-A Note: I told you updates would come faster! Here is Chapter 21. Fair warning: this is a super angsty chapter with mucho Paily Feels. I really hope you all enjoy. Please continue to leave me reviews, I really do appreciate each and every one of them!
Happy Reading!
I must admit: as my doomed existence played out at the beginning of 2014, I honestly was growing more and more skeptical that I would be alive to see 2015. But, here I am with Christmas come and gone as well as the beginning of a new year, which happened to be only a few days ago. I ended up spending both with Alex in Philadelphia which I was more than happy to, considering I really did not care to see Emily and Stephanie ring in the New Year by making out. Christmas was quaint. We spent the day cuddled up together in blankets watching old Christmas movies after opening presents in the morning. She had gotten me a new specialized tool kit to fix my other bikes practically falling apart in the shed. I love the gift. I've been using it to continue working on my bikes during my free time to get it ready for spring. For Alex, I got her a small necklace with a silver camera charm. It reminded me of her plus she said she loved it so I guess it all works out.
I finally found a job to pass the time, Stephanie had put in a good word for me with her friend Tom who owned a small car shop in town and needed help. I don't need the money but I was getting hideously bored during the day when everyone else was at work. I had some experience working with machinery from being in the Army and I enjoy it enough to take the job. It's not much but its physical and keeps me busy so I've been working here for about a month now.
I'm alone in the shop today, which I don't mind. It's peaceful. A light snow is falling outside the large transparent bay doors and the only sounds are the soft blow of the heater and the clinking of my tools. It's right after closing time and I don't have to be anywhere today so I decide to stay late and change the oil on one of the cars. I'm under the car about to drain the oil when I hear the bell ring signaling that someone has entered the office. I sigh and drop my hands down, sliding out from under the car. I must have forgotten to lock the door and change the sign again. I take the rag out of the back pocket of my jumpsuit and attempt to wipe the grease off my hands as I walk into the office. I'm still focused on my hands when I begin to tell the customer that we are closed.
"I'm sorry, we're closed for the...," I pause when I look up and am caught off guard by the most beautiful eyes staring back at me. "...Emily, hey. What are you doing here?" I give her a smile as I am pleasantly surprised to see her but I notice she seems nervous about something.
"Can I ask you a favor?" She says with a slight grin and pleading eyes.
"Uh sure," I answer raising my eyebrow as I throw the rag on the counter and lean forward on it with both arms straight out. She pauses and watches my face. The look on hers makes me think I'm not going to like this request. She gathers herself with a slight pause and a deep breath, her shoulders physically rising with her chest.
"Look Paige, I know this whole wedding business is hard for you but I really need your help." Yup, I already am not liking where this is going. Letting out a short sigh, I bend my elbow quickly before straightening them again to signal to her that I'm not sure I can help her with this. "Please? I really need a friend for this," she pleads, biting her lip. I cave, of course, because it's Emily and I'm helpless to her. I stand back up completely and square my shoulders, picking up the rag.
"Ok, fine. I'll go… but you owe me dinner," I tease, pointing at her with my gray covered hand.
"Awesome thank you Paige! I didn't know what I was going to do when everyone else told me they were busy," she teases back with a smile causing me to throw my greasy rag at her in response.
"Oh, Shut up."
About an hour later, I find myself standing outside of a bridal shop. A Bridal Shoppe to be exact, which I'm pretty positive may be a thousand times worse. Although, I don't really know because I've never been in either. When she told me this errand was in concern of the wedding, I knew I was not going to like it but I really had no clue it would be this.
"You have got to be kidding me," I say looking up at the sign, before rolling my head back and to the side to show the dark-haired girl beside me that I am not amused.
"Come on, McCullers, it won't be that bad. Pleaseeee," she says with a cute pout, putting both hands on my arm above my elbow, tugging a little as if she was a child in desperate want of ice cream. I sigh out loudly as I am the parent who is wrapped around her daughter's finger. I really am powerless against her.
"You owe me big Fields." I comment as I step forward into the shop ahead of her. The sooner we get this over with the better. Even with my back is to her, I know the look she must have on her face, it's that little smile out the corner of her mouth that she does whenever she wins at something. I look around the shop when I walk in and almost gag at the shear amount of lace and puffy sleeves. I turn around on my heels to walk past Emily and out the door, when she grabs my elbow and pulls me back to her side, keeping her eyes facing forward through the whole thing. When I'm back at her side and turned around, she links her arm with mine and holds it tight against her side so I don't escape again. I look down briefly at our linked arms and remember all the times before that we would walk together linked like this. I always liked it better than holding hands because it meant she was closer to me; close enough for me to feel her familiar and comforting warmth radiating off her body. I look back up a second later giving Emily a side glance to catch her eye. Smiles erupt on both of our faces at the silliness of the whole scene that just happened. We both start to giggle when the salesperson walks out causing us to drop our arms fairly quickly. I clear my throat to stop my giggling as I look down to try and clear the goofy smile from my face.
"Emily, good to see you again!" The lady says pulling Emily into a hug when she reaches her. "And who is this? The lovely other bride?" My grin quickly disappears as the comment hits me like the shockwaves of an exploding bomb; each word stabbing me deeply in the heart and twisting the blade.
"No, madam, I'm Paige, Emily's… uhhh… friend," I say before Emily can utter a word. I can't hear her say I'm just a friend, that I'm not her fiancé. It would just twist the knife even further and deeper into my already broken heart. I know I'm just a friend, I know that is the cold, hard truth in this case but I just can't bear to hear her say those words. 'What am I doing here?' I think to myself. Oh right, it's Emily. I'd do anything for her.
"Oh well, it's nice to meet you Paige," the older woman remarks before turning back to Emily. "You're here to try on your dress yes?" Emily nods in response with a grin. The lady motions for her to follow us and we walk past a curtain into the back room. It's all so... White; as white a sterile hospital or undisturbed, freshly-fallen snow.
Emily and the lady disappear behind another curtain that acts as a changing room, leaving me sitting on a wooden bench with white, rather uncomfortable cushions outside. I can't help my nervous fidgeting. I know Emily is changing into her dress on the other side of that curtain; her wedding dress. Her wedding dress she will wear to get married to Stephanie. Would she have picked the same dress to marry me in? I feel my heart weigh knowing I will never know the answer to that question.
I hear the curtain pull back and it causes me to look up. When I do, my breath catches in my throat and I am awestruck at the sight before me. 'WOW' is my thought but I can't speak. She's gorgeous. The dress is perfect. It fits slim to her body, showing off every curve ending loosely around her feet and barely touching the floor. The top hem follows the curve of her breasts dipping down to show a modest amount of cleavage. The straps are thicker and cover the joints of her shoulders giving full view of her collar bones and the perfect curve of her neck into her shoulders. It's one of her more sensitive sweet spots I was so happy to have found long ago. I feel a deep want surge within me begging me to go put my lips to the perfect skin laying bare there to elicit the soft, gentle moan it always earns. I'm speechless at her beauty in this moment. I can't move.
"Paige?" Emily says trying to pull an emotion or comment from me. "Please say something... Is it bad?" I shake my head immediately. Bad? BAD? Are you kidding me? I slowly get up and walk over to her, grabbing both of her hands before looking down at the hem of her dress and working my way up to her eyes.
"It's stunning," I say barely above a whisper. "You're… stunning." The corners of her mouth start to turn upwards into a shy smile.
"Thank you," she says quietly, looking down. Is that blush on her cheeks? Adorable.
"Now, let me see the back," I say lifting an arm up to spin her around. Bad idea. The back is open, accentuating the gently lines of her torso, ending right below the small of her back. Oh how badly I want to run my hand along those perfect lines. To feel her sensitive skin. To feel her body shudder under the soft, loving feel of my touch. "Wow, Emily. It's perfect," I say instead. She turns around again to face me and grabs my hands again.
"Thank you," she barely whispers, "for coming. It really means so much."
"Of course. Anything for you."
After we're done at the bridal shop, Emily keeps good on her word and takes me out to dinner. We talk about our day and how the other's significant other is doing, though I don't really care. We're about halfway through dinner when she pulls a small box out of her bag, wrapped up with Christmas paper and a bow, and hands it across the table to me.
"Em, you didn't have to get me anything."
"I wanted to," she says shaking the box a little, urging me to take it. "Sorry it's late." I take the beautifully wrapped box hesitantly and open it. Inside is a beautifully framed picture of us with my parents taken long ago back in high school. We all are standing out back at my parents' house next to my father's grill. High-school me has her arm around Emily, as we smile at my mother giving my father a kiss on the cheek as he attends to the grill. Spencer and Hanna can be seen sitting next to the pool in the background obviously arguing about something but we actually all look so happy. I don't have many pictures of my parents, they both hated their photos being taken but this one was a candid; Aria probably took it when we were not paying attention. They died two months after this moment. I can feel the tears starting to form as I place a finger on the picture of my mother. I miss them more than I can say.
"Thank you Em," I choke out. "This is amazing. I didn't even know this picture existed."
"I was going through Aria's albums one night and found it. I figured you might want it because of your parents." I smile at her and nod before thanking her again. It's a simple picture but it means so much. I don't tell her I have a gift for her as well since I want to give it to her later when I can slip away before she opens it.
After dinner, we are walking back to the auto shop to get our cars that we left there since everything was so close. We laugh and joke with each other the whole way. I missed our time together, our friendship. This is the longest we've been able to hang out alone together and I was loving every minute of it.
"No you're the one that scared Mrs. Johnson's cat and I'm the one that had to spend all night looking for her because you had a chemistry test the next day!" I laugh out. "I almost fell asleep in formation at ROTC because I hadn't gone to bed yet."
We're about a block from the shop when we hear a loud bang. A car backfired, but my brain doesn't register it as such, it registers it as an IED.
The Humvee rocks and is thrown to its side, tossing me against the wall of the vehicle. I register the engine setting ablaze and the heat scorching my skin. My body protests my movements as I try to escape but my eye catches sight of something shiny: a ring. The ring is attached to a woman. A dark-haired beauty, I'm in love with and I will do anything to save her, even if my body is so broken I can barely move.
I immediately pull Emily around a corner and into an alley, pushing her to the ground and covering her with my body to protect her from the subsequent gunfire that obviously never comes. When my brain realizes what happened, I roll over and put my back against the wall sitting next to Emily who has a terrified look on her face. My heart is racing, adrenaline running through me, my breathing heavy and ragged. I'm on edge. This has never happened to me before, I'd only ever had the dreams. I don't know if it's because I feel a need to protect Emily or the association of the memories of Emily with the sound of explosions that triggered it. Either way, I can't calm my heart rate. I'm embarrassed and scared. I can only hope this doesn't keep happening. I'm still internally freaking out, mentally still in a burning Humvee, when I feel a soft, calming, magnetic touch on my shoulder. She doesn't have to say anything, just having her touch on my shoulder helps bring me back. When I return back to the present, I turn to look at her with my face twisted in fear. She pulls me in and holds me close, allowing my heart to calm itself even further. She strokes my hair and holds me tight until I can finally breathe again. When I regain my composure, I look up into her eyes finding they are full of concern.
"That's how you saved me Emily," I say. "That's how you got me through those three and a half years of… of torture." It's the first time I've ever admitted to her even slightly how bad things were for me. Admitting it to Emily meant it was real and I did not want to live with the fact that I had been tortured for three and a half long and painful years of my life. "Thinking of you always calmed me," I tell her trying to reassure her that I'm ok. "You were... you are my angel." She doesn't say anything. She just nods her head and pulls me into another tight embrace before standing up and helping me to my feet. We walk back to the car in silence both still stunned at what just happened. It doesn't take long for us to reach the parking lot after that. We stand in front of each other nervously for a few seconds before saying goodbye. It reminds me of our first real kiss, not the stolen one in the car, but in the parking lot of the remote bar on the edge of nowhere that I had found online, except this time there's no kissing.
"Thank you," I say looking into her eyes, "for just now and for all the memories I had to keep me alive." She goes to say something but I stop her. "You don't have to say anything Em, I just wanted you to know." I then reach into my pocket to pull out a small box and hand it to her.
"Paige..."
"It's not what you think," I say, knowing she thinks it's some sort of fancy jewelry. "Just open it when you get home ok?" She nods but looks confused as to why she can't open it now. She obliges, however, and places it in her bag. "Bye Emily," I say giving her a kiss on the cheek and to me it's not just goodnight. Maybe I'm finally able to let her go; to actually let her live her life like I promised myself that I would. Maybe, I'm finally letting her go, not in my heart, I can never stop loving her, but I'm letting her go enough to no longer interfere with her life. "I'll see you soon." With that I turn around and head to my truck to go home for the night. It's been one hell of a day.