AN: This is another heavy chapter. Angsty angst.
Just bear with them; we'll get to the good stuff soon.

Chapter 11

Eric's statement about us never catching a break couldn't be more true. Over the next few days there was limited alone-time to be had, and none of those times were good for our talk. We cuddled, and kissed every now and then, which all in all was very nice, but you don't enjoy those kisses that much with a constant nagging of that little voice in your head. Eric seemed fine and the way he acted was as if he wasn't bothered at all with our severe case of denial. We could always have our talk later. The first couple of times I could understand why he didn't want to talk it out, it's not like I was jumping with enthusiasm. After a couple of days, however, you start to worry. I started to think about what I had done, or said and if any of that could be a reason for Eric to shut himself out like this. The worst part was; he became more distant by the day. Even worse; he only acted that way with me. Gran got the vibrant, funny and smiling Eric while I got to handle the one who was capable of showing no emotion at all. I was worried, but I also couldn't help but get angry with him. I know that we still had a long way to go, but I felt that we had reached a point where we should have at least a little trust. I did want to be able to trust him, and him to trust me, but we couldn't do that the way we were acting now. He couldn't even tell me how he really felt. It was like living with a moody teenager, everything was 'fine' and 'great' and after a couple of days there were barely conversations longer than two sentences between us. There was too much that reminded me of the way Bill started treating me towards the end, and I wasn't going to let that happen again. Not to mention; Eric has hit a low point before in his life. I wasn't close to him so I've never witnessed it first handedly, but I was on the same show. Eric was drinking a lot, partying every night and probably ending up snorting coke from some hooker's stomach in a hotelroom. It would've ruined him if it wasn't for the producers and Pam saving his ass. At that time I wondered why his parents weren't around to support him? I did the same thing right now. Eric had never mentioned his family. Everytime I became so angry I wanted to give up, I realized that the man I felt for needed time. I was willing to give that to him.

Eric and I were sitting on the couch watching Friends on the tiny screen. Gran went to bed 10 minutes ago, leaving us two in awkward silence with the tension shooting through the roof. Gran wasn't dumb, and she noticed the way we acted around eachother. The only time she tried to talk to me about it hadn't gone well.

I was in the kitchen, working on my column that was due for tommorow. Gran had really outdone herself, and Eric and I reaped the benefits from it. Eric ate himself so full he actually had to lie down for a while. That wasn't mentioned in the article, although I would never forget it. I was just finishing it up when Gran walked in.

"Did you notice Eric acting a little off?" very smooth, Gran. I chose to ignore it and shrugged my shoulders. Ofcourse I knew, she didn't even have to ask.

"He's always so happy.. you should keep him happier if you want to keep him close."

There was something in me that totally snapped. Gran should know half the stuff that happened between us, she had no right to speak.

"I have to keep him happy? I can't do that for him. He doesn't let me."

"Nonsense. Every man wants a woman to keep him happy. You should try harder."

I stood up so fast my chair fell down on the floor behind me. I had only snapped to Gran a number of times, I could count them on one hand. Most of the time it was because she was so old fashioned about things I simply wasn't. This being one of those cases.

"Don't tell me to try harder. Don't tell me what to do."

I was close to screaming at her. Not wanting to make my Gran lose all her faith in me I decided to get some time alone to organize my thoughts. As I ran towards the front door in a hurry I bumped into a very shocked Eric. Ofcourse he would've heard everything we said.

"Get out of my way Eric."

He hesitated, but eventually moved out of my way. We didn't speak a word to eachother for the rest of the day.

The subject was avoided after that, though Gran did gave me some judgemental looks from time to time.

I gave some glances in his direction during the episode, and I knew he looked at me a couple of times as well, but neither of us said anything. At the end of the episode I had enough, I grabbed the remote and turned of the tv.

"What's wrong?" I asked him.

"Nothing's wrong. I'm good." His eyes were glued to the floor as he said it, his hair covering up his face like a curtain. I resisted the urge to brush it behind his ears. For someone who was 'good' it looked like he felt the opposite.

"Don't lie to me. Please tell me what's wrong. I know there's something you're not telling me. Are you upset with me? Did I do something wrong?"
Eric looked me in the eyes for the first time in 2 days. It was progress, even though it lasted a couple of seconds. That eyecontact was the first sign of his defences failing him. In those seconds it became clear that the situation wasn't hopeless and the Eric I felt for was still in there. There was a long pause. When Eric finally started talking I was at the point where I wanted to pull out my hair from the frustration I felt.

"You did nothing wrong. It's just..." Eric fell silent again, leaving me at the tip of my seat waiting for the big climax. I apparently did nothing wrong, but even though Eric claimed it was that way, a huge part of me thought it was to get me to leave him alone. That part of me was probably right.

"I'm tired. Sleep tight."

You could've knocked me over with a feather, or you could photograph me and laugh at how far my mouth was hanging open. Or both. Talk about getting blown off.

Eric simply stood up, nodded in my direction and made way to the guestroom he was staying in. That nod probably was the worst thing he could've done. We have been living in the same house for 5 days, we kissed, we made out on this couch, we were photographed making out on his bed. And the only way to properly wish me good night is to nod. Once again, Eric had found a way to piss me off. With my blood boiling I walked over to his bedroom and didn't even bother with knocking while walking in. Eric slammed the laptop sitting on his lap shut and jumped off his bed. I think the look on his face mirrored mine, anger.

"You can't burst in like that." He hissed while he pointed at the door.

"You can't just come over here, walk into my life, act the way you do and expect me to just sit back and watch it happen," Eric opened his mouth to talk but I continued, "you followed me here. Which made me believe we could work everything out, but we can't even talk about it. We can't even have a normal conversation."

Tears were welling up in my eyes, again. I've never had that problem that whenever I would get mad I automatically started crying, but with Eric the tears kept coming. In this case it could work in my advantage, Eric could handle every type of woman, except the ones that cry. And my Gran.

A switch flipped in his head. His face relaxed, and once again he reminded me off that kicked puppy. Eric walked around the bed and in my direction, and tried to pull me in for a hug. I shrugged him off me and walked backwards to the hallway. His eyes never left mine. Even in the dark they were radiating. Something in his eyes was pleading me to stay, but the rest of him screamed at me to leave. I whiped the tears from my cheeks with the back of my hand, preparing myself for saying what I was about to say.

"You can't keep pushing people away. They won't wait forever."

I closed the door after saying it, I had no interest in seeing Eric's reaction to that sentence. It was what I had wanted to tell him for a while, and now I had. From this point on it was up to Eric how to proceed.

I threw on an old football shirt from Jason and crawled under the covers after brushing my teeth and washing my face. I was very tired, physically and emotionally. I closed my eyes and drifted off quickly, but woke up again from someone knocking on my bedroom door. I walked –it was more like stumbling from the sleepiness- to the white door. I looked at my alarmclock on my nightdresser and saw it was 3 in the morning.
Even before I opened the door I could've guessed who was standing there. It was Eric. First, we had a thing for walking out on eachother leaving the other person with thousand questions, now we knock on eachothers doors. For someone who looked miserable and tired, Eric was still really something. He was wearing flannel pyjama bottoms and skipped everything else. If I would knock on someone's door at 3 in the morning, without sleep or grooming, that person would think I was a nightmare. Eric still looked liked a dream. Life can be so unfair. I forced my hormones to calm down, hormones could make our situation only worse, and asked Eric what was wrong.

"Can I stay with you? I don't want to be alone."

I nodded and grabbed his hand. There was no way I was going to ignore him, sounding the way he did. I hadn't stopped caring for him or falling for him, and my heart broke a little when I heard the sadness in his voice. If it were Bill doing all this, I already would've given up. Sometimes it surprised me that Eric could find his way back to me. Maybe it was because I wasn't ready to see him go just yet. Together we walked over to my bed and crawled under the covers. Eric was a tad too big for the bed, but he made himself comfortable by draping his body around mine. I could feel the warmth of his body against mine, and smiled in my pillow because of it. Being held by Eric is a whole new experience, and the rush I felt from the first touch hadn't changed. Eric's touch could still set me on fire.

My trail of thoughts was interupted by a certain someone nuzzling my neck and pulling me closer against him.

"I've missed this," he placed a small kiss behind my ear, "I'm sorry for acting the way I did.. Do you hate me now?"

I turned around to face him, which was hard with his arms holding me close to him, but I managed. My hands went up to cradle his face, making sure there was eyecontact.

"No. I don't hate you. You wouldn't be here if I did," he gave me a small smile after hearing that. It was obvious he was relieved. There still was more to be said though.

"I want you to trust me. You can talk to me, Eric. I want this, us, to work but I won't be doing all the work. You need to work too."

Eric nodded, looking very determined. He placed a kiss on my lips, and then my forehead. I smiled and gave him a quick kiss on his lips back and turned around so we were spooning again. Eric let out a long sigh before nuzzling my neck again, his new favorite spot. I was on the edge of falling asleep before Eric broke the silence for the last time, smiling against my skin.

"You won't get rid off me that easily."

"Right back at ya."

That's how I fell asleep that night, with Eric as my security blanket though I was one for him more. In some sort of twisted way; it felt nice to be the one Eric wanted to be comforted by. We actually took the first step. I said what I wanted to say, and Eric hadn't run away. The funniest part was, or the most surprising part; Eric and I slept together for the first time, and all we did was sleep. Eric hadn't pushed me, or even showed interest in taking things further. I knew it must've been killing him (hell, I could feel how much he wanted to take things further) but he still let me choose the pace.

Eric was still sound asleep next to me, snoring lightly. It actually was cute. What was less cute, was his excitement pressed against my back. That was plain torture.

Eric and I could have all the troubles in the world, but I never felt not attracted to him. The man was a god.

I didn't trust myself with him so close to me, and I really needed to go to the bathroom, so I tried to wiggle myself free from his grasp. Bad move. As I tried to pry myself away, he pulled me closer. I wasn't going to give up easily, however, so I gave it another try. A husky voice stilled my movements.

"Do that again, it feels great."

It took me longer than I want to admit to figure out what he meant. As I gasped Eric started to laugh. He had enough pity to release me, and stared at me with his hands folded behind his head. The way the blanket covered him made it look like he was naked. Eric, naked in my bed, that would be something.

The smirk decorating his face made it clear I had been out for a while taking in the perfection that were his muscles. I picked my mind up from the gutter and went to the bathroom to take care of my bussiness. My bed had remained occupied with a certain man, who patted the mattress, wanting me to join him. I jumped back under the covers and rested my head on his chest. We fell into a silence, a comfortable one. My fingers drew patterns on his stomach, while his fingers were twirling my hair and releasing it. After a while Eric let out a long and deep sigh.

"Have I ever told you about my parents?"