Caleb being the cause of his own possessive and manipulative tendencies is funny but also sad to me.
He wants to have you all to himself because he knows that after his staged death, you’ve belonged to the world. Nobody was tying you down, you had no one to return to anymore, nobody that you could call home anymore. But that exact same thing is what gives you so much power over him.
Because you had no choice but to get used to the loneliness. You know what it is like to lose loved ones, or at least to believe that you’ve lost someone close to you.
He knows that he needs you more than you need him, and that is why he is so desperate to win you back and convince you that you don’t need anyone else but him. Because he needs you, nobody but you.
So after having managed to narrow down the vast world around you until all that was left there was just him and you, it cuts him deep when, during an argument, you spew all his insecurities right at him. Especially so because those are simply truthful facts that he has never been proud of.
“I’ve been to hell and back for you, and with you.” The cold look in your eyes scares him, sends chills down his spine, and for a moment he doesn’t realize that he has stopped breathing. He braces himself for the inevitable, but hopes that you’re stronger than him. More compassionate than him. You’ve always been so.
“I’ve had to convince myself that I’d never see you again, Caleb. So what makes you think that I won’t be able to grieve for you a second time?”
It is only when he’s on his knees in front of you, clinging onto you as he sinks his fingers into each of your thighs and presses his forehead against your body-
With a shuddering breath, pleas falling from his trembling lips as the tears in his eyes threaten to overflow, Caleb realizes that he will never be your world.
You will be his lifeline, as much as his possible downfall. You will always have the upper hand because you know what a life without him is like while he would never even dare to imagine a world without you.