Addie could hear an almost exact stream of consciousness as she sat next to him. She knew he thought her comments were laughable. She’d almost wished he had laughed. At least that way she’d know he wasn’t offended by her comment. There was strength in being soft; that was something her grandmother had always said to her. There was no shame in being soft in a world that tried its damnedest to make you break. She knew, even now, that the world nearly had. There was was, though, off to the side in his head, pulling him away from the dark edge of whatever he was trying to avoid. She could almost see the branches reaching out for him.
Then, he spoke, drawing her from the mental image inside his head. “Anders.” She repeated him. “Alexander…Alex…Anders.” Alexander was a yellow name. She couldn’t explain it even if she wanted to, but it was. Perhaps it was just because that was what she associated with him so feverishly now. If the two of them were to follow the rules Alex set forward, one of them would be living on the streets by now. Following rules had never been Addie’s strong suit and she wasn’t about to start trying now, especially not as she tried to get Alex to breathe for a moment and just lay down.
Not only did Addie hear what he’d been thinking but she also heard the fact that he hoped she hadn’t. She could hear sharp, shrill beeps growing louder and louder, too. She’d apparently set off some sort of alarm system inside Alex’s head and she saw him slip into a vibrant, streaky blue. She wanted to reaching out in this moment, press her palm to his chest or run her hand down his arm, but she knew she’d only add to the mounting anxiety that flourished around him. She tried to steady her breath, hoping he would follow in suit and that was when she felt it: the warmth spreading from her cheekbone to the nape of her neck down her spine, blooming into an open flower in her stomach. He’d thought of it, too and she’d felt every second of it.
If he had just stayed where he was instead of immediately shifting away… But that wasn’t how it was supposed to happen, was it? Something like that wasn’t supposed to happen in a moment of stress, right? Though, she was positive that tomorrow, she’d feel the same way. And judging by how he seemed to struggle to pull away, so would Alex. Was there truly any different between then and now?
She wanted to assure him, for what was essentially the fourth time now, that she was more than capable of handling herself. Whatever he thought he would do to her, whether it be dragging her down or being her downfall, or whatever new way of saying that it was today, was not accurate. She wasn’t quite sure why, but he seemed hellbent on making his own life harder. Why he would not even start to accept that she wasn’t going anywhere just because he told her to was beyond her. Perhaps, she realized, it had just always worked for him before. Addie was no before, though; she was persistent to a fault. It often led her to trouble or frustration and had never been the best at moving on from something.
The image of Alex nailing down signage and plastering dangerous posters over things as she flew past was amusing enough to her to draw an audible laugh as he lowered himself down next to her. That was exactly what she was doing and when she saw it set in that manner in his head, she almost felt a little bad about it. He was just trying to protect her but that circled her back to the logic of not needing protection in the first place.
He lowered himself slowly, pushing a few of the larger, more cumbersome pillows toward the edges as he came to rest next to her. He was purposefully far from her; she could tell that he’d done it with extreme care, most likely because of the kissing thought from a few moments ago. He really didn’t trust her, or perhaps it was that he didn’t trust himself. With that thought, she shivered slightly, realizing she’d never put a sweater on when she left her room earlier. She leaned forward, nearly desperate for the warmth she knew being close to him would give her. If she was being honest with herself, it wasn’t about the warmth at all and hell, that shiver was probably the result of something other than chills. “Just…” she stopped herself, trying to pull the right words from her head, “don’t run off on me?” She didn’t want him to just disappear; she didn’t think she could handle that right now. Moving her hand across the gap between them, she meant to lace her fingers with his. Instead, she lifted her hand slightly and her thumb brushed against his bottom lip. “Stay?”
If there was an Olympic medal to be won for selective hearing, Addie would have have gold. Funny, he hadn’t thought it possible to be selective when tuned into someone’s mind, but there she was, thinking on about strength in being soft, like it made him some kind of hero. But the world had broken him. He was not standing quiet and firm against the raging winds of inevitable tragedy, he was a trembling heap on the floor that had learned to pool into something man-shaped come morning and tumble through a routine of existing until he could turn back into a puddle come evening. It was numbness, not strength, that got him out of bed every morning. She didn’t get that, though. Maybe he should be glad of that. It should be a good thing that she couldn’t comprehend just how much of a coward he was.
There was something odd about hearing his full name from her lips. It was unsettling, not because the sound itself was unsettling, but because of how entirely right it felt to hear from her. Like he had been waiting to hear her say it before the name really felt right on him. He was almost convinced to laugh, but smothered it into a suppressed smile instead. She wasn’t wrong. He had thought on more than one occasion of simply...leaving. It would be easier to pack his things and move on from Paris to a different city, somewhere far away that he wouldn’t come across wisps of purple wherever he looked. He doubted he would make it all that far before devolving into madness once more and who knew how long he wander the streets this time. It had been about a year of living on the streets last time, hadn’t it? It was all a blur at this point, memories he would just as soon forget.
Distance. Distance was very much necessary at the moment, because as much as Addie seemed convinced that she knew what she wanted, he didn’t think she did. He could still feel the remnants of Christian, angry muddled brown that he was, and he knew that the man’s presence had addled Addie. He knew that the whole night had been an unmitigated disaster and surely when she woke up in the morning, she would instantly regret ever letting a thought like that to take up space in her mind.
At least, that was what he intended to tell himself. It would certainly be better for both of them if she woke up in that mindset instead. Things were already so convoluted and difficult, adding another aspect of confusion to it would only make things worse. It would only add to this string that she was wrapping around his heart, the thread that would surely destroy one of them when it was snapped and he was doing his very damnedest to make sure it was him. He was also certain that he was an abysmal failure in that regard. His every effort had been to protect her thus far, and all he seemed to do was make things worse. That should have been further evidence against him, and still she went on trying to draw him closer.
“If you put down roots in me, you’ll tear me to pieces when you pull them back up.” He didn’t know where the words had come from; he had no memory of forming them in his mind, only of them spilling out of his mouth unheeded. It was true, though. All of this, the softness, the easy conversations, the were roots curling into the soil of him and holding him together. For the time, they kept him whole. But the consequences of it threatened to leave him so much worse than how he had started.
Her laugh was enough to make him smile. Really, smile. This was the same issue they had been arguing over (mentally or verbally) since the moment they met, and something about her laugh eased some of the tension of it. He thought that he would like to make her laugh again, before remembering that it wasn’t his job to make her laugh. That wasn’t enough to diminish his smile just yet, the intensity of the moment’s emotions fading with the sound of that laugh. The evening had been too much, but that cut through it all in a single moment.
“There’s a blanket,” Alex told her softly, wryly. He could feel her intention with the movement, and he was not yet ready to give up on his imposed distance between the two of them. There were plenty of ways for her to keep herself warm, most of which had nothing at all to do with him. The problem was that Addie was not the one to take the sensible road, and that was the only road he knew how to walk anymore. The amusement of the moment faded though, at her request. He couldn’t blame her. He had been running off every chance he got, doing his best to chase her away and keep his distance. But he couldn’t leave now, not with her looking at him like that, asking him to stay. He couldn’t leave her after what this night had been, even if he did know that it would be for the best. And while he was prepared to string words together in an attempt to express as much, the feeling her fingers on his skin against stopped him cold. Fingers on his skin, thumb against his lip, it was all Alex could do not to shut his eyes and lean into the touch. This was against the rules. No, they had already been breaking the rules, this was...this was...he couldn’t string two thoughts together to think of what it was, at least not beyond the part of his brain that was currently telling him that this was nice. “I’ll stay,” he told her, voice falling to a near whisper. His hand went up to catch hers, and he couldn’t stop himself from taking it and pressing a kiss to her fingertips before he pulled the hand away from his face.
