of red hits the toilet seat as her limb falls limp at her side. She wobbles, tears leaking and Meliodas catches her before she hits her head. With a scuffle, his shoes squeak in her blood over the tile as he lays her out over his legs.
His head shakes from side to side, denying the situation and her request. "I can't! I won't." He's almost screaming, hoping if he reaches a high enough decibel she might hear something. Meliodas' stomach burns, his grip too tight and he tries to make his touch comforting, fearing these were her last moments and he wants to make them softer for her. His teeth clench, his own eyes leaking and her uncut hand comes up, touching his cheek and smearing the tear.
"Pa-lease." She hushes, her lips are turning blue and it trembles. Her face is pale, her breathing rapid and the bathtub fills more than the safety drain can take. A cascade of water falls from the edge coating the floor and the blood around them starts to thin, a swirling pink. "Ayelubeayew." She warbles and he doesn't understand it. Her dying words and he screams as her blue eyes, already dim, grow dull before her lids shut sag.
"Open your eyes!" He howls. "SOMEONE HELP HER! She can't hear me if her eyes are shut!" Meliodas shakes her, sloshing in the water as he heaves her up, grunting to princess hold her limp body. "I won't let you go!" He bellows, angry and vicious, overcome with too many coursing emotions. Down the steps, his back hits the wall for support and a slew of picture frames crash around him. "You can't leave me." Meliodas' voice cracks, his body breaking down with shakes as hers grew colder with the dripping blood from her wrist leaving a path down the steps.
He doesn't have a plan outside of get her away from the scene. Her breathing is shallow, disjointed and Meliodas' breaths cease until the little whistle-intake is heard once more. "I won't live without you." He declares, his plans shifting back to what they were before she came back into his life. "I love you." Meliodas chokes, tears dripping on her peaceful face.
Zeldris steps over the threshold, takes in the scene, the blood and his wreck of a brother with one glance. His phone is out, dialing 911 just as the first siren of an ambulance could be heard in the distance. "She can't die!" Meliodas whimpers, the anger in him dying with her and all that is left is emptiness. The darkness is expansive, overpowering and when his brother reaches for her he panics. "DON'T TOUCH HER!"
He feels he has to keep her safe and Meliodas doesn't even realize it's Zeldris in his state of hyperarousal. He thinks outsiders wouldn't understand, that only he can see her, truly see her and it took him too long. Meliodas is panting, his lungs seeming to catch all the air she's missing as he moves her down the porch stairs. Officers arrive, an ambulance on its tail in an onslaught of alarms and urgency.
A man in an EMT uniform calls out with his partner, a flashlight clicked on as he reaches for the limp Elizabeth in Meliodas' arms. Immediately he reacts badly, slamming his forehead into the mans in a vicious head butt that knocks him backwards, away from her. Zeldris howls, rushing forward but the officers arrive before his brother and in a struggle, Elizabeth's body is maneuvered from him. It takes two officers and two EMTs but the two teenagers are separated.
Meliodas fights, flying elbows and punches, slipping from holds and yelling. "Don't touch her!" He doesn't stop until Zeldris tackles him down between the officers. Zeldris is of the notion that the officers would press charges while he personally, would not; that Meliodas needs an outlet for his emotions. Zeldris knows too well the lure or violence. Elizabeth is on a gurney, checked over and put on an IV. The ambulance is leaving in a matter of moments.
The brothers trade punches, slamming and pounding into the others flesh. Zeldris' brow is gushing blood. He is more in control than Meliodas, avoiding hitting his face while his younger brother is too lost to give the same courtesy. "She's gone." Meliodas croaks, rolling on top of Zeldris with his next punch but his brother uses the same force to continue the tumble until the two hit the wall. The flowers under their weight are pressed flat.
"Get yourself together," Zeldris grunts at he takes a few hits, and he sees his father shine through in his brother. "She needs you!" Zeldris howls, slamming the message home by cracking his fist across his brothers jaw. Officers descend, wrestling Meliodas' rearing fist back and he breaks down.
Meliodas doesn't sob, he doesn't scream or cry, the man just sags in his cuffs and lets the rough officers guide him. Zeldris follows, wiping at his face with a scowl as miranda rights are stated. "Its a panic attack, trust me, he's my brother... He's not good at expressing himself, this is what it looks like. That girl, she's his girlfriend-" But his brothers voice is cut off when Meliodas is shoved in the back of the cruiser, the plastic seat skids across his face as he doesn't even try to prevent the blow.
Zeldris smacks at the glass and Meliodas blandly looks over as his brothers voice yells, muffled from outside the car, "I'll bail you out! I'm calling Bartra." When he steps back an officer climbs in the front seat, rubbing his sore jaw and glaring into his rearview window but Meliodas hasn't bothered to sit up. 'She's gone.' Kept circling in his mind. They drove for a short while, two officers manhandled him to get him out and they take pictures.
They spend extra time on the scratches and bite marks on his hand and arm. He's given new clothes to wear and when he changes they confiscate his old ones. They take his finger prints and he only speaks once when he's brought to a detective. "Is Elizabeth alive?" He wonders, fearing and needing the answer as he can't get her dull eyes out of his mind.
Meliodas is brought to an interrogation room, cuffed to the metal table which is bolted to the floor. Two different detectives come in. He lays his head on the table, looking over the path her nails dug into his flesh and wonders 'will this be the last thing she gives me?' They think he hurt her, at first when the detectives ask he simply tells them "no", denying that he cut her or attacked her but eventually Meliodas reconsiders.
He starts to feel if he wasn't such a self absorbed asshole he may have caught on sooner, that they were the same from the very beginning of their relationship in elementary school so he should have known her list meant the same as his. 'A bucket list... why didn't I figure it out?' The detectives bring out two faxes as evidence after a few hours and give Meliodas a blank notebook and a pen.
"The officers you've assaulted, while resisting your arrest, spoke to the girls neighbors. A Mrs. Abernaty states she caught you spying, watching her dress through her window." Meliodas doesn't deny that, he can't, but sits up to look at the police emblem stamped on the front of the notebook. His cuffed hand stretches the chain, it grinds against the bar as he takes the pen in hand. "That's for your confession." The detective explains, pushing the written statement Mrs. Abernaty recounted before him over his right hand. The header stated 'known stalker of victim'.
The word victim circles in his mind.
'A confession of my sins...' Meliodas thinks, a haze is affecting him as if he is recovering from the worst beating he's ever taken but he knows the fight with Zeldris was mild in comparison to the usual. Elizabeth's pale blue lips flash in his thoughts and he groans, pained. The detective thinks he's getting somewhere and eagerly places the second paper beside the other to show him a sheet from his record in juvie. A paper submitted by his councillor, one of the best men Meliodas has had in his life.
The detective points his finger at the page as if this is the linchpin in his case. "Do you know what this says?! You've been obsessed with Elizabeth Liones for years! Mr. Escanor, a licensed psychologist says... and I quote," the detective picks up the paper to read it verbatim. "Due to his Attachment disorder he has developed a secondary disorder of obsessive love. Because of his repeated expressed fantasies and how his entire life centers around one girl he knew as a child, Elizabeth Liones, it is my recommendation that Meliodas have no contact with her in any capacity. A rejection is likely to lead to a repeat of Meliodas putting the object of his attentions in the hospital or worse."
Meliodas had not known Escanor had diagnosed him, being underage the information had gone to his uninvolved parents. He's never heard this recommendation but Escanor had given him warning about 'triggers' and that Elizabeth is his primary one. Escanor hadn't told him this would happen if he entered her life and Meliodas grips at his hair, tugging and fisting as he tries to think it through. 'It is my fault.'
The detective continues his theory on what he thinks really happened. "Why would she cut her primary wrist first?" but she's a signer, both of her hands have been trained to be equally dominant. "You shoved those pills down her throat, the bite on your hand and the scratches where she fought back, not to mention the 911 tape. You were vicious. She wanted to leave you and you couldn't let her go."
Meliodas is better at handling his overwhelming emotions but this is beyond the scope of what he can handle. Slowly, he sits back, he head shaking from side to side 'no' in denial of his own memories, of the detectives assessment and of Elizabeth ever reaching such a dark place when to him, she is all the good there ever will be in the world.
The mustached man in his collared shirt stands, hitting his knuckles on the table, reminding him of all the times Ban did that to Elizabeth's desk so she knew he was there. "I want you to hear the rest of the evidence we have." The man walks over to the mirrored glass and gave a nod, and as the audio had been cued up a ringing sounds over the tinny speakers, as if a call is going through.
"Nine-one-one, what's your emergency?" A woman's voice sounds in the room as the detective grins while shutting the door, catching Meliodas' wide-eyed understanding. He's left alone in the room as the lady repeats her words just as he hears his own voice, "LET ME IN!" Meliodas shivers, it feels like ice is sliding down his spine and settles in his gut because he knows how it sounds. As if Elizabeth made the call... and as he slams into the door once, twice and she sobs in her surprised high-pitched exclamation he gets what the officers concluded. The door splinters, the sound cracking in his chest cavity, echoing. There is a tumbling as the phone flew from his grip, but it sounds as if they were struggling over the phone.
For a brief moment, there is only the sound of the running water as the dispatcher calls out "Miss, are you okay?" but she's tapping on a keyboard, her fingers working quick as she fears she understands the situation and getting it wrong. Meliodas screams, his hands grabbing at his ears and he wishes he were deaf, just like her so he didn't have to relive this because his mind filled in the visuals. Her contrite face as she cleaned up her own blood. 'Did she not want to inconvenience anyone with her suicide?'
The volume is turned up and he can hear the audio through his hands. It sounds like an animal snarling, he realizes how cruel he was in her final moments as his vicious voice demands "Don't FUCKING leave me!" He shakes, the chain connected to the table jangles but he lets go of his ears to hear the loud recording of "I won't let you!"
Meliodas lets his mind replay him wrapping her arm in the towel. He wants to hear the next part, her voice is coming up and it doesn't disappoint, even with the tinny overlay. "Stahp!" Meliodas basks in the sound, his eyes pinching out tears as he squeezes them tight. "Don't touch meh." His hands are shaking as he grabs the pen, flipping open the notebook ahead of him as her pale face looms in his memory. .
He touches the pen tip to paper as his voice sandpapers across his eardrums. "You're gonna listen to me!" Meliodas just wants her voice, he doesn't want to endure his own cruelty to her, how he misses his chance to tell her while she was still conscious. There is a struggle, her little sobbing grunts before she screams, wildly. Meliodas looks at his hand as he knows he is stuffing it down her throat and he breaks down, throatily gasping as he listens to her vomit.
"Stop!" Meliodas howls, tainted with tears. No one abides.
"You made me do this." The tape continues, his voice is rough and the man scowls at the paper before him, wanting to release the building storm inside of him. 'She could be dead right now, she might not exist anymore and without her soul I can't... I won't go on.' His muscles tense, his head arching back as if to give his body more room to accept the feelings. He's tight, as if about to take a crushing blow, and it comes as he expects, her soft, pleading voice asking so shakily he can see her terrified gaze with the words. "Let meh go." There is a scuffle, squeaking shoes on the tile and he can almost feel her weight in his arms.
His recorded self feels how he does now, his scream repeated in his mind. "I can't! I won't!" Meliodas's head falls forward, hovering over the paper, his golden locks tickling over the page. Her voice is the antithesis of his, hushing and quiet to his raging panicked screaming. "Pa-lease." He remembers her blue lips trembling, her breathing turning rapid. There is dripping water and he knows this is when the tub overflowed.
Meliodas has reached the max his body can take and he howls, standing and straining against the chains. "STOP THE TAPES!" He howls, his rage turning and he can't throw the chair or the table as it's bolted down so he simply slams his own head into it with a resounding crack, his blood spurting in an arch. It only mildly dulls the pain.
"Ayelubeayew" Her voice warbles and he doesn't understand again, his brain fuzzy and he curses, a string of raw, rough words as he had his second chance to understand her but wasted it. 'Just like I wasted every moment with her.' He growls, his face pressed to the metal as he groans, knowing he missed her dying words a second time.
"Open your eyes!" The tape cracks, his words sounding underwater due to the tub overflowing. "SOMEONE HELP HER! She can't hear me if her eyes are shut!" He hears the sloshing of water, of his pained grunts on the tape and he sighs, low and relieved as this is the end of the recording. It clicks off and he sags into his seat, putting the pen still in his fingers to the page again.
He starts a letter, writing her name on the top as the speaker clicks once more and to his utter horror, the tape starts over again. "No!" He screams, so tense his muscles ache. Meliodas wipes at his bleeding forehead with his unscratched arm and he calls out again "Stop this! It's torture! I CAN'T SEE HER LIKE THIS AGAIN." Because he recalls her scratching breathing, her parted blue lips and her pale face accenting her dull eyes. "I CAN'T!"
Meliodas screams the entire audio until the end, he has a third chance to understand her last words. "Ayelubeayew" and Meliodas howls as the meaning alludes him. He puts pen to paper to finish his letter, a response to hers, the one he never finished as he understood it was a goodbye letter quickly. He starts a stream of consciousness, as the overwhelming emotions course through him he lets them flow out, giving it all a path to go.
He confesses, the notebook if full of confessions. How he failed her in her final moments, that he knew she wasn't happy when he left that morning and how he should have known. The tape repeats and his neck stretches when her voice sounds, his jaw cracking from the pressure of his teeth grinding. Meliodas looks at his scratched up hand as that part of the tape plays. He listens, straining and stilling to hear "Ayelubeayew" and when he doesn't understand, again, the man twists in his chair. He wants pain, he has so few options but he wraps his ankle around the chair leg and with his other he tries to break his fibula bone, coming up short of succeeding but feeling what he needs with the ache that spreads up his leg.
Meliodas groans, a mixed reaction of both pleasure and pain.
He writes as he listens. Poems flowing from his fingers as he fills page after page. Three pages are dedicated to the feel of her skin. Another couple about the light that she shines when she enters any room and how her smile makes him feel. His words turning harsh with how 'fucking special' she is and how the rest of the flea-bagged rats in the world have brought her down. He spends seven pages on how being a self-absorbed asshole made him unworthy to live, that he had no plans of continuing, 'without your heartbeat pumping life into the world there is no reason for my own to keep torturing me with survival.'
"Ayelubeayew" her voice echoes, his pen ceases for the first time in two hours, his hand cramping but the gears twirling in his mind click together with finality. Meliodas stands, he howls, arms raised as far as they can go and the pen in his fist snaps in two, blue ink exploding in his palm.
"YOU CAN'T!" He bellows in rage, his arms coming down to fling the notebook away. "I'M NOT GOOD!" It flaps its pages, crashing to the white cinderblock wall and out of reach, the broken pen following the notebook. Meliodas devolves into sobs, hunching over the table and he throws punches, roughing up his knuckles in a pointless endeavor to get the tapes to stop because now that he understood what she was saying, he can't hear it again.
But he has to. When the part comes up the next time, he stills sitting on the edge of his metal chair with the upper half of his body limp over the table top. She's saying "I love you." Parts of him die, his heart feels as if its shriveling inside of him and he prays internally for her life. 'Spare hers, take mine if you need a soul.'
There is no resistance in the man as the tape repeats and slowly, as the minutes pass, he longs for her last words. He doesn't need to hurt himself as this hurts so nicely he feels as if he is finally being absolved of his sins. That perhaps, when he follows her to the grave that his soul will have been cleaned enough to join hers in heaven, and if she isn't there he'll follow her wherever she may have gone.
"Ayelubeayew." her voice warbles and he understands. Across the table his bloody fingers reach as if to find her when there is a new sound over the speaker. A scuffle and a "Hey!" that isn't a part of the audio track. It ends prematurely but Meliodas doesn't rise. He hears the door open, knows a person has sat down in front of him but he simply lets his silent tears pool under the side of his face on the table, unmoving.
"Meliodas." The voice is thick, familiar and of a man he saw just this morning in an extremely different situation, a time Meliodas has wished to return to, to restart his day, thousands of times. He rises, green eyes wide and reflecting Elizabeth's father, his own eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot.
The two stare until shakily Meliodas asks, "Is she...?" But he can't finish, his throat closing in on itself and he blanks, unable to continue the thought, he can't face it.
"You got to her in time." Bartra chokes, swallowing thickly. "I'm getting you out of here." He pulls out papers, a pen and in a few pen swipes Bartra is his legal advisor, his lawyer. The older man stands, looks over the ruined bleeding man before him and sucks in a hissing breath before awkwardly, his hand comes out and pats his unruly blonde locks. "Give me fifteen minutes. Zeldris and Gelda are out there doing everything they can."
When Bartra leaves, paperwork in hand, the silence doesn't bother him because Elizabeth is alive. Meliodas is having a hard time processing the thought of him doing something right, of reaching her in time. After reliving the nine-one-one call over and over, the interruption of his penance seems wrong and in spite of there being no danger his body's hyperarousal doesn't calm.
After a moment, he fears he hallucinated Bartra, that perhaps he's been stuck in silence. Meliodas would prefer her dying words over having nothing of her at all and asks quietly "can I hear her, one more time?" but either no one is behind the mirror or no one thought he was worth an answer. He holds his breath but releases it after a moment when the click doesn't start.
Meliodas waits. It takes less than the fifteen minutes Bartra requested for an officer to come in and uncuff him. He's grumbling about 'resisting arrest charges' but once the chains are off, Meliodas rubs at his wrists and follows the man out. He catches sight of himself in the mirror and can't manage a reaction to the dried blood on his face and caked in his hair. What he sees is what he expected, as that's about how he feels.
He's limping through the station, his own inflicted injuries throbbing but when he sees Gelda on the other side of the glass divider keeping the public out he winces at her reaction. "Did you do this to him!" She yells, her greasy finger rising and she points around at the officers seemingly not knowing where to land. "I want the interrogation tapes! Do you HEAR ME!?" Her ponytail bobs with her aggression and Zeldris pulls at her fist, telling Gelda something that makes her flash with pallor, eyes glinting to Meliodas in understanding.
Meliodas doesn't try to put on a face of bravado for them as he's lead around to the side metal door and out of sight. "You're released, we'll be in contact with your lawyer." The door opens and he walks into the lobby. To the left is his brother and sister-in-law. Gelda tries to rush him but Zeldris grabs her wrist, holding her back and she cries, she's still pretty but she snots loudly with her emotions.
When the two reach his side, Zeldris looks him over with worried green eyes. He isn't sure how to comfort his brother but he does remember that Meliodas never reacts well to touch. Zeldris has a black eye, his eyebrow cut and a nice bruise on his jaw. With one glance Meliodas frowns, seeing the damage he did.
"I'm sorry." He tells Zeldris, green to green. Neither of them are good at expressing themselves, yet they both felt so much love for the other in this moment that they didn't need to. The two smirk, a connection formed long ago grows solid, unbreakable, and Zeldris releases Gelda to smack Meliodas' shoulder.
"Fuck that." Zeldris jokes, but Gelda elbows her husband in the side at just the right spot to hit where its sore and he winces. Meliodas almost smiles until Gelda falls upon him, her arms around his shoulders and she crumples, crying, her speech so rushed and choked he doesn't understand a thing. But her message is clear enough with the emotions thick in her voice. Gelda pulls away, her puffy eyes and splotchy face stunning as her expression is one of love, for him. Meliodas can't breath and it gets worse as Bartra strolls out like he owns the place, nodding over to them.
"You have the address. Room five-thirteen." The old lawyer speaks to Zeldris but continues on, head held high but his shoulders give him away as a defeated man. He has too much on his plate and with Elizabeth, Barta can't find one single fuck to give about any of his other obligations. His daughter comes first.
Meliodas slinks from Gelda and Zeldris eases the situation but guiding them both toward the parking lot. "I don't have a change of clothes for you but we have napkins and a bottle of water you can use to clean yourself up." Meliodas winces when he touches his forehead cut, not really thinking about it with seeing Elizabeth again just around the corner. He feels exhausted with the whip lash his feelings are giving him. He feared he would never see her again, that she was gone from this world and now he's on his way chanting 'room five-thirteen' in his head.
.X X X.
Her sisters tried to talk to him. Bartra said something, low and calming but Meliodas is focused on not walking too quickly but moving as fast as he dared through the halls of the hospital. He passes the waiting room where her family is. He doesn't want to be accosted about his own head wound and keeps his palm over the damage to be as inconspicuous as possible. Yet, when he is standing outside of her room, he stops. A piece of him doesn't believe she's in there, a dark twisting writhing of snakes in his stomach keep him in place as he fears finding her hospital bed empty.
Meliodas stands there so long that Bartra walks up beside him. The two stand, side by side facing her partially open wide-door. Inside you can see the tan curtain and the open bathroom to the left. "She asked for you." Bartra speaks, "her first word when she came back." Her father meant it as comforting but Meliodas winces, hoping she hadn't been afraid or confused as to why he was no longer by her side. It's been hours and Meliodas yearns for her.
There is no hesitation as he dips around the barrier between them and walks around the curtain pulled across. She looks so small, she's strung up with tubes and she's so pale he has a hard time spotting where her skin ends and her hairline begins. Elizabeth is sleeping, but his chest grips at the vision of her being motionless with her eyes closed. He goes to her side and moves his face to be perpendicular to her torso to watch her chest, under the white knit hospital blanket, rise and fall.
"Elizabeth." He hushes, and as if she can hear, her eyes flutter open. Instantly the blue orbs crinkle, filling with tears and she reaches with her I.V. arm to touch him. Meliodas sinks into the feel of her hand on his face, her little weak fingers weaving into his hair and she pulls his head forward. He doesn't fight it, bending farther into her until their foreheads touch. She jolts with her sobs and his scabbed hands come up to cup her face, tears filling his own eyes.
"Aye Louve Yew." She confesses, her sobbing making her voice thicker but Meliodas chuckles, humorlessly as he's heard her say it over and over again before this. She wiggles, moving until her back hits the side railing of her bed and her little tugs let him know what she wants. Meliodas has no will to resist her, pulling away to kick off his shoes and maneuver to join her on the bed. He makes the sign for 'I love you' and as he lays down beside her, he presses it to her chest, over her heart and hospital gown.
Her sobs increase in intensity from his confession and he pulls back her blankets to lay under them with her. "I'm sowwy." She speaks, and he's already shaking his head no from side to side as he is careful with the tubes around her. "I thought I held yew back." His head just keeps denying it, shaking no as his tears fall and he signs back, his motions shorted with the little distance between them on the bed.
"I only want to be where you are." He stares into her, her eyes flitting from his hands to his face as if to make sure she understood correctly. "The rest of my life is yours to do with as you please." Meliodas finishes and her expression crumples, her bandaged arm gripping at his blood stained, jail-provided white shirt. He pulls her into an embrace and he holds her as she cries, gentler than he's ever been, afraid to break her when she's just been put back together.
The two don't separate until a cafeteria worker comes in with a tray. She's so focused on her task of setting up the food on the wheeled table the worker doesn't notice there are two people in the bed. Simply pushes the table to be within reach of the bed and goes. Elizabeth sniffs, rubbing her leaking face on his shirt before releasing him. With hesitation, the two maneuver into a seat and Meliodas gives her the bed. "Don't go!" She speaks, and he nods, pulling the high back chair closer so he can watch her eat.
With the first bite of food to her lips, he smiles. Meliodas wants to tell her all about his own suicidal plans, about how far he had fallen before she blazed back into his world but he doesn't want to burden her. Instead, he comes up with another plan, he remembers how he had to make plans when he shifted to a 'living' mentality. He touches the back of her bandaged hand as she is using the I.V. one to eat to attract her eyes as he signs.
"Elizabeth." Meliodas starts, "let's plan something fun together. Is there anything you want to do?" His only intention is to have a date or event to look forward to. Meliodas makes a note to himself to always have something dangling in front of her, a juicy apple for her to reach out and live for. Her lips twist, her eyes softening in kindness and her expression reminds him of Gelda's but seeing Elizabeth's love quickens his heart in a different way.
He doesn't know the sign she uses and he asks her to repeat it before he shrugs. She spells out "Europe" and his eyes alight as he looks to hers with a laugh.
"Backpack across Europe? Hostiles and train rides?" Meliodas asks, his hands moving fast in his eagerness and she nods.
"Dad agreed to the settlement. We can use some of that money." She offers but Meliodas has his own money, cash he's been saving for a few years now. "Take a year off before college." Elizabeth shrugs, not wanting to push him.
"We can apply to colleges together, for the rest of this year. If I buckle down I can finish well." Meliodas adds, "I'm used to living out of a backpack." He means it earnestly but Elizabeth laughs, a musical chime that chips at the ice in his stomach, a sound that causes him to think she's okay. They are making tentative plans and he jokes more than usual to coax her pretty smiles from her. She's finished her meal when there is a knock on her door.
A moment later her sisters come in. Veronica and Margaret are forced, stilted as they sign but after a moment their father comes in with a reluctant Zeldris and Gelda. Bartra has two paper bags of greasy fast food in his grips and as people settled around Elizabeth he passes out cheeseburgers and fries. Meliodas offers his seat to Bartra but when Elizabeth flinches Bartra refuses it, sitting on the windowsill.
Veronica and Margaret take the floor, leaning back against the far wall while Gelda and Zeldris make a home by the air conditioner. The two families mesh well, with Meliodas interpreting what his family says and her's speaking as they sign. Gelda tries her hand at signing and with Zeldris' approval they sign up for a class Gelda finds at the library called 'Intro to ASL'. Elizabeth feels lighter and better than she has in days as she regards the people important to her.
A nurse knocks and softly calls from the door that visiting hours are over. Meliodas' heart drops. His throat grows tight at the thought of leaving her and of the inevitable sleepless night awaiting him as when it's quiet he can still hear the nine-one-one call repeating. He memorized it, unavoidable after hearing it for hours. In his bleak self-admonition Meliodas misses Elizabeth's request to her father.
Veronica laughs, quipping over her shoulder as she goes "Take care of our girl, Melio." Hearing his old school days name rubs him the wrong way but he's so raw the ire only pricks into his consciousness before fading. Margaret hugs her sister, long and deep, kissing the side of her head and they are both crying by the time they part. Meliodas stands, to say his reluctant goodbyes when Bartra's hand presses down on his shoulder.
"If you don't draw too much attention, or make any drama, the nurses aren't going to care if you stay." The older man pushes him down into the chair once more and he obliges, wide eyed as he looks to Elizabeth for approval. She's gripping hands with Gelda, Elizabeth nodding to whatever Gelda just told her. Zeldris isn't sure what to do and simply gives a little hand flick wave to Elizabeth as he steps around his wife.
"I'll bring you some clothes, pick you up tomorrow or whatever." His brother is heading to the hall when Gelda says her goodbyes and follows. Bartra is last to go, kissing his daughters head and touching her face with both his hands as he mouths to her. Whatever he says makes big tears leak and splash on his fingers. In the end, he kisses her forehead and she nods against him, her hands coming up to touch over his.
"I'm sowwy." She says but Bartra shakes his head, pulling his hands away to sign, "No, I'm sorry." and Bartra waves her to lay down. She does and in a playful, fatherly way, he tucks her in, even pushing the blanket in around her like a cacoon. Elizabeth laughs at him and Meliodas smiles, glad to see something that represented the happy childhood she had with her father.
When he leaves and it's just the two of them again she moves over, untucking on one side to give him space beside her. "Sleep with meh?" She asks and his exhaustion creeps up enough to make itself known. Meliodas, goes to her and the two plan their future together, both declaring their past left behind. No more lists, no more sins and no more dwelling. Meliodas and Elizabeth want to evolve. Their co-dependency and mildly unhealthy attachment aside, their love is pure.
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
Call 1-800-273-8255
Please let me know what you think, I always want to hear from readers and... please reach out if you need help. Wikipedia has a whole list of helplines per country.