stay - you're most heartbreaking pairing :DDD
PROMPT: [here] PAIRING: [maeve & sean] WORDS: [843]
Maeve was a ruiner. A suffocater. She lay waste to every thing she touched and Sean was no exception. God, she wished he was but he wasn’t. With racing thoughts and an aching chest, terror and an overwhelming not enoughness clotting her veins, Maeve knew for certain she would let him down. He had pinned months of hope upon her when she didn’t know how to hold it, horrific nights spent in prison only made through with the thought that she would be there at the end of it. And she was. She was there. She was there when he stepped through those gates a free man and she was there when he was too weak to even undress, but she couldn’t stay any longer. In prison he saw her as this light at the end of the tunnel, something to live for. On the outs though… all he would see was just what he had subsided on for months. Someone foolish and fragile, full of empty promises and all festered inside. He would have her and he would love her and then, then he wouldn’t even like her. No one who loved Maeve ever liked her,
And Sean, Sean was someone she desperately needed to like her.
Unwilling to lose him to herself, the only option left was to run. Panic welled up in her chest and fought at her throat, struggling to claw free and make itself known. Unable to breathe right and keep her composure, bitter tears stung at her eyes. This had to happen. In desperation Maeve slipped from under the covers and the warmth they held. A soft groan stilled her with a shiver, a sick sort of chill that sunk heavy in her stomach.
"Maevie?" The sheer fright and worry that steeped his voice ruined her right then and there, she stood not a single chance. Not when it came to Sean.
"Aye?" Maeve breathed, her body tense and every muscle taut, prepared to run from a threat and a fist that never came. The soft smile that graced his lips instead killed her. How could she have expected so little of him?
"Where- where are y’going?"
Falling silent, she studied Sean’s faintly lit frame before her. The rise and fall of his chest pained her to watch, each breath rattly, ribs cutting sharp, harsh shadows across his skin with each inhale. Helpless like a child, that’s what he said he felt like earlier that day as she undid his buttons and soaped up his skin. As best she could Maeve assured him that all she was was a man standing in front of her, but now tangled in his sheets she wasn’t so sure. Painfully slim and so small, the only word she could grasp was childlike. Childlike and utterly breakable. Ugly bruises mottled his skin, all manner of scrapes and injustices he hadn’t deserved. Maeve took a deep breath and swallowed hard, swallowed away her fear and tucked it between her ribs. “Nowhere..” She murmured, leaning in to brush a gentle kiss to his forehead, lips lingering on the spot. With a shaken sigh she continued, her words a promise and a prayer and worst of all a lie. “I’m not goin’ anywhere…”
The way he spoke so certainly about her, so trusting when all she knew how to do was ruin, broke her heart. Blinking hard, Maeve struggled to do away with her tears, she didn’t deserve them, not really. “Just go back ta sleep, you’re safe now.. I gotchya.” No she didn’t, she didn’t even have herself. No one did and all she could do was free fall, waiting to hit the ground, waiting to break her back. God, at least everything would stop moving, at least her heart could stop beating so hard. Maeve dragged her fingers through his thick blond waves, long from months in prison. A thin smile ghosted over the corners of her mouth as he nestled close, content and peaceful, everything he deserved. “Shh. You’re safe now.” With a light touch she drew her fingers along the sharp line of his collarbones, over the M inked under his skin just for her. Slowly his ragged breaths eased into something gentler, deep and easy.
Maeve lingered for only minutes, slipping from the bed as soon as she knew he was asleep. Deep heavy shame weighted down her chest and slips down her cheeks in ugly tears, unable to believe she was doing this to him. Quickly she pulled her clothes back on, stumbled into her boots. Sean hardly stirred, lulled back to sleep from her comforts and saccharine sweet promises. Taking a ragged breath, Maeve made a break for the door, her steps light and her body tensed. Over the years she had learned to keep her existence to a minimum, body held so small that it hardly disturbed the air around her. At the door frame Maeve paused, daring just one look over her shoulder.
A sob caught in her throat.
