CHAPTER 11
Quil:
Quil chuffed out of his mussel in agitation as he weaved his way through the trees, annoyed that he hadn't thought ahead enough to grab his leather tie (or been willing to take the time to go inside the shop and then his apartment to get it from where he had left his clothes just beyond the trees and out of sight) and therefore had to carry his clothes in his mouth as he made the short run through the trees to Claire's house.
She doesn't know if I care about her!? He thought for the seven hundredth time, this time rejecting the idea completely. He'd ask the same question with a hundred different tones, ranging from pain, to ambivalence, to frustration, to open rejection.
Of course she knew that he cared about her…. That he loved her. It just wasn't even a possibility that she didn't. He had been saying it to her since she was only two so a solid almost fifteen years of saying it definitely counted for something. And why would he be so protective of her if he didn't care? That logic just made no sense. If he didn't care about her, would he have gut punch reactions about what she wore or who she talked to? Would he be getting in fights with members of his own pack in the middle of a crowded restaurant or almost lay out some random douchebag in the middle of a casino floor all because of her?
No. She knew. Of course she knew.
So, the only question that was left in his mind was why would she say it?
He'd seen similar behaviors from the teenaged girls he'd been hooking up with back when he'd been a teenager…. But those were all games designed to get his attention and elicit reactions from him, and while he'd accused Claire of doing just that their last night in Vegas, it was immediately clear as soon as he'd managed to get his head out of his ass that that just didn't make sense. He'd been a jerk to even suggest it. Claire didn't play games, and honestly these days it seemed like a reaction from him was the last thing she wanted. Before Vegas it had started to feel like she was trying to attempt the impossible by trying to just slip under his radar.
So then why would she say it!? He chuffed in frustration again as the question screamed unrelentingly in his mind.
He was still in his wolf form and dawn was just barely starting to approach so that though he could still clearly see everything in the surrounding forest, the tint turned from an inky blue to a slight gray. Tonight, he'd been grateful to run alone. Bennett and Ty had the night off after covering for the rest of them the two nights they were gone, and out of Brady, Collin, and Leah, not one of them were willing to run with him anymore…. Not that after Vegas he could really blame them… though he did think his sixteen-year history as a wolf should have earned him a little more leniency. In fact, Tyler was the only one left who didn't resent if he had to run a shift with him, and that was probably only because Quil was still training him. Bennett blatantly refused. Which was fine. There was no way that Quil could be in a wolf form around Bennett and not exercise his need to dominate the stupid prick until he finally submitted. Bennett's resentment of Quil was at a previously unprecedented level and the fact that Quil had screwed up so badly in Vegas did not help the matter. Quil knew he had botched it, and hurt Claire -that seemed liked a punishment in and of itself- and he really didn't need or appreciate the condescension of a seventeen-year-old wolf who'd been in the pack less than a year, pointing out his mistakes. Just the thought made Quil want to clamp down on his jugular while ordering some alpha edicts about where Bennett's place really was in the pack. They'd had a couple of close calls the last few weeks with just overlapping each other during shift change. Now they had to make sure and wait until the other was human before either could phase, it was just too much temptation otherwise.
Quil fully expected a call from Jacob any day now demanding to know why his pack was so misaligned and out of sync unlike how it was supposed to be. To that question Quil already had his answer. come run your own damn pack.
Just blow it off! Quil tried to tell himself instead of getting upset over it again. Brady and Sophia were getting married this weekend and he'd be seeing Jake and Renesmee then anyways….. he was sure that was going to be a happy reunion. It'd be so great to have the whole pack together to lecture his ass about how he should be running a stupid pack. If Sam or Paul or Jared…. Or hell, even Embry or Seth had some suggestions for him then they could either shove it right back up their asses where it came from or else come do the job themselves. Quil had never asked for it. He had never wanted it. Never thought, hey, you know what would be really fun!? Being in charge!
Quil spit his clothes out onto the forest floor, barely managing to not overshoot and send his boxer-briefs right into Claire's yard in his agitation. That was when he noticed that between his frustrated state of mind and refusing to phase back to human in his rush to get over here after his shift, that his boxer-briefs were the only piece of clothing that had made it. His shirt and pants were nowhere to be seen and were either still where he'd last left them or flown out somewhere on the way over.
Rolling his eyes in yet even more annoyed frustration, and grateful once again that no one was in his head to hear his chaotic thoughts he'd never be able to block out, he finally pulled the heat back into his gut where it had originated from as he stopped moving just long enough to bend his knees so that one moment he was a wolf bracing for impact and the next he was himself again, crouching forward on his bare feet and touching the moss covered ground with his palms.
He leaned forward far enough to snap his boxers off the ground and then stood back up as he yanked them in place, tired of wasting time.
He had spent the last six hours running his lone patrol, surveilling the all too familiar surroundings that had seen too little change to hold any of his attention, with nothing to think about but Claire's blasé remark before she'd hung up on him and then shut him out completely.
He couldn't even remember a single time she'd ever hung up on him before. At first, he had even wondered if the call had just dropped.
He'd had felt plenty of guilt and misgivings but after the night of stewing about it he'd had all that he could take and was ready to get some answers from her. They needed to talk anyways, he hadn't had a chance to apologize for the weekend since she'd ended the conversation so suddenly. Without even pausing to take a breath after snapping the elastic of his boxer-briefs into place, Quil moved forward into the yard, so that he was moving purposefully toward the house before immediately scaling the siding up the barely worn path he'd forge from the hundreds of times he'd done it before.
For the first time ever a different scent other than his own lingered on the side of the house where he never thought anyone else would ever be. Bennett's scent hit him with the force of a truck. Not because it was strong, it was so weak he figured it was days old, but because it was so familiar, he recognized it instantly. He was still moving from the momentum but was suddenly shaking and seeing red. He immediately wondered what would happen if he phased right there while scaling the side of the house. It was suddenly a very real possibility. Before he had the chance to think about it any farther, he was at the window looking in.
The sight of Claire with her back to him and curled up into herself as she slept, suddenly calmed him the way only she ever could. Talking to her was more important than being pissed anyways, so he forced himself to focus as he grabbed the glass and pulled it to the side.
Except it didn't move on the first pull. It rattled a little, but it was caught on something. Quil stared at it for one single second before he realized that it was locked.
She had locked the window.
He suddenly couldn't stop the memory of the night she'd accidently locked him out after his evening patrol from hitting him hard. He'd woken her dad up trying to climb in and Claire had almost been caught sleeping pants-less in his shirt with him in just boxer-briefs after his run. She'd blushed so hard after they'd climbed into her bed together with Quil listening incredibly closely to Robert settling back into bed while Claire buried her face in his dirty chest, 'I'm sorry! I forgot to unlock it before I went to bed!' she'd hissed so regretfully. 'Why even bother locking it at all?' he'd whispered back as he stroked her hair. She was on the second story and he was the only one who ever used it as an entrance so what was she worried about? 'I didn't want you to catch me coming out of the shower…' she admitted reluctantly, and he suddenly laughed loudly at her so that she clamped a hand down over his mouth as she shushed him, worried he'd woken her dad again, before she smiled and stretched herself up to kiss his cheek with her hand still covering his mouth. He'd almost seen her naked like three times just the week before on the day that his mom caught them in his old room above the garage, but now she was so worried about modesty she was locking her window? The thought had him smiling into her palm while she whispered with her lips still to his face, 'I promise I won't lock it again, alright? Now be quiet and go to sleep!' he smiled even harder in response as his arm tightened around her, so he was pulling her even closer into this side, 'Goodnight, Nino.' He agreed so that she'd finally moved her hand and settled it happily on his chest, he'd used the advantage and turned his face to press her lips directly to her ear, 'I love you, crazy girl.' He whispered and he felt her shiver in response, only managing to pull herself even closer to him.
He shook his head forcefully, trying to force that moment back out again. He couldn't afford to remember things like that… to think about her like that. To remember the way her body had felt pressed tightly against his wearing almost nothing but his shirt… seriously he had to stop. He had to stop because it was wrong and gross, and she was sixteen. And Robert had been one room over the entire time and Quil hadn't even bothered to worry about that deception since he knew he wasn't actually going to touch her, so it shouldn't matter. Except that he eventually had touched her. and it did matter and what did that say about him?
His stomach twisted into a sick knot even as he tried to focus on just the window in front of him. He needed to get inside and fix things with Claire. That's what he needed to focus on.
He could definitely force the window open but there was a very high risk of the glass completely shattering with the way his hands were shaking from the lack of control he was currently feeling after the long night he'd just had. Plus, even he couldn't justify forcing his way in anymore... not without a Robert there to catch him.
There was one tiny part of his mind that was optimistic, thinking maybe it was locked for Bennett's sake instead of to keep him out but immediately the much more realistic side of his brain snorted and thought, Yeah, right! She didn't seem to have any problem with Bennett in her space these days ….. all over her personal space.
Aggravated and shaking from the multitude of directions his brain seemed to be shooting, Quil forced himself to take a deep breath to calm himself. He needed to have his shit together when he spoke with her, especially since waking her up did not bode well for her patience level with him.
Taking another breath so that his hands were finally steady, he tapped persistently a few times against the glass with his knuckle.
Claire stirred at the sound, moving slightly before tucking in tighter to herself under the sheets.
Quil tapped again, but longer and more insistently this time. He couldn't tap any louder without taking the chance of waking someone else up, especially Rachel whose room was just next door.
This time Claire froze as she seemed to stir on her side before suddenly lifting herself up in bed as she sat up and then turned in shock to look at the window. Her face didn't register surprise, but her brows furrowed in frustrated recognition before she immediately hopped out of bed and made her way to the window.
"Quil! What the hell are you doing here!?" she hissed to him through the window and he immediately thought that he'd been right about how scary she could be when woken up. He didn't like the way she said hell though, she'd been doing that a lot lately. She didn't curse and he wished she'd stop doing it now.
"Unlock the window." He prompted calmly.
She just looked at him in disbelief before saying at a full volume, "No!"
"Shh!" he immediately shushed her quietly as her hand slapped to her mouth in shock at her own disruption and he listened closely for any other sounds in the house indicating they had woken someone up.
"No!" she repeated but this time trying in an angry whispered hiss.
"Claire." He sighed reasonably, "Open the window."
He may have had supernatural level strength but the angle he was holding onto the window seal was at a straight parallel directly in front of his body and his forearm was starting to complain as he held on with just his right arm and pointed again at the little lock in the corner with his left hand.
"Go home, Quil. You can't do this anymore." She whispered insistently, leaning closer like she was afraid he couldn't hear her and making the glass fog up with her breath.
Quil just sighed before he looked down at the ground and then back up at her. "Do you really want me to come through the front door instead?"
Claire just stared at him with her face still scrunched, either from frustration or because she was still sleepy, he couldn't tell through the glass.
"Then unlock the window." He said simply when she didn't reply. He needed to get in and … and apologize… and demand to know why she said she didn't know he cared… and make things right… she just had to let him in so he could figure out how the hell to do that.
Claire dropped her head to her chest as she stared at the floor and ran a hand through her hair starting at her temples and ending where her hair was gathered in a crazy ponytail. She dropped her hand out of her hair so that the front was smoothed down from the motion, but the ponytail sagged even farther down toward her right shoulder as she reached up and undid the lock in the corner without looking up from the floor.
Quil wiped at his nose to hide his smile he suddenly couldn't completely fight while she was just being so cute with her messy hair and her agitated movements.
It took him two seconds flat to push the glass aside and climb through her window, making sure to land lightly on the balls of his feet as he dropped to the floor so that it only made a dull thud from his weight.
He turned and slid the window shut again, suddenly leaving them in the dark stillness of the confines of her bedroom. He blew a breath of relief as he turned to face her but then froze at the sight of her.
Suddenly, it was that night all over again. She was standing in front of him from where she'd moved to the side to make way for him and was staring at him with obvious annoyance written all over her face. That was expected. What wasn't expected (and was also bringing up unexpected reactions from him that he hadn't felt in weeks) was what she was wearing. Which was not pants.
His eyes immediately dropped down her long legs to her still dirty feet and pink toenails and then all the way back up to where the hem of the plain gray t-shirt hit her just low enough to cover her underwear that he was ninety-nine percent sure she was wearing but only because he knew from experience how much she hated going commando. He somehow had just enough perception to note the pair of sweatpants bunched up at the foot of her bed and half under the sheets. His eyes stayed glued to their trail though as they made their way all the way up the t-shirt that was almost hanging off her left shoulder, exposing the bare strapless skin underneath. If the strapless shoulder wasn't enough of an indicator than the way she was angrily crossing her arms under her breasts so that they unintentionally lifted up and formed the t-shirt around them made it obvious a bra was not an accessory she was working with tonight. Besides he already knew she never slept in a bra….
"Is that my t-shirt?" he asked in surprise, finally breaking the tense silence between them that had only lasted a couple seconds.
Quil was surprised and grateful that this time when caught off guard by her he had a fairly reasonable explanation to explain it away like he'd been noticing the t-shirt instead of her in it.
Claire rolled her eyes in annoyance as she moved her right arm to push through her hair again, Quil took in how the motion moved her breast under the shirt and made the collar of the shirt dropped farther down her left shoulder before he blew out a heated breath and snapped his eyes to the corkboard on her wall still holding the school calendar from the year before.
This wasn't right. He shouldn't be having these thoughts about her anymore…. At all. He shouldn't have ever had these thoughts about her. He was feeling hotter than he should be allowed to feel around her and he was only in his underwear so he should have had plenty of ventilation to keep him cool.
"Is that why you're here? To get your shirts back?" Claire whispered in response and Quil suddenly had to think back to what they'd even been talking about.
"No, of course not." Quil insisted immediately as he looked back at her and forced himself to look at her directly in the eyes and not allow his eyes to travel any lower. "I just didn't think you still slept in my shirts." He explained with a shrug hoping she wouldn't pick up on how much he liked knowing she still did; he was actually wondering why she was wearing the one that he hadn't seen in months instead of the one that he'd left her less than twenty-four hours earlier and had to still smell like him. "Especially in just my shirt…."
The last part had just slipped out, but he figured he couldn't really help it when she had legs that looked like that and a habit of accidently pulling the shirt a little too close to her chest.
"Calm down, Casa-nova." Claire huffed critically as she rolled her eyes again and took a step away so that she was turning around as she grabbed the sweatpants out of the bed. "It was the only thing that was clean. I haven't done any laundry since I got home just hours ago."
She turned as she bent over so that she was facing the bed and he couldn't see down the collar of her shirt as she bent forward to yank her sweatpants on. He couldn't see down her shirt, but he did have a nice view of her ass covered in lacey pink panties as she bent over.
For some reason it shocked him. Not her ass. Her ass did things to him he didn't want to analyze because it'd just make his developing ulcer even worse. Her panties shocked him. She'd started wearing sexy lacy stuff around the time that they'd started dating, he had assumed she did it a little for his sake since before then she'd always worn plain cotton brief style panties in colors like gray and black. He would have thought she'd have gone back to those after they broke up but seeing the pink lacey number that looked like it belonged on a lingerie model instead of a teenager suddenly had him incredibly frustrated and wondering why she was still wearing them.
"Okay stop." She said a little too loudly after their whispered conversation and his head snapped up and out of his daze to see what she was talking about so loudly and why instead of putting her pants back on she had just dropped them and suddenly jerked herself back up. "Get out."
"What?" he asked in shock as he looked around himself trying to figure out why she was suddenly so upset. "Claire, can I please just have five minutes to talk with you? I know you're still pissed but-"
He didn't get to finish his thought and start his massive apology before she cut across him in a whispered yet completely resolute voice, "No! You don't get to show up here, demand that I let you in and then stand there and check out my ass."
Her hands where on her hips and she was standing there turned around to face him with an impressive amount of assurance for someone not wearing any pants.
"I wasn't checking out your ass-" He defended immediately in surprise that she'd think that though his inner voice was rolling its eyes at him.
Claire's silent look of disapproval made it obvious she didn't believe him either.
"Okay, I was staring at your ass, that's it." He assured her.
"How is that any better!?" she shrilled in a quiet whisper.
"Because I wasn't checking it out! I was noticing your pink panties and trying to figure out why you're still wearing them." He defended quickly, in a rush to quietly explain himself and not taking the time to think his explanation through.
"You were trying to figure out why I'm wearing panties!?" Claire accused in an obviously disgusted voice.
"No!" Quil huffed immediately as he took a step closer to her to somehow try to bridge the massive gap gapping between them. He rubbed a frustrated hand across his face as he mumbled into it, "That's not what I meant. You're making me sound like some sort of pervert."
Claire ran a hand through her hair again as she looked away from him and looked up at the ceiling since he was only a foot away from her now and didn't leave much space for her to look away from his body taking up all the space in front of her. He expected her to point out that he sounded like a pervert because he was being perverted but instead, she sighed as she looked back at him.
"What are you doing here, Quil?" she whispered softly to him.
He was surprised by her direct approach but quickly reshuffled to respond in the same sad, quiet whisper she had used,
"I needed to talk to you."
Claire sighed again as she looked back at him and the intense eye contact burning between them even as her eyes started to slowly fill with mystery tears that confused Quil, especially because the longer they stood so close together in the dark the more an electric spark seemed to grow between them, heating them and charging the air around them.
"What is there to talk about anymore?" Claire whispered and Quil's heart broke at the thought. There was so much he wanted to fix between them.
"Everything!" he whispered in a way that was somehow both definitive and yet broken at the same time.
"Quil…." Claire sighed as she suddenly looked away from him and started to turn away.
He immediately reached out to her and grabbed her wrist. Holding it fast in his grip so that his thumb was in her open palm and his fingers wrapped all the way around her thin arm.
"No, don't do that..." He urged her as he pulled her back into the little bubble they'd seemed to create with that static almost crackling between them.
She turned back to him and locked back in his eyes again the second he touched her so she couldn't hide the tear that leaked out of her eye and ran down her cheek.
"… Don't pull away from me." He continued as he reached his left hand up and wiped the tear from her cheek while he still held her wrist and she loosely grasped onto his thumb in her palm.
Claire blew out a shaking breath as she stayed staring into his eyes.
"What do you want to talk about?" she finally whispered.
"Everything." He replied immediately without thinking and then smiled at the ambiguous response.
She smiled softly in return, but it was a sad smile that reminded him he was here for a purpose and not to draw her in more and more until the friction charging between them exploded. "Claire, I'm so sorry about Vegas…." He whispered and the regret was so heavy in his voice it almost seemed tangible… "I -I just… I can't handle the thought of you being hurt like that and I was such a dick to do that… I need you to know I know that." He hissed insistently as he used his hand that had brushed her tear to suddenly cup her cheek when she suddenly tried to look away when her eyes teared up again.
She wouldn't look at him even while she held his thumb and he held her wrist and cheek. She still hadn't responded, and he meant to reassure her of how sorry he was and how much he loved her when the thought suddenly had him bursting out, "Why would you say you don't know that I care about you!?"
He had whispered it roughly to her and she blinked as she made to turn away again but he used his hand on her wrist to pull her right back in, so she was looking at him with her face still in his hand. "I know you know that's not true. I just don't understand why you'd say that….. I love yo-"
"Don't say it!" she suddenly hissed as she used her free right hand to clamp down on his mouth before he could finish. "I don't want to hear you say it!"
"Wha-? Claire…" he whispered back in confused frustration as he dropped her face and grabbed her fingers and slid them an inch away from his lips. "You're the most important thing to me-"
"Just stop! Please, just stop!" she suddenly begged him as she shook her head back and forth and pulled her right hand out of his grip holding her to his face though curiously didn't make any move to pull her left wrist out of his grasp or move her fingers away from his thumb they were curled around. And he one hundred percent didn't understand why she would ask him stop.
"Why?" he asked in complete confusion, why wouldn't she want to know that he cared about her?
"Because I'm in love with you and I think we both know it." She said as she looked up at him a little ashamed and he suddenly had to break the eye contact she was making with him to blink up at the ceiling as she continued, "And I don't want to hear you say you love me in any other way than the way you said it the night you asked me to marry you."
He shook his head slightly back and forth in confused frustration but now mixed with the most real dose of shame he'd probably ever felt. She was sixteen.
There was a lump the size of a golf ball in his throat now that he couldn't seem to swallow past as he forced himself to look back down at the girl in front of him. The beautiful, smart, capable, amazing girl that he was still holding with just one hand and standing less than a foot in front of. This girl that he had asked to marry him. What the hell had he done to her?
".. Claire…." He tried to respond as he shook his head some more since he really couldn't reply with anything worth saying. He didn't even know what he would say.
"No, I just can't hear any more about how you love me like a little sister or a niece or a cousin or a friend or anything else. Okay? We can't go back to that. We just can't. It's not an option for me." She insisted as she looked away this time, mostly mumbling quietly to herself while he tried to stare at her imploringly. Begging her wordlessly to just ….. he wasn't even sure… not love him more than she should? Not love him so much it hurt her but love him still? What the hell did he even want?
"…..But… I do care! I do love you…." He tried again absolutely positive she needed to know that, but she cut him off with just the shake of her head as she looked back at him again.
"Are you going to kiss me right now?" she asked almost curiously but more like she was proving a point.
The question seemed like it should have felt random, but it didn't, even with the way it pulled him up short from where he was edging closer to her. Not with the pull that had strengthen between them so that he was now only eight inches away from her and she was looking directly up at him with her wrist still held in his hold and his left hand hovering somewhere over her side, unsure what to do with itself if it wasn't going to touch her.
He thought it through as best he could while his brain was working so hard against the intense instinct to just do it. Just kiss her! He couldn't think. It was the only thing that made sense. To make her feel how he felt. How he cared. All he could picture was leaning down to taste her again like he hadn't done in weeks, of using his free hand to skim her thigh until he worked his way up over her hip and the lace of her panties to her skin under his t-shirt she was wearing. Of the way, her hands would run up his chest and then around to pull through the hair at the back of his neck. He was already thinking about how easy it would be to pull his own t-shirt up off her head and… and then the thought imploded along with the acid in his stomach as the dream shattered and the idea tainted when he thought about her youth he was still trying to save but had probably already stolen when he took too much of it. Of her dad and the things Quil had promised to him.
His throat seemed to swell, and his eyes suddenly burned as he looked at her watching him struggle before he blinked and suddenly shook his head again.
"…..I…. can't." he admitted with a shrug as he looked away from her and down toward the t-shirt falling against her chest, this time really only seeing the football logo. "…You're still sixteen…. I'm thirty-one, Claire."
His voice sounded so dead and almost foreign, but his eyes snapped back to her when she sighed in a resigned sort of way.
"… So, you don't want to be a couple."
She said it simply like she was summing up the situation.
All he could manage in response was something between a shrug and a head shake.
She sighed again before looking down at his chest in front of her and saying, "And I don't want to be friends with you….. So, where does that leave us?"
Quil bit his cheek to try to fight the suddenly intense burning in his eyes as he stared at her shirt.
After a second when it became clear to himself that he couldn't speak, he simply shrugged his shoulders at her.
"If you can't be with me than you need to leave me alone." She said simply but without looking up at him from his chest she was staring at and his heart broke even more at just the thought as he looked back up at her. But she kept looking away, and her face turned to the side while she refused to look at him.
"You know I can't do that!" He whispered harshly, using frustration over their entire situation to color his tone and hide his true feelings.
"Well I can't do this." She said calmly as she took another breath, but her voice cracked, and then suddenly she stepped back and pulled her arm away from him so that they were no longer touching.
He opened his mouth to say her name as he stepped back up to her, trying desperately to recreate the connection between them when she stopped him by looking at him as she held up both of her hands like she was fending him off defensively.
"… Go."
It was all she said and yet it was probably the most frustratingly painful thing he'd ever heard from her.
He blew out an angry, pained breath as he shoved a hand in his hair and turned to the side to face away from her. He forced out a breath again before he suddenly said more calmly than he felt,
"Look, Claire, I'm sorry about how I treated you in Vegas. I was a jerk, and I know you deserve better than that."
Claire nodded as she kept staring at him in front of her.
"… If you could do it all over again would you do it differently?" she suddenly asked quietly.
"Of course I would." He replied immediately.
"… What would you change?" she asked, and he felt like she had just entrapped him with the question.
She seemed to be asking if he had changed his opinion on if she should have even gone. He hadn't. She never should have been there and it still broke his heart that she didn't understand that.
He looked away from her as he thought about it again and took another breath before replying,
"I never would have said those things in the restaurant… I never would have done anything to make you cry."
Claire's eyes filled with tears that she blinked away as she nodded slightly at him without really responding.
It was quiet and they weren't really facing or looking at each other while Quil tried desperately to think of a solution that would somehow not break her heart and yet feel right to him at the same time.
"Will you go now?" she finally asked softly, and he looked over at her wishing he could promise to stay instead. He wanted to just climb in her bed with her and hold her like he used to.
He'd give up every feeling of attraction he'd ever had towards her if he could just hold her safe in his arms again right now.
He looked down toward her toes as he thought about it and unintentionally noticed how long, and tan, and bare her legs were and suddenly realized he couldn't just keep his love for her while turning off his want for all of her. He finally realized he couldn't splice the situation.
So instead, he nodded his head as he swallowed and rubbed his face, palming his burning eyes to try to make them stop again as he held back a groan inside him.
Claire didn't say anything as he turned back to the window. He placed his hand on the glass and then stopped and waited. He counted to five in his head as he tried to run through every possibility and come up with just one option that could give them both what they wanted, before he slid the glass opened and climbed out, simply dropping to the ground below him with a soft thud.
Forcing himself to move and walk away was one of the hardest things he'd ever had to do. It just went against everything inside of him.
It was wrong to stay and not be what she wanted him to be, but it was wrong to go and not be with her…. He was screwed either way.
.
By the time he got home, walking the same path he'd run as a wolf through the woods, he'd found his jeans, but his shirt was long gone somewhere along the way. He didn't have the energy to notice as he climbed the stairs to his apartment and bypassed a curious Butch without giving him a response.
He climbed in the shower as he set the water to aggressively hot in the hopes of forcing himself to feel something again besides just the shame and weight and numbness that came with being just the shell of the man he used to be.
By the time he got out Butch was gone and there was a yellow post-it on the front door.
I took Butch for the week.
-C
He didn't know how long he'd been in the shower, definitely a lot longer than usual but he knew she had to have timed it on purpose so she could get the dog without seeing him.
And that began Claire avoiding contact with Quil and Quil letting her without forcing her to acknowledge him really much at all. He still saw her almost daily. He really couldn't not. But now when they saw each other it was always around other people and any conversation never seemed to be directly between the two of them.
After she took Butch, he didn't come over to the house again until the next night for dinner, but Jamie was also there along with Rachel and Travis and everything felt much more like a familial group environment then that static bubble he had left her alone in. Travis seemed a little confused by Quil's presence, but he never openly questioned it, at least not in front of him. Claire didn't really speak directly to him at all except the times when she asked him to pass the gravy or when she asked him to cut Jamie's chicken for him while she was in the kitchen still working side by side with Travis to cook dinner. Afterwards they all played ping pong in the basement but because of the odd numbers (and Claire's obvious avoidance of him) it was more Quil against whichever random grouping they decided to try to beat him with. He left when Claire took Jamie upstairs to bed, he was hoping she'd text him to say good night or try to reach out in some way. She didn't though.
Wednesday, Quil was distracted all day by his constant feeling of something being off. Just not right. Like his life was incomplete. Like his brain had held in a sneeze and there was something left unfinished, words left unsaid. After the afternoon of unproductive work and a half-hearted workout at the gym he chalked it up to not having enough fulfilling time with Claire, but that conclusion sucked because he also didn't think he'd get anything more from her than he was already getting.
That evening he walked through the door of the Young house with apprehension since he really couldn't stand the idea of spending the next four years of his life this way with Claire treating him with such indifference, until he could finally give her the type of commitment she was looking for guiltfree.
When he made it past the living room where Jamie called a cheerful hello before ignoring him again to focus on whatever Lego masterpiece he was creating on the coffee table, Claire turned to face him after having grabbed something from the fridge. She hurried to him and he lifted his brows for a second before he managed to school his features from the surprise she was even acknowledging him.
"Here! Can you go throw these on the grill? Trav ….. I mean I love him, but he sucks at the grill…. I'd just do it myself but then he'd definitely ask questions, so I'm just going to say you got here before he did and wanted to help, okay? Can you do that for me? Please." she entreated in one incredibly quick breath.
He huffed out a laugh as he took the Tupperware container full of meat and marinate she was shoving into his gut.
"Yeah. I can grill, Nino" He replied with a slight laugh.
He expected her to seem relieved since she'd been so insistently stressed but instead her shoulders stiffened and she looked past him to look at Jamie in the living room before she nodded and went to turn away as she muttered under her breath,
"Thanks, Tio."
Something about the term slapped him in the face and he suddenly felt like he might actually understand for the first time why Claire hated the nickname he'd given to her years ago. Her reply was definitely harsh, and he was suddenly slapped back to the night she'd introduced him to the boy she was dating and Bennett had asked if he was her uncle, and how much that had hurt.
Right, he sighed to himself, no more nicknames…. That devil part of himself that was always just in the back of his mind pushing him into all the things he regretted was suddenly reminding him that he had another nickname for her that she loved hearing…. That thought he had to physically shake away as he reached forward to grab her wrist instead of letting her walk away, she turned back to him with a look of frustration clear on her face.
"Right, Claire." He emphasized in a resigned tone. "I'm sorry." He sucked a breath in through his teeth before he made the promise that somehow felt like a compromise that sliced him straight to the gut, "I'll drop the Nino thing."
She looked up at him for a second as she seemed to evaluate his level of sincerity before she nodded her head gratefully in response without saying anything at all.
Quil nodded his head in reply and then they just stood there silently for a second until she looked down at her wrist with his hand still blatantly wrapped around it and he immediately dropped it again.
He looked down at the container in his hand to avoid looking at her for a moment before he not-so-subtly changed the subject by asking,
"So… steak, huh?"
"Yeah, we're having a little going away party for Trav and Rach tonight. They're going to California with his family tomorrow. He reports to Basic in two weeks and his family wanted to spend some time with them and get to know Rachel better." She explained with a shrug as she started to make her way into the kitchen again.
Quil followed casually behind her, grateful she was engaging with him one on one even if it was just about her family.
"Cool." He replied as he watched her pick the knife back up she had obviously abandoned when he had come in and start chopping up a carrot to add to the salad beside her. "Well let me know if there is anything I can do to help with Jamie." He offered as he leaned against the counter watching her and thinking of the promise he'd made to himself to help her more.
When she bit her lip and sighed in response without looking at him, Quil quirked an eyebrow.
"Claire?" he asked leadingly and when she paused to look up at him, he gave her a knowing look until she finally admitted,
"Jamie needs the rest of his five-year-old vaccines before I can finish registering him for Kindergarten."
"Okay," Quil replied a little confused since he knew school started again in less than two weeks, "Do you need me to take him? Does he need an adult present or something?"
"No." Claire replied critically with an obvious eyeroll at the suggestion that she wasn't adult enough to do it, "Never mind. Don't worry about it. I can deal with it."
"Claire, I wasn't insinuating anything… I'm just trying to figure out how I can help and why I'm needed since I'm surprised you haven't had it done already." He replied immediately with one hand up in the air as a surrender and the other still holding the container of raw steaks. He wished every conversation between them didn't seem to have to either end in a fight or with her in tears…
Claire huffed in frustration and Quil was confused that she was still pissed at him until she explained in a tense whisper so that Jamie wouldn't overhear, "I thought it was already done! My mom is a freaking pediatrician and yet she didn't bother to make sure her own kid was immunized!"
Quil blew out his own breath of frustration in annoyance at Susan especially since the stress of it that was clearly emanating off of Claire in front of him.
"That does seem ridiculous." He assured her and she smiled and nodded up at him gratefully just like how they used to talk with each other, before she suddenly frowned and looked down again.
"Right. Well, he has an appointment at her office tomorrow morning…. After that I can get him registered and take him to meet his teacher." She explained.
"Okay. I can take him." Quil offered helpfully.
"I can do it if you need to work!" she hurried to offer, "I just have to work tomorrow so if I take him, I have to take all four kids with me because if I let Sam Jr stay home Sarah will also want to stay and I don't trust those two not to kill each other if I'm not there to intervene, and I'll have to drive from La Push which will add another twenty-five minutes to the drive…."
"Claire…. I already said I can take him. Let me help. I'm part of this family too." He insisted and wondered when she would finally understand that and potentially stop holding him what felt like five miles away from anything and everything that she did.
Claire stared down at the cutting board in front of her for a minute even though there was nothing on it and she wasn't moving to change that. After a minute she nodded in response and muttered a simple, "Okay. Thanks."
Quil was about to reply when the front door opened, and Travis walked in towing a surprisingly pregnant-looking Rachel behind him by the hand. Quil suddenly figured it probably had to do with the fact that she was wearing cut off shorts that seemed a little stretched around the button and a fitted t-shirt that hugged her small but now round belly instead of a mass of gray, loose fitting sweats which he'd mostly seen her in lately.
"What's up, Fam!?" Travis called excitedly.
He dropped Rachel on the couch and ran a hand through Jamie's hair on top of his head as a greeting before making his way into the kitchen to join Quil and Claire.
Claire laughed at his chipper greeting and Quil suddenly wondered how Rachel of all people ended up with the always cheerful All American that was now her husband. He kissed Claire on the cheek as a super brief hello and she moved her lips to more kiss the air in a hurried reply instead of taking the time to actually kiss him in response. The simple gesture suddenly had Quil rubbing his chest to stave off the sudden jealousy coursing through him. He wasn't even threatened by Claire's relationship with her brother-in-law but the casual way that he could touch and kiss her hit Quil in the face when he realized he was the only one who couldn't.
"This all looks great!" Travis continued excitedly, "How can I help?"
Claire laughed again as she replied, "We're good! Go hang out! Quil beat you to it and offered to take my dad's traditional place at his grill."
The casual comment hit Quil in the gut as he took the container still in his hand and turned away to move toward the backyard before Claire could see the look he could feel on his face.
This is what I'm here for! To help her with the things she needs to keep moving forward! He reminded himself as he opened the backdoor, too lost in his own head to hear whatever reply Travis had given that had made Claire laugh again.
Somehow the fact that Claire could give Quil a job to replace Robert felt like a betrayal to both men… he didn't understand the feeling and he couldn't quite place it, so he forced it aside just as he heard Travis ask when Bennett was going to come by again and how it'd been fun to hang out with him the night before.
At that comment, Quil snapped the backdoor shut and went to work alone on the grill not wanting to hear whatever reply Claire was going to give him.
.
The next day Claire dropped off Jamie at Quil's apartment at a prompt eight AM since she had to head straight to work, and it didn't make sense for Quil to have to drive down to La Push to pick him up. She gave Jamie a big kiss on the cheek, making him giggle as she reminded him to be good.
She looked up at him with a smile from Jamie's reaction still on her beautiful face as she stood back up and then placed a hand on his arm in front of her. She quickly stretched on her toes and leaned her body towards his around Jamie as she looked directly at his lips and confidently moved her face towards his.
He watched her, curiously confused for a split-second until her eyes suddenly shocked wide open when she was only about six inches from his face, and he hadn't leaned into her. She suddenly jerked her entire body away from him, dropping his arm in the process as she turned away again. She was burning a surprisingly dark red as she cleared her throat and ran a hand through her hair which fell forward to hide her face.
"Thanks for your help, Quil." She barely muttered before she shot out the door and down the stairs before he could reply.
"What was that?" Jamie asked with a mix of critical and curious as he stared at the door Claire had just rushed through.
Quil looked down at him as he thought about what had just happened between them.
She had been about to kiss him. For one moment she must have forgotten that they weren't together anymore, too distracted by her hurry and the giggly moment with Jamie, she had kissed Jamie and reached up to kiss him goodbye too before she'd remembered…..
"I think she was just in a hurry." Quil replied with a shrug as a feeling of regret settled over him. What'd he done to her and the way he'd messed with her mind was something he didn't know if he'd ever be able to forgive himself for.
"Yeah, but that was weird…." Jamie said in response.
"Maybe she didn't get enough sleep last night." Quil offered hoping that Jamie would drop it.
"Yeah, maybe." Jamie agreed before suddenly declaring like it solved everything, "But girls are weird."
"Yeah, for sure." Quil agreed as he reached down for Jamie's small hand and led him out the same door he was still staring at. "But I need some coffee, come on I'll get you some pancakes from my favorite place down the street."
They spent the rest of their morning walking to and from the café where Quil got his coffee and Jamie his pancakes, before Quil pulled up the stool that he'd bought for the shop when Claire was eight and set it right next to the car he was working on restoring, and set Jamie on it with a toolbox just like he used to when Claire was little. He listened to Jamie's casual chatter about him going to school this year as Quil worked and asked Jamie to hand him tools that he had to point out to him so that it took three times as long as it would if he just grabbed them himself.
Everything about the morning was great until they were on their way to Port Angeles in Quil's car and Jamie suddenly chimed from the backseat.
"So, what is a vaccine, anyways?"
Quil tried to explain the mechanics of it, wishing that Claire was there because she was so much better at answering these types of Jamie-specific questions than he was. Once Jamie understood that a shot was involved in the process, things turned south quick.
A lot of tears made an appearance before they pulled into the parking lot of the doctor's office where Susan worked. Just to get him out of the car Quil had to promise Jamie an insane amount of ice cream plus a happy meal on the way home and a pizza for dinner. When that alone didn't work, a phone call to Claire was had where her gentle voice lovingly but very firmly told Jamie he was a big boy and to go make her proud! After that he finally unbuckled his seatbelt but Quil still had to carry him into the office like a much smaller toddler as Jamie cowered into his shoulder and Quil rubbed soothing circle on his back. Thankfully they were only seated in the waiting room for a few minutes before they were called back and set in an exam room.
When another doctor besides Susan came in to do the exam and give Jamie his shots (which he tensed super hard for while sitting on Quil's lap and squeezing both of his hands with more strength than Quil had known he'd possessed) Quil wondered if Claire had scheduled it that way on purpose to avoid Jamie having contact with their mom.
They didn't see Susan at all until Jamie was walking out of the exam room swinging his hand still connected with Quil's and proudly modeling the six new stickers on his chest that he'd scammed the unsuspecting doctor out of -though Quil couldn't talk when he thought about the amount of junk food, he now owed Jamie….
"Mommy!" Jamie screamed excitedly as he dropped Quil's hand and sprinted right towards an exhausted (and Quil suddenly suspected hung over) looking Susan.
She looked up in shock as Jamie almost took her legs out from under her when he hugged her upon impact. She made confused eye contact with Quil before looking back down at Jamie and rubbing a hand around his back and then up at Quil again and seemed to glance around as if trying to find Claire as well.
"Jamie!" she said with surprise and managing to fake a decent amount of enthusiasm, "What are you doing here, Sweetheart? Mommy's working right now, I have to help other children today, remember?"
"I'm going to kindergarten!" Jamie said proudly as an explanation and Susan looked at Quil until he explained,
"He needed his vaccines so Claire can get him registered for school."
"Oh! Right, right! His vaccines…. Didn't Robert get him those when he was four?" she replied with some confusion and Quil just shrugged since there was really no good way for him to reply to the woman who clearly had no idea what was going on with her children.
"Mom, can we hang out in your office for a while?" Jamie suddenly interrupted to ask her.
"NO!" Susan suddenly answered too quickly as she reached behind her to immediately shut the partially opened door behind her. Quil quirked an eyebrow at her as she looked at him and he wondered what she was hiding in there. "Mommy is busy right now, honey. I'll have to play with you some other time."
"But…" Jamie tried again when Quil cut in to say,
"Come on, Jamie, we still need to go get your happy meal and ice cream."
"Oh yeah!" Jamie suddenly cried as he completely abandoned his mother's legs and ran back to Quil before unexpectedly jumping into his arms. Quil barely had enough time to catch him before he lifted him to his chest and hugged the air out of him, trying to give him just an ounce of the love he should have been getting from his parents.
Quil turned away without acknowledging Susan again, he had nothing else to say to her anyways (at least nothing else that he could say in front of Jamie), and walked away back towards the waiting room. Jamie lifted his hand in a small wave as he said sadly, "Bye, Mom."
Quil didn't hear her response which was impossible because he had superhuman hearing. She just didn't respond.
"Come on, Jamie, let's go buy you some Legos…." Quil suddenly said as they walked out the door leaving his mother behind.
"WHAT!?" Jamie shrieked as if Quil had just told him that today was also Christmas. "A happy meal AND new Legos!?"
Quil wished that he could make every child in the Young family as happy as easily as he could with Jamie. He'd buy Claire all the Legos in the world if it could repair some of the damage between them.
Quil went to bed that night with a mixture of emotions churning in his gut that night. He'd had a great day with Jamie, and spent all evening with Claire, Jamie, and Butch eating pizza in the living room while they watched the Lego movie and Jamie built the new spaceship set that Quil had bought for him that afternoon. Claire even let Quil stay to finish the movie after Jamie had fallen asleep and he'd carried him up to bed. It had been a simple thing, and Claire hadn't even sat next to him on the sofa (She'd actually been working on her laptop on the coffee table while she sat on the floor), but it was something and Quil had been happily satisfied with the evening. She'd even thanked him for his help and squeezed his hand when he left for the night.
The only thing Quil had to deal with now was the fact that tomorrow was the rehearsal dinner for Sofia and Brady's wedding. The entire wedding party had to be there and then the entire pack would be present for the wedding on Saturday including Jake and Renesmee. Great!
Quil couldn't remember the last time he had dreaded something so much.
One thing was for sure, he knew it was going to be an interesting weekend.