I know who brought me here.
Him.
He did, didn’t he?
Instead of taking me back home, he brought me to this strange place that for some reason doesn’t feel as strange as it should.
It’s his scent, I think, and all the white.
Last night I wasn’t thinking clearly.
I was hurt and sad and afraid. It was like someone was sitting on my chest, suffocating me. So I snuck out of the house to get some fresh air.
I wasn’t expecting to walk for so long or to end up at Blue Madonna. I wasn’t expecting to see him there either. I wasn’t expecting to be brought here.
When I come out of the hallway into the living space filled with soft blue-colored couches and cozy rugs and see him sitting at the marble kitchen counter, bent over something, I don’t expect to feel a painful twisting in my heart.
A deep angst in my gut.
Ledger did a number on him.
Last night I was so out of it, I barely noticed the extent of the damage he had done. But under the bright kitchen lights, I can see it all.
The red-purple bruises, dark and angry and so painful looking. Both his eyes are red and swollen. His lip is cut. His jaw is bruised up and I can’t be sure but I think his nose is dented.
Maybe I gasp or make a distressing noise at the pain that he must’ve felt last night, must still be feeling, because he looks up and his wolf eyes connect with mine.
All those conflicting feelings that I always experience when he’s around make my knees weak, but I pace myself and start with the most obvious thing. “This isn’t my home.”
Instead of answering me, those wolf eyes of his take me in and for the first time I realize what a wreck I must look right now.
My dress is all wrinkled. I probably have sleep lines on my face, or at least my features must be swollen with it, with sleep. My hair feels all messed up, flowing down my back, my braid coming untied during the night.
“You sleep well?” he asks.
“What is this place?” I ask, looking around. “What am I doing here?”
He pushes something away, a book, I notice, and straightens up. “It’s a vacation home.”
“What vacation home?”
“A place where people go to take a vacation.”
“Is it yours?”
“For now.”
I’m confused. “What —”
“You never answered my question,” he cuts me off. “Did you sleep well?”
“What? That’s not even the point. The point is —”
“The point is that you were tired. You could barely stand up. I had to carry you to my Mustang. So I’m asking you how are you feeling when you shouldn’t have been out at midnight in the first place.”
God.
Him and his stupid protectiveness.
