Parenthesis

by knottedblonde

"She tries to put a lot of words into the kiss, words she isn't brave enough to say out loud: She'll stand by him because she cares about him, and if there's anything he's taught her it's that when you care about people, really care about them, you don't leave. Not forever." Sequel to my other story, Artemisia. Artemis-centric; the gap between Season 1 & 2. M in later chapters.

24. Corner of Your Heart

AN: I'm back! Enjoy the update.

---

Oblivious to her mood the weather continues to be almost unbearably hot and shamelessly sunny; the soil in her grove of trees is soon cracking and begging for rain the cloudless sky won't give it.

For the first time she doesn't miss the long length of her hair or the way it used to stick to her sweat slicked neck.

The first few days of June pass and she avoids Wally at all costs, leaving the room whenever she senses his arrival and instead going on long walks to the more lonely parts of the Cave, seeking solitude. She can feel herself slipping deeper into the miserable corners of her own existence, growing hollow and oblivious to the world around her. Her feet prowl unknowingly through the Cave, retracing old paths and trying to fight her own exhaustion, knowing full well that sleep means only an empty bed beside her and half-imagined pictures of Wally plaguing her dreams.

It happens the morning after their encounter in the kitchen— her reflexes are weakened by lack of sleep and she isn't quick enough to escape the walnut smell as it comes peeling around the corner. Instead of running away she ignores him completely when she passes him in the hallway, practically sprinting to her bedroom like a kicked dog with its tail between its legs.

She hears a sigh before her door is closed, and it takes several tense minutes of her pressing her shoulders against the wood paneling before she hears Wally's footsteps on the other side, signaling his retreat.

And she can't help it; on the rare occasions she's forced to be in his company she checks for her elastic on his wrist and each time she sees it another painful twinge sounds through her stomach. He never takes it off— it's there during training, at breakfast, popping up under his uniform when they go on missions. She even accidentally catches him leaving the showers once, dripping wet with the damn thing still there.

Despite the showmanship of the elastic Wally remains sneering, almost painfully indifferent to her, as if determined to remind her that whatever passed between them in the kitchen was meaningless; nevertheless she can feel his eyes on the back of her neck, can sense the way his head turns to follow her as she passes through rooms.

(They don't look each other in the eye anymore, or at least she doesn't look at him— she can't stand the thousand stabbings of pain that run through her when she does, the burning jolts of old love she hasn't quite squashed out of herself yet...)

The Team all seem determined to crowd her still, despite the fact that she's trying harder than ever to maintain a façade of normalcy; although her head is still reeling from her last encounter with Wally, still obsessing over her elastic and whether or not his hand was actually going to adjust her hair, she does make an effort to at least appear less surly. She tries to smile. She does her best to listen when people talk to her.

She starts running again, relishing in the blisters that pop up on her toes and the way her shoes gouge bloody lines into her feet. It has the same effect it did months ago— her whole body aches as she forces her feet to plow through the sand, forces her lungs to endure the heat and humidity and the sweat coating her limbs. Afterwards she stares at the tile coating the shower walls and watches as a mixture of her own blood and sweat disappears down the drain. She tries not to wish she were drowning away with it.

One day she makes the mistake of running in the heat of the day, her calves pulled taught and her muscles straining so hard for muggy oxygen that she's beginning to see spots, when someone calls out from behind her. "Hey!"

(And without knowing why she expects to see Wally when she turns around, flinching automatically as if anticipating a spray of sand to hit her like it did all those months ago—)

Instead when she turns she sees another, less boyish mop of ginger hair on the beach. Her stomach, previously twisting, relaxes almost comically. "What do you want, Red?" She tries to yell, leaning forward to brace the heels of her palms on her knees. She feels as if she might faint.

Roy takes his time walking up to her on the beach; he's sweat coated too, no doubt having just made the same mistake she did and tried to exercise in such intense heat. "Is that all I get?" He huffs at her, pretending to look angry. "It's been weeks, Sweetheart."

She makes an annoyed noise in the back of her throat, too exhausted to keep arguing; instead she sends him a scathing look before collapsing into the sand, her back pressing into the wonderfully cool beach so recently moistened by the ocean spray. "What do you want?" She repeats through her teeth, hands scrubbing the sweat from her face.

To her annoyance Roy actually sits down beside her; he's so much taller than her that his runners are actually being lapped at by the tide, the cold ocean water probably sticking to his socks. "Just saying hi." He mutters peevishly.

Her knees knock together, one elbow throwing itself over her eyes to block out the sun as she squints at him; as usual he's very hard to read, especially so in the glare off the water. As if he can sense her stare he deliberately avoids her gaze, instead glaring out towards the horizon. "Hi." She practically snarls, hoping he gets the message to leave her alone.

"Hi."

A bubble of impatience flares up inside her, her teeth gritting together automatically. "... Anything else?"

For some reason the corners of Roy's mouth quirk upwards, his head swinging away from the water until he's looking at her properly. She registers the usual flash of eyes up to her forehead everyone always tries and fails to do subtly, and with an uncomfortable flip of her stomach she waits for him to finish examining the too-short blonde bristles. "... Nice hair cut." He tells her after a moment.

The second he says it she feels her whole face sour. "Go to hell." She spits at him, sitting up.

Roy keeps looking at her for a long second. "Are the rumors true?"

"What rumors?" She mutters darkly.

"That Sportsmaster did it."

She feels her nose wrinkle, fingers curling into fists and seizing a handful of sand to stop herself from reaching over to throttle him. "... Just... I don't want to talk it over, okay, Red? If that's what everyone—"

"I didn't hear from the Team." Roy cuts her off, going back to staring at the water. "... Cheshire heard something. Wanted to know if it was true."

It takes a full heartbeat for this information to penetrate her skull and the second it does she jerks her head towards him so quickly her neck spasms, sending a sharp jab of pain down her spine. "Cheshire?" She gasps out, rubbing at her neck. "You're still seeing her? Even after Athens?"

Roy's face darkens at her disbelieving tone before he shrugs. "... Not my call, Sweetheart. Your sister has a knack of showing up unannounced whenever she wants something."

"Like you're trying so hard to stop it—"

Something twitches about his cheek bones, a flash of some emotion she can't quite place as he shifts beside her, shoulders tightening. "Artemis—"

"Call the League!" She snarls before he can argue, swiveling towards him in the sand; she hates that suddenly he won't look at her, his shoulders tensing and rising like a wildcat's haunches as her voice gets louder. "Go into hiding, Red, come on—"

"No point." He mutters, shrugging.

He makes to stand and she feels her cheeks reddening, not sure what to do with the slightly deflated Roy she's so unused to dealing with. "No point!" She repeats, watching him get to his feet. "So you're just... You're just going to be her little call boy for the rest of your life? Be her messenger until she doesn't have a use for you anymore—"

Roy turns back, glaring down at her. "Do us both a favor and shut up, Sweetheart." He says firmly, scowling. "Don't talk about things you don't understand. Besides, I'm not here for Cheshire. I need to talk to you."

She opens her mouth angrily but finds herself oddly silent as he extends a hand down to her. "... What is it?" She asks despite herself, allowing him to help her to her feet.

His hand feels starkly similar to Oliver's; the same blisters, callouses, the kind of wear and tear you can only get from being an archer... She supposes hers must feel the same, perfectly molded and beaten in after so many years of practice. "... You broke his heart." Roy says after a moment, voice no longer snarling but instead quiet, dangerous.

Her fingers tighten involuntarily; as if expecting it Roy's grip on her doubles, refusing to let her go and scarper down the beach the way she would be tempted to do if it were anyone else. "... Red." She sighs after a moment, trying to get her hand back.

Roy's eyes are still blazing at her, reading every emotion passing over her features, no doubt memorizing her reaction and trying to find some deeper meaning to what's there; she hears herself exhale, eyes staring guiltily out at the water.

"... I had to, okay?" She says after a moment, finally managing to get her hand out of his. "... You know my family. You know why I had to."

Roy lets her take an awkward step back, still staring at her with an odd intensity. "... Explain."

"Do I have to?" She bursts out, sand clinging to the sweat on her skin. "You know Jade, and Sportsmaster... And you know me, Red. We're all hunters, it's in our blood and I— I can't protect him from that. You know I can't. I'm not enough to stop them."

She's not expecting Roy to argue against her own insecurity and she's glad when he doesn't; instead he exhales loudly through his mouth, no longer watching as she blinks prickly tears out of her eyes. "... But you still love him."

She wants to answer and instead rounds on him, glaring. "And you still love Jade."

Roy scowls for a moment before looks away, shaking his head. "... You remind me of her, you know." He says after a moment. "Trying to leave people for their own protection, always running away..."

"That's not a compliment." She grits out between her teeth, hands balling into fists.

Roy smiles grimly, seeming to enjoy her anger. "It's not supposed to be." He says frankly. "But it is true... Let me give you some advice that she wouldn't listen to, Sweetheart." When she looks skeptical Roy pauses, watching her for a long moment until the strange smile falls from his face. "Life is short, alright? And the whole hero thing... All I'm saying is, after everything you've seen... You should stay close to anyone that makes you glad you're still alive."

It's a very odd thing to say, and she feels the lines of skepticism and anger deepen around her eyes as she scowls. "What's the supposed to mean?"

"It means," He tells her, turning away. "That letting go of Wally was the biggest fuck up of your life."

---

Roy's words haunt her even hours later, seeming to follow her around the rest of the day and catch on the backs of her heels. "You remind me of her, you know... Trying to leave people for their own protection, always running away..." He doesn't know anything— the words had been another one of his taunts, another way to unnerve her, knock her down a peg for breaking his friend's heart...

("... Letting go of Wally was the biggest fuck up of your life...")

Well, at least that part she knows it untrue. It was being with Wally in the first place that was by far one of her worst mistakes...

Despite the scalding water from the shower head sending soap running down her body she still feels tainted by his words, as if lingering grains of sand are still digging into the seams of her skin. As usual she's dolled out too much shampoo, her inch long strands doused in suds. What does Roy know, anyway? Her and Cheshire... There's nothing there anymore, no bond between her and the monster who had dug a sai into her neck only a few weeks ago, no lingering affection between her and the creature who had tried to drown her in the heavy weight of mud... The only thing she has in common with Jade is her eyes, the same steely grey as Paula's.

But Roy knows Jade. The malicious voice in the back of her mind hisses. And she had said it herself— Roy knows her.

"Trying to leave people for their own protection..." The words seem to wrap around her diaphragm like iron, making it nearly impossible to breathe in the heavy steam of the shower. Isn't that what she did to Wally? Turned her back on him to keep him safe? "Always running away..."

But Jade didn't leave to save her; if there's one thing she knows about her sister it's that she left that day to save her own skin, left because they no longer had Paula's protection— she abandoned her baby sister and left her to face Lawrence's wrath alone. What other reason could there be for that kind of betrayal? For that kind of selfishness?

Her stomach twists as she thinks of Lawrence's obsession with getting his better daughter back, the sometimes fortnight long absences where he would be hunting her, the maniacal way he would return only to force her through training...

Had that been the reason behind Jade's leaving? To draw Lawrence away? At the thought her fingers slip, sending a great rush of frothy shampoo into her eyes.

Had her older sister honestly thought that sentencing her to five years of near isolation would be better than dealing with Lawrence? Did she really think that she would have rather been alone and safe than suffering by her side?

Did Jade really mean to sacrifice herself to keep Artemis, in the loosest sense, safe?

The shampoo is still stinging her eyes but she can't be bothered to scrub it out, instead now standing almost immobile in the shower stall, mind racing. It doesn't make any sense. Jade's tried a thousand times to kill her since, it doesn't—

Has she tried to kill her? The malicious voice is back, snarling at her. Sure, she's roughed her up a few times— shoving her face into a television screen, attacking her on roof tops, throwing sais... But there's only been the one time Jade's really tried to kill her...

(And without wanting to she remembers the taste of mud in the back of her throat, remembers the maliciousness in her own voice as she was convinced she was about to die, remembers wanting her last act to be to humiliate her sister. "I should have let him kill you. I wish you were dead!")

Jade had only turned on her when she had thought she had regretted keeping her alive. When she had thought she had been given up to Sportsmaster...

(And suddenly her heart is throbbing in her ears, beating so quickly that she can feel her own blood pounding inside her to her pulse. Had she even meant that? Did she really want Jade dead at the hands of her father?)

((No.))

Before she realizes what she's doing she's ripping at the temperature valve, not stopping until her skin is screaming from the cold and she can't remember why her knees are shaking.

---

Exhaustion clings to her like a disease that evening, settling into her bones and making her joints ache; she can't even bring herself to be annoyed when Kaldur inexplicably shows up to her abandoned corner of the library, holding a cup of tea.

"Are you speaking with me yet?" He asks her after she simply looks at him dryly without offering any words of greeting.

Her eyes narrow, neck lolling back into the armchair she's sitting in as she surveys him. "Why would you think I'm not talking to you?"

As if taking this as a good sign Kaldur makes the odd Atlantean shrugging movement, passing her the tea and settling into the chair beside her, flexing his webbed fingers around the armrests. "I thought you were perhaps still angry over the squad assignment in Athens. We have not spoken properly since..."

He trails off uncertainly and instead of answering right away she takes a sip of the tea, wincing slightly as it burns her lips; if she's being honest it hadn't occurred to her to be angry with him beyond the few spitting remarks she had made in the moment. So much has happened it feels as if there simply isn't room in her body to feel anything else other than miserable... The girl who would have once been furious over the betrayal feels like someone else entirely, someone without a broken heart and the knowledge that being with Wally is horribly unallowable.

The tea spills over the rim of the cup as she settles it against her knee. "... To be fair I haven't really been talking to anyone, Kal. And you've been pretty busy yourself the last few days. How are things with Tula?"

Kaldur ignores her teasing tone and her attempt at changing the subject, his eyes instead finding the weak smile she's trying to wear. "Tula is fine." He says simply, watching as the stiff corners of her mouth twitch unconvincingly.

"That's great."

Another pause in which Kaldur's milky eyes follow her shaky hand as it lifts her mug to her mouth. "... Are you feeling well, Artemis?"

"I'm fine." The words are said into her cup and stupidly she slops tea down her front. "I'm good."

He keeps staring long after she's replaced her mug on her knees; very suddenly he bursts into words that sound well rehearsed, as if he's been thinking them over guiltily for a few weeks. "I am sorry for everything that has happened, Artemis. I had no idea that going to Athens would be so... You have my deepest apologies for breaking my word, but I had—"

"It's fine, Kal." She interrupts, pressing the back of her head into her chair again. For some reason she closes her eyes, not wanting to look at him. "It doesn't matter."

She can sense his staring and isn't surprised when he keeps talking, not recognizing her dismissal. "... You have been through a lot." He says carefully, and when she opens her eyes to look at him he's got his webbed hands pressed together, elbows braced on his knees. "I have arranged counselling sessions with Black Canary, if you wish to—"

"I don't want them." She says quickly. "I'm fine, Kaldur. Really."

Once again she can sense that he wants to keep talking, but before he can get the words out she starts speaking again, forcing herself to keep her tone cheerful. "So." She hums, taking a page out of Zatanna's book and cutting to the chase quickly. "Am I ever going to hear the whole story?"

A confused look crosses his features, his brows contracting. "The whole story of what?" He asks, leaning back in his arm chair. "What are you referring to?"

She rolls her eyes. "Don't play dumb, Kal. What made Tula change her mind? What made her come back?"

For some reason Kaldur's cheeks blush the familiar deep purple color, his head shaking slightly. "Is it not obvious?" He says plainly, still looking confused. "It was love, Artemis. We— Tula and I are in love."

Something strikes her at the way he says it, as if it's something simple that she should have the sense to understand. He's still looking at her as if he can't quite make sense of her questions. "... Well, I know that." She says dumbly, blinking. "But, I mean— why now? What changed?"

"Nothing changed." He says, still using that same slightly confused tone. "We have always loved each other."

She can feel herself beginning to get annoyed, brows furrowing and mouth twisting into a frown. "But, I mean— what about Garth? Why did she ditch him?"

Kaldur blinks at her once, very slowly, as if digesting the words. "I believe we are coming to one of our familiar misunderstandings." He says vaguely. "... Nothing has changed, Artemis. That is what is important. The fact that we still love each other, despite everything else that has happened."

"But—"

"I am not arrogant enough to believe I understand it." Kaldur nods his head in acknowledgment. "But perhaps that is the beauty in it: that you never have to give each other a reason. You simply do as your heart tells you."

It still doesn't make sense to her but she can't think of any more questions to ask; instead she sips her tea, the silence weighing heavily on her eardrums.

---

"You can tell me stuff, you know." She watches as one of his feet reaches out, nudging the toes of her boots, trying to push past the barriers she's always putting up. "... We're friends." He adds, almost as an after thought.

For some reason she can't stand to look at the honesty in his smile, the boyish freckles she once hated now glinting in a familiar way on his cheeks. Familiar? Wally? It strikes her how odd it is, the way he's burrowed into her; the way someone who was a stranger sprawled at her feet a few weeks ago can suddenly be sitting— a little too close— beside her. It's even more odd that she's not bothered by it. Has it only been a few months since she told herself that she could never like him? Since she narrowed her eyes at his back and deemed his freckles, his Wally-ness, entirely unacceptable?

As if knowing her mind is elsewhere Wally nudges her boot again, leaning closer until their elbows are touching. Only a few months and now her heart starts thundering at the smallest of smiles, her stomach twisting as he brushes against her.

Only a few months and she's trusting him with her secrets.

... She's an idiot.

The silence is stretching out as her mind races around inside her skull, and more to avoid the mixed feelings of excitement and nervousness she ducks her head, fingers flexing into the carpet; her pony tail swings down the side of her face, hiding her smile from his too-kind eyes but doing nothing to block the walnut smell from caressing her cheeks.

"Right." She mutters, feeling the wall outside of Black Canary's office digging into her spine. She exhales, opening her mouth to push words past her lips. It doesn't matter what she says, if it's eloquent or poorly worded. Either way Wally will always listen. "... Friends."

The second she says the word something changes; the carpet underneath her turns icy on the backs of her legs, the warmth indicating his presence vanishing; she hasn't even properly raised her head in alarm before his arm shoots out, latching onto her with such an intensity that any other words quickly change into a gasp of pain.

The walnut smell is gone and is replaced by the smell of rotting flesh and blood, the sourness that clings to all dead bodies flooding through her nostrils; when his palm slaps against her she feels a flash of lightning inside her, feels the white hot and excruciatingly painful grip he takes on her forearm, so fast she can hardly process the thought of reacting, of defending herself—

And his nails are burrowing into her flesh, digging into her and peeling back her skin, he's skinning her alive—

When she screams so does Wally, continuing to claw at her as she struggles against him; he's not right, he's bleeding out his mouth, he's got holes in his chest and a gaping wound in his shoulder and he's carving swatches of her out, trying to fix himself. "Artemis!" He keeps screaming, peeling layer after layer of skin from her arms, some pieces of her clinging so tightly that she can see her bones when they're stripped away. "Artemis, help me!"

He flattens on top of her, shredding her clothing, ripping her apart as she tries to run, tries to call for help, tries to fight against the rotting fingers peeling her legs apart—but there's nothing to do, she can't help him, can't save herself, not when her hair is wrapped around a javelin point and her father is laughing somewhere too far for her to reach and Wally's pressing into her, hollowing out her insides—

"Please, Artemis!" He screams into her neck, one hand scratching up her arm and latching onto her throat. "Please—"

The frantic noises coming out of her throat are what wake her, the animalistic and feral pants of pain forcing her to jerk up so quickly in her bed that the blankets she's thrashing in immediately entangle her. She's a mess of sweat and tears, of imagined nails still scratching at her and sticking to her newly healed scalp as she screams, loud and guttural, the bile in her throat threatening to choke her. Ridiculously she starts clawing at the back of her head, fingers searching for a pony tail she no longer has and fighting to free herself from something that isn't real.

It takes several tugs on her too-short hair for her come back to reality; the air in her room feels oddly cold after so many days of heat, strange shivers spasming through her muscles as she finally escapes the blankets. She's not on a roof top. She's at the Cave. She's not in a hallway, she's in her bedroom, she's safe, she's—

She was dreaming. She tells herself, not convinced as she drops her hands from her hair, unthinkingly rubbing at the same place her imagined Wally had been clawing at her, as if checking that the skin on her arms is still there. It was a dream. Not real.

Is she sure? Something whispers maliciously at the back of her mind, voice low and torturous and reminding her unwillingly of Jade. How can she be sure of anything? She's crazy now, she's not Artemis, she's the Metropolis Girl, that wild and terrible thing that haunts the broken shell of her body and—

She's not aware of curling into herself until her head is smashing against her knees, teeth gnawing painfully on the inside of her cheeks as she wills herself not to scream again. Just a dream. Calm down. Keep it together. She keeps repeating the words to herself, fingers gripping her sheets like a lifeline.

("You can't not breathe, Artemis." Wally voice whispers, and unwillingly she forces herself to take in oxygen.)

Her nightmares have been getting worse lately, have been getting worse for a while; sometimes, weeks ago, she would wake in a panic like this, thrashing against Wally and screaming over what she had seen inside her head... And he would hold her tightly, he would roll on top of her and press her firmly into the mattress until she would stop fighting him. He would encase her in his arms and smooth her hair against her back and he would hum unknown songs into her ear, hum until her mind quieted and until nothing felt real except the sound of his voice and the feeling of his fingers pressing reassuring circles into her back—

But Wally and her aren't even friends now. The voice chimes in, recalling the few soothing moments in the dream, in which she had felt warm and comforted and safe. She made sure of that, the two of them can't even look at each other now without all the blood draining from her face, a familiar coldness spreading from her heart to her finger tips…

She realizes she's sobbing and promptly stops, feeling nauseous when she tastes blood on her tongue.

All at once there's a spectacular crashing noise above her, the walls of her bedroom rattling dust from the ceiling as thunder and lightning wage war on Happy Harbor; the heat had finally broken after dinner, all the mugginess and moisture in the too-hot air turning into the first truly violent rainstorm of the summer. There's another roll of thunder and automatically her hand flies out to the opposite side of the bed, searching the hollowed out space Wally used to occupy with a kind of desperate insistence before she remembers that he's not there. He won't be there ever again.

She ruined things between them, broke what they had. She's worthless, she's disgusting, she's—

The snarling words pounding inside her head only inspire more pathetic sounding whimpers from her mouth; as if it's what she's been waiting for she feels a tightness around her heart, feels the familiar numbness spreading through her as she cries, alone and in the dark. Like she's hiding something indecent she yanks her covers over her head, teeth clenching around the knuckles of her fingers as she tries to keep quiet.

It was only a dream.

Don't be a baby.

Focus.

((Wally never had these dreams. Nobody else on the Team is too afraid of the dark to sleep. Keep it together.))

Now that she's awake she can hardly believe she's slept through the noise coming from outside; every few minutes she can hear lightning crackling, can feel the force of the thunder shaking the walls and rattling the objects on her desk, but neither of those compare to the colossal crashing of the rain against the mountain. There's static in the air, so much so that her hair starts frizzing, already short and unruly and now a full blown mess under the influence of both sleep and the storm. She spends the next half hour tossing and turning, routinely wiping sweat from the small of her back and growing more sour in her mood as she desperately fights off both her panic and the urge to seek out Wally, to selfishly ask for the comfort she no longer has a claim on. Finally, after nearly forty minutes, she resigns herself to getting out of bed.

All the heat of the day has disappeared in a matter of hours; when she opens the door to her bedroom and peers into the hallway her skin immediately prickles, legs bursting into goose pimples under her sleeping shorts and nipples perked underneath her tank top. Unthinkingly she grabs the perfectly folded sweatshirt on her desk, half-asleep and unaware of its significance until she yanks it over her head.

It hits her hard, as it always does when she's not expecting it; the walnut smell washes over her as she fits her arms into the sleeves, the shock of it so quickly after her dream sending her bare feet halting. Wally's sweater. The same one she set there when she had purged her room of memories, the same one that— unlike his English notebook from the previous semester, old pieces of loose leaf in which he had scrawled their initials in the heart together, and the corsage she had found rumpled on her bedside table— she had been unable to throw out.

("Souvenir." She had grinned as she stole it off the back of his desk chair; they had been in a fight, of course, so he hadn't said anything...

But a few weeks later he had caught her wearing it around the Cave, had eyed the way the faded blue fabric had clung to her. "You keep it." He had told her, waving her off when she tried to return it. "Seriously. It won't fit me in a couple months, anyway, I've been growing so much...")

The sweater rumples down her front the same way it always does, fitting her more properly than she's always imagines a boyfriends' sweater should. She doesn't know why she couldn't throw it out, doesn't know why of all the damn things he left behind she had been unable to stuff this in the garbage bag too. She feels traitorous wearing it now and half glances back into her bedroom, still visible through the crack in the door, debating returning to bed and giving up any night time excursions. As if tormenting her the rumpled bed sheets look back.

("Please." The dream Wally seems to call to her.)

Unwillingly she shivers, shutting the door behind her— she won't be able to return to her bedroom until the sun is up, until she has the safety of day time and wakefulness to hide in. Besides, it doesn't matter; by the time anyone else gets up she'll be changed.

---

His smell is hardly clinging to the fabric anymore; it's a small comfort, one she latches onto to as she begrudgingly shoves her hands deep into the front pockets, beginning to walk silently through the hallway. It has to be about four in the morning now— she can tell by the light in the hallway, by the quiet that seems to stick to the walls. The Team is usually up at all hours, just by the awfulness of all their sleeping schedules, but four in the morning is usually the only time the building feels remotely abandoned; even Wally would normally still be asleep, even if his sleeping was full of twitching and—

She stops walking when she enters the common area, thoughts freezing inside her head when she automatically glances towards the window her and Wally would look out of in better times. Stupidly one of her fists, covered in the fabric of the sweater, pauses in the act of scrubbing old tears from her cheeks.

Wally's at their window.

Her first instinct is to sprint back down the hall, and ridiculously her feet actually stumble backwards; she can't imagine anything more embarrassing than being caught standing here, tear stained and in his sweater, running away from her nightmares. She can't handle it, the stickiness of feelings and the complicated mess that is all the emotions that are running between them. The other day only proved that… Whatever she had wanted to exist between them after they broke up, this friendship this… Understanding, it isn't going to work. It can't work, neither of them are built for that kind of thing, especially not her—

She actually turns around, already two steps back down the hall before another instinct kicks in, one that's much more tender than the first and— although she won't admit it— so recently raw from her conversation with Kaldur. Her eyes narrow, inhaling the last few notes of Wally's scent coating the fabric of his sweater before she turns back to him.

... He's shaking.

Shaking and naked from the waist up—Wally looks as if he's having some sort of fit, the muscles of his back she's so familiar with clenching almost painfully tight as he sits crumpled in on himself, fingers clutching tightly at the hair blossoming in the windswept fashion from his scalp and yanking at it repeatedly, as if wanting to pull it out. His knees are trembling, hidden beneath the fabric of the scarlet sweats he always sleeps in but still looking as if they're practically vibrating, inches from the floor.

Fingers seem to tighten around her heart, and as badly as she wants to hide, as badly as she can't stand to be seen... She can't bring herself to do anything other than stand there, unmoving.

She remains still for nearly a minute, flinching when the sky outside lights up with another streak of lightning and is followed almost immediately by a crack of thunder; she's always hated thunderstorms, disliked the noise. It's always reminded her of memories she can only half recall, odd flashes of an early childhood marred by her parents fighting, but the clanging of things being thrown across the room and Jade's tears. Between the old memories and the shakiness the nightmare has left her with she can't help it, can't stop one of her hands from reaching out in fright to grip the door frame like a lifeline, as if she's afraid that the wind outside will somehow burst into their sanctuary and sweep her away into the darkness—

The lightning illuminates the window, and her stomach twists.

It happens so quickly that she would have missed it if she had blinked— the second she grips the door frame Wally seems to jump, his muscles constricting and a feral sounding grunt flying out of his mouth, his fingers going white in his hair. And she can't help it, the sound does something to her the way it always does—

"Kid." The old alias bursts out of her mouth before she can stop it, sounding frightened and too quiet; almost the second she says it she wishes she hadn't, wanting to remain alone and concealed in the dark.

She's lucky; the rain must be too loud on the window because Wally doesn't even react, remaining balled up and broken on the floor. She catches herself biting the inside her her cheeks, debating... She shouldn't do this. She doesn't have any business doing it. She should go back to bed, she should leave him alone, it's not her problem anymore—

She glances back down the hallway, skin still prickled against the cold air filling the room.

("We're friends, you know.")

((She's not sure what makes her turn back; later on she'll tell herself that she was being selfish, simply avoiding the ghosts that haunt her bedroom. But Wally— the boy so unlike the surly version who's been sneering at her all week— is right: they are, or at least were, friends.))

Whatever she tells herself she still feels her heart thrumming loudly in her ears as she advances exactly one measured step forward, clearing her throat. "Kid?" She calls, as loudly as she dares to in the quiet of the night.

Again her words hang in the empty air, growing more embarrassing by the second the longer they go unanswered. She waits several moments for him to look over his shoulder, to say something back to her; instead she watches as he seems to tense, shoulders positively quaking with the effort of breathing. She's never seen him like this, never seen him look so… Horribly and frighteningly un-Wally-ish.

... Maybe Wally's afraid of thunderstorms?

For a long moment she stares at his bare back and racks her brain, trying to recall some memory she isn't really sure exists. "I don't really like horses." He had told her once. "They're... I don't know. Creepy. You can't tell what they're thinking."

No, Wally isn't frightened of thunderstorms. The thought alone is ridiculous— he got his powers from lightning, after all. And even as she thinks on it she distantly remembers standing with him in front of that window, watching a storm unfurl on the horizon as they had sipped tea together for the first time. He had been fine then, hadn't he? The rain, the wind ripping across the ocean, it hadn't bothered him but… But he had still been standing at the window long before she arrived. Almost like he had been waiting for something…

There had been static in the air then, just like there is now—she can feel it when she takes another step forward and crosses her arms in front of her chest, can feel the way it sticks to her skin and coats her hair, sending the too-short ends flying away from her scalp in unruliness. Wally still hasn't turned around yet, not even when she clears her throat again, mind probing her memory for something, anything that might help…

She remembers his fidgeting, his feet tapping and his anxiousness, refusing to take his eyes off the shore longer than a few moments, no longer than it took to thank her for the tea... He had only really looked away to make her laugh the one time, his mouth stuttering out words that were too scientific for her to follow, unknown facts about storms that didn't really make sense to her but seemed to be important to him…

Then she remembers the crack of lightning—it hadn't been close, miles away on the opposite end of the shore, hardly loud enough to disrupt her drinking her tea. But Wally had stopped talking, his head had snapped towards it, his whole body had gone rigid…

Had Wally been waiting for the thunderstorm?

But why? She can't remember much more, nothing beyond the way he had teased her for finally going to bed—"You're going to miss the best part." He had told her, making to grab her sleeve and drag her back. "Come on, Artemis…" He hadn't liked that she was going to bed, his teasing a little too insistent, he wanted her to stay up with him, she's sure of it…

Wally had been waiting for the thunderstorm to come. Something bigger than him had prompted him out of bed, had dragged him to the window—their window, the only vantage point, the only place in the whole building where the walls are penetrable, almost thin… What had happened last time? What had happened after she left?

Has she already abandoned him once when he needed her, but didn't know how to ask?

She hesitates, still several feet behind him. Maybe this is beyond the realm of her understanding… Or maybe she's overthinking it, misunderstanding something simple. Well, it's not her business to understand, anyway. She's not his girlfriend anymore.

She should just leave him alone, she'll only make things worse.

She makes to turn around when lightning strikes again, crackling loudly on the water and lighting up the room in an almost blinding white; once again Wally makes that feral, dying noise in the back of his throat, without meaning to her mind is slapped with a thousand emotions, a thousand memories... There's sand on her tongue and they don't know each other's names and he's holding in his arms like she's the most precious cargo in the world; she's shivering in the September air and unthinkingly he offers her the sweater dangling off his cast-clad arm; he's bandaging her hands, he's holding her upright on the battlefield...

She bites the inside of her cheek, gathering her nerve. She knows what Wally— righteous, goody-two-shoes, better than her, Wally— would do if he found her in front of their window, like this, in the middle of the night... Regardless of what was happening between them.

("We take care of each other, Artemis. It's what we do.")

As much as her mind is set on it her body still battles her; ridiculously her legs twinge when she forces them to move, one hand shoving the sleeve of his sweat shirt up her arm nervously. "Kid?" She tries again, a little louder this time.

Nothing. She takes a few more steps forward. "Hello? Kid Idiot?"

She's no more than a foot from him now, staring as the muscles in his back keep jumping, the rolling in his shoulders positively shuddering as thunder clangs against the harbor. Unrelentingly Wally doesn't reply.

She's beginning to get truly frightened now, instinct overwhelming her and telling her to run, telling her that he's dangerous, something's wrong—

(Because she can only think of one other time Wally didn't come when she called him. The one time the snow in Metropolis was stained red with his blood...)

"Wally?" She croaks out his real name, closing the distance between them and not stopping until she's standing beside him.

A spasm of cold fear bursts through her when she crouches to better see his face—all the muscles in his cheeks are screwed up as if in pain, his freckles standing out against the strange waxy color he's turned. He's sweating, beads of it bubbling out of his forehead and dribbling almost too slowly down his jaw. His eyes are shut tightly, as if trying to avoid seeing something.

"W-Wally?" She whispers, suddenly afraid to be too loud should she startle him—something's wrong, she's not sure if she should get someone; he's having sort of fit, he's—

The wind outside picks up and his hands start pressing more insistently against his scalp, the muscles of his chest straining and the tendons on his forearm popping—he looks as if he's trying to stop himself from doing something, trying to show restraint, a low groan firing out of his throat, barely audible through clenched teeth.

She doesn't know where the courage comes from, doesn't know what prompts her to be brave when the only emotion she can process is fear; all she knows is that she can see the terror on his face, can see no recognizable part of the boy she loves etched into the person in front of her and it's unacceptable, it's... All she knows is that her jaw is suddenly setting, hands clenching where they're still inside his pockets.

"Hey." She says as firmly as she can, trying to sound less afraid the she is. "Baywatch. Listen when I'm talking, idiot."

It's an old tactic, trying to bait him. She's not surprised when it doesn't work.

"Hey." She repeats more forcefully, practically snarling in his face as she settles into the floor beside him. "Kid Idiot." She grits her teeth when nothing happens other than his increased trembling, his breath coming hard and fast out of his nose. "Will you cut it out?" She hisses.

Still nothing.

She doesn't hesitate, because she knows if she allows herself even a second to think about it she's going to end up not doing it. Trying to ignore the twisting in her stomach slides herself over until she's sandwiched between him and the glass.

The window feels as cold on her back as it did through her uniform the last time the both of them were here; behind her she can hear the thunderous sound of the rain, her knees squashing up against her chest. She's careful not to touch him as she settles— for some reason that would feel wrong, more wrong that it does to be sitting here, comforting him, when she should be literally anywhere else.

He still doesn't acknowledge her, doesn't look up as she shivers; it's like all the heat Wally usually radiates is gone, sucked somewhere deep inside himself. As if waiting for something both her hands reach to grip the hem of her shorts nervously, trying to yank them further down her legs to cover more of herself. "Kid?" She whispers, voice breaking. "… Wally?"

There's a beat, long enough for her to see her breath rustling a few pieces of his hair that aren't stuck slick to his forehead with sweat.

Then one of his fingers twitch.

It happens so quickly that for a moment she's not even entirely sure it's real—almost immediately his finger is back to the clenched position, knuckle turning white again. "Wally." She repeats, watching again as it happens and trying not to feel a twinge of relief. Okay, she can do this, she can do whatever this is.

Without thinking on she tries to keep talking—she doesn't know how she knows but something is telling her to get Wally away from the window, to get him somewhere where the rumbling of the thunder won't be as loud and the lightning won't be as threatening. She can't do that with him stuck still like this. "Wally? Listen to me, okay?' She says quietly, watching as her voice sends both of his hands quivering this time.

His hands clench and unclench, as if unsure he's even hearing her. Unwillingly her eyes fall to the bullet shaped scar on his bare chest and suddenly she can't help but remember the last time she talked to him when he was unresponsive. "... It's A-Artemis." She tells him, voice wavering.

Still no reaction other than his fingers; stupidly, one of her hands releases the hem of her shorts and raises, tentatively, towards his shoulder. "You're freaking me out." She tries to say sternly, instead sounding faint. "Can you just stop being such a—"

It all happens at once; her hand reaches out towards him, hardly touching his skin—in a second lightning has shot out across the water, bursting white into the room and—

And she cries out when a hand snatches her wrist, a scream ripping out of her throat as he slams her back against the window, ramming her bones with so much force against the glass that she's sure they're shattered; it's painful, so painful that tears are burning in her eyes, but not as painful as the fact that Wally's snarling at her, something out of her nightmares, his skin ice cold and vibrating against hers—

"Wally!" She gasps out, throat tight and not letting her speak properly as she thrashes against him, her feet catching him in the stomach—she can't feel her fingers, his hand dragging hers up above her head when she tries to struggle against him, ribs aching and other hand clawing uselessly against his. His face is still hard, inhuman, no part of him the boy she loves as he hovers over her. "Wally, stop it—"

She sobs, loud and heart wrenching, and suddenly something on his face breaks; as quickly as she can blink his pupils are blowing out, color returning to his cheeks, expression no longer blank and ruthless but pained, confused, staring at her wide-eyed and not understanding as she slouches there, cowering beneath him. "A-Artemis?" He gets out.

His eyes move too fast for her to see, not when she's so panicked and strangely out of breath, pupils firing between her face and her wrist, to her useless struggling; at once he's looking frightened too, stumbling as he releases her, rocking violently backwards. "W-what's going on?"

She can't even bring herself to move away from the glass, can't bring herself to try to comfort him; her wrist is still throbbing white hot against the window, adrenaline coursing through her and telling her to stay away. Almost too slowly she drags her hand in front of her face, eyes wide and breathing uneven as she stares at the ugly blotchy red and purple bruises blossoming there.

"I—" She starts, voice sounding raw from her sobbing and screaming; it seems to take a bit of extra effort to pull him into focus, to not flinch when his arms move violently to scratch through his hair. "W-what—"

"I'm sorry." He blurts out, hands scrubbing his face as he seems to crumple into himself. "Oh my god, I'm so sorry—"

It hits her suddenly that he's crying, a trail of hot and pathetic tears bursting out of the corners of his eyes and being smeared painfully away by his hands, which seem to claw at his face that same way they did to her in her dream. "Wally—" She starts, trying to move forward.

"No!" As if he's afraid of her he scrambles backwards; usually his movements are so elegant, more planned, nothing like the feral and clumsy ones he's doing now, socks catching on the bottoms of his sweats as he staggers to his feet. "Don't, Artemis, just—just stay away from—"

There's another massive crack of lightning and almost immediately he seizes up, face curling into a grimace of pain and muscles stuttering and stopping with impulses, half of them twitching with the need to move and the others looking as if they're being forced into stillness; at once he's groaning again, hands clutching at his head, sounding as if he's about to burst—

"Wally." She says as loudly as she can, ignoring him when he shakes his head. His eyes are opening in a horrifying grimace, staring out the window and at something she'll never be able to see. Never learning, she stands, reaching for him.

This time she's expecting the fight, expecting the way his limbs shoot out and try to shove her backwards, the way his shoulders positively vibrate when she gets a grip on him, trying to throw her off. "Kid!" She screams, nails digging into his neck when he keeps fighting her, near snarling as his pupils reduce to pinpricks. "Wally!"

—She doesn't know what else to do, how to calm him when he's wild like this—

Instinct tells her it's suicide to lean in and kiss him, but the softer, fiercer part of her spurs her on, her hands grasping either side of his face and yanking his mouth to hers— she feels as if a part of her is dying when she tastes the familiar walnut scent, the lingering cinnamon, the unknown sweetness she can't place that always seems more noticeable in times of last resort. Suddenly his mouth is opening underneath hers and nothing is as real as the shaky breath she pulls out of him, or the way all his muscles seize up and then shudder into relaxation, as if she's dopamine firing through his bloodstream, drugging him, relaxing him—

(And even though her feet remain planted firmly on the tile in front of his she can feel the Bialyan wind biting at her skin, goose pimples prickling about her ankles as the Happy Harbor water laps at her toes, the earth turning behind her as his gloves run down her shoulders, her core pulsing as his heat blossoms between her legs. All she can feel is the thousand other kisses that have come before this one, and the thousand more she's forever going to be denying herself—)

It lasts less than a second, as quick and as familiar as blinking, but when she pulls back he's gone perfectly still, muscles slack and pupils blown out, body shaking as he struggles to breathe her in. She doesn't pause to think about it, doesn't allow it to occur to either of them to lean in again. She just starts talking, ignoring the pain in her chest. "Is it the storm?" She asks, voice as hard as she can get it, silently begging him not to say anything about what's just happened.

Wally's pupils are so large she can hardly see the green in his eyes. "I—" He breathes, glancing down to his hands which are hovering stupidly about her elbows. "... Yes."

"Okay." She nods, taking a step back, hoping the space will make her feel more in control. "Then let's just..."

She doesn't finish her sentence, instead reaching out to prod him in the shoulder; obediently Wally takes a step backwards, still looking at her dazedly. Her heart is still thrumming loudly in her ears, mind whirring inside her head, but she doesn't indulge the anxious thoughts slamming into her or the terrified twisting in her stomach—it's as if the only thing that exists for her in this moment is Wally, an old loyalty to him forcing her to stay focused, to keep him safe—

"Let's just get you to bed." She says weakly, prodding him backwards again until he gets the message to start walking.

And her life is like a bus stop—people pass her by, linger for moments until something better happens to roll by. And as much as she knows that Wally's ride is here, it's time for him to move on… She's gotten too used to the feeling of him sitting beside her, of passing by the hours together...

She knows this isn't a good idea— her being here, comforting him. But instinct, the one much softer and tender than anything the Metropolis girl would allow, is guiding her now.

Wally follows her prodding, still looking a little wide-eyed and confused, as if he doesn't know what's going on. Uncharacteristically he doesn't say anything the whole walk down the hallway.

(She feels his fingers brush once against her knuckles and like a coward she pulls away, shoving her hand into the pocket of his hoodie.)

---

"Here." She says dumbly when they arrive at his door. Her head is still reeling from kissing him, still half dazed— she doesn't know how much longer she can stand to be around him without doing something stupid again. "... Just try to sleep, okay?" For some reason Wally keeps staring at her, pupils still large and unnerving as he stays silent. "Wally?" She croaks out, blinking up at him.

Something in his expression breaks when she opens the door for him, twitching out of her reach when she tries to prod him inside. "Can you...?" He doesn't finish, instead sending her an almost pleading look in the darkness.

She feels her throat go dry when he trails off, head jerking towards his door before his gaze promptly drops to the carpet. "... Wally." She sighs.

"Please?"

She feels like vomiting when he says the word, but it's next to impossible to swallow the bile in her throat when he blinks too suddenly, eyes oddly glassy in the half light. Instead of answering she glares hard at her bare feet, waiting for Wally to go first before she follows, feeling like she's being lured by a wild animal into its den.

She closes the door behind her and immediately feels as if she's being gagged; as always the intoxicating walnut smell is strong in here, emanating from his sweat soaked skin and messy hair and clinging to the carpet, sending her mouth salivating and knees knocking together. It's suddenly all too difficult to keep herself from running to him, from kissing him again, from forgetting every stupid reason she can't allow herself to love him anymore. It's painful how much restraint it takes, how cold she has to force herself to be as she presses her shoulders against his door, trying to keep her distance.

"Better?" She asks him, voice cracking with exhaustion, watching as he drags his feet across the room, collapsing into his bed. As if testing the both of them she can feel a roll of thunder in the distance, it's rumbling now slightly dulled and no longer shaking the walls or pawing at the scarred corners of her mind.

A muscle jumps in Wally's cheek but again he doesn't answer her right away, instead arranging himself into a hunched position against his headboard. "… Better." He confirms, arms wrapping around his knees.

She's sure she can't trust herself to leave the safety of the doorframe but even she can't stop herself from looking at him, watching the long lines of muscle she knows so well tense and he winds his limbs together. He still doesn't look quite right: eyes wide, skin waxy, shivering and staring blankly at the creases of his bed sheets.

Something's wrong.

She can practically feel the weight of all the unsaid words between them and it takes nearly a minute of her biting her lip raw in the silence before she's brave enough to break it. "… Wally?"

She nearly sighs with relief when at once he raises his chin from where it's been digging into his knees, eyes finally finding hers. "Yeah?"

Her stomach twinges at the roughness in his voice, sound raw and broken as if he's been screaming for hours. "… What, uh—" She starts, not entirely sure if she can be tactful. "… What the hell is wrong with you?"

She's expecting him to laugh at her bad phrasing but instead she's greeting with only a stony silence; when she looks back at him he's ducked his head, forehead pressing against his knees, looking suddenly more boyish and vulnerable than she's ever seen him. "… I'm sorry." He says very suddenly, sounding choked. "I didn't mean to— how's your wrist?"

Inside the pocket of his hoodie she can feel her tendons aching, and more to spare his feelings she burrows it deeper inside, not wanting him to see the bruises he's left there. "It'll be okay." She says vaguely.

Wally's shoulders raise and lower, as if he's just let out a relieved breath. "Good." He says to his knees. "Good. I—" He breaks off, a strange noise sounding in the back of his throat. "Sorry."

Again it's hard not to immediately run and comfort him; traitorously her feet twitch against the carpet, willing her to leave his doorway. "Stop apologizing." She tries to say meanly. "I don't need that, okay? Can you just… Can you just tell me what's going on?" She can tell that this isn't exactly the right thing to say—the words aren't even fully out of her mouth before Wally's shaking his head and curling tighter into himself, muttering words that she doesn't catch. "Wally—" She starts to sigh, beginning to get frustrated before she cuts herself off, deciding to change tactics. "Okay. Okay…"

There's another low roll of thunder and instantly his shoulders tighten; she actually has to reach out to grip the doorframe to stop herself from rushing to him. "Let's just… Let's just play questions for a bit, okay?" She decides, pressing herself more firmly against the door. "Like that first day at the beach all those months ago, remember?"

There's a beat of silence before Wally looks up at her, one hand scrubbing at his face in a way that makes her realize almost jarringly that there are tears burning at his eyes. "Yeah." He says, sounding water logged.

"Okay then." She says firmly, feeling like she's addressing a child. She gets the sense that if she's going to figure out what's going on she's going to have to lure Wally out of his shell, just like he's done with her so many times in the past. "You go first."

Nothing happens for a long while; Wally simply looks at her, still shrunken and unseeing but with something a little more human in his eyes—it's almost as if he's testing her, trying to figure out if she's serious, still half-waiting for her to disappear into the darkness and leave him to deal with this alone.

Finally he blinks, eyes leaving hers and glancing down. "… Is that my sweater?"

The question makes her knees quiver so violently she's sure he notices. "Yes." She mutters defiantly.

"...Oh."

It's so little of a reaction that instantly she can feel her cheeks reddening. "I've been meaning to give it back—"

"Don't." He cuts her off, voice slightly raspy. "... I don't really want it."

She has no idea what that's supposed to mean, her blush quickly disappearing from her cheeks as she tries to decide whether or not he was trying to be rude; Wally only watches the confusion on her face for a few seconds before he scrubs again at his cheeks, fingers trailing over his forehead and disappearing into his hair.

It takes every ounce of courage she has to clear her throat, forcing herself to speak. "... What's going on, Wally?" She asks, voice oddly hushed.

She thinks she hear a sigh. "... I-I don't know."

The words don't sound quite right coming out of his mouth, and instinctively she hears the sternness in her voice, habitually prompting him the way she used to. "Wally."

For some reason he flinches at the sound of his name coming out of her mouth, finally sitting up properly against his headboard; there's another sigh as he presses his elbows against his knees. "I don't know, Artemis. I just... I had a bad dream."

"A bad dream." She repeats, stomach squirming uncomfortably. She wonders if she was the only one who revisited the rooftop tonight.

"Yeah." He says back, beginning to sound annoyed but more like himself. "And I— I just needed to get out of here. The storm— I don't know what happened."

She catches herself folding her arms awkwardly in front of her chest, shoulders finally unsticking from their spot on the door. "... You don't think you could have had a, uh..."

When she trails off Wally looks at her, eyes narrowed across the room. "What?"

Stupidly her feet shift against the carpet. "Well— I mean... I-it looked like you were having a panic attack, Wally."

There's several beats of silence where he stares at her, looking offended. "... I don't get those. I'm not crazy."

"Excuse me?"

"You know what I mean." Wally brushes off the annoyed look on her face, going back to glaring at his knees. "It wasn't like what happens to you. I wasn't— I wasn't screaming or freaking out or—"

"Or attacking people?" She finishes for him dryly, glaring. There's a very sticky moment in which she can hear her own shrieking loudly in her own mind, can remember her thrashing out against him, still convinced she was fighting imaginary threats inside her mind; he should know as well as she does that anxiety attacks aren't always hyperventilating and rocking back and forth. He's seen enough of own personal hell to know that sometimes they burst out of you in fits of rage, in stumbling over words, in fighting to breathe as you sit, paralyzed as your mind threatens to drown you.

In the silence she's sure Wally's remembering it too, and before he can make another excuse she hears herself speaking. "... Look, I know what I'm talking about, okay? Unless you've suddenly developed a fear of thunderstorms—"

"This wasn't like that!" Wally bursts out, sounding angry. "I don't— I don't know how to put it into words okay? I had the dream, I just wanted to get out of my room, clear my head and— and it was the noise or something, I don't know, but it was like... I could feel it." He says badly, ears going off with embarrassment. "The lightning. Running through me."

The way he says it sends her stomach clenching. In her many years of near lunacy and anxiety she's never felt anything like that— only a persistent numbness that seems to lock all her limbs together."... You could feel lightning inside you." She repeats, voice oddly blank. "But... We've watched thunderstorms before. Sometimes we've been out on missions and ended up in the middle of one. What—"

"I don't get it either, okay?" He says roughly, hand clenching his hair. "I mean, at most sometimes I'll get a little jittery, or whatever, but... And Uncle Barry says I'll grow out of it, but I don't know why tonight it was like... Like I could hear it calling out to me, like I-I—" Something in his voice sputters out again, and as if he's afraid to look at her he drops his head to his knees, hiding. "… It was like sensory overload." He mutters, barely audible.

She's not aware of how tense every muscle in her body has gone until she tries to speak, lungs crying out against the stiffness as she struggles to breathe. "... D-do you think..." She starts, not sure where she's going. "Do you think— with the panic attack... Maybe it got your guard down? Or...?"

"It wasn't a panic attack." Wally says insistently before pausing. "... I don't know. It doesn't matter though, it won't happen again."

"Wally—"

"Did I hurt you?" He interrupts, and immediately she realizes they're back to their game of questions.

She supposes there isn't a point in lying, especially when he raises his head from his knees and looks at her almost pleadingly. "… A little." She admits, shoving her fist farther inside his pocket in hopes of hiding the bruise she knows he's looking for.

She registers that he breathing is back to normal, his chest no longer heaving and lungs no longer rattling and sounding as if they're about to burst; as she notices this she also becomes aware of the fact that they're done talking and she's rapidly losing her excuse for being here, for being anything other than terribly alone with her ex-boyfriend.

"Well." She says awkwardly, one hand reaching up to run self-consciously through her hair before she realizes the gesture is borrowed from him, her arm swinging stupidly back to her side. "I guess... I guess I should go back to bed too. Unless—" Her voice breaks embarrassingly. "Unless you need anything?"

She shouldn't have added the last part, and almost the second she says it Wally lets out a sigh that's barely mixed with a bitter sounding chuckle, his head burrowing back to his knees miserably. "What?" She blurts out dumbly, not understanding.

"You." Wally sneers, lifting his chin up to shake his head disbelievingly at her. "Asking if I need anything. Like you care."

For some reason her cheeks heat angrily, her fists clenching. "Of course I care." She blurts out before she can stop herself. "Why would I bother with all this if I didn't care?"

Instead of answering properly Wally makes an annoyed noise in the back of his throat, head lolling until it smacks loudly against his headboard; she feels another flare of annoyance when he closes his eyes, as if he'd rather not look at her. "What? " She snarls. "You have something you want to say to me?"

Wally jerks his head round at her tone, ears now brilliant in the dim light. "Don't stand there pretending like— like you can help, okay?" He stutters, looking furious. "Not when— not when the only thing I need right now is you."

He says it to the ceiling, unable to look at her; as he forces the words out she feels her stomach drop down to somewhere about her ankles, her throat suddenly dry with shock. "... Wally." She croaks out after a moment, sounding exasperated. "You can't—"

"I know, okay?" He cuts her off, waving away her rejection and instead slipping down angrily into his bed sheets, his back to her. "I know I'm not supposed to... It's over. I get it."

Her stomach seems to have jolted back into her abdomen is making up for lost time by suddenly churning violently, vomit seeming to rise in the back of her throat as she stares at the freckles on his back. She knows this is it— he's giving her an easy way out, a chance to leave without anything else said, but... But just now something is clicking into place.

She licks her lips. "... What was your nightmare about, Wally?" She asks, so quietly she's almost sure he can't hear it. A part of her isn't sure that she really wants to know.

He lets the hushed words hang in the air for several seconds before he rolls onto his back, staring at the ceiling and not at her. When he speaks it sounds as if the words are rushing out of him, as if they've been haunting him all night. "... We were on the bridge." He breathes, and without him saying she knows he means the Metropolis bridge, the same one that appears in her own nightmares from time to time. "... You were notching your arrow and— and we were just talking. But then, right when you were about to fire, something..."

Even from here she can see the waxy look crossing his features, and in the glassiness of his expression she realizes that he visited The Exercise again tonight. "... And you were gone. Skin falling off bones and hair falling in loops out of your skull, and I wasn't fast enough to...

"You looked so small, that night on the roof top." He whispers, and now she knows he's no longer talking about the dream anymore. "I've never seen you look like— so vulnerable. I thought you were... And I— I wasn't fast enough. If I had just—"

His voice breaks and cuts off with a barely contained sob; at last she releases herself from the doorway, drawn to his pain like a siren, feet lobbing halfway across the room before she can stop them. "Hey." She says firmly, trying to block out the sound of his uneven breathing. "Baywatch—"

"I just needed to see you tonight." He says shakily, pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes. "And I couldn't— I must have stood outside your room for an hour, too freaked out to knock and— and the storm just drove me crazy, it felt like the bridge was collapsing around me and—"

She can sense that he's working himself into a panic again; she only hesitates for a half second before she launches herself across the room, not stopping until she's at his bedside. "Wally—"

"And I know I shouldn't be saying any of this." He blurts out even louder, nearly yelling. "Because you don't feel the same, because you're scared— but I'm scared too, okay? I don't know how to do this, I don't know how to—"

"Wally!" She says his name as loudly as she can; against her better judgment she starts yanking at the hands pressing painfully against his eyes, pressing her weight into his bed until she's sitting on the edge of it. "Listen to me for a second, you need to—"

"I—"

She manages to wrestle one of his hands from his face, the wrist bearing her elastic lurching away from his cheeks; ignoring how badly she wants to rip it from his arm she resolutely winds his fingers around her bruised wrist, deliberately pressing them too tight. "You need to calm down, Wally." She commands, watching as the one bloodshot eye she can see focuses on her face. "Relax." She tries to say more kindly, squeezing his hand tightly around her. "That's a pulse. I'm okay, I— It's okay."

Wally's eyes remain wide as he stares at her, pupils beginning to blow out but still looking as if he doesn't really believe she's there— then all at once she can feel his fingers tightening around her wrist, flexing around the bruises he's left until she's sure it would be impossible not to feel her heartbeat, loud and fast, underneath her skin.

"It was a dream, Wally." She says with as much authority as she can considering how dry her throat has suddenly gone, her lips feeling as if they're fumbling over her tongue as his eyes rake down to the only place they're touching. "It wasn't real."

"It felt real." He says in a hushed tone. "It always feels real."

And she's not ready for what he does next; not ready for his fingers to loosen their grip, not ready for the shiver than runs through her body as his thumb twitches into an almost unnoticeable circle, caressing the edge of the bruising he's left there.

This time she has enough sense to withdraw her hand, the gentle expression she's been wearing suddenly closing off as quickly and as jarringly as being submerged in icy water; it's painful, watching the way Wally's fingers follow the movement, as if wishing to restrain her, call her back to them. "... Sorry." He mutters, looking away when her fist resumes its hiding in the pocket of the sweater.

"Stop apologizing." She says roughly.

Now she really doesn't know what to do; it's so strange navigating this new territory with Wally, trying to decide how much intimacy is too much or too little. Once again she feels as if she's being gagged, feels as if she's drowning in the silence that follows. How is she supposed to do this— how is she supposed to shut down all these lingering feelings, how is she supposed to be friends with him if she can't even be in the same room with him without simultaneously wanting to throttle him and throw herself at him—

The quiet lasts nearly a minute before Wally breaks it. "Do you like the short hair?" He asks very suddenly.

It's an odd question, so odd that even in her surly state she can't resist turning her head to look at him— his voice sounds very suddenly more human, more Wally-ish than anything else he's uttered tonight. Automatically her eyes narrow, trying to read him, trying to find some meaning in the familiar features that still maintain the waxy, half-dead look he had a few minutes ago.

"I don't know." She says as honestly as she can, feeling wary and unsure about whether or not they're back to their questions game. "... Do you?"

She doesn't know why even asks such a stupid question, and she has to remind herself that she doesn't care about the answer. Instead of responding right away Wally frowns, seeming to look at her for a very long moment— eyes narrowed and studying the static in her hair, the frizzing ends that only look more ridiculous when she blushes under the intensity of his gaze. "I haven't made my mind up." He says after a moment. "Just so different, I guess." There's a long pause in which he frowns, shaking his head before he goes back to staring at his bed sheets. "... You don't really look like you anymore."

It's not meant to be mean, simply honest, but knowing that doesn't stop the painful pang that strikes her somewhere behind her ribs. "Makes sense, I guess." She mutters, glaring at the floor. "I don't really feel like me anymore, either."

Out of the corner of her eye Wally nods, watching her reaction. For a moment his mouth opens before he seems to think better of it; unlike her he seems to be able to resist the temptation to comfort her.

Then he asks something she's not expecting. "… You think this will ever not be weird?"

Another pang runs through her, and she doesn't ask him to clarify. "… I haven't made up my mind yet." She tries to say coyly, instead sounding choked.

"Me either." He admits after a moment. She's not entirely sure what either of them are supposed to do with that, if saying it aloud even helps anything.

(And when she glances at him he's got the corners of his mouth turned up. It's nothing like the toothy, too-straight grin she's so used to— still, it's enough to send her heart sprinting inside her ribs, enough to make her stomach twist with a kind of wanting so intense that she very nearly crawls back into bed with him, wishing for nothing but the safety of the covers and the feeling of no clothing between them. It's nothing like the freckle blotched smile she so loves, the one that she knows she'll never get over...)

((And if she's being honest, does she really want to?))

Once again silence falls between them, and for the first time since she broke his heart it feels familiar, comforting, not as if one of them is bracing themselves for an attack. In the quiet she feels her heart ache for him, feels her fingers curling into fists inside her pockets to keep from reaching for him. As much as she won't say it aloud she does miss him, miss the quiet comfort between them. Misses not having to always feel the void with noise.

She misses when it was easier for the two of them to just be.

That was one of the first things she loved about him, before she even knew she was falling in love—distantly she remembers the turning of their heads to watch the sunset, remembers the first silence like this that stretched between them on the last real warm day of the summer. That quiet, this quiet, the emptiness between them when neither of them are running or bickering or fighting to hold each other closer—she supposes there's a kind of serenity to the stillness, to the nothingness, to the fact that neither of them have to say a word to each other to know the other is there.

She remembers that first silence again, the offering of a sweater she had wanted to take. She had loved him, even then, even before they were really friends. And she loves him now, after destroying everything between them.

She blinks when she feels the bed shift beside her; when she turns to look at him he's sitting up properly again, breaking whatever spell she's been under. "… Why?" He asks her, voice hardly louder than a whisper and sounding uncomfortable, as if he's afraid of what he's about to say. "Why did you… bother?"

She could have let him suffer at that window if she wanted to.

She swallows, throat tight. She's been asking herself this question all night, worried that whatever lies she's been telling herself won't be enough to satisfy him. "Because we take care of each other, Wally." She sighs, suddenly exhausted as she repeats the words he once said to her in the middle of a fight. "That's what we do."

For some reason he frowns, trying to read her face as she says the words with such a finality; she's back to staring at the floor again, not brave enough to look him in the eye, not brave enough to watch the emotion flickering across his freckled cheeks. "You could have left me. I would have been fine."

"Is that what you would have done if it was me?" She blurts out, immediately regretting it when he flinches at her accusatory tone. "… Don't answer that, just… Never mind."

Wally looks hurt when rises unexpectedly from the edge of his bed. "Okay." He shrugs, naked shoulders rising and falling as he keeps staring at her. "I won't answer. But you know if I did—"

"Don't, Wally." She cuts him off quickly, shaking her head. "Don't. I know, okay? You don't have to say it."

He sighs and things are suddenly more awkward between them; whatever peace they found in the darkness is beginning to disappear as morning approaches, any escape from emotions or hurt fading as quickly as the stars no doubt are on the horizon. She doesn't look at him but can tell he's got a sour look on his face. "If you didn't want an answer you shouldn't have asked." He says gruffly, continuing before she can interrupt and insist that she had taken it back. "… You know I'd be there, anyway. Waste of a question."

She blushes, bright red and blotchy and burning on her cheeks. "… You should stop saying stuff like that." She says stiffly, shifting her feet uncomfortably. "It's—I mean… Wally." She stutters.

He ignores whatever she's trying to tell him, eyes narrowing at the blush on her cheeks. He hesitates for a second, as if deciding on something. "… Why did you kiss me before?" He asks, sounding almost accusing.

She can see his ears going off as he says it, the tension between them now boiling hot and threatening to snap at any moment. "I don't know." She says quietly.

"Yes you do." He's always been too good at reading through her lies.

The inside of her cheek is still bothered from all her biting, and when her teeth dig into it out of nerves it sends a flash of pain through her, forcing her to focus. "I knew if I did you'd come back to me." She says honestly, although not entirely sure what she means. "… It's worked before."

She's not brave enough to look at the way his brows are suddenly shooting up into his fringe. "… Do you want me to come back to you?" He whispers, sounding breathless.

She supposes it must be the worst way to miss someone—looking at them and not recognizing each other. Trying to find familiar pieces in the shards that stand between you, picking up old memories that were once so happy but now tear reddened lines into the dips of your fingers. She isn't the girl he fell in love with, not anymore. Not with the threat of her father looming closer now than ever. Not when coming back to each other means luring Wally into more danger.

Her eyes sting with tears, and before he's quick enough to spot them she turns her back on him, marching towards the door. "No. I don't." She spits out.

(And as she walks away she thinks of all the times Wally has come back to her, and all the ways he's managed to infiltrate the stony walls of her heart; she thinks of all the time they put into finding each other, into becoming friends, into falling in love... It all seems like a such a waste now. Soon the two of them will mean nothing to each other... Soon the two of them will find out it's easier to sleep in an empty bed than constantly fight for covers; soon they'll both forget the feelings they once had or learn to dismiss them the way one dismisses a stranger in passing on the street...)

(And it's all so painful, so suddenly real that she feels as if her heart is breaking all over again; how is she supposed to live through losing someone who is as essential to her survival as the blood in her body? How is she supposed to move on when she feels as if she's losing part of herself? How is she supposed to leave the arms that were once her home?)

((Why did she do this to herself?))

Her mind thunders inside her skull but her feet refuse to stop moving; he doesn't call out for her when she shuts his door behind her, and she decides it will be the last time either of them find each other in the darkness.

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AN: Thanks for all the reviews and all the well-wishes for my trip! I'm happy to report that after a much needed break I'm back and writing more than ever.

I have a quick Q&A for several people who have been pestering me in the reviews for a while, BUT if you do not like MILD, ITTY BITTY SPOILERS do not read the un-bolded portion.

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Q: Will Wally ever find out about Garth attacking Artemis in Athens?

A: Yes! Trust me, in this story there is a time and place for everything!

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That's all folks! Please read and review!