lay so much destruction in its wake. It violently drags Lavinia Summers away from her make belief world; Elias Montgomery is no longer a pretty ill-fated boy who offered her sweet peaches and gave her toothaches from his even sweeter lips. His demeanor shifts, his gaze is unrelenting and grim. She is not used to this. There is a glint that promises a cataclysmic finale in his myraid pools of blue.

The air is thick, she shouldn't have asked about Holly.

There is a slight buzzing in her ear, a rapid beat of her heart out of fear that she might lose her lover and her creeping anxiety that she tries to shake off with the heat. She sits on their bed, the hot summer air wafting into the room. They met on a hot day like this, it seems too long ago.

She can't lose him, she thinks.

"She doesn't matter to me." He is thinking. Elias Montgomery has this mischievous glimmer in his eyes; like the universe whispers every conspiracy in his ear, like he knows every malicious thing you ever did—like he knows everything. Right now, he doesn't know.

"You said her name yesterday." Twice. Her words are barely a whisper. She cannot recognise her voice anymore.

Regret flashes in his eyes. She watches him and she realises that it's finally happening — you're going to leave me.

"Who is she?"

Stop.

She doesn't know why she presses on, but her name weighs heavier than her heart at the moment. She waits for him to come up with an excuse, any words of assurance and she would believe him. He doesn't need to say it because she can see it in his eyes—you're like the rest. He says nothing the entire time, tears build up in her glazed eyes while she swallows the painful bile in her throat.

"Who is she to you?"

Stop.

Stop.

"Lavinia," he warns. Drop it.

You're going to lose him.

The hurt is evident in her face, he can see it too. He wears a pained expression, like seeing her hurt is a double edged sword—it hurts him too. But he nurtures his silence, the words on the tip of his tongue are not meant to assure. They carry the weight of his past, the remorse and torment of his decisions. He stares at her and he almost breaks his silence. Almost. But his feet is rooted to the ground, his past is catching up with a fiery pace.

He cannot say a word.

Her vision is blurry, her quiet sobs fill the dreadful silence — she realises it has never been her. Her thoughts drift to Holly and she is filled with envy. She shakes her head at herself, she tries to bite down the sudden self pity that grows inside her. Her fingers tremble, her lips wobble slightly — "You are hard to love." Her mother's words ring in her head suddenly and she chokes on her sobs; he has never told her he loved her back.

She hadn't realised but unconsciously, she had placed him in the centre of her universe. He was her sun; light of her life, her warmth, her life, her soul. She was selfish, admiring him for the distance wasn't enough. Elias Montgomery was never truly hers, she believed she would be content as long as he was with her. Wanting wasn't enough; she yearned for the sun and so she flew too close to it. She gave him her heart.

But he never did. Not when—

"Okay," she accepts in a soft whisper. She catches the relief on his face, a dull ache settles within her. She gets out of bed and gathers her things. Eyes blurry and mind dazed, she moves around the room in a hurry. His presence suddenly feels suffocating.

"What are you doing?" His voice is shaky, the usual indication of arrogance in his tone is gone.

His eyes widen when he realises what she is thinking.

Stop!

"Lavinia," it sounds almost like a plea but boys like Elias Montgomery are deceiving like that. He calls her name like a tender yearn, it is raw and vulnerable; everything he is not. The pride of a god is gone, in its death lies a man just like the rest. It is almost as if he is saying it's not golden ichor but warm crimson blood that thrums in his blue green veins. "Stop." He voices her thoughts. Stop.

"You love her!" The build up erupts from her throat, she spits it in his face as if all the sugar coated poison he has fed her are finally affecting her. "You do. That's why—" she stops abruptly. He sees her hesitancy but he hears what she wants to say.

She is the reason why you don't love me.

"God, stop." His words sound equally pained. Her heart lurches in her throat, his own accelerates against his chest. She stands between him and the door, he pleads with his eyes. Don't leave. The ache in her heart grows, all she wants to do is hold him and tell him she's never leaving. But she doesn't. Instead, she curses him. She breaks down into tears, her breaths come and go like the high tides; roughly and quickly.

He walks to her cautiously as if he's afraid she will disappear any second. He gathers her in his arms and he releases a breath of relief. She trashes against his chest, crying and cursing him for making her feel like this. The anger leaves soon, she can never be mad at him for long. She blames herself, for being delusional—she let his words get to her. She lays motionless in his arms, her crying has stopped.

"You're wrong," his own voice softens when he looks at her. "You're wrong baby."

"I don't love her," he mumbles into her hair. "I don't care about her—" her eyes meet his and he sucks in a breath. "—not like I care about you." He says it with conviction and sincerity.

She shakes her head against his chest. "You don't," she cries. You don't.

Before he can say another word, she detaches from him. A look of affliction appears on his face, his lips turn into a frown. It is a contrasting image from the mischievous smirk he always has on or the haughty smile that effortlessly spreads on his lips. He looks intense with his emotions laid out in the open.

"You don't love me," she is aware of the words that leaves her mouth. It is easy; it has always been on the tip of her tongue. "I love you' and 'I care about you' are so similar, both professing love yet again, it is so different.

She takes his silence as an answer.

"Where are you going?" The roles are reversed. He was always the one leaving, she was always the one asking. STAY. He doesn't have to say it, she can hear it without the words.

This time, she is the one who walks out the door.

...

"Elias," she calls his name. There is something about the way she says his name; it is not the way each syllable leaves her lips with a soothing sigh, or the way she looks at him while she says it. It is the depth with which she utters his name, the promise she exhales. It is enough to convince him that there is no one who will love him like she does.

She finds him on the floor of their bedroom in the darkness, an unlit cigarette between his fingers almost as if he couldn't bring himself to light it.

He had heard the door click open when she came back. He doesn't ask her anything, where she has been or why she has returned. He simply opens his arms out for her and without a word she runs into his embrace. He holds her in a bone-crushing hug, burying his face in her neck. She caresses his hair as they sit in the darkness. He kisses her eyes, her nose, her cheeks, her lips. He presses a kiss on her forehead. It's them against the world. Despite everything, they find their way back to each other again. They are two entangled souls, no matter the distance, they will always meet halfway.

"Welcome home." He is defenseless, exposed and vulnerable. He cannot let her go, he holds her protectively and she snuggles into his warmth. She feels like she's home.

"I missed you," his words caresses her like a soft breeze in the summer's heat. "I have always since I left," he continues and her arms wrap around him tighter. He had missed her since he left that summer, she wasn't the only one.

"I missed you," he repeats again. I should have told you earlier. "I missed you. Stay, don't leave." He takes her hand in his.

She nods her head frantically. The hot breeze flows in through the curtains, nature always sympathises with tragic young lovers.

They stay like that for a long time that night. He tells her everything, he doesn't want to lose her twice. She listens intently, her eyes glimmering, so in love with a mortal, a god, a boy all at once. They go back to the past, she smiles when she hears him talk about the summer they saved each other. Her eyes widen with each revelation, he doesn't stop. She cries and holds him tighter when he touches a certain memory he fought so hard to forget. She tells him she loves him — I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU. At last, she falls asleep after crying in his arms — her home — with visions of him.

His eyes land on the unlit cigarette but he never picks it up. He lays down next to her, he realises he didn't need a cigarette tonight. He looks at her; his darling is so impeccable and she resembles an empyrean angel, so celestial, so ethereal and so delicate.

"I can't live without you," he whispers lightly, only the gods and the universe hears it. He falls asleep next to her, he never let go of her hand that night.

a/n: i said december, i didn't

specify which year so yay

early update? i'm kidding, i

apologise for the late update.

i am surprised, and happy

that people still pick up

this story. ty for reading :)