Chapter 10: Doubt Truth to be a Liar | October, 2015

Holly

"Come ON, Holly! Please? Pretty please, with a cherry on top?"

This is Alex's idea of a convincing plea. She's starting to beg and it's getting on my nerves so much that I almost give in... But I am bent on finishing Paradise Lost tonight, so that I can get the head-start I need on the lengthy essay due in three days. Today is my nineteenth birthday, and I can understand that she wants to make me feel special—but to be honest, I've always hated my birthday. And going out to see a movie is especially unappealing at the moment, since it's so time-consuming. I hate the idea of disappointing my friend, especially when she's only trying to be nice, and to get me to lighten up and have fun... but I'm seriously concerned about my deadline with this book...

"Holly," she says again, widening her eyes and pouting slightly, as though this really is solely for my own good... which, since Alex sometimes knows what I need more than I do, myself, it probably is... "It's Guillermo del Toro. You LOVED Pan's Labyrinth! The cinematography is supposed to be stunning, and..." She leans in with a look of extreme sincerity on her face, "I'll pay for as much chocolate and popcorn as you want."

We have one of our short staring matches, during which my resolve wears progressively thinner, but after a few moments, we cannot help but both break out laughing. And an hour later, we're both sitting in a movie theatre we frequent, not too far from campus, sitting in decent seats with two large popcorns and ample chocolate bars between us. After only a few minutes of the movie, I find that Alex, as usual, was right about this being a good idea for me. Sitting in the quiet darkness, focusing on the screen and Del Toro's masterful artistic vision, helps me to deeply relax, and let my mind move away from the stresses of school and other aspects of my personal life.

I've almost settled completely into a meditative dream-state when, suddenly, a new character appears onscreen. His name is quickly revealed to be Thomas Sharpe, an Englishman visiting the United States and taking an interest in the main female protagonist of the film. I feel my eyebrows furrow slightly at the sight of him, and think I recognize him from some other film, but I'm not sure, and he's absent in the following scene, so he quickly leaves my mind.

But the next time he appears I do remember, and it makes me stiffen on instinct, and look over at Alex silently, almost holding my breath for the ridiculous feeling coiling around my gut as my pulse speeds up. She sees me looking at her and draws her eyes from the actor on the screen, smiling and wiggling her eyebrows suggestively.

"So hot, right?" she whispers under her breath, so that nobody else can hear. "He's SO good in the Avengers, like, oh my God."

Of course. I suddenly feel profoundly stupid, and my cheeks flush a deep red as I glance back to the actor onscreen, and, surely enough, recognize him as the man Benedict had introduced me to backstage on the opening night of Hamlet—the man who he'd brought back to his flat, the man I'd playfully taunted for his towering height... How embarrassing, not to have had a clue who he was, then. He'd seemed slightly familiar of course, but I hadn't though much of it. Tom had been his name, and I scoff lightly at myself, chuckling and shaking my head as I put the dots together: Tom Hiddleston.

Alex's mouth widens in a smirk as she chews on some buttered popcorn, the light of the screen making her eyes shine gleefully. "Do you have a crush on him?" she whispers with a quiet giggle, noticing the reddening of my cheeks.

I take a deep breath in and out, remembering how unpleasant it had been, keeping my initial acquaintance with Benedict from her, and then having to admit it later, after an embarrassing situation... I decide now that I don't want to experience that again with her, and I decide that I'm going to have to make a point of telling her the truth about these kinds of celebrity encounters, if they continue to happen through my connection to Ben.

"Alex..." I say, keeping my voice very quiet, not wanting someone to hear.

"Yeah?" she says with a shrug, furrowing her eyebrows—she must think I'm crazy.

I exhale deeply and, after taking a few moments to gather myself, say, very softly: "I met him." Her eyes widen to the size of the sun, and I keep going before she can say anything, explaining myself as though on the witness stand: "He was backstage with Ben when I went to see Hamlet, and then..." I stop myself suddenly, not wanting to go too far, but I notice the look of urgent alertness in Alex's eyes, and ascertain that it's too late to exclude the rest of my encounter with him, now. "And..." I continue, "then we went back to Ben's flat together, and had pizza. It was, just casual... I didn't even recognize-"

"Are you KIDDING me?!" she exclaims, her voice a fraction too loud, her eyes containing equal parts exasperation and awe.

I cringe at the volume of her voice and whisper, "Oh, my gosh, keep it down," cowering back into my chair and almost clenching my eyes shut, expecting a hoard of people to swarm down on us for our inappropriate volume.

Some people around us mutter in annoyance, and someone shushes us from a few rows behind, but after another moment, the theater is quiet again, and I can ease up. But only slightly, as Alex is still glaring intrigued daggers of jealousy and excitement at me.

"I'm shutting up for the rest of the movie," she says in a quiet whisper, pointing at me to demonstrate her sincerity, "but when we get out of here, girl, you are SPILLING." She looks at me pointedly, and then shoves some more popcorn in her mouth, signifying the end of the conversation, and leaving me to turn back to the screen in half-peace.

Later that night when we get out of the theater and start on the walk back to campus—which is only three very well-lit blocks away—she makes good on her promise. Reluctantly, and keeping my voice down even though nobody would care to listen into our conversation anyway, I tell her a more detailed explanation of what had happened: Tom coming backstage to green Ben, a decision to go back to Ben's flat together, since the two of them wanted to spend some time together before Tom had to leave somewhere on a plane the following morning. I can tell that she's spending an extreme amount of energy in not prying into what Tom was like in person, and after a few moments of very tense silence, she simply gives up with a sigh of sarcastic disappointment.

"How is it," she says, "that you've so easily stumbled upon this inner circle of hot British men?!"

I scoff slightly at her wording, incapable of keeping the blush from my cheeks at the adjective she'd used... "It's not anything top-secret like that, Alex. They're just friends. Really, just... normal people, plus a lot of talent and a lot of recognition."

She giggles a little and puts her hand over her face as she realizes my point. "Oh, my God," she says, whining a little in slight embarrassment, "you must think I'm such a weirdo for fangirling like this."

She looks at me sheepishly and I shake my head to calm her. "It's okay," I say, "All of this will probably pass before too long, anyway. It's impossible to keep this sort of thing up."

"What do you mean?" she retaliates, as we're just entering the campus, heading towards our dorm hall through the progressively colder autumn night. "It's obvious you two really like each other. I mean... you're practically... involved!"

"Oh, come on," I manage, though I stutter slightly, because a small, slightly confused part of me wants her to be right.

"No, really," she says sincerely. "Use your common sense, Holly. These are the basics of attraction: He wouldn't have just invited you to stay in his apartment for an entire summer... and then promised to see you again as soon as he could, AND introduced you to Tom fucking HIDDLESTON... if he didn't like you. AND I know for a fact that your thoughts and feelings for him aren't totally limited to friendship."

I open my mouth a bit to protest, but a slight croak comes out and my throat closes up. After a beat, I just settle for shaking my head, and I give Alex a look that keeps her from continuing down that path of conversation. But the lingering look she gives me, and the sureness of her words, makes me know that she's right...

For the past weeks, I've been going every three days to meet the therapist that works with the school, once Alex convinced me that it would be a good idea, and I couldn't refuse without being self-destructive. Truthfully, it's been helpful to meet with someone who can offer me professional advice as far as how to proceed in my situation, after my father's incarceration, and my subsequent liberation from threats from him—for the first time in my life. Overall, her advice as far as exploring my feelings while remaining strong and based in the present have been extremely beneficial. So, though I was surprised, I wasn't completely averse to the idea when, at our last meeting, she suggested that I try masturbating a little.

"It can be a very helpful and redemptive process," she told me, seeing the shock on my face at her suggestion. "It might help you get more comfortable with your body, and to explore your sexuality as an individual, not as how it pertains to other people, or to your father."

I nodded my head in agreement with her, but, really, inside my head, I was thinking—rather spitefully—that she had no idea what she was talking about. Separating the idea of sex from my father, surely, I thought was an impossibility. Being raped almost every day from the age of ten and then doing away with the significance of that wasn't ever going to happen, I thought.

But still I was curious, and though I didn't believe she was right, I wanted very badly for her to be right. So, I snuck into the showers in the middle of the night when nobody else was in there, for the sake of privacy, and tried touching myself—for the first time in many, many years—while the water was running. The first two times were unsuccessful, ending in discomfort or panic, leaving me with tears in my eyes and a general feeling of disgust and shame.

But tonight, on the third try, there's something different about the feeling. Perhaps it has something to do with how exhausted I already am, and my sudden ability to let go of my memories, my anxiety, after a long and tiring day... But I am glad to see that, tonight, I can just let myself relax. And I go with it, wanting to be successful in this endeavor, really believing that, maybe, if I can give myself this pleasure, then my father will be diminished, and start to fade away—and then maybe I won't be so afraid of feeling anymore. I hold strong to this hope as I continue, under the warm, sprinkling water of the shower, to move the tips of my fingers against myself, and then, tentatively, to experiment further...

A few moments pass, and then, without warning, an image comes into my mind—or, rather, less of an image, and more of a general sensation, a feeling of familiarity: a specific movement of Benedict's shoulder, his arm, back in London, the warm, secure feeling of his arms around me, an accidental brush of his elbow or hand against my skin...

By the time I register what's about to happen, it's already too late. I try to stop it, in the final moments before I slip over that edge, which is so unfamiliar to me, except in a forced, sickening sense, as it always was when my father would manipulate my body so cruelly to respond to him. But it's inevitable, and as the waves of extreme elation wash over me, making my chest shudder, I can only whisper, "No, no, no..." to myself.

Quickly after I've come down from the physical high, I rinse myself, turn the shower off, and hurry back into the general restroom space, dressing in my pajamas and hurrying, as though from the scene of a crime, back to mine and Alex's room. I try to shut the event out of my mind, but it's already too late, I know... that general sensation, the essence the smell and... taste... of Benedict... has been seared irrevocably into my mind, connected to that sudden and extreme physical wave of pleasure. And suddenly something like fear and embarrassment, but with an undeniable hint of sweetness, comes into my heart.

Come on, Holly, I say to myself as I make my way down my hall, shaking my head sternly at my uncontrollable feelings. I throw every excuse I can find at myself, to try to dissuade my mind, heart and body from this sudden feeling of extreme inclination and attraction towards Ben. I tell myself he's twenty years younger than I am. I tell myself that, sure, he's friendly towards me, but surely he couldn't feel this way about me, in turn. I'm sure his kindness is something he displays to everyone, and I'm just being foolish by kindling a small bit of hope that there might be something special in his heart, in his eyes, in his smile... reserved solely for me. But I'm being silly. I'm sure he would feel extremely uncomfortable if he knew that I'd thought of him—even accidentally—just before coming to a sexual peak of euphoria.

I try to compose myself but feel another sudden ripple of arousal in my lower abdomen, and have to stop in front of the dorm room, so embarrassed to see Alex in this state that I consider going back downstairs to seek out some privacy on the communal couch, perhaps with a movie. God, what is happening me? But I put my foot down—physically, on the carpet outside the door—and tell myself to get ahold of myself. God, what is happening to me?

When, at last, I get back into the dorm room, it is to find Alex's bed empty, and to feel even more foolish as I remember that she told me earlier not to expect her back until late, since she was going out with some friends. I bury my hands in my hair and pull on it to try and distract myself with pain, but something about the feeling only makes the sensation in my lower zone worse, and I quickly stop, laying down on my bed. But that doesn't work either. All I can do is stand up and pace miserably from one end of the short dorm room to another—only five strides each way, even with my small frame—and try to distract myself from the sudden present-ness of him... But the harder I try, the more consumed I become my thoughts about him... His eyes... His cheekbones... His lips—

"SHUT UP!" I say to myself, with a hissing scold that feels like a shout, but, really, is only a whisper.

In desperation, the firm language offering me a moment of clear-mindedness, I pick up my phone from the desk and check it to distract myself. But, lo and behold, the moment I enter my password, I'm faced with a notification: a waiting message from Benedict (nickname Ben, for the necessary anonymity), which had been sent around ten minutes ago, when I was still in the shower.

"Fuck!" I say to myself, wanting to throw the phone across the room, but forcing myself to breathe in and out. "BAD timing..." I whisper, sitting down and crossing my legs to keep this uncomfortable feeling of want at bay. But I have no choice but to open his message, and I let the storm of my feelings wash away as I'm enveloped in the pressing comfort and light of his demeanor, which comes across even over text...

"Holly," reads his message (So damn sophisticated, I think, incapable of helping imagining his low, alluring voice reading his words directly into my ear). "I hope it's not too late where you are. I have some exciting news! Let me know when you're around. / Cheers, / - Ben."

A tingle of wonder goes through me at the fact of our correspondence, but I shake it away quickly. "Hey, there," I type, "Sorry, I was showering," and send it before I can second guess myself.

Suddenly, everything about what I say, think, and do feels extremely off. I don't know what to think about anything, and a confusion fills up my throat. It seems instantly as though the only solution to this problem would be to have him here with me, physically, to feel the presence of his body, telling me silently that I am redeemable, that I can do nothing but strengthen and improve.

My phone vibrates again suddenly, jarring me out of my reverie. Before looking down at the screen, I feel a sudden spark of tears at the corners of my eyes, at the suddenness and confusion of these feelings. In London, of course, I'd begun to feel a real closeness to Ben—but even in the cab, before I left him to go into the airport, the heavenly kiss between us had seemed too good to be true. I feel like, somehow, there's something I'm missing... I must be tricking myself in some way or another. The whole thing seems not too far off from an illusion, and I feel suddenly dizzy.

I return my focus to Benedict's newest text, hoping to be grounded by his words, but I find, when I read them, that I'm only left more unsteady, reeling and giddy than I was a second before.

The new text reads: "No worries! I hope it was relaxing." (I blush heavily and grow painfully warm at the irony and swat my own wrist in punishment, though it doesn't change my feelings). "I know you're probably settling into bed, and don't want to bother you— But I thought you'd like to know that I'll be coming to New York for filming in the beginning of November. I would love to meet up with you, but I will understand if our schedules cause conflict, or if you would prefer to focus in on your studies."

My heartbeat picks up at the news of his imminent presence in my location... But then, almost immediately, it drops off suddenly and I feel as though I am in the deepest of despairs. How can I possibly meet up with him in person after this new personal development has happened on my end? Surely I would blanch in his presence, and any comfort we worked so hard to cultivate over our summer in London would be instantly nullified. Seeing him physically seems embarrassing and terrifying now.

I set my fingers to typing before I have another chance to think, knowing what I need to do. "That's really great news!" I start, not really sure what I'm doing. "I would love to see you. I will have to wait and see until I find out about my schedule and upcoming exams. I hope you're well! Off to bed..."

And I send it before I even take care to re-read it, or think about how terrible I'll feel later. A few moments pass, and then my phone vibrates again, and I read his final text: "Whatever suits you best. Sleep well! - Ben."

I shut my phone off, plug it into the charger almost violently, and hurry into my bed, like a child convinced that covering themselves with blankets will protect them from the invisible monsters waiting in the corners. But it's still a long time before I fall asleep, and the guilt doesn't diminish even in my dreams.

To my equal dismay and saddened relief, over the following weeks, there is no communication between the two of us whatsoever. Our texts and calls have, quite suddenly, gone silent, and I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that it's because of the way I said what I said. Part of me regrets it terribly, and I feel a loss of things both past and future. But in the end, I know I have to decide to make my peace with it. After all, I had been right to be nervous about how I'd thought about him physically on that night in the shower... Opening myself up to that type of feeling can only be dangerous. Since then, I've stopped trying to get back 'in touch' with that part of myself, and I lie to the therapist, saying that I've been continuing, not wanting to get into what happened with anybody. But a result of my inactivity after experiencing that extreme physical bliss even that one time, is an extreme and ever-growing frustration. I want the feeling again terribly, but I decide every day to abstain; I don't want to become reliant on the feeling, or, more specifically, to become reliant on Benedict. Especially since I deem it reasonable to take his silence as him finally separating himself from me.

It takes time, but after two weeks, in the very beginning of November, I've decided to be okay with what has happened. I'd known from the beginning it was bound to be short-lived, and it's only because of that one-time experience in the shower that I'm mourning my connection with him so much—or so I tell myself.

I find myself automatically listening to a lot of Sam Smith, feeling slightly sad and gloomy. After a few days of listening to nothing else, though, I identify my common sign of depression, and quickly switch up my music habits. This serves, in my desperate mind, only as evidence that I'd been becoming dangerously dependent on Benedict... the separation must be a positive thing. Right?

"Oh my God!" says Alex, at one point in early November, her voice shattering through my recently-acquired barrier of separation from the world. I can't muster the strength to turn to her, but it doesn't seem to really matter to her whether I'm listening or not. "Benedict's coming to New York for Doctor Strange!"

"Yeah, I know," I hear myself say, down a very long tunnel.

Alex scoffs and slumps down next to me, gratefully seeming to take the textbook in front of me as the source of my impersonable manner. "You have to keep me informed on these things, girl," she says sarcastically, trying to cheer me up. "I deserve the inside scoop." She gives up a little giggle, and looks at me for a moment, before taking my avoidance of her eyes as a sign to leave me alone, and starts in on her own studies without another word.

I feel almost like crying. I still haven't told Alex about the state of things between Benedict and myself, because a part of me doesn't want it to be true... and admitting it aloud to her would make it true.

It's a few days later, when I finally have to escape Alex and my own guilt by going to a café far from campus, instead of using my usual study area in the library, where anybody can approach me, especially Alex. I feel even more upset at myself for doing this, feeling as though I'm abandoning her, as though I'm a terrible human being... but I know that if I have to endure any human interaction, I might snap, and I can't have that.

I've never been in this café before, but the chance of scene is welcome, and I'm the happiest I've been in weeks when I realize that there's a table right in the back corner, far away from the majority of the other people in the café, where I can set myself up for a relaxed, antisocial study session. I make it to the table quickly and lay out my textbooks, instantly sitting down and forcing myself to copy mathematics problems into a notebook, almost mindlessly at first, until I start to comfortably tune out the noise of the diner, and focus in on my goal.

It seems as though no time passes, then, between the moment I sit down, and the moment, suddenly, a sort of uncomfortable hush of awareness goes over the other people in the diner. For a moment I think it might just be one of those awkward moments that sometimes happen in the city, when people stop talking with no real reason, expecting it to pass. But a few more seconds pass, and then I'm forced to look up. And I instantly regret it when I do.

Before my eyes fall on the small group of people who have just entered the café, I hear, vaguely, the words: "Hello. Could we get a table, please?" And instantly, I feel all the warmth disappear from my body in a snap. I feel as though I'm about to be faint, or be sick, or simply die... I would know that voice anywhere.

I look up, incapable of stopping myself, and my eyes are met with Benedict: or, rather Doctor Strange, his costume and cape draped around him like true armor, the likes of which I don't have and never will—fake blood covering his face, smiling at the cashier.

Before he can notice me back—though I'm sure I'm invisible to him now—I look back down at my textbook with my eyes swimming with tears, wanting to hide but knowing I have nowhere to go, and wish in futility but with all my might, nevertheless, to disappear.

Benedict

I wasn't sure what to make of Holly's shortness over text that night, and took it, at first, as a slip of her fingers due to the lateness of the hour in her time zone. Yet, as the days had counted up and silence reigned supreme against us, I began to doubt myself, and to wonder whether I'd said something offensive... First, I looked through our texts almost religiously. Finding nothing glaringly wrong, there, I decided that it must have been that I'd imposed myself upon her in the cab outside the airport in London, when I'd kissed her. In the moment I'd thought that she and I had both been equally responsible for its initiation, but soon it grew on me that, possibly, I'd only been telling myself that in the heat of my own desire. For a few days I formulated a plan to apologize for my actions, but then, I began to doubt myself, and masked my own shame and trepidation by telling myself I was merely giving her some space. When I arrived in New York I saw the chance to brooch the subject of my presence to her again, but I ended up procrastinating, confused, myself, and not saying anything at all.

But now, as I'm sitting with a few friends around a table in the café on a shooting break, I regret my actions gravely. For, sitting right across the space of the cafe, looking down at her textbook as though willing it to become a portal, is Holly. And I can tell from the tenseness all over her little body, that she's very aware of my presence, and of my eyes on her.

In a perfect universe, we would never had suffered so many weeks of silence. She would get up from her table, come over to ours, and join us—and nobody in the café would question or suppose. But this is not a perfect universe. The silence still plagues the space between us, and she would never dare to approach me in public. Still, I can't help but look at her, almost probingly, that foolish hope welling up and stirring in my chest. And after a moment, she does look up at me, too, returning my gaze with an iron-hardness in her eyes, which breaks after a moment to reveal a great, confused sadness. I cannot tell completely from this distance, but it seems that she may have started to cry, though her face remains as still as a cold, devastated statue's.

"Ben, you alright?" I hear from beside me, and turn back to my companion with difficulty, managing a polite smile and taking a sip of my coffee. The next time I glance back up to look towards Holly's table, she's stuffing her books and materials into her backpack. When I look back up a second time, she is gone, the tinkling of the bell tied to the door, the only evidence of her ever having been there.

"Are you crying?" I ask her over the phone, a confusing balance of anger and devastation playing in my own heart when I consider the possibility. It took a great amount of resolve to make it through the remainder of the filming for today, and by the time I got back to my hotel room, I was too exhausted and distraught to do anything but yield to my primary instinct and call Holly on the phone. I couldn't bear to send her a text, which seemed too impersonal. I almost gave up and let her go, officially, when she didn't answer the phone the first time, but on the second attempt, she'd answered, and given up a sniffle, prompting my first words to her.

"No," she says in answer to my question, her voice tense, resisting the natural urge to slip back into our easy conversation of months ago. "I have a cold." I hear her sniffle again and decide to believe she's telling the truth, even if part of me still suspects she's been in tears... because of me...

"Holly, I want to apolog-"

"Please, don't do this, Benedict. It's okay."

I inhale sharply, surprised at her words and her interruption, not sure what to make of them. I decide to wait and let her elaborate, but an entire minute passes, and she says nothing at all.

"Holly..." I start again, slowly, to let her speak again if she wishes, but still she makes no sound but another sniffle, and a barely-suppressed cough, which I'm pretty sure is faked. "It was wrong of me not to respond," I continue after a moment, taking advantage of her silence, telling the complete truth. "I thought you were upset with me for kissing you back in London, and I didn't want to press you into anything... But then I became worried, and... foolish, and I didn't follow up. This is my fault, and I hope..." I almost tell her that I hope she'll forgive me, and I still do, but I decide not to say it, not wanting to sway her into feeling any obligation to me. Perhaps it had been right for us to slowly drift apart in this way; though I've come to the full understanding, by now, that I want her, it is not lost on me that, by being with me, she would be in great danger of having her life taken from her. And she is so gifted, so intelligent and full of life and passion, so young...

"I wasn't angry with you," she says suddenly, breaking through my thoughts. "I..." She breathes out with such force that the speaker of my cell vibrates against my ear almost painfully and I hear her blow her nose on the other end of the line before sighing and seeming to steel herself again. "Ben, I've got to tell you something, and I don't want you to be upset, okay? I really... I really don't know how to say this, and I've never had to say this to anyone before."

She waits a moment, and I say, with a measure of trepidation, "I won't be upset with you."

I hear her sigh again, not with complete security, but, again, seeming to steel herself against the situation, against some corporeal punishment that might suddenly befall her for what she plans to say. "I was afraid of responding to you, after that night, because... Ben, I think..."

She makes an agitated sound in her throat, and it's now clear that she's stopped trying to trick me into thinking that she's suffering from a cold rather than tears. For a minute, I painfully listen to her cry, feeling a dread in my chest, my body cramping as I sit on the edge of my suddenly-stiff hotel bed, wishing that I might be with her, to embrace her, to quell her anguish, but knowing that, likely, my presence would only make it worse.

After a minute she manages to compose herself. "I'm sorry," she says again, breaking off and focusing on her breathing.

"Take your time," I say, my voice lower than usual, caught in my throat.

"Ben, I have feelings for you," she says after another beat, very suddenly, and all in a half-breath, so that I have to re-trace her words before grasping them. The second that I do, she starts again, still speaking quickly, as though her words are leaving her without her consent: "Real feelings. After the kiss, I thought it must have just been a slip-up, on your part. I felt so odd about it, and I thought, maybe, it hadn't even happened, when you didn't say anything about it afterward... So I tried to ignore it, but then, I couldn't help... I began to think about you more... in that way... I can't believe I'm telling you this." She takes a long, shuddering breath, and I want to interject, but I don't know what I would say, and she begins suddenly, before I have a chance to embarrass myself. "But I was afraid of becoming involved with you like that, of becoming reliant... I've never been in a relationship before. I'm terrified of that whole idea, that sort of thing... And, of course, I had no idea how YOU felt about ME, and I just got overwhelmed, and scared..." Her breath catches in her throat and she's deadly silent for a moment before saying, in a terrified whimper, "I'm so sorry, I don't even know what I'm saying."

But I know that she's told me the truth, the full, pure truth, however painful and unexpected... and there is something in this which gives me a breath of silent, pressing hope. For in her own anxieties, I recognize, as in a mirror, my own. I press my forehead to my palm, massage the bridge of my nose, and cannot hold back the slight chuckle that enters my throat, the smile of relief that breaks across my lips, the tears gathering at the corners of my eyes. I hear her waiting with bated breath on the other end of the line, and across the space between us, I reach an encouraging, steady hand of honesty and... hopefully (oh, God, hopefully), of love.

"Holly, listen to me, I beg you," I begin. And then I tell her the most sincere and tender contents of my heart.

Author's Note:

Eek!

Thank you for reading! I have some positive feedback about Tom Hiddleston, so I think I'll go ahead and include him a bit more in the story. We'll see where that goes! If you were wondering, the movie Alex took Holly to see in the beginning of the chapter was Crimson Peak.

Also, in case you didn't know, that incident with the café ACTUALLY happened... I couldn't resist using it as a plot point!

Using capital letters for words usually bugs me extremely, but I've decided that, since it's much easier than underlining or italicizing words, I'll go ahead and use them to make some words stand out. I hope it doesn't annoy anybody! If it does, I can totally change it.

Please nobody take offense to the reference to Sam Smith's music in this chapter! I personally can listen to his music any time or season, and don't find it very depressing, but one friend of mine considers listening to his songs a personal marker for a state of sub-happiness—so that's why I chose to use him in that way. I'm sure literally nobody cares but me. XD

Love you all to pieces, and hope that you're doing MARVEL-ously! (Ha-ha).

Une-papillon-de-nuit

28 July, 2020