#para 06

[justcallmebeau-blog]

Para || Call It Comfort

WHO: Beau & Belle WHEN: 1/27/17 WHERE: Beau’s apartment WHAT: After Belle gets into a fight with Augustus everything comes crashing down, and despite the usual worry about hanging out on campus she comes by Beau’s apartment for comfort.

Beau hadn't been expecting company. He'd opted out of going back to the studio tonight, not up to the drive, and when Belle had stopped responding to his texts he'd let himself get comfortable with ice cream in one hand and a book in the other. Staying in wasn't the plan he'd had in mind but right now it wasn't the worst one. The knock startled Beau out of his reverie but what got to him even more was the visibly upset friend on the other side of the door. "Belle? Come in," he murmured, arm going around her as he herded her inside. "What happened, love?!"

Belle: She barely waited until she was over the threshold and the door closed behind her before she wrapped her arms around him, burying her face against his shoulder. Belle hadn't consciously decided that it was okay to let herself fall apart with Beau but once it started she couldn't stop it, her shoulders shaking as she cried quietly. She'd never been a wailer or a loud hiccuping sobs type, more prone to quiet crying jags in the safety of solitude on the rare occasion she needed the release. She let go of him with one hand to rub at her chest, only then realizing that she'd grabbed her inhaler on her way out of her car. She could still probably handle the attack without it. Maybe. Sort of. "I-I can't," she stumbled, shaking her head and closing her eyes tight as she gave up and sucked in the medicine. Hating the lack of control over her own reactions.

Beau didn't ask questions as he bundled Belle up in his arms. God knows he wanted to, wanted to ask exactly who fucking hurt her to have her breaking down in a way he'd never seen before, but he held the questions inside for now. One hand stayed low on her back rubbing small circles, the other hand mimicking the motion at the base of her neck. "Hey, hey, are you -" The second Belle went to inhale Beau was guiding her over to the couch and pulling her onto his lap. Unlike their earlier conversations this was entirely for comfort. His heart was breaking just watching her so upset. "I've got you, baby girl. I've got you. Don't have to talk."

Belle: The medication helped ease the beginnings of hyperventilation but everything still felt tight and condensed, yet falling apart at the same time. Belle focused on his hands rubbing circles on her back and then on his warmth when he wrapped around her on the couch. That, more than anything, helped bring her back down to somewhere near level. The tears kept coming and she didn't even try to stop them, didn't have the energy. "Sorry. I'm sorry." Shaking her head, she coughed and pressed closer against him, slowly letting him calm her down from the worst of it. "I think...I think I'm okay."

Beau smoothed a hand through her hair, combing through it in a way that always made him feel like either purring or going to sleep. There was a song his Da had sung to him as a kid that he hummed a few bars of until Belle seemed to be calming down some. "Don't apologize. Tell me who's getting socked in the jaw, but don't apologize love." A brief kiss was placed to her forehead and both arms wrapped even tighter around her like he could somehow protect her from everything like this. "Or don't talk at all. Whatever you need, I've got you."

Belle: Belle pulled back to look at him, frowning. "What? No one. God, if you're going to lose your job it'll be because you couldn't possibly resist me anymore, not because you punched some jerk in the face." She made the joke half-heartedly, sniffing as she pressed her forehead against his and closed her eyes again. She barely had the energy to hold herself up, let alone feel badly about leaning on her friend so heavily. "Besides, it wasn't just that, and unless you punch...wellness basically everything in my life right now... It's just been a really long week."

Beau 's arms just wrapped tighter, eyes closing when their foreheads met. "Yeah. Yeah, we'll hold off on the violence. Save it for the passion." Even if it was only to not make things worse for Belle. It felt vaguely reminiscent of when she'd been comforting him over the Martin and Malcolm mess, and he just hoped he could soothe her the same way. "Talk to me. You can tell me about all of it, and let me do what I can to help. Please." Not that Beau didn't fully understand how stubborn his friend could be, but he was hoping.

Belle: Crying should have made her feel better, but all it did was made her achy and tired all over. Slowly, she nodded and told him about her issues back home, an abridged version of the politics but mostly the people saying she couldn't do her job from clear across the country playing with paints. She told him, briefly, how she was doubting her whole show concept when, so close to the deadline, she couldn't possibly start fresh. Frankie was supposed to help with that, at least, but what if he couldn't? "He's just a guy I knew back at one of my old boarding schools. Old southern money and he thinks he's better than everyone else. We got into it when we were kids and it's just never been friendly between our families. I didn't know he was going to be here and it threw me off, just tipped me over the edge I guess." The only thing she didn't tell him was that it was harder than she'd thought to not be free to be visibly friends with him. He didn't need that on his mind, and she was certain it was just as difficult on his end too. "He said I was just playing at being an artist. And maybe I am, I don't even know. I have to pick eventually, don't I?"

Beau let her talk as much as she needed to, listening and absorbing and maybe there was only so much that he could do to help Beau but an ear was simple. "First of all, fuck everyone else. I know it's not crazy easy for you to focus on how wrong they are, but it's true. Frankie's going to be exactly what you need and if you need another opinion just hunt me down." The whole time he was talking his hands were running through Belle's hair, working through any tangles and not taking away any of the physical comfort. "The guy sounds like someone worth getting a stiletto to the face," he said, not all that kindly. "Which if you ever do please invite me to the show. Or let me help kick his face in," Beau grumbled, bitter he couldn't do more. "Why should you have to pick? You can be the savvy businesswoman ​and​ the crazy talented artist. You're already doing it, a degree is really just going to cement that. I mean, I know everything I'm saying sounds so biased but it's ​not​."

Belle: "You can borrow my shoes but I don't think they'll fit." She laughed quietly, curling up on his lap a little more comfortably and settling her head on his shoulder. She could feel his heartbeat with a hand settled on his chest, slow and steady. "I have to pick. It's a demanding job and I can only delegate so much before I have to be the one to handle things. And don't get me wrong, it's a good job. I'm good at it, I might be able to do important things with it, even, but..." She shook her head again and sighed. "I just don't want to make the wrong decision and only find out later that it should have been something else

Beau let out a genuine laugh, though it was quiet and barely-there, not wanting to disturb the atmosphere in the room. "Might have to find someplace my size just to do some arse-kicking," he said solemnly. "If you do have to pick, though I maintain there's a way to balance the two somehow without it taxing you too much, then you're going to pick artist." There was no doubt in his voice, no hesitation at all. When Beau looked at Belle now versus her when they'd first met ​this​ Belle was the one who seemed to really fit. "Hey, hey. Sweets. You're going to let yourself finish classes before you force a decision on yourself, for one. For two you have my vote but you'll have support no matter what route you go. For three, seriously, smack the shite out of anyone trying to pressure you into a decision right now."

Belle: He was so calm and determined that it was difficult to keep arguing with him, even though a part of her still wanted to. She nodded once slowly, then with a little more gusto as he continued, sliding her arms around his middle to hug him tightly. "Thank you, Beau." Wanting badly to kiss him, really kiss him, she only pressed a small chaste kiss to his chest above his heart. "Thank you. I just- god, I'm tired," she let out a shaky laugh, nuzzling against him. "And I shouldnt be here. Bad enough the stupid gossip blog is speculating, the headmistress doesn't need an excuse."

Beau smiled warmly down at Belle and pushed her hair back from her face. The simple gestures were so easy between them, and those were what he was going to cling to until the semester was over. "Anytime, sweets. You know my door's open for you." As much as he wanted to argue with Belle, to assure her that no one would care what she was doing there, he knew that it was risky to assume that. Even if it was bullshit anyone would assume... or not so bullshit in their case, but that was their business not anyone else's. "Let me take you home at least? I can drive your car if you trust me to, get you something warm to drink on the way back and make sure you get settled inside." Almost as an afterthought, "and I can call an Uber back here." Beau's pleading face was strong, the worry taking precedence over anything else.

Belle: Belle nodded her head, agreeing to whatever he thought would be best for her, too drained to really do much deciding for herself at the moment. "That's fine. I have tea at the house I can make." Tracing her fingers along the worry lines on his face, Belle leaned in and kissed him slowly, gently. There was no heat behind it at all, but she needed to have that sort of connection with him. Just for a moment. When she felt like she didn't want to pull away she made herself, tightening her arms around him before pulling herself together and standing. "I'll be okay. I promise. You can drive me home and I'm just going to sleep for a while."

Beau held the kiss as long as Belle allowed it, letting himself take the reassurances and comfort that came through most clearly in her affection. This time he didn't try to prolong contact or tease her in any sense but he did link their arms as he led her to the door. It could be taken as something very innocent and it was dark enough around campus that he wasn't all that worried. "Thank you. Makes me feel better. You're getting a text first thing tomorrow - which might be pretty late for me given my sleep schedule." The tenderness still hadn't left his voice but he'd already deemed the situation worth it as long as she allowed it.

[instantfrustrationjustadddaniel]

After The Storm || Para 06

Charlotte felt the temperature change as darkness crept in from all angles.  The cool, crispness of the air set her on edge and she felt each time she blinked her surroundings altered.  Within moments she was in a place otherworldly and foreign to her like the way she had hallucinated the hell that Evangeline put her through.  Charlotte staggered backward a few steps, each footfall producing a sound like splintering bones, but there were no other signs of movement around her. The girl peered over her shoulder checking the ground behind her before peering up through the tree line of twisted and warped branches and crooked trees at a thick looking sky the color of dust.

The world around her blurred as Charlotte looked ahead of herself again and moved along.  She cursed the sound of the floor of the dead forest crackling and crunching below her feet as she knocked and bumped her way through the gaps between the distorted trees.  The air met with her to produce a coldness in temperature on the surface of her skin that made her feel it turned her bones to ice, save the searing, blistering pain of her dying arm.  She knew its venom had spread by the way her muscles felt weak, her breathing labored, her vision blurred and her mouth tasted like blood to her. But there had been talk of a cure and Charlotte couldn’t justify discounting it yet.

Her time was up by means of Evangeline’s contract and she found herself in a scenario more disheartening than her death at Evangeline’s hands might have.  That would have marked her clearly as the prey but as she staggered along in the freezing, sunless light of the forest she knew she was equally hunter and prey.  She was to kill Caleb, or he her. If she could find him she could explain—neither of them had to die. There was a plan. There was still hope. If she could be saved he could too. If he would listen he might have hope. Unless Jericho was defeated. Then what may happen to Charlotte would be unknown but she put a heavy belief in the possibilities each ending with her death.

The farther Charlotte walked the more intensely her lungs ached from the sharpness of the frigid air.  She tried to distract herself; his warm hand around hers, their bed, warm laundry, stained sheets, the warmth of freshly dug soil, the surprising heat of someone’s blood on her skin. Wrong. Again: her hand in hers, wrapped in sheets, a knife through butter, adrenaline rush—thick sheets of ice fracturing underfoot. 

The hair on Charlotte’s arm raised as she turned to look back but a blow to the throat pulled her breath from her chest and a grating impact pushed her vision to black.  Her nails clawed at the muscled wrist and she heard the sound of her own suffocation nails on a chalkboard.  She hit the forest floor before she even knew he released her. Charlotte thrashed onto her back, her ribcage pitched upward and sunk again and again as she took in gasping breaths trying to fill the cavern of her chest again.  Though blurred around the edges she could make out Caleb prowling over her body.

“Stop,” she commanded, but her voice betrayed her conviction and released a quiet, hollow cough. It took more effort than she knew she had left in her body to turn onto her side.  She placed her palms to the frostbitten ground and tried to push herself upright.  Caleb came close and gripped the front of her shirt suspending her shoulders.  Her head felt like it was swimming with lead and wilted in midair as she willed her eyes to focus on him. “We don’t have to…”

“I wish it were true,” Caleb consoled her softly. But it wasn’t a consolation for Charlotte. It was a selfish want to keep her as his own and dissect every dimension of her.  “I admired your work. I wanted to learn from you.”

Charlotte felt her body release an involuntary shudder and he released his grip on her, watching her body fall and settle in the dust. 

“You were supposed to be the best,” Caleb hissed at her in the accusatory tone that came with disappointment.  “But you won’t die. You’ll never die.”

“What?” Charlotte breathed in a haze.

“You’ll never die,” he repeated.  “You’re Jack the Ripper, you’re the Axeman of New Orleans, the Zodiac Killer, you killed the Black Dahlia, don’t you understand? I’m going to kill you, but you’re never going to die. You left your mark, your signing card. People already talk about your serial killings, and they’re never going to find you now. They’re going to talk about you for years, forever.” Caleb stooped low, twisting a lock of her hair around his dirty fingers.  “I’m the one who has been passed the torch.”

“You need to listen to me,” Charlotte said in a slow, stern voice.  She’d recuperated strength enough to speak.  “We don’t have to this. The angel, he’s helping us.”

“If I wanted an angel I would have prayed,” Caleb told her, as if he were talking to a small child.  When he saw Charlotte’s eyes flash and lips part to speak again he lifted his hand and pressed a grimy finger to her lips. “Shh. I’m going to take care of you until she’s ready.”

The adrenaline piped hot through Charlotte’s system and as Caleb’s gaze wandered and at the first moment of opportunity her arm flew out clutching a fallen tree limb. She couldn’t kill him, so she would have to run long enough to outlast the war between the fallen angel and the demon.  When Caleb turned back to her she thrust upward from the ground barring him away from her with it before using the limb as leverage to pull herself up from the ground.  She felt like she was looking at the surreal forest she was in through frosted glass.  She was severely slowed down by her dizziness, her inability to focus her eyes and the low hanging limbs and tree trunks she stumbled over and into. 

Charlotte turned to peer over shoulder as she sprinted and saw no one behind her.  She directed her gaze forward again, her unruly hair blinding her from the thick root she tripped over.  She tumbled some distance before her body rolled to a stop. The small cuts and splinters from the terrain were nothing compared to the pain in her arm and her ankle.  She grimaced and whimpered as she forced herself to sit up, pulling her pant leg up to reveal an already swollen ankle. 

From between the darkened shadows of two trees Caleb limbered into sight in a slow, casual pace.  Charlotte looked to each side for the stick she’d run with, her only defense. As he drew nearer, Caleb stooped low and picked it up, dragging the end of it behind him.

“You shouldn’t have run,” he laughed sadistically before he shook his head.  He circled her slowly and she kept her eyes on him noting a small slope behind her as he made his path around her.  “I was going to make it easy for you, but you had to run.” He tapped her ankle with the end of the stick and grinned as she cringed. In short, staccato syllables he instructed her,  “Don’t run again.”

Caleb turned his back to her lifting and inspecting the stick, it’s weight, and length.  Charlotte’s chest sputtered in short, rapid breaths as she stared at his back.  His shoulders lifted in time with his hefty sigh and his head shook slowly.  “You shouldn’t have run,” he echoed, pivoting quickly and bringing the end of the small tree limb down with shattering force on Charlotte’s knee cap.  “I can’t trust you, Charlotte!” he roared, his volume suddenly built up and his voice furious. He brought the heavy branch down over and over between her knee and ankle.  As he grew fatigued and breathless his aim grew sloppy and a stray blow clipped her hipbone before Caleb heaved the branch away from himself. “I have to keep you here, I have to make her happy.”

His words were lost on the girl.  On contact her body contorted and she let out a piercing scream.  The pain was consuming and the felt the hot, thick flow of her blood soak into the fabric of her pants as she writhed on her back choking rather than breathing. Her body took on a sudden stiffness and her hands balled into such tight fists her nails cut through her flesh.  She grit her teeth hard, her body refused to let her breathe, but nothing lessened the pain. She pulled her arm over her face and buried her eyes in the crook of her elbow.

Caleb kneeled next to her and took her wrist in his hand.  He pulled her arm away look at her face, a grin spreading across his face as she made eye contact with him.  His hand pinned Charlotte’s good wrist to the floor, his other hand lifted a lock of her hair watching as she strands sift from his fingers and stick to the wet planes of her cheeks.  “You don’t have to cry,” he soothed as he shook his head.  The words came with a stomach-wrenching undertone like a laugh.  “You have a while left until she’s ready for you.” The tips of his fingers traced the glistening trails of tears on Charlotte’s face.

Charlotte shut her eyes as she turned her head to the side refusing to look at Caleb.  The pain in her leg was nearly too much for her to handle. Her breathing was ragged and forced by heavy concentration.  With each pump of her heart, which beat clumsily against her ribcage, she felt a warm wet sensation soaking her jeans further.  She forced herself to look, her neck craned to look at the source. The leg of her pants looked all wrong, stained black by her contaminated blood. That was nothing compared to the shape of it and wide slashes in the flesh.  The form hardly resembled a working leg and she could see muscle, open veins, bone.

The air around the two changed suddenly.  The sunless, strange sky cracked and a harsh wind howled, building and building.  The noise became unbearable and it made the air thick as the howling grew stranger and frigid cold blowing over the two of them and the screech became nearly deafening.  Caleb scrambled to his feet wide eyed and desperate.  He mouthed Evangeline’s name time and time again before he croaked it stumbling toward the tree line. Charlotte watched him for a moment knowing there were only mere seconds before his temper went up in flames again.  With great pain and effort Charlotte managed to flip her body.  She released a hollow sounding yelp, stretched her work arm out before her and used it to drag her body.  She bit her bottom lip to keep herself silence and tasted the metallic flavor of blood from her split lip.  She stretched her arm as far as she could, painfully, but grabbed hold of the club-like stick, rolling onto her back.

Caleb felt the rage well up in him as he realized Evangeline was gone.  He turned on Charlotte approaching her quickly. She was weak, she was nothing, as good as dead already but she would suffer just as he had.  Charlotte held the stick away from her body to keep him at a distance as he approached. “Caleb, it’s over,” she pleaded. “It’s done you don’t have to-Neither of us have to-Both of us can live, without her just-“

She hadn’t meant to. For so long, she hadn’t meant to, but Charlotte destroyed.  She found, she touched, and her touch was destruction.  He fell, his chest making contact with the end of the branch but it pierced him cleanly and his weight became dead weight.  His body slid down the length of it and as the deception of the forrest faded Charlotte felt cold metal—the fireplace poker in her hand and then the heaviness of the man’s body unanimated body and heated blood spurting between his body and her up.  She shifted her eyes straight ahead making contact with the lifeless ones of Caleb.  It started as a tremor and grew until she couldn’t breathe and the panic only felt worse by the second.  She tried to shove him off of herself, let go of the poker and pushed with all her might but soon it was too much and she couldn’t breathe or think or fight anymore.  She busied her shaking hand with the cross and waited and waited shuddering under the burden of that body.

Charlotte shut her eyes, the fatigue finally setting in, and she could allow it.  Her chest slowed its slow rumble of sobs and finally found a stay pace of slow labored breath.  She fell into a light sleep that made her body feel warm and weak. Her body was draining with every passing second.  Or perhaps the pain was so mind-numbing that she only thought she slept.  In the strange fatigue her mind wandered from unexplored blue boxes to hot showers with her hunter when he came home to century old crosses to bright yellow tennis balls and the sweet trace of Oreos mixed with the heavy scent of scotch. 

_____

 Jericho rose from the floorboards of the main room and hurried to the side of the hunter to help him up after the collapse of the demoness.  He focused on his face hoping he had not misjudged the power of the final attack and cost the hunter bodily harm.  He lifted Daniel, his heart still pounding rapidly in his chest.  “Are you alright?” he practically barked at the man.  He couldn’t remember the last time it beat so fiercely and he tried to calm it down so that his other senses might help two of them.  Evangeline was dead, but he feared that things were far from finished.

“She’s alive,” he finally rasped, his voice full of a relief he honestly never expected to feel about a girl with a history like Charlotte.  He glanced at Daniel, still breathless and wary from the attack.  Charlotte’s signature was still there but it faded quickly and it was nose-diving at a rapid speed. 

Jericho hurried to the door nearly ripping off its hinges in his haste. It was in tack, completely, save one fireplace tool missing from the rack.  Angels and demons, for years, had implemented the tool of celestial hallucination to haunt, hinder or provide revelation and by the site in the middle of the room Jericho recognized that it had been used in an instant. 

“Help me get him off of her,” Jericho ordered, pulling the heavy body of Caleb off of Charlotte.  If he hadn’t had the senses humans lacked he would think the woman below was dead.  Blood and bone were everywhere and her skin felt like ice.  The situation was dire and he felt a real fear his end of the bargain wouldn’t be feasible any longer.  He looked at Daniel seriously, forcing the man to focus on him if he had to.  “Lay your jacket over her-we need to stabilize her temperature.”  He caught the small sensation of the girl stirring and opening her dim brown eyes.  He looked back to Daniel, lowering to her broken body.  “Talk to her,” he directed.  He lifted her leg healthy and grabbed Daniel’s arm directing him to take over holding it momentarily as he tied a tourniquet around her mangled leg.  “Put her head in your lap, carefully,” he told Daniel, taking over holding her leg.  He scrambled for his cellphone still speaking to the hunter as he dialed for help.  “She’s lost blood, a lot, and she’s fading fast. She might go into shock—you need to be prepared for that. Try to keep her with you.”

He left Daniel to his own devices as he gave quick information and directions into the phone, propping Charlotte’s leg against his shoulder, careful not to touch the injured one, and applied pressure through Daniel’s jacket to the gash on her side.  His eyes flickered toward Daniel to check on him as well.