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@clayton-doyle
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I felt like crying but nothing came out. It was just a sort of sad sickness, sick sad, when you can’t feel any worse. I think you know it. I think everybody knows it now and then. But I think I have known it pretty often, too often.
Charles Bukowski, Tales of Ordinary Madness
(via cryingtotheocean)
impulse (elena&clayton)
He had made no conscious decision to go visit her. It was simply a spur of the moment idea, occurring to him as he swallowed down a piece of bread in the morning-lit kitchen. In the blink of an eye, he found himself putting his shoes on and hitting the streets, footsteps retracing the path he'd walked after leaving the surreal, dream-like home of the woman he had slept with. It was that murky shelter that he sought out now, his eyes still tired from lack of sleep. He wasn't sure how he would be received: slap on the face? an arrangement for 'next time'? no one opening the door? Clayton had never dealt with a situation like this before; it was all a mystery to him.
Soon, he arrived at that familiar brick building, cosy-looking and innocent. He was about to knock when he stopped short; he could smell others in the vicinity. He took a step back from the door and stared up at the second floor; Elena had roommates, and they were probably sleeping, but the last thing he wanted to do was attract attention.
He sneaked around to the back of the house, where he knew was Elena's room. He peeked in through a window and, sure enough, saw her lying in bed, dark hair obscuring her face.
(It was an effort, not to envision Violet sleeping there.)
Tap tap tap.
It was enough to stir her. With a few more insistent knocks on the window pane, Elena spotted him, and instantly she froze. Clayton drew his hand away from the glass, unable to read the look spreading over her face. Relief coupled with indecision and shock, melting into helplessness and guilt. Should he have come? He made to step away, disappear back into the woods where he belonged, but before he could do so she clambered out of bed and slid the window open.
"Hi." Her voice was still painted with sleep, though her eyes were alert. She was dressed in a large t-shirt and pyjama shorts. Her breasts made the shirt tent and fall loosely around her figure.
"I didn't want to wake your roommates."
A smile briefly lifted her features. Amusement: oh Clayton. But it flickered and vanished, like a dying flashlight. Something was wrong; the energy and youth she'd offered him was absent. He could smell it. Was it simply because he was here? "Climb in." She put her hand on his arm and helped him in, leaving the window open behind him to let in some air.
Now that he was inside, Clayton realised he was lost for words. It was stupid to have come here. What could he say to her? I had a good time that night, but it wasn't personal. It didn't mean anything to me. How are you?
And just as he was about to speak, she beat him to it: "Clayton, I need to say something."
"Oh." Here it was. She was going to tell him that it had only been a one-night stand, that she really didn't need to see him, that he'd wasted his trip. They could stay in touch, sure, be friends, fine—
"Don't get mad, please? I didn't know until a few days after you left and I've been trying to find you—" Why were there tears in her eyes?
"What is it?"
"I'm so, so sorry, Clayton, but I'm pregnant. It's your baby. Ours."
A second passed, and the first thing that came out his mouth was a laugh. High and abrupt and ridiculous. The blood was being drained from his brain. He could not think. "What?" Again, that demented half-laugh, like someone drowning and gagging on sick, oily water. The wind sucked right out of him.
"Stop it." Furious tears glistened in Elena's eyes, rolling down her cheeks. "I'm carrying your child, and - and I'm going to have it. I thought you should know."
Ice particles crusting his blood vessels. When had his knees started trembling? Another laugh bubbled in his throat, but this time it caught there, snagged on disbelief, frozen stock-still and strangling his cowardly voice. Elena took a step toward him, and as she wrapped her arms around his waist, he realised she was scared and sorry. Maybe he was too. Maybe he wasn't. He was suddenly suspended and grounded, lost and clarified. Thoughts everywhere at once yet his mind was numb, a sea of fog and shock. Couldn't even lift his arms to hold her as she pressed herself closer, again seeking comfort from his useless shell. There were sleeping persons above them oblivious to the storm beneath. A world away.
"Clayton." Her voice was feather-soft and shivery on his ear. "I think…I think someone—another werewolf—he wants to hurt me." She was crying again. Hot tears pooling in his shirt, on his skin, salty and sticky. "I don't know what to fucking do. I mean, without the baby, I wouldn't be so…but—" a raspy gasp "—I'm scared he'll do something.
"I know you're a good man. Please. If - If you don't want the baby…I'm not asking you to be a father. But just help me, please. I don't know what to do."
I don't know what to do.
Perfumed shampoo and bedsheets and pine trees through the window. Yet still he felt cold. Pinpricks everywhere, in his bones and edging into his heart. Elena's ragged breaths, silently beseeching, waiting, needing…
I'm not asking you to be a father. But just help me. Please.
"Clayton."
I don't know what to do.
stay safe | clayton & violet
Violet stood back, stumbling over her own feet. She had dreamed of leaving Bindlebrim so many times, but never had she uttered her fantasy. It lost its dazzle the moment it fell from ones lips and failed to come true. Inadvertently, Clayton had broken a small dream. One part of her felt like she should be grateful for being grounded back into reality and stripped of her foolish hope.
”No.” (It can’t be done.) ”I can’t leave when I have something to live for.” (The changing tide.) ”Not when I waited so long to get it.” (Violet Moore is coming back.) (I can’t leave her again.)
The offer was placed on the table with shaky hands and desperation; he needed this. He wasn’t going to survive here. He needed an escape, to retreat and find new footing. Her heart yearned to help him, aid him in his new life. Make sure he didn’t make the same mistakes. But she couldn’t, he can’t take his baggage with him and that’s all she is. B a g g a g e. A heavy load weighing him down like bricks attached to his ankles as he wades down the river.
She was in her head again, thinking too poetically about a man she really barely knew. She didn’t have the first idea where he had come from, what made him the man he was or even what his favorite color is. Yet she had created some tragic mess for her to fix, just so she could avoid internal reflection. She couldn’t blame herself. Her inner self was tormenting to observe, filled with twisted betrayal and a girl clawing to be released and have her innocence restored.
There was nothing left to say. She had let him down, again. She could help him get away but that would sacrifice herself and her position within the pack that she no longer cared for. She would have to be killed for him to even stand a chance. There was no way he would allow that to happen. So she would do it in secret. Set up the opportunity, find a way to break the curse and distract the others by any means necessary.
Violet Moore had risen from the dead, regaining the one thing that made her parents proud - her selflessness.
Her friends used to joke ‘don’t mess with Lettie, she’s fearless, causes all kinds of trouble’. It had been true. She never backed down from a fight, never feared what might be said about her if she defended a friend who lost her value. To her, they were worth more than any stupid society could measure. Then she was bitten. Lettie became Vi and she lost that tenacity, the bubbly sense of humor and purpose. But now the latter was returning to her, spinning its wheels in her gut and shining on the Omega she had come to care for.
She placed her arms around him, embracing his lean body for the first time without lusting for comfort. This time she simply wanted to hold him. She held him tight for several moments, letting his confusion fade until he would begin to understand. Or at least she hoped he would. This was her final goodbye.
”Stay safe.”
The words festered in the air as she walked back into the darkness, on her way to River’s to help with her newest assignment. She was wearing something she hadn’t expected to arrive with such grief. A smile.
He was finally going to be just fine.
"No. I can't leave when I have something to live for."
It was like having bitter ice cubes jammed down his throat. He could scarcely believe his ears, and (in order to protect himself) he ran over her words deliberately slowly, letting the pain take over bit by bit.instead of being consumed by one huge wave. And still it winded him. She had something to live for now. He did not know what (or who) it was, but he knew that it was not him. This would be the answer she would give him if he ever decided to tell her his feelings for her, and - finally - he realised that she was right: 'they' were never meant to happen, in any form whatsoever.
Clayton had stood through all sorts of pain, but this was something he could not take.
The summer breeze tugged at his clothes, as though telling him to step away from the woman he could not have. It was fruitless and an endeavour that would only end in misery. For so long he had used her image as his guiding beacon, leading him out of darker days when his blood was constantly spilt over his skin. But all her ethereal value seemed to vanish at her refusal to accompany him out of this town. I'm offering you freedom, he wanted to shout. This is our only fucking escape, and I don't give a shit if you never want to see me again. Do you hate me so much that you can't even walk out of hell with me?
Some distant part of him knew it wasn't him that she hated, but rather the pack, their history, and the fact that they were not human and never would be. But that did not diminish the sudden sense of abandonment. He had always thought that they could be each other's comforter (lover), but the unknown hands behind this life seemed to have other plans for them. She would stay, and what would he do? Well, it sounded like she was telling him to leave, to go on without her. What kind of repayment would that be? After all the times she bandaged him and healed him?
And yet, if he stayed, she would undo all her past goodness in the simple, deadly act of loving another.
So when she put her arms around him, he returned the embrace with unsteady arms, knowing that this might be the last time she would allow him this luxury. She had been his protector for too long; it was time she looked after her own damaged soul, by spending her days trapped here with someone who could bring a smile to her face. She felt so real against his body, but she would soon turn into a ghostly memory, one he would try his damn hardest to forget and never would.
No words left his lips as she walked away. He had to let her go. He wasn't sure what his next step was, whether he would stay or leave, but whatever he chose to do he would not do it for love. All along he had thought she was his hope, but now he understood.
She was a fairytale. A facade. A lie.
stay safe | clayton & violet
Compassion was a weakness of Violet’s. His bitter tongue, disappointed lips all making her heart squeeze with need to make him feel better about himself. It didn’t matter in that instance that she never wanted to talk to him again. All she cared about was that she couldn’t let him down.
"No Clay, it’s not. I can look out for myself. Look I’m sorry, I’m sorry that I had to tell you this way and that I wasn’t able to make myself clear. It’s not just the history that drives us crazy, it’s u s. There’s something there and it’s not healthy. You have to see that.” She said, her pulse thumping from the adrenalin that comes from being honest.
Truly, she was teetering the edge of whether she wanted him in her life or not. Her words sound like she was driving him away but she knows Clayton Doyle. She knows that he picks up on different things than most would. He will hear ‘there’s something there’ and it will give him hope, and maybe he will leave her alone for while, but he’ll be back. ‘Something’ is all that he has. ‘Something’ is all that she has.
It’s hard to let go of the only thing that makes you feel A L I V E. All that time she spent with Phoebe, helping out River, was all nothing but distractions. But Clayton. The way his soft brown irises meet her harsh blue for a fraction of a second and then part, afraid of lingering and understanding each other, that’s the thing she wants to run away from. Her fears, her dreams, her world; all piled up into one spindly man cursed with the same demons as her.
She doesn’t love him, at least not yet. This keeps her white pillow soaking up warm tears. She doesn’t let him get near enough to her heart to break it, but it doesn’t mean he won’t find a way in, a loop hole to scram through. He came so close, so often. He thinks he loves her. She knew this the moment he told her of his one night stand so regrettably and full of shame. It’s a facade. A feeling to hold on to.
He doesn’t. Because he doesn’t know her. He only knows the shell that tries to push the monster away. He doesn’t know the sunshine that was Violet Moore.
"You should see your friend, Elena.” She spitted out her name, unsure if it was voluntary or not. “Find someone else you can protect. Be the man I know you can be.”
His pleas were met by deaf ears and a stubborn mouth. The thing was, he could understand where she was coming from. It was true; he felt the minuscule change in the air every time their eyes met. He only thought it was a good sign because he needed to believe that it was. Violet, on the other hand, needed to believe in the opposite, because she had built a wall against her heart and was focusing all her energy into surviving.
Surely this was the reason for her insistent denial. He was just another obstacle she needed to leap across.
Clayton refused to back down though. The fact was that she was still wandering the streets alone, her back unguarded, and he knew it would not cease to bother him. So he sighed and pushed his hands into his pockets, gaze still averted, stomach sinking at the way she said Elena’s name. He almost wished he’d just kept his mouth shut, that he’d never gave Violet a weapon to use against him. It only added to the layers of guilt around him, and they felt like a straitjacket, binding his limbs until it was difficult to breathe.
But you’re the one I want to protect.
All his courage seemed to desert him. How on earth had he thought he’d be able to confess this to her? His lips felt so dry, his tongue so heavy. “This isn’t about being a man, Vi. Let me return the favour. I can’t stand knowing you’ve done so much for me while I’ve done nothing for you.”
As the words flew from his mouth, he was suddenly hit by daring inspiration. He felt his pulse quicken as he considered this idea. It was something he’d thought about for many months but never acted on, because he did not feel that he was worth it.
However, Violet Moore, she was definitely worth what was on his mind; that, and a whole lot more.
"Okay, I’ll stop following you. But you and I both hate the pack, and I still owe you. So let me do this one thing for you. Please. This way, I’ll be out of your hair for good.
"Let’s leave. Leave this fucking town and the pack behind us and get out of here. There’s got to be some way to break the spell right? Just for the two of us. Can’t be that hard.” He took a deep breath. “And once we’re both out, you can be as far away from me as you like. There’ll be no ‘us’ to drive you mad.”
Freedom had never tasted so bittersweet.
stay safe | clayton & violet
"I don’t need to be fucking saved!" She practically screamed the words. E l e n a. The name wasn’t familiar to her, but if she meant nothing to him it wouldn’t have entered his thoughts. She thought warm water would erupt from her tear ducts, but instead it remained a soft glaze, not willing to let itself fall until her anger had ceased.
ANGER.
All because he cared for her, yet he spoke of another. Selfish Violet needing him for herself but not wanting him at all. In the end, it would finish in heartbreak on either side. Their friendship, if you could call it that, had an expiry date. She shouldn’t pursue it, allow him to think there was a chance for them. It wasn’t the right thing to do. But then, what about Violet was right?
"I don’t care about who you’re spending your nights with or who whatshername is. I want to move on with my life, but you keep coming and d r a g g i n g me back. The fucked up thing is I let you, I want you to, but I can’t do this anymore. I can’t be in this fucking pack, or in that fucking house, or pretending to be someone I’m fucking not.”
Her face was still clear from the waterworks that would surely turn up later, the honesty making her feel free. She’d wanted to let it out for so long. To let him know she didn’t belong just like him, that she had been pretending all this time, that she had only wanted to survive. He seemed to be listening so she continued.
"It took me too long to realize that I’m still half-human, I know that. It would have saved us a lot of pain if I’d come to that conclusion a little sooner. But when the picnic stuff happened and the pack was beating on you, well… I hadn’t met Phoebe then. You mean a lot to me Clay, and I want you to be happy, but not with me. We have too much history.”
Her heart dropped to her stomach. She was letting him down, again. She had been so angry at his mention of Elena, yet she had now done the same thing. How would she explain her relationship with Phoebe to him? How could she let him know that after he spent years trying to break down her walls, all he needed to do was rebuild them? Make her feel worthy instead of trying to be her protector.
(Men and women were not of the same species.) (Her lover had taught her that.) (Along with self-respect and strength,) (yet she still couldn’t let Clayton Doyle in her heart.) (He would be the only one who could truly destroy it.)
He was used to her flinging angry words at him, but even so he was unprepared for the barrage he received as he stood before her. "I don't need to be fucking saved!" And although the sentence was thrown at him, it sounded as if he wasn't the only one she was trying to convince, as if she needed to justify it to herself. She was not him, and she was desperately trying to make it clear, to the both of them, that she did not want him to be a part of her life.
However, the eternal question remained: why? Why couldn't she succumb to the fragile bond they had and help him forge something sturdier out of the ashes? He tried, on the spot, to come up with some excuses for her, to try and comfort himself that she would, one day, come around. She was scared, perhaps, of the others ridiculing their friendship. Or she was too proud to accept him as a friend: she could do better.
And yet the more he listened, the more he realised this wasn't just about him. He listened to her confessions about the pack, about being what they were, about being someone she truly wasn't. He understood (or, at least, he thought he did). He could never be her friend, her confidant, because he would only be a daily reminder of the agony they lived in. She didn't even want to be in the pack any more; what chance did he have of securing her as his? Especially when she had Phoebe.
A knot tightened in his windpipe.
(Clayton thought he'd be okay with this. He thought he'd be fine with loving from a distance, without reciprocation or acknowledgement on Violet's part. But this was proving a feat more difficult than he'd imagined. He had underestimated the strength of his own heart.)
"I'm not…trying to save you," he insisted, finding that he was unable to meet her eye. "I'm just trying to look out for you, the way you did for me. And if it makes you feel better, just imagine I'm not doing it out of friendship, but out of obligation." He couldn't keep the bite out of his words, that bitter disappointment of not being worthy enough, or not attaining the approval of his g o l d e n g i r l , who, second by second, seemed to be slipping from his grasp and into the brightness of better, greater things.
"I just want you to be happy too. I can tell this woman - Phoebe - makes you happy. Good. Go there more often. Just please be careful." His shoulders slumped; he felt so useless. Why hadn't he been the one to provide her with this sanctuary? Was it truly because they had 'too much history', as she so finely put it? "Just let me make sure you're okay. You're my packmate. I know you and I don't want to be in the same 'family', but we are. It's my duty to look out for you."
It's my heart telling me to protect you.
stay safe | clayton & violet
Hesitation. It didn’t matter how good a lie that followed would be, though it was transparent anyway, she knew from the amount of time it had spent grasping onto his tongue it would be a lie. He was here for a purpose and whatever it was, it would not hold good intentions.
"I didn’t ask what you were doing Clayton. I was asking why you were here, outside the gym. Don’t give me all that coincidence bullshit either.” There was no longer patience for pleasantries, he had found someone else to take that careful position. He was sleeping around outside of the pack. She expected such disloyalty to the rest of them, with their violet outrages, but with her it hit sharp. She had done more damage than any of them, yet the impression that he didn’t care for her had broken her enlarged ego to irreparable extents.
There’s a question that begged to leave her lips, tingling the edges. She was afraid to ask it, tear them further apart and let her knowledge known. It would be a low blow from someone filled with resentment and he would know it. Yet she asked it anyway, unable to stop the words from exploding. “Does she live around here?”
Her jaw clenched, she stares with venom at the pavement. She can’t let him see the water breaching her eyes. Her breathing was ragged but it wasn’t not cold enough for him to see visible evidence. For once, God had done her a favor.
She awaited his reply, not eager to hear the answer but intrigued none the less. It felt good to finally have been honest with him. Maybe if she knew more she wouldn’t feel this emptiness consume her, the dreams of Clayton smiling as she is in agony ceasing to exist. It’s an optimistic thought that she dares to think, but only because her options are non-existent. Like an atheist praying to God for final salvation before death, Violet had lost enough to gain the one things that destroys everyone - hope.
She saw right through him. As always, he felt small compared to her, like an insect under the glare of a microscope, being scrutinised, being scanned for injuries and wounds. That was not the case this time. This time, she was looking for truths, and she had secured her first with that blunt, knowing question.
He actually held his breath as she lowered her eyes to the ground. He could feel the heat (unwanted, hated) rush into his face, making him suddenly despised the sun hovering over them, watching like some curious spectator. She knew. Her question was posed as good as a confession: I know what you did. I know. And he realised that he had been too clumsy, assumed too much. Of course she had caught Elena's scent. They lived together, for god's sake, and she had the same abilities as him. Again, words fail to surface.
Oh how he must've looked like an idiot, standing there, expecting some m i r a c l e to whisk him away.
"She doesn't," he replied, and his answer was a confirmation, yes, I slept with someone. "I'm—"
He held his tongue. What was that? An apology? He fought to regain his whirling thoughts. He and Violet, they were not even friends; an 'I'm sorry' from him would have no standing between them, no meaning. "I - I'm here because…" go on, just fucking say it "because I've been following you. For your safety," he added in an anxious burst. "After you told me about the hunter girl, I couldn't just let you, y'know…this - this has nothing to do with Elena."
There, a name, something for her to seize on. It hit him, abruptly, how resentful she was of her existence, and of his night with her. He wanted to ask what it meant to her, why Violet couldn't even look up to meet his gaze. But this thought did not spark hope in him this time. For some reason, seeing her standing so resolutely apart from him, his mad desire to tell her what was in his chest was dampened, put out like a dying flame.
There was no room for his revelations today, not now. Especially not after the way she'd looked at that trainer, that woman.
"It was just a one night stand."
stay safe | clayton & violet
He was always with her. Following her every footstep, clouding every thought. She had seen little of him since the incident but it didn’t mean he wasn’t in her head constantly. Taunting her with his wide grin, his arms wrapped around the back of some female she had never seen. Violet’s stomach flipped as she saw his face light up in ecstasy while hers was ridden with regret and pain.
Perhaps this why she had been making her way to Phoebe’s more and more often. After River offered her a chance to make her own means, Phoebe had followed suit, giving her some experience working at the gym. It paid poorly, but Vi didn’t care much for the money. Both jobs gave her two separate things that meant more than green slips of paper ever could; the excitement of investigation, the company of a beautiful woman.
Recently, her connection with the Amazon had surpassed friendship, though physically it had not reached any new heights. Still Violet had found a fascination with the females lips, her shaped thighs tightly wound in black cotton. Up until now Violet hadn’t thought much about her sexuality. When she was younger, before the bite had made her incapable of emotional connection, it was frowned upon to look at women in any way that wasn’t friendly. Now things were different and Phoebe’s fire was hard to resist.
(But it would never go further than a daydream) (Violet could not live with the jealousy) (Nor the vision of Clayton embedded in her mind) (Which not even the woman could subdue)
She saw him that evening, hiding behind a post. Had he seen the way she gazed at her boss with passionate lust? Even if he had, would he think anything of it? Would he feel the heartache she did when she inhaled the sweaty scent of another on his skin? The selfish part of her hoped so, but then Violet always had been cruel.
She had chosen to walk on like she had not seen him, though the knowledge of his eyes pressed against her back had made her stop and turn. “What are you doing here?” she asks with bitterness seeping though her voice. She’s giving him the opportunity to be free of her pathetic grasp but he seems intent on not taking it. Or maybe he has already moved on, only haunting her to repay all the burns that she had made on his heart.
For a numb second, he actually thought she was going to ignore him, allowing him to head into the shady alleyways where he could vanish safety. But then - with a jolt - he heard her behind him, only a few paces behind, and he could almost feel her eyes boring into the back of his head. He swallowed before stopping in his tracks and facing her. She looked athletic in her sportswear; attractive, even.
But it hurt to look at her now. It hurt, because his newborn thoughts about her (which had emerged while he stood with his head against her bedroom door) had stayed with him, refusing to let him sink back into blandness. It was both a blessing and a c u r s e . Every time his eyes landed on her, he saw her differently, as though the sun had changed its hue and was showing her in a new, blinding light. Her hair seemed more alluring than ever, her lips beautiful even when turned in a frown; and her eyes, well, they hurt him the most.
Because he knew she did not feel the way he did about her.
It was obvious in her scowl, the lack of warmth, a gaping contrast between her voice that day in the park. And the difference was enough to make him question himself and his foolhardy heart. Did he, in fact, love her? How could he? when she looked at him with such indifference, the same as before. He was completely, wholly stupid, for believing that a change in his heart would be reflected in reality.
(It seemed that she would never cease to inspire hope within him.)
"I um…" He was biding for time, trying to come up with a perfectly reasonable excuse, but of course there was none; at least, none came to mind. Should he come clean now? Would there be any point in delaying the inevitable? He could already hear her pressing questions, demanding the truth.
"I was just out for some air." The lie sounded weak even to him. He knew she would rip it apart, use the same ruthlessness he had seen in her when she dealt with the pack's enemies. "That's all."
Sweet Dreams Violet Moore
They parted without a word uttered, only tears as conversation. His tender hands had wrapped up her shame in white bandages. How many times had she done the same for him? Yet somehow this was different. He’d walked out the door when she wanted him to hold her, walked around with that scent.
The scent of another laced around his neck and on his lips around and within his clothes. He reeked of her. Whoever she was, she managed to hurt just as much as the other who had tormented her with a silver blade. This was a whole other realm of torture.
It wasn’t pain. It was grief.
She had wanted Clay to move on for so long that it hadn’t occurred to her how she would feel when he found someone else. Someone to plaster his wounds, someone to take care of him. Violet didn’t love him the way that this other wolf would. But Clayton had always been hers, and now he belonged to someone else.
The cuts stung as she tossed in her sheets. Her throat was closed up with the fear of the small girl granting Vi’s death wish, her eyes burned from the heartache of losing the only one she cared for. She tried to focus her mind on eradicating the issue, but only murder came to mind and it came as little comfort. She would hide in the other corner only to find herself wondering if he had gone to the other.
No where to run poor, pathetic Violet Moore. A monster exists purely in the darkness; there’s no light for you to own.
Exhausted from the night, her fear of the living gave way to the fear of her fantasy. A man with black hair and a skinny frame stood before her holding a silver knife, behind him a tiny girl spinning a silver bracelet. They were together as they moved. One step, slowly made. Violet was on a table, braces wrapped around her body restricting her movement. There was a growling that lingered in the air.
"Clay, what’s happening?" He was not in wolf form how could he growl with his voice so low and so eerie. "Clay, please help me, please." He stopped and the girl who followed him now moved to his side like it was a game of chess. Motionless they listened as the unknown howled. There was no moonlight but she could feel the darkness crawl beneath her skin.
She had been here before. In a grey tin room with no windows but a door that teased her with it’s golden handle. Unreachable, ready to be pushed. Then it came. The bite and then her first howl.
The two observers smiled as they watched a girl be murdered and a monster risen to take it’s place.
The screams of pain must have been loud because even the cold Gavin had rushed to her room to hold her down. He would never give up the opportunity for a fight, but this wasn’t the kind he was interested in. She gave him her thanks for holding her down and he left with a strew of complaints and curses to fill the air but one sentence rang through her eardrums as if they were still leaving his mouth.
Whoever the fuck caused that damage, make sure they are fucking dead.
The face of a young girl was soon joined by the appearance of a familiar male. Both of them mocking her with bright, gleaming smiles.
stay safe | clayton & violet
He had never meant to let it get this far. Clayton was not a proactive man, never taking on jobs for the sake of the pack, but somehow, for Violet, things just got out of hand on their own. It had started as pestering thoughts as he returned from the forest, after another fruitless search for possible hunters spying on them. During ever waking second he worried for her, wondering if it was okay to just let her go about her 'normal' life outside the shelter of their home. He couldn't cease the nagging voices, no matter how much she avoided him and acted like nothing was wrong.
Taking matters into his own hands, he started following her. He would wait until she'd left the house before stepping out and tracking her scent, letting her drift out of sight so she wouldn't spot him. He knew with a strange solidness that he was doing the right thing. This was justified. There was method to this madness, but more importantly there was a purpose. And that purpose was to preserve the one who was vital to him; without her, there was no Clayton Doyle.
And yet that was besides the point, because he was not protecting her for his sake, he was doing so for hers.
But following Violet through her day-to-day wanderings brought an unexpected surprise. After the first few days, he realised that she was visiting a gym rather frequently, and one day he spotted one of the trainers, a tall, well-built woman, and she was talking to Violet, and Violet was talking back, and…and he had never quite seen that expression on her face before. Something like admiration and envy; she even looked a little flustered at one point. And no matter how hard Clayton convinced himself that this meant absolutely n o t h i n g , he couldn't quite shake the image of the pair from his mind, leaving him moodier and surlier than normal.
And that was what let to his downfall, to his exposure. He was watching her say goodbye to the trainer again when he realised that he was too late. Violet was already heading his way while he leaned against the lamppost suspiciously, and he was sure she'd already glimpsed his face, but he turned around as naturally as possible and kept walking down the street, hoping to out-stride her, his heart pumping. He was still brooding over how happy she looked as she waved goodbye, and he cursed himself for his feelings. Violet had almost caught him red-handed because of them.
Or maybe she already had.
Shit.
I am not okay, but not okay is how I’ve learned to live.
Don’t be fooled, M. L. L. (via gasaii)
u n s a i d — dedicated to violet moore and clayton doyle
and we are leaving some things unsaid and we are breathing deeper instead
He had finally managed to calm her down, having muttered false words in order to cease the flow of tears from her glistening eyes. "It's gonna be okay. We'll figure it out. You'll be fine." Things he too wanted to believe, for her sake. And now he watched her walk up the stairs, her head held low, ruffled raven hair spilling down her back like a dark, trickling waterfall. Thud, thud, thud, and she was gone from view. He waited, then, sure enough, he heard her door close: a small, defeated sound, as though their talk had made such a mundane task an effort, a toll on the soul.
Heading back into the living room, Clayton gathered all the bloody pieces of tissues and bandages and threw them into the bin. Cleaning up the evidence, so that when Violet woke up tomorrow, she wouldn't have to be reminded of her troubles, and could live in an unworried fantasy for just a little longer. He owed that much to her, right? After all the times she had sat with him in this very room, sealed his gashes, wiped away his blood, looked at him with something other than pure loathing—
Click. Lights off. The darkness seeped in, tugging at his weary limbs, come to bed, go to sleep. He let his feet (and the shadows) take him to the stairs and carry him up into the gloomy hallway. He turned and walked softly, heading for his room…
He stopped.
Visions of another life came to him. A woman - a werewolf - moaning beneath him. A flick of the head, hair covering her face, and it was Violet pressed against him; it was her arms linked around his neck, and it was her breath on his lips, and it was her that he wanted to hold and touch and kiss.
His heart was racing when he realised he had stopped at Violet's door. It stood between them, a solid board of old wood, and Clayton approached it, praying that she was both awake and asleep, for he could not understand why his mind had slotted her in Elena's place that night. The switch had only lasted for a fraction of a second - a flash of time both minuscule and incomprehensible - and yet it had left Clayton shaken and disturbed. Violet had pushed him away. She didn't want him. It was so clear that it made Clayton's head ache. Then why, why, on the night that he had wanted to forget her, had he forlornly, blindly, instinctively craved for her?
The wolf stood before the door, too afraid to knock, but also too burdened to move on. Something was rooting him here. Maybe it was the danger that now hovered over Violet's head. Someone had hurt her, and could well hurt her again if she wasn't careful. He recalled running his fingers over her wounds and bruises, assessing the damage, and a storm grew inside him. Knowing that she had been injured hurt him more than any physical wound on his own body ever could. He wanted to find whoever had done this to her, to make them suffer as much as she had. Funny, how she could do this to him, make him want to lash out, something he'd never done for himself.
And maybe that was why it didn't matter that she had cut him off. Not only did he care about her; he needed her simply to exist and be. All along he had tried to disguise it as some sort of curiosity or appreciation for all the help she'd given him. He had painted his motives cold and emotionless. But no. They were only lies. The truth - the honest, hard-hitting truth - behind his insistence and desire for closeness was simply because Violet Moore was the one thing that kept him going. She was his life source. He sought energy and the will to live every time her eyes flickered over to meet his; he discovered hope every time her fingers brushed against a long scab puckering his skin; and, most unexpectedly of all, he had unearthed love on the day he took her to the park, when her laughter had filled the air and drowned out the jazz music, which was no match for the happy words that burst from her lips and the radiant smile blossoming on her face.
Clayton grappled with these thoughts. He tried to burn them, to throw them back into the pit they'd came from, but he was poisoned, and all of a sudden his heart was weak, but fuller, much, much fuller, so much so that he felt fit to burst.
I love you.
It was unsaid, and it was the most honest thing he had ever known, and it comforted him, knowing that the echoes of his mind would remain in this house and follow her as she went about her life. A lightness buoyed him; he was free of this secret. It was out, a true thought, exploring the cracks and tears of the hall and seeping into Violet's room, maybe even dancing beside her ear as she drifted in her sleep. Or was she awake? Standing a few feet in front of him, breathing deeply, while more unspoken confessions caught in her throat?
He could write songs about her, he realised, as his forehead rested against the door. He shut his eyes and imagined telling her, letting her play with the thoughts of a dead man, who had nothing left in the world except for her. How had he lived thus far without knowing any of it? Perhaps he'd been too scared to delve and understand; not knowing was better, a philosophy he'd long stood by when it came to matters of the heart. He placed his hand on the doorknob. Her scent coated the cold metal surface, and he knew he could walk in, do it right now, sit on the edge of her bed, watching her stir and rise in anger at his intrusion, then slowly understanding, just like he was doing now as he stood there, head against the door, wondering if she'd be even more distressed if she knew…
Creak.
Clayton nearly gasped, and only just managed to bite down on his tongue at the sudden noise downstairs. He let go of the doorknob (and a billion possibilities) and turned to the staircase. An old fear took him. Was it a hunter? Here to silence Violet, to stop her warning the pack? It could have been the wind, could have been a rat skittering across the floorboards, could have been anything, but all he could think about, standing in the dimness, was Violet.
He turned his back on her bedroom door and went down the stairs. Nobody there. But it wouldn't hurt to go out and look around, make absolutely sure that they were alone, that she was safe. He didn't bother putting on a coat before stepping onto the sidewalk, the streetlamps shining on him, as though pointing him out, look, a man acting for love, fighting for it, a hero.
The street was deserted, and he supposed it was finally time to accept reality. From this point on, he would endeavour to be a hero, someone who could protect Violet, who could make her stay on this damned earth a less tragic journey, and whether or not it included him, well, that didn't matter. It really didn't. He made his way toward the looming forest, and he knew deep in his core that he was willing to die for the one person who'd given him such hope and longing. He was aware of many things now, and, subconsciously, emerging from the depths of his mind, his memories became brighter, clarified, like they were yesterday's stories: long nights spent in utter silence except for the scratch of bandages and the ticking of the clock, not wanting to be anywhere else; hand-in-hand, her fingers slim but with a firm grip, strolling beneath the canopies together whilst music followed them like birds; watching her cry and feeling like the heavens had deserted them, leaving them to fend for themselves, lonely and scared and like children again; seeing her in Elena's place, half-delusional, not knowing that his mistake would lead to an unborn child and more bloodshed and a deeper hunger to end his life; standing in front of her door, drained, thinking, sensing the growing war between hunters and werewolves and feeling like he belonged with her.
Clayton Doyle walked between the trees and let the black unknown swallow him whole.
And we are leaving some things unsaid And we are breathing deeper instead
Break my heart. Break it a thousand times if you like. It was only ever yours to break anyway.
Kiera Cass, The One (via quoted-books)
How I’d love to get away from here and be someone else for a while in a place where no one knows or expects certain things from me.
Libba Bray, A Great and Terrible Beauty (via b-ookquotes)