Five let out a small sigh. Lila had called it—it was over. All seven years, dissolved into nothing. If there were a hole to hide in, he would. He would fight for her, but not against his brother, not against her family. Her parents. He had no chance of keeping the one thing he truly wanted to save. He had saved his family from endless apocalypses, but for Lila?
For Lila, he would survive through endless apocalypses and burn down the world to find her again.
And she said... no.
Five blipped into the subway tracks, stumbled for a second, and dropped himself on a bench to watch the subway pull up. Twenty stops to the greenhouse, where the instant coffee still sat on the table. Lila scent that lingered on the pillows. He could go there, but he feared how he would imagine her leaning, humming, and watering their home with the love she had just rejected. He would kill to touch her one last time and regret rose through his chest and blemished his face with blood. Anger and jealousy mixed in this body at the mere thought that Diego could touch her every day without thoroughly understanding his privilege. He couldn't fathom the loss of the tingling electricity that came with her touch, and it just occurred to him that Lila may be his own pacemaker. Without it, his heartstrings stretched and groaned in protest.
Lila felt the blood drain from her face. She had said it without knowing it. With only her family in mind, she said what was expected to be said. She still smelled Five on her hair and his soft kiss vibrated on the corner of her mouth. Their last touch haunted her and hated she had taken it for granted. Diego roughly snatched her wrist and ripped the bracelet off.
"Ouch! What was that for?" Lila snapped back to reality and glanced back at a rustle of Klaus, hoping it was Five. "Give that back, Diego." She grabbed it back out of his hands.
"Lila, look at me. Do. You. Love. Him?" Diego's scowl looked more angry and bitter—betrayed even—than heartbroken.
Five had looked broken. She hoped Diego would have the same face. It infuriated her that he looked more bitter than sad that she loved someone else. If it was anyone but Five, would he have cared that much? It wasn't as if their relationship was the liveliest thing since their blue suburbia, but even throughout the years, even through the twins, Five was the most exciting thing every time. For a second, she remembered how he would bring her a bottle of cheap, sparkling wine to share while the twins finally slept. It was the first time she'd felt human, actually human, since their birth. To whisper laugh at a joke and talk about anything else than her family was all it took to feel like herself. Five had done that, not Diego, long before the Marigold.
"I'm sorry. I have to... stop him. I have to talk to him. I have to tell him..." Lila trailed off and trying to focus on her powers that she shared with Five. Diego looked angrier. He looked like someone had stabbed him in the leg and it was his turn.
"Lila, then go. But you go, and we're done. You leave, and I'm out. You and Five can play house somewhere else." His curt voice hit her like dull arrows. Shocked but bounced right off her back. Lila couldn't find the right words, so she blipped and hoped Five was still there.
Five choked out a sob he had been holding back, a small laugh escaping as he wiped his eyes, staring at his slender, tear-wet fingers, spreading dirt from their trip back. He thought 'huh, tears. That's a first in a while...' and he laughed out another stream of tears. He watched it plink, plink, plink down on the concrete platform and lifted his head. As it slid down his face, he wondered what it was exactly that was bringing him to tears. Was it Lila's face when she said it was done? The defiant, stubborn face he loved, so sure, so determined, that they had to be over. Or was it the last seven years of surviving by the bare teeth and bones so he could see her alive and meet her family? If he was dumber, he would have never shown her the book, but he knew that he was too smart to do that to Lila. He kept hoping and hoping that she would choose him. But she had said 'This isn't real, Five! None of this is real!' in their bedroom. He was so confident that she would choose him. Why was he so goddamn stupid to even consider, that out of all of it, she would choose him.
He shot off the bench and kicked the trash can across the platform, letting out a primal scream that scratched and broke his already dry throat. He pouredout all the pain and sorrow that Lila had stabbed him with. All the grief that he now needed to suffer through, all of Lila he would now have to detox. With tears streaming now, face wet with anger and grief, he sat back down and stared off into space. The tears finally stopped and his mind went numb. A flash of blue light and Lila appeared. Five lazily followed to the spot she landed in and saw her shoes first. It was worn and torn from the running and bombs. The seven years didn't feel like a past life for a moment. With half hooded lids, he stared. So sleepy and tired, for a second, Five was more confused than anything and didn't move. Lila slowly approached and sat next to him.
"Five..." Lila whispered.
"What can I do for you?" Five flatly dragged out his words, sarcastically, groggy from the scream.
She lifted her hand to wipe the tear on Five's face but he snatched it away, scared of her warmth. It was time to forget her and it started five minutes ago.
"No. You don't get to do that anymore."
"I'm sorry. Five. I'm so sorry." Lila dropped her hand and let out a stream of tears, streaks and streaks of tears, with her brows furrowed and pain seeping from her face. When she saw nothing on his, a part of her broke. She had known what every twitch of the brow, every habit, every tell he had, but she'd never seen this version of Five before.
Five had to slowly turn off all the nerves in his face and hands to not touch her. He did everything and poured the last of his energy to not grab her or show what she did to him. Determined not to show how broken his heart was, nor to show how his heart stretched in defiance of being so close to her. His body screamed and begged for the pacemaker, but he didn't want to feel alive. Not right now. He smelled her ginger shampoo they've gathered from a bush near the greenhouse and saw the sewed in patch in her shirt that he had stitched only days ago. But all of it seemed like memories of a past life. He was trying to memorize all of it. The scrunch from her nose to the thick curls of her hair, to the soft smell of her skin. He was trying to let her go, like she wanted.
"I have a family, and we've talked about this." She pushed the bracelet towards him with shaking hands. "You knew this... I knew this... but we still did something we weren't supposed to." Lila turned her face in shame and was still holding the bracelet. "I'm sorry it felt so right..."
He stared at the bracelet. He had made it for her with light hammering and over a light flame, etched every leaf and design. He gave it to her as he casually uttered, 'because I love you' on a silent afternoon and snapped it onto her wrist. There was twist in his stomach and nausea hit him like waves.
"Here," he said bitterly, "keep this too then. Or trash both. Do as you please." Lila heard the crack in his voice and felt the absence of love as he dropped the box on top of her bracelet, refusing to touch her. He got up to head for the train. He gave her a small pocket-sized box, singed from another apocalypse. Lila hadn't been expecting for Five to reject the bracelet and stared at a blue and velvet box, now held in her palm in the middle of the bracelet. In another universe, Five would have smiled and given it to her, somewhere warmly lit and safe, and in return he would get a smile that he loved. But this was not in this universe. This was a version of hell that he hated.
"What is it?" Lila whispered as she slowly snapped open the box. It held a small ring, with nothing too ostentatious, but clearly made over a long period of time and with love. Lila silently stared and looked up at Five, who was halfway turning away from her. His eyes briefly met hers, and she saw his eyes shatter into millions of pieces beneath her. The pang in her chest didn't subside and there was nothing more she could do. She closed the box and shoved both of them in her pocket. Before he could fully turn away, she grabbed his wrists, whitening her knuckles and gulping a big breath. "Five. Please. Don't leave. Please. You know, I love you." She couldn't help but plead.
Five hesitated, turned around, and rushed in to kiss her. He felt drained and didn't have the energy to keep numb and sedated. She was taken aback but didn't stop it as she didn't think she could, even if she wanted to. He kissed her unlike any time before. It was soft and desperate, like he was trying to memorize and remember every part of her before he let himself forget. Like granting one last wish before his death. And she didn't like it one bit. She felt uneasy at her core that this kiss was the most heartbreaking kiss she'd let him give her. His lips softly touched her like he was afraid to break it, and his arm slithered around her waist and her neck. His breath was hot and his face cold from the tears. Lila's hand wrapped around his chest across his back and felt him like she didn't remember him. It had only been 20 minutes since their last kiss and this, was to break off all their other kisses and stolen moments in time. And as soon as it started, it was over. A small gasp broke between them and their eyes shaded as they touched foreheads, Lila heard Five whisper. "I have never loved anyone like you, and hear me when I say, that I will never love anyone like you. I won't convince you to stay or to love me, or... to choose me. But I will never be the same. Lila, you have found me broken and watched me build myself from the pieces. I will not ask you to stay any longer than you have already. I understand. So please, go."
Five abruptly dropped her waist, and separated their foreheads and they both felt the coldness from their absence. Five turned and entered the subway car and sat on the seat next to the entrance, so he didn't have to see her as the car pulled away. Lila stood still and at a loss of words. She watched him pull away from the platform and she did what anyone would do if left alone. She went home.
Home wasn't the same anywhere. She felt a hole had been punched in her chest and it didn't take long for the hole to turn into days in bed and with a far-off look in her eyes. Diego was concerned but not enough to do much, because he knew there wasn't much that could be done. He had said it was over, but he couldn't leave her like this. Even if his brother had broken everything in between them.
"You should just go to him, if you are going to be like this." Diego whispered as he gathered the dishes still full of food from the day before. Lila looked partially dead with hollowed out cheeks and a small wet spot next to her eyes on the pillow. There was nothing that she understood and nothing he understood about all of this. "Jesus, Lila. You have kids and a family to take care of. Let's get you up."
Lila slowly got up and gave a curt nod, as if someone was controlling her body like a doll. Blank faced, she trudged downstairs and started picking up after the kids and gathered toys and loose socks. Diego followed her and watched her on autopilot. She started pulling pots to start dinner and like nothing, broke a smile for her kids. She returned blank faced as soon as she turned away with Diego eye's hot on her tail. He couldn't stop thinking why she wouldn't just blip to him. Why wouldn't she just leave? If she loved him so much, and she felt this empty why was she still here, making dinner and starting the domesticated lives they agreed to?
Lila couldn't stop thinking about Five's face. The shadow underneath those bangs, pulled lips with pain, and their last kiss that left her empty and soul sucked. There was nothing left of her to give out as love. She felt empty and alone in every timeline. There was nothing and no one that would fix this, other than Five. She knew and Diego knew.
Five couldn't bear the pain and strain against his ribs. He felt the choking sob rise underneath him in the train and he could still taste her. He still lingered on her smell and the soft part of her neck. There was nothing that could erase that now. No matter how many promises of forgetting. He rode the train in a full loop and entered back in the platform where he left Lila. He had decided that he couldn't fathom living in a timeline without Lila. He stared at the spot where he kissed her.
He set up camp for the night. Lit a small fire with nearby debris and laid on the bench using the blazer as a blanket. He drifted off into sleep, exhausted from the heartbreak and his brain pulsing a headache. What seemed like seconds, he rustled awake and rubbed his eyes open. He was back in the strawberry greenhouse and heard the familiar humming and the smell of coffee. He couldn't help but smile, excited as always to find Lila. He carefully got up and walked towards her humming. She was just there, smiling, watering our breakfast and sipping coffee. She was glowing underneath the Sun and for a second, she was the Sun. She was everything. He rushed behind her to hold her. He wanted to feel her warmth and her smell, he wanted to bury his face on her hair and consume her as she was. He slowly slithered his arms around her stomach, but warmth did not follow. She was gone like a cloud and appeared behind him. Five's face dropped. It was a dream.
'I already watered that section, you wanna do the ones over there?' vaguely gesturing behind her.
'Lila, I love you.' He said, unable to face her. He said it confidently without stutter and sadness. Damn it, this was his dream, and he was going to say whatever to make her stay this time. 'I don't know how to live without you. And I wish I would have taken that ring and put it on you.'
Still facing the strawberries, his arms slightly shaking on his side, and small tear starting to form. He finally turned and lifted his gaze to meet Lila's. In his dream, Lila was his. No one here to find them, no one to judge them. No one to reject.
'I love you too, silly. What's gotten into you this morning?' Lila laughed a hot laugh and stepped closer to him, concerned. Her eyes twinkled at him with love.
'Lila, I wish I could touch you again...' Five said stepping closer to meet her halfway. Stepping closer to remember her smell. 'I wish I put that ring on you.'
Everything dissipated. The clouds wrapped around him, and everything went black. He woke up on the platform's hard bench. Tears welled again. He just couldn't. How could his mind be so cruel? How could his mind betray him again and again, just when he had fallen into sleep? Without his knowing, without him even trying, he blipped away. He blinked and landed on a soft surface. He smelled her again. He thought it was another dream, then he saw her letting out huffs of air as she struggled to keep peace as she slept. He blipped into her bed. He laid there blinking, hoping this was a dream. But no, she was here, mere inches from him, and he smelled her hair and her shirt. He saw the tear marks on her face where the salt remained from her tears. He reached out and touched her, surprised of the incredible warmth. She was his Sun. She radiated everything he wanted and there was no hiding that. He caressed her cheeks and followed her hair to its end. He reached for her hand and held it. Five felt a cold band on her hand and looked down to find the ring he had been making for a month, full of imperfections. He smiled. He caressed the ring and her soft hand.
Lila's eyes snapped open as she felt her hand in someone else's. For a second, she thought it was the kids or Diego. But then she smelled Five before her eye's adjusted in the dark. She immediately started crying.
She whispered through her sleep and tear, 'This better not be another bloody dream. I-I can't handle another dream like this.'
Five's heart sank. He thought this would be easy for her. That she'd already moved on. That she'd accepted Diego yet again. His heart ripped into another million pieces.
'No, love. Not a dream. I thought so too. But I think I blipped in my sleep.' Five whispered too. He smiled and pulled her closer while he could. He couldn't fight his consciousness even if he wanted to. He pulled her into his chest like he used to, and he felt Lila sigh into contempt. He kissed the top of her head. He kissed it again just for luck. He was grateful her hands slithered behind him and pulled him tight, feeling her tears on his shirt. For the first time, in a long time, for the both, they fell asleep in peace. In actual peace. At home, waiting for the Sun to wake them up.