Chapter Four: I Just Wanted You To Watch Me Dissolve

Song Inspiration: We Might As Well Be Strangers By Keane

Malia has been having trouble sleeping lately, always stuck with this restless feeling in her bones that she couldn't quiet with any kind of meditating or sleeping pills. Her room is dark and the welcome lull of sleep pushes her heavy eyelids closed as it nears 5:45 am. And even then, her body still tremors as her fingers reach out and cling to the sheets of her bed, as if searching for an invisible hand in the mess of the pillows and blankets.

With a huff, she pushes back the sheets and snags a cigarette from her pack off the dresser and brings it to her lips, shakily lighting the little devil while taking a long drag. The nicotine film of smoke surrounds her in small clouds before dissipating into nonexistence. Something about it is enthralling to her, the idea that one second something can be there and the next, poof, gone. Something about it grates at Malia's brain, the familiarity of it making her head throb at the thought.

Sometimes, especially on nights like this, she just felt like something was missing. But every time she thought about it, the idea slowly trickled away, fading off as if the thought was never a thought at all. The concept of the whole thing is kind of a labyrinth within itself, and Malia doesn't like to dwell on it.

She lays back against her pillows with her brown hair sticking out in all directions and she takes another pull from the cigarette. Honestly, she doesn't even remember getting into cigarettes. It's another one of those blank spaces in the sequence of memories that feels like a dead end.

Leaning over, she rifles through her dresser and pulls out a stack of pictures she had taken with the pack throughout senior year and previous one. Sifting through the batch, her eyes are stuck to one of herself. It's from the day she found out that she's passed Junior year and would be able to go onto the next grade. But something about it is...off. She has a picture with everyone, but there's one where she stands alone, a huge smile on her face, and her arm outstretched casually, as if she it had been wrapped around someone's waist. Next to her is a confounding, empty space that throws the whole photo out of balance.

Why would she be reaching out her arm in a picture by herself?

The longer she looks at the picture, a small tear of sadness squeezes her heart, causing her to frown in confusion. Everything gives off an emotion: people, places, objects, anything really. Looking at the picture, she appears happy and care-free. But for some reason, she feels a thin thread of devastation pulling at the center of her chest and she doesn't know why. Something about that photo broke her heart, or maybe someone?

Malia looks at the clock and it reads 6:37 am. Throwing on a pair of shorts and one of her dad's old college tshirts, she climbs through her window with a destination in mind and the photograph crumpled between her fingers. Fifteen minutes later she stands in front of the McCall house. She decided to walk. Driving had been an option that had crossed her mind, but she needed the time to clear her head. Climbing the side of the house, she lifts the window near Scott's bed and slides in quietly. She had planned on waking him, and she still was going to, but looking at him gave her pause. Scott's mousy dark hair is ruffled and wild, slightly curling around his ears. Her hand itches to run her fingers through it and sweep her thumb over the little scar he has on his forehead that you could only find if you were really looking for it. Her heart swells at the vision of him and she begins to realize how intimate it feels being in his room, surrounded by his things, and a small part of her wishing she were with him laying there, tucked into his side. The thought shakes Malia to her very core and she swallows the lump in her throat. Seeing him more relaxed than she has in a while, she almost leaves unnoticed, thinking that it would be silly to disturb him over something as stupid as a picture.

She's about to leave when a groan leaves his lips and a goofy smile rests on his face, yet his eyes are closed. Malia hones in on his heartbeat and he is indeed asleep. What happens next strikes her heart with a bitter sweetness and a current runs from her head all the way down to her toes, causing her breath to hitch.

"Malia..." He groans. "I want you to take- I want you to take it." He mumbles incoherently, rubbing his nose against his pillow, which Malia finds cute. "I want you to take it all, take everything."

Malia stares dumbfounded, trying to understand what he could possibly be dreaming about and why it involves her. A pink blush tints her cheeks and her eyelashes flutter as she looks at him, seeing the guy who's fingerprints are all over who she is now.

"I- I don't even know what- what it is- I just know that I want you to take it... It's yours, it's yours." He whispers in a hushed tone, his voice softening until it dies to a silent mouthing of unintelligible words.

Malia gets down on her knees until she's eye level with him and runs the back of her fingers down his cheek in a comforting motion. He leans into her touch and his lazy smile stretches out further. She rests her forehead against his and the warmth of his skin makes Malia want to melt into him and bury herself in a place so far deep inside him that she runs into his heart and stumbles upon the rhythm of it's beats.

"Scott..." She murmurs, playing with the hair on the back on his neck and tugging on it gently. It's weird how Scott brings out this calmness in her. To the world, she is aggressive, staggering, impulsive, and brazen like a chaotic rumbling of piano keys flying across the board. But with him... With just him she tempers down to a slow-beat melody, losing herself with a warped weight that takes on a new definition of feeling and the decay of her comforting walls she'd built so high around her.

She knows that what she feels for Scott is beyond her control at this point, no matter how much she hates to admit it and the number of times she'll continue to deny it. Sometimes she'll catch herself talking to him but realizing she'd rather stare into his eyes for hours straight instead of actually talk about anything. She likes how dark his eyes are, how they bore into hers with this enchantment he holds for her that she is undeserving of and she can see her own reflection in them. And she loves how as they stand face-to-face, his very presence makes her hands shake so hard and her lips tremble just to get a taste of what a man as magnetic as him could taste like. It's been so long since she's kissed someone and felt something. Actually, she doesn't remember a time where she's ever felt something. And within those dark, intense eyes, she sees this unspoken promise of protection, something that she'd kill for. Because she trusts him. And that means more to her than any 'I love you' ever could.

She presses her hand against his chest and his warm, heavy hand clamps over hers and keeps it there with a hum of satisfaction. His brown eyes greet hers and Malia's small smile makes a reappearance.

"Hey, you." She says lightly, still clutching his fingers that intertwine with hers as the two of their hands stay hugged to his chest.

"Hey 'Lia." He says in a low throaty voice that's dripping with sleep as his heavy-lidded eyes take in her appearance while his thumb brushes lazily over the back of her hand. He looks at the clock and then back at her. "What are you doing here?"

"I-um, I found something in my room. And I wanted your opinion on it." She explains, taking her bottom lip hostage between her teeth and looking down at Scott from beneath her eyelashes.

"And you had to ask me at 7:00 in the morning?" He grins keenly, trying to stifle his chuckle. Malia Tate and unpredictable are basically synonymous. He really shouldn't be all that surprised.

"Well you know how I get. Once my mind is stuck on something, I can't let go of it until I get my answers." She replies casually with her dark eyes shining with pride. If there's one thing Malia can say for herself, it would be that she gets shit done. And she gets it done quickly.

"So what you mean to say is that you're impatient and determined." Scott says, rising from the bed and throwing on a shirt, playfully mocking her cute, yet neurotic tendencies.

"Well I mean, I wouldn't say it quite like that..." She states, her voice drifting off as she unintentionally stares at the small sliver of tan, muscular flesh that peaks out from beneath his shirt, close to the v-line of his hips due to his low-riding boxers.

Her tiny, pink tongue unconsciously sweeps across her lips before she averts her gaze and looks back up at Scott's face, realizing that he's watching her with wolfish eyes.

"Malia, are you okay?" Scott asks with fake modesty, knowing exactly what she had been staring at and unashamedly loving how she just stood there fixated on him with alluring, hungry eyes. He always wondered if she would ever look at him like that. And now that she had, Scott would make it his mission to make her look at him like that again and again.

"Uhm yeah, I'm fine. It's just... I thought I saw a stain on your shirt." She mumbles unconvincingly. However, her arched brow and perfectly measured head tilt dare him to say otherwise. But she should know that he's not afraid of her.

"My shirt, huh?" He questions, taking a bold step into her personal space and making her head swim in the presence of his masculine, sandalwood aroma. The mix of his scent and close proximity makes Malia feel hot between her thighs and the back of her neck. With measured breathes, she takes a step back and calms the tendrils of ecstasy that crashes through her body like shoot-up drug. She pulls out the crumpled picture from her pocket and smooths it own before stamping it against Scott's chest.

"Forget that, I need you to look at this picture. Look at the way my arm is positioned, as if someone is standing really close to me. My arm looks like it would be wrapped around someone's waist, doesn't it? I've had this overwhelming feeling that something in my life is off. I'm missing something very important and I think this picture may be a clue to what that something is. I don't know why, but when I look at it, I get this odd inkling that I am trying to remember something and trying to let it go at the same time." She explains in a single rushed breath, looking it over and running a finger over the unnaturally blank space beside her.

Scott doesn't say anything for a minute, opening and closing his mouth as if he wasn't sure how much or how little he should say.

"I've had that feeling, too. I don't know... I walked by this locker yesterday at school and I felt myself stumble as I was about to pass it. Suddenly I got this loud ringing in my ear that seemed to focus in on the locker. I thought I was going crazy. I started hearing little voices, nothing concrete that I could really make out, but something was familiar about it. I don't really know how to explain it. And when I put my hand against it, the coolness of the metal helped me relax and the noises disappeared. But, this phrase rung through my ears, " You're my best friend, Scott, you're my brother." It was so obscure and faint that I thought I'd conjured it up myself." He admits, a quiet shadow crossing his face.

"Do you think it could have something to do with the ghost riders?" She asks, left reeling at the news Scott had given her. So it wasn't just her, she wasn't overreacting. She wonders if Lydia is experiencing it, too.

"I don't know... The legend is that they take people. What if someone has been stolen from us but we just can't remember?" He ponders, taking in the new theory a second at a time.

"I think we need to talk to Lydia about this." Malia suggests, having the unnerving suspicion that they are being watched.

When she leaves and goes back home to get ready for school, the prickling sensation doesn't leave her. Something big is unraveling before them, and she is going to find out what the Wild Hunt has to do with it.