Hello, it is Wednesday and I am back with a new chapter! Gosh, this one took so long to edit :D It's becoming a common theme of me sprucing up old stories that never saw the light of day and this one is no different. I wrote this chapter back in 2021, perhaps even before I decided that Justin and Eli would be endgame. It was so fun for me to revisit that dynamic - even if Justin doesn't actually appear - and remember how much space their development and relationship takes up in my heart. In this chapter, we see Lynne and Eli have a meal together to catch up like old times. But, well, it turns into something quite important for them both :3 I hope you enjoy!

Glowing from the inside out thanks to my own contentment as well as the blazing fire heating my skin, I found myself seated next to an elderly lady in the restaurant with lines on her face like a treasure map. While my company embroidered tablecloths for the establishment, I couldn't control my eyes from wandering to where I truly belonged.

My eyes searched for a distant table where two people I kept tucked inside my heart were having dinner. Almost as soon as my eyes locked onto them for another occasion and I honed my ears onto what they were saying, my lips stretched apart on my face.

The sight of the two of them interacting encouraged my spine to elevate. It was always wonderful to see old friends, people who recognised each other from past lives. And who would no doubt search for one and other over and over too.

Words that formed and gestures that were articulated only proved my musings.

"Well, I must say that this feels long overdue. It reminds me of long forgotten days." Eli spoke to Lynne across from him and crow's feet kissed by his eyes as he looked over at her, past the food that had been placed on the table in front of them. "We should have a toast."

Unlike other people that I knew, Eli's eyes sparkled like ice cubes in a glass because of both the company and the food in equal amounts. He had made his suggestion long before his fingers reached out to his real glass.

Naturally, Lynne mirrored his smile and softened into her seat at the words coming out of the cousin of her dear Jordan's mouth and then she somehow brightened further at the words that were being put forth. Her chin travelled downwards towards the red and white check tablecloth and the side of her nose crinkled, complimented similar lines etching Eli's temple.

She was ready to comply long before her own fingers reached out to her own glass as well.

Lynne was the first one to take hold of a stem and she held it daintily in her fingers, like an artist who had just nurtured the creation into what it was, turning mere sand into glass. After Eli followed suit and took hold of his own and waited for her to find the words to say, they tumbled effortlessly out of her mouth.

Lynne did not need to join her hand to her heart. The diamonds in her eyes as she looked across the table at Eli spoke volumes of the gladness she too felt in his company.

"Well then, I should very much like to have a toast. Here is to old times and new times as well." Lynne offered as she elevated her glass into the air. I gathered that this was her waiting to see if Eli was going to let it be known whether her toast sufficed or not!

Evidently it did and not only did his sunken orbed gaze lock further onto her and he seemed to sink demurely back into his seat, but white teeth also glistening from his mouth.

He chinked his glass together with hers. My head moved gently to one side when the both of them held their wine glasses up in my direction too, included though I had abandoned them for a stranger without so much as a second thought!

I wonder if the extra glint in Lynne's eyes acknowledged this fact. She had a different smile when she turned to Eli once again. Hands falling to her lap, she traced the hem of her dress now she was no longer holding her wine glass.

"I can hardly remember us dining together like this back in Johto. And I can't imagine meeting up like this after our move to Kanto either!" Lynne mused to herself as much as she mused to Eli across from her. While he took some appreciative mouthfuls of his own glass of wine before reaching for his knife and fork, intending to tuck into their meal, Lynne's hands briefly moved away from her lap to tap her own chin thoughtfully. "You'll have to remind me if that sort of occasion has slipped my mind."

Although I had a bit of a rumble growing in my belly since leaving the other dining table to keep the white-haired lady company, I was not thinking of my own oncoming hunger nor was I thinking that it was time to head back to my own crowd. Instead, I was filled with the tickle of amusement and observation that, despite the fact that Eli seemed as hungry as I secretly was, he looked over at Lynne and prepared to answer her once more anyway.

His knife and fork poised in his hands and mid-air with a natural elegance, head bowing downwards towards his pizza, his eyes travelled to Lynne, and he did his best to engage. He decided to tug one more bit of conversation out from him before he properly tucked in. Gradually, real interest penetrated his masked politeness.

I watched that as he cast his mind back, eyelashes appeared to still against his eyelids.

"I didn't necessarily mean that this arrangement exactly is a blast from the past. Just the company feels delightful." Eli formed his words truthfully, his cutlery joining his dinner plate just for a second as he forgot about eating. "I would know because even back then your company was a welcomed affair. Without even mentioning the bewildering times I had left behind."

As Eli feigned a small smile and traced the curve of his knife handle thoughtfully, from my own table I found it intriguing how someone could touch so simply on a bit of a heavier subject without it feeling too weighty at all. Jordan was like that. It made me remember why even Eli found it effortless to be sitting across from Lynne.

They had been through a lot together.

Being reminded of some of the older, more complicated times, Lynne didn't feel the urge to delve daintily into her pasta and instead waited another few movements of the clock, her expression altering and her head inclining as she engaged with Eli.

Her lips formed a careful union together, expressing everything before she even had a chance to. But, of course, words came from her too in due course.

Picking up her own fork for her meal but using it to poke at her spaghetti and twirl it around rather than devouring it, she mused to herself for a couple of moments more before uttering some words of her own. It always led her stomach into a state of unease to say things for the sake of it. And she didn't often like to ruffle feathers.

But she deemed her thoughts necessary. Even welcome, too. So, she offered them.

"That's very sweet of you to say." Lynne began and her ocean blue orbs twinkled like a midnight sky as creases decorated the sides of her eyes, smiling there so her mouth did not have to. Twirling her spaghetti on her fork a little more, she brought some of the other ingredients into her fork full while Eli took his first proper mouthful. "I'm still glad we had those times. And especially so that you and my Jordan had each other. I simply don't know what he would've done without you either."

Eli's eyes were back open after having his first mouthful of food and was then bringing his glass to his lips to wash his pizza down with some very rich red wine. However, the appreciation for the words that he was hearing could easily be noted on his face as well as the other sensory pleasures in which he was indulging.

It was almost peculiar, though, how someone so blunt and often straightforward didn't obviously touch on these feelings of gladness as well. And in addition to this, he didn't even speak in obvious words of fondness for his cousin in return either – or his cousin's wife.

After following his mouthful and lifting his white and very square napkin to his face to delicately wipe the corners of his lips, his eyes sparkled like their own sky and his spine appeared to press backwards into the chair behind him as his neck elevated.

I managed to focus on this even though my sweet lady companion decided to give her fingers a break from embroidering and give me the kind of rub on the top of my head that prompted me to stifle my squeals!

Eli allowed silence to pass before answering even if he didn't occupy his lips with eating or drinking either. He didn't speak for a good few scratches into the affection that was being offered to me. I somehow managed to focus enough to note that that wasn't exactly unusual for him. But it was bordering on out of place.

"I suppose that I mustn't speak entirely of disdain towards that time in my life, even if my time in Unova as a boy only just seconded it in terms of misery." Eli said, referencing his boarding school school adventures as a young lad, as well as the epiphany he had left to join Jordan and Lynne in Kanto. "You could say that they were necessary to appreciate the clearer times I went on to have."

While Lynne flashed a smile at Eli following his words, his own curve of the mouth faded away. But this was to concentrate on cutting his pizza correctly in between conversing. I decided it was time to join them all over again. But only for a moment even if Eli's words had intrigued me. I promised my new friend that I would seat myself back with her after I had simply filled my own cheeks at last!

As I clambered from table to table and landed on the correct one, I made a beeline for the garlic bread. And as I did this, my desire for clarity regarding what Eli had said blurred into nostalgia and I thought that I'd have quite liked to experience the Johto days with Lynne and Eli and Jordan too.

I felt deeply lucky in my heart of hearts to get to hear everything from my loved ones past lives through terrific tales but sometimes one did dream of actually being able to be there. No doubt did it give an extra sense of closeness.

Seeing somebody during the seedling stages of life and through hardships gave an extra insight into character. Though I believed that I knew all of them rather well, those sorts of wordless observations and knowings without discussing were rather priceless.

But oh well. I wasn't there, was I? And I would simply have to move on.

Ripping a bit of garlic bread away from the basket with my paws and my teeth while Lynne and Eli ate their own meals, I glanced at the two of them and felt a thin invisible pull tugging me closer to them both within my own mind. It was time for silence to hang over the scene like mist in the air. They had said everything that they intended to say for the next couple of minutes.

In their own way – in their own very different ways – they proved that memories of the past were very firmly and fondly in each other's minds. But soon enough, I would go on to be shown that things in the closer past and even the present were plain to see by some people.

After smiling nonchalantly over in Eli's direction as she ate her own dinner and then paused, one of her hands going down to absentmindedly finger her napkin and the other reaching for the stem of her wine glass before she even intended to take a sip from it, Lynne decided to occupy herself with looking over at him in front of her.

Despite the fact that my own chewing noises were rather loud in my own ears, I like to think that I got a good idea of what she was thinking about. Yes, she did feel an affinity towards him. And she felt peaceful in his company even though his face no doubt reminded her of her own past that she had left behind to embark on a new life with Jordan.

He had always been pretty much the same to her. She didn't really see him as strange. A lot of people could throw this label at him, but she was not one of them. He simply was who he was. Sure, he had changed a few times and gone against himself many more, he still had that quality of same-ness about him. Like he was certain of his ideals and his thoughts and his identity. Even if that wasn't the case at all.

Lynne hummed to herself at her own otherwise silent observations while Eli ate and she formed an appreciative smile, lips continued quirking upwards. Her fingers stopped lingering on the stem of her glass and reached to fluff through the fur on my head instead. I sure appreciated that!

And I appreciated it even more when she used her other hand to push the orange juice in the glass that was meant for me right over to me. She went on to hum to herself a little louder and that was because she had new things to observe.

An intrigued glint appeared in her eye and lines appeared on the side of her nose as it scrunched, her neck gracefully sloping while her head tilted ever so slightly to the side. A waiter had come over to our table with the dish that had taken longest to prepare and just so happened to be for me.

And in between the joy that I had already been demolishing the garlic bread and a proper meal was still to come, both Lynne and I noticed that it was a different waiter than before.

No doubt did Eli stumble across this observation too because the second waiter was vastly different to the one prior. He seemed far younger than the jolly silver haired man with the imposing accent.

This waiter had long hair, tumbling past his shoulders that possibly should have been tied up. Pale, almost translucent skin peeked out from the neck of his shirt and out of his cuffed sleeves. And I have to mention that he possessed eyes that were a little hollow in his head but very piercing, nonetheless.

Yes, he had a lot of features that warranted him being noticed. And Eli noticed him as well.

Lynne couldn't help but take in how Eli had hardly been able to get a word of gratitude out on behalf of the table over the fact that our last order had been delivered to us. After she effortlessly piped up for them both and gave the waiter her best smile before he departed again (I did too), her smile grew less painted as she noticed something.

Or rather, she thought of something. And did she dare address it with the Eli? She thought of that too for a couple of seconds.

In spite of the fact that he had hardly managed to say a word to the fellow male, he had been composed in all other areas. And since his departure, he seemed to be able to exhale better than before. He chose to look down at his pizza rather intently, though I guessed that he didn't intend on eating some more for some time.

And I was shown to be correct from the way that he sat up a little straighter all over again and reached behind him to tug his jacket off his shoulders. After he did this and as he intended to place it on the back of his own chair, he turned behind him and his eyes scanned around. They appeared to scan around aimlessly. Though of course, it wasn't too hard to figure out where they wanted to be scanning to!

Lynne decided that she couldn't keep quiet about it any longer if she had been deliberating whether or not to at all. Moving her hand out of my fur and covering her own mouth lightly for a moment, she had lightness in her gaze as she spoke to Eli, trying to garner his attention.

"He caught your eye." Lynne spoke and to tell you the truth, my head swivelled almost as much as Eli's did! For a few seconds, I forgot all thoughts about delving into my own dinner. Instead, my head rotated with surprise, and I was reminded that Lynne could be equally as straight forward in her own way. "What did you like about him?" Lynne asked knowingly as Eli's eyes widened in a different way to usual.

My head stopped turning and instead tilted down towards my neck instead. I had a moment to ponder to myself what I believed Eli's reaction was going to be. Of course, a possibility existed that both Lynne and I were wrong, and Eli was going to sincerely prove this. Another possibility was that he was going to get very hot under the collar and deny any sort of thing that Lynne was hinting at.

And then there was an extremely real chance that he would get very hurt. And not only this but he would shut down and clench his jaw, refusing to say anything at all.

I didn't like to think of the fact that remained the small potential that he would storm straight out of there. I guessed that I knew that that sort of thing was behind him. That sort of thing was in the past. We were in the present.

But still, things were still uneasy for Eli. He proved this by poking his bottom lip out and biting on it before sucking his top lip, his eyebrows dancing on his face. He swallowed. His words when they appeared, came out hurriedly. He denied what Lynne was saying, of course, but the quickness of his words made it clear that her observations were not too far-fetched.

"How could I know what I liked about him? I don't know him. I didn't catch anything because I didn't really look at him." Eli stumbled through these words, but his tone didn't elevate or decline once. His eyebrows managed to stop dancing on his face, and they knotted in one position. Lynne's hand moved back to the top of my head as she remained opposite Eli, and I couldn't help but wonder if it was her seeking her own comfort. "I… I have a girlfriend with whom I am most content. I don't need to be looking at anybody else."

Lynne may have preferred to say things when she thought of them, but she disliked upsetting people more than anything. Eli had mumbled some incompressible words and then finally concluded, sinking into his seat as if he didn't even believe his own demeanour.

He knew how obvious he was being. But for once, he did not know how to stop. He did not know how to place the mask back on.

The silence that befell our little group was undeniable. The fog thickened and surrounded us. Even though the white -haired old lady that I had been sat with could hardly hear at all and I had been the one to prepare most of the conversation, as I tore my eyes away from the people that I was sat with for just a second and glanced over at her, I got the impression that even she caught on to it.

The silence could not be ignored. I could not, however, say it was entirely uncomfortable. It was merely rather telling. And instead of looking away from one and other, Lynne and Eli looked over at each other. A pure oceanic orbed look met one that was both a blue and green hue and very intense. It didn't break. Their eye contact didn't break away from each other.

Something did eventually break, though. And that was Eli breaking into a bit of an out of place smile. His lip started to quirk upwards. He almost smirked. Then, he looked away. I put all of this down to the fact that he had known Lynne for so long that he couldn't really hide anything from her, even if he could hide it from himself.

Maybe he would keep things from her. But he would do it with a smile. There and then and in that moment, that smile continued to come.

For once, Lynne did not return it.

After spying down at her lap and then purposely looking around the restaurant (to my friend or perhaps to the waiter that was partially the reason for the silence) she tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. She addressed his words and complied with them with a nod. Even so, she still slanted her head and her eyes fixed back on him all over again.

Once more, she felt the inclination to continue questioning him lightly and she could not stop herself.

"I have just always known you as somebody who likes to look at beautiful things. Girlfriend or no girlfriend." Lynne began and I couldn't help but feel every inch of the fact that the words label or no label echoed around the room and my ears even if she hadn't even sounded them. "I'm sorry if that was out of place, though, Eli. It wasn't my intention to make you feel uncomfortable."

No doubt did Eli long to look down at his pizza rather than coming face to face with the circumstances – no, his own reactions – that felt rather unconcealable. However, I understood that the time in which they had known each other made it apparent that the both of them didn't like to fill silences with pointless words. They didn't like to dodge subject matter and dance around words, instead coming straight out with them as best as they could.

Both Lynne and Eli understood that when an apology was put forth, it was meant. Perhaps Eli knew this more than anyone. He knew that when apologies were not offered then they were not meant either.

Thankfully for him and welcomed by him, he had heard words of sincere, gentle apology. Letting out a sigh, he obviously accepted this and looked back at Lynne and straightened his back a little more for her as well. And not only this, but her getting her sentences of earnest truth out there most likely caused him to be able to as well.

It caught me off guard a little bit. Slurping up my own spaghetti as quietly as I could muster, (which wasn't very) I multitasked by listening and eating. Somehow, I didn't put Eli off and cause his shoulders to shudder.

"Well… It is rather uncomfortable. But that is on me rather than you." Eli informed Lynne and his lips pressed together in more of a line that time rather than a smile. Along with this, he bobbed his head before intending to go back to his dinner.

It was the combination of all of these things that caused Lynne to react in the way that she did.

Lynne did not react like thunder clapping in the middle of a bright and humid day. Nor did she react like a whisper on the back of the neck that caused you to shiver. All Lynne could do was react in the way that was most natural to her.

Her head tilted at quite the impressive angle, and her eyebrows plaited themselves together. Mirroring Eli's own actions, her pale pink lipstick swiped lips pressed together. She also did her own thing, her hand breaking the distance with Eli's own one as she thought her musings.

"It's not awkward, Eli. At least, it doesn't have to be." Lynne commenced. The way that he purposely widened his eyes in disagreement and pressed his lips harder together, making his face appear all the more austerely structured than ever before made it plain that he disagreed with her words. Even so, Lynne continued trying, her hand properly reaching out to him that time and touching him on the top of his hand just once before keeping her hands to herself. "I've never really thought of you as anything other than yourself. Whatever you have told me about yourself, I have believed and never dreamed of questioning otherwise. It doesn't affect me which beautiful people you choose to look at."

I couldn't help but feel a wave of affection for Lynne washing over me as I ate, and I knew it wasn't the endorphins as food finally reached my belly! She was one of the more recent people who understood the truth to which kind of people he really did like to look at – and in what kind of way.

But if that interaction was anything to go by, she had taken to it wonderfully. Because, exactly like she expressed, she took Eli for Eli. And whatever he told her about her, she believed and didn't dream of arguing or labelling him otherwise.

However, the newness of her knowledge was entirely clear for the fact that the reasons for his uneasiness were not exactly as she believed. And despite the fact that Eli didn't always have the desire to explain every little thing about him and his life – especially after the amount that he had done in recent months – I supposed he had one more inclination to do it there and then.

Words flooded into his mind. They swarmed his brain. Then they decorated his tongue. Eventually they were spoken out in the open.

"No. No, it's not that." He countered and this directness caused Lynne to have a few more mouthfuls of dinner before she pushed it away from herself pointedly, obviously in her own head deciding that understanding Eli even more was far more of a priority. Lynne listened and I did too as Eli's words started escaping from him. "It's not that. It's more… It's how… It's like-"

Lynne sighed. Lynne sighed softly and it was this that interjected her husband's cousin. Pushing her own hair out of her eyes even though she probably would have liked to do this to Eli in almost a motherly way as his words twisted and his intestines in turn knotted inside of him as well, her lips pressed together empathetically.

All of a sudden, she pieced a few more things together. It was true that she was rather new to the ins and outs of the last few years of Eli's life and the way he offered a piece of his heart to someone only for his entire chest to end up shattered, but as she looked at him then, it dawned on her. Very gently and softly like a dawn that had waited so long to come, she understood a touch more.

She actually held a hand to her heart that time rather than doing it in only thought. And after her eyes laced with the same empathy and her eyebrows drew together with care, she spoke in a hushed voice.

"I understand. You feel strange to even glance at another man and it's not because of your girlfriend."." Lynne spoke quietly and as if she was reciting from a book and not from real life. "It's because you felt so strongly for him. You think it would be strange to have your eyes wander after something so life changing."

The words that she was speaking were as from the heart as they were crystal clear. She didn't need to utter names. She didn't need to utter any names at all. She got her point across. And this was proven by the way that Eli recoiled in his seat.

He still hardly moved many muscles as he did so. He broke the distance with the back of his seat with a quiet thump. His eyes did not feel the air hit them. Eyelashes merely tickled around his pupils. His hands drew together in his lap. And at last, his jaw seemed to stiffen and then gape.

It was his natural instinct to swallow. To look down. To frown. Because of past times, I wondered if he would act like a few years back and deny everything. But he couldn't deny a single thing. Definitely not to Lynne ever. But more recently, not to himself at all.

Names didn't even need to be said. One name was clear in Eli's eyes. That name seemed to encapsulate his orbs as other words tumbled out of his lips.

"I know that you are close to us both, so this was going to come up eventually, but I did not expect our dinner conversation to turn to this." Eli began and for some reason, Lynne let out a breathy noise that was bordering on a chuckle. After turning to her, I focused back on Eli. He was starting to feel the air in his ears. "I don't really encourage my mind to think of Justin too much in the way I once did. And I allow myself to speak of him like that as little as I can help it."

His eyes tried to shut. But like he had grown weary of pretending – no, he had burrowed his way out of it – they opened almost as soon as they had fluttered shut.

It was his turn for him to appear as though he was reading from some far-off script that didn't really mean anything to him anymore but of course, once meant everything to him. His voice was as level as a road. Monotone.

Nonetheless, a jet of something I couldn't quite put my finger on announced itself when he spoke his former lover's name. It went beyond just love. It was richer than hurt. It was the invisible string that tied them together.

It was this same thread that lured Lynne in. Placing her elbows on the table in a way that she hoped was not overbearing and cupping her chin with her hand, she wanted to listen. And as she intended to do so, she asked:

"Because it was so very sad?" she wondered and for half a moment and as I pushed my own dinner plate away for the time being, I considered whether this touch of child-like innocence was going to encourage Eli, or it was going to close him up again like he was back in the past. Still in a cocoon.

I should have known not to predict. I should have known not to guess. I should have known to be present.

In the present time, it was revealed to me.

"No… Not at first." Eli said and almost as soon as he responded with honesty, this prompted Lynne to get even more of an idea of the things that had only just lightly been touched upon.

She hadn't heard too much of the heaviness at all. She believed that she had a good idea about some things and so she had another question.

"You were in love?" Lynne asked with nothing but openness while I held my breath a little bit. Lynne was continually leaning on the table and listening. I too was sitting on the table and listening. However, I knew that I was the only one with my heart rate starting to increase in my chest.

Well, it was highly likely that it was the same for Eli.

He stuck out his own bottom lip gently and bit down on it before he thoughtfully sucked on his top lip. His eyebrows didn't jitter. Instead, his eyes did. They cast back. They cast a few years back. And because they did this, answers ran across his mind and were revealed by his tongue.

He spoke plainly once more. It was true what they said. Once you started, you couldn't stop.

"I was in love." Agreed Eli in the most level of tones while his expression contorted so very subtly but in the most yearning way. You could almost see the face of Justin Morgan in his eyes as well as his name. All of their memories. Their moments. All of their ups and downs. Yes, their downs. The separation which had been like a punch to every part of his body, not just his gut. This was what caused Eli to add in a voice that abandoned him. "That was the problem…"

It was time for his eyebrows to knot together and it was time for him to bite down on his lower lip. While I just listened, Lynne's expression laced with confusion.

She was not as naïve and airy fairy as she once had been as a teenage girl and some of her own life changing romantic encounters. But still, that was confusing to her. That was alien. She didn't like to believe that Eli was mistaken but she couldn't help but feel like there was a slight chance that he must have been.

Lynne couldn't wrap her finger around the words that Eli had spoken. She showed this ongoing confusion by the words that came next.

"How on earth could that be a problem? Love is the most wonderful thing on this planet. It's the most powerful thing in the entire world. Any world." She shook her own head as she continued saying words that she believed to be true. I was inclined to agree with her. But I felt that there was a time and a place for everything.

I wasn't sure that that was the place. Not when Eli was clearly being hit with so many memories and so many new ones that he hadn't thought of for years in the presence of someone he couldn't deny himself to.

"Because." Eli started and it began to be proven to me that perhaps Lynne's words were not the wisest. Though his eyes did not tear up, they widened, and they glistened, and they shook. His mouth started to tremble like a leaf as well. "Because the love that you have… The love that you believe in… Not everyone experiences that. It's a mere fantasy to some people. It's unattainable. And even if you attain it for one impossible, unfathomable moment in your life, you have to wake up… "His eyes threatened to spill. "I had to wake up…"

I only realised that Eli was lifting himself up in his seat when he plopped down a little bit, his skin temperature evening out and draining after feeling the same heat as the candles placed on our table. He swallowed. At his own momentary outburst.

Be that as it may, I don't believe that his heart was filled with regret. He just didn't believe that he was the best at dealing with such intense emotions. But I knew that in my heart he was wonderful at it. He just felt things deeply. He just felt things strongly. And in time, I hoped he would realise that that was an asset rather than a crime.

Lynne wanted to shake her head at everything that Eli was saying but at that point she realised that she should not – and she could not - because he was starting to speak from experience. Not for one single second could he deny him of that. Not when he had denied himself of that for so long.

Exhaling, Lynne looked slapped with sadness, and she pondered to herself. She, however, only mused for a split second. She just had to ask. She just had to know, her arm no longer pressing on the table and her hands sinking into her lap.

"Well… What made you wake up…?" Lynne questioned. And as she did so, I could tell by the look in her eye that it was possible that she still wasn't really going to understand.

She wasn't going to understand that story. It wasn't her own. It wasn't like anything she had experienced. But maybe that was okay. No, that was definitely okay. Not everybody was built to understand Eli's path. Maybe not even Justin.

Unlike the times before, Eli needed a few crackles of the fire before the words ignited inside of him and he offered them to Lynne. I don't believe that he ever thought about holding them back. I don't believe that he took the time to alter them. He had simply felt the need to be quiet for a bit. So, he took that chance.

And when he knew that moment needed to be up, he told Lynne the truth. Eli's eyes finally glistened a little more. But still, his eyes did not spill. Any hint of a tear seemed to be absorbed by him. It was like he was saving them for later. He was saving them for a time when they truly needed to be expressed.

"He left…" Eli painted this image to Lynne, and I knew these words were going to echo around her mind for a good while. Other words echoed around her brain, and they echoed around mine too. That time, they were words that he formed. They were words that he added. "He left. He decided that he didn't want it anymore… He decided that he didn't want me anymore… So, he walked away…"

And as those words walked away from Eli as well, another hollow silence filled our table. It seemed to breeze over the entire restaurant as well. The fire near the old lady appeared to burn not as bright.

I didn't hear sighs. No one seemed to swallow. Yet everybody quietened down. No one looked at one and other. It was like they were just sitting with the moment. Sitting with the moment, feeling it, and feeling every part of the moment that it had to offer.

Lynne's eyes glittered in their sockets. Upon seeing Eli's own gaze but not his tears, her eyes filled with upset and empathy. She resisted shaking her head. She fought not to sniff. She too sat with the moment. She felt it.

No, it was not part of her story. It was nothing like any of her stories. It was Eli's. He was sharing it with her. At last.

And although she felt a tremendous aching of sadness and sympathy travelling from her gut right up to her throat, she felt a stinging sensation of pride in her heart equally as much. At least he was brave enough to feel every part of his heart ache. He was no coward. He had never been. And he never would be.

The only thing Eli was that day that could be labelled was silent. Following his emotional release and his honesty, he was silent. However, he was not refusing to speak. He was not refusing to engage. He looked at Lynne for the entire time and watched her reactions. He pondered to himself. He could tell that she couldn't relate. But maybe he was glad that she didn't. He wouldn't wish that on anyone.

Gladness placed itself there between them both. Gladness wedged between everyone. That was the unifying emotion during that moment in time. And then, something else took over. Another sort of urge took over.

Lynne had thought long enough and hard enough and silent enough to think of what she wanted to say. Slowly but surely, she rested her elbow on that able and cupped her chin all over again. Bittersweetly, Eli copied her actions and with tired eyes he looked back at her and very nearly smiled.

I deeply gathered that it was this that prompted Lynne to ask just one more thing if it was deemed appropriate.

"Are you angry, Eli? Towards him…?" she questioned, and I found it interesting that it was this out of everything that caused him to flinch. But after I decided to take a step back and move back to the table and go back to my friend once more, I really believed that I knew why.

Eli was certain that emotions could not be his forte. He felt them deeply. Roughly. Intense ones scarred him. He didn't like to be frivolous with him. That was the reason for his reaction.

But still, the real streak of him couldn't help but win out against his fragile one. And after thinking to himself for a couple of moments with his tongue poking inside his own mouth in his austere and clenched jaw, he shook his head slowly and an answer of the same nature came.

"I'm not angry… Not anymore." he posed, and Lynne's head tilted like she was enthralled in the quietest of ways. Well, she was. She was enamoured by the strength of people and moved by it too. "At the end of the day, he protected his own heart. Did the right thing for him. And looking out for yourself no matter what is an admirable quality… A beautiful one, even."

Eli didn't need to whisper that this quality was one of Justin's many ones. The way that his head had turned towards the waiter previously that evening had proved how much he occupied his heart and his mind, as well as everything that he had said about him that day.

Even if they had gone their separate ways. Even if they were trying to revive something that they had once had but in a whole new way while they continued to look ahead rather than backwards. They really were connected by an invisible string. And I for one wasn't going to be one of the people standing there with the scissors.

After Eli got those last words off his chest – and out of his chest and his heart too – he believed that he was going to have the last word.

But he was proven incorrect by after a quiet look took over Lynne's face as she tilted her head as she listened, she couldn't help but notice something. And because she couldn't help but notice something, she spoke it.

Lynne spoke of exactly this while gently rising from the table. Eli's eyes widened slightly, and his orbs travelled upwards as Lynne rose. Holding a hand to her heart, she didn't put on a show and merely spoke from her heart as well.

Lynne spied down at him as she spoke her mind and her heart with a tiny smile taking over her face.

"I don't think you need to believe that love is a problem for you anymore. You still have it, Eli. It's still there." Lynne told him and before his eyelashes could dance or he could deny any of this completely, muttering the word maybe or entirely disagree, she stopped being in front of the table and added: "It's just possibly going to grow into an affection that is entirely different to the one you had before. But equally as sizeable."

After uttering the words that she deemed the truth and at the very least her truth, she moved round to Eli's side of the table. He finally spoke the words of maybe with disbelief and polite scepticism in his voice.

But that was the last opportunity that he had to do anything. That was the last opportunity he had to do anything at all. For you see, I watched as Lynne moved around to the side of Eli's table with him and she wrapped one arm around his shoulders while the other wrapped around his head.

And in a very motherly way, she pulled him to her chest. She didn't express anything. Anything with words or a sigh. The sentiment exuding from her spoke volumes. She was proud of everything that he had said. She was proud of everything that he felt too. She hoped that he would join her one day.

I believed that he would. With swelling in my heart, I watched as Eli at least joined her for a hug. He looked taken aback at first. But then he couldn't help but go with it. He shut his eyes. He nestled in. He unclenched. He succumbed.

And as he did this, no doubt did he succumb to the memories of the past. The memories of the man he once loved. The memories and thoughts of the man he still loved. Justin. He was hurt by him. He was hurt by Justin. But he knew he had hurt him too.

Far bigger and better than that pain, though, there was a future. He had hoped that that was true before. But since Lynne had told him that, he found himself beginning to believe it. Or at the very least, he wanted it enough to go after it.

For the time being, memories were the thing that he went after the most. Every moment. Every embrace. Every touch. Every blush. Every grin. Every intwined part of their bodies. Every heartbeat.

His heart once beat for Justin. His eyes once bled for Justin. Not anymore. He intended to smile for Justin. He intended to move on.

And as he came to that wordless yet welcomed epiphany and as he was held against Lynne's chest and his eyes were pressed shut, that forbidden tear finally trickled down his cheek and down onto the floor of the restaurant.

It was something he didn't need anymore. It was paving the way for something bigger. It was paving the way for something better. Lynne was right. He was building what he needed. And that time, he wasn't going to wake up. He was going to keep his eyes open the entire time. And welcome each and every part that the next chapter had to offer.

The End.

There you go! Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed :) I remember this chapter being heavily influenced by the Disney movie Enchanted. I remember watching that movie and getting struck by this idea. I miss those times! It's a lot harder for me to write spontaneously these days. The dialogue between Eli and Lynne when discussing Justin explicitly is directly inspired by the movie. I pondered altering it during my editing sessions. But I am inspired by all sorts of things and of course, that is going to show in my writing :3 Thanks again for reading and I will be back again over on Letters That Changed Everything. Perhaps I will see you there!

Amy signing out :P