In The Shadows with a Gryphon
There was way too much of her left over from the first time. If he intends to get on with his life, he'll have to throw the leftovers away. Clean out the hard copies of memories that he wishes to all hell he could just erase from his brain.
He can make a valid excuse for it now. Though why he would need an excuse to get rid of her words, he can't explain. But, the computer needs upgraded and that means he should get a fresh new start. As for the disks, well, they're easy formatted and erased.
Slowly, he pulls a chair over to the computer and sits down to do what should have been done ages before. He clicks open files and folders and dumps them unhesitantly into the recycling bin. He's angry now, as he watches the words blur on the screen. He's finally angry enough to just toss them all away.
~~she startles awake as she feels that same insistant and familiar tug on her heart and soul. Her body trembles head to toe as she listens for the first time in weeks to the whispered pleas of the man she has surely lost forever. He is begging her to come closer, but she knows he cannot feel himself doing it and she doesn't know if he could even feel her there so she debates the action, but her heart wins and she closes her eyes and moves to him. She presses herself into a corner between a chair and a wall and watches his fingers fly over the keys~~
This task is taking far longer than he'd expected, and he is starting to feel the burden of getting rid of the past. For some odd reason, his head seems to be spinning with little tiny thoughts that wont stay still long enough to make any sense. He wonders if the others are going to be home soon, he needs company tonight, and if he knew there were people in the house maybe he wouldn't be so surprised to feel the breath on his neck. Maybe he wouldn't keep turning around to see who is behind him (cause they're is nothing behind him) if he knew they were home.
Cursing like the man he is, the gryphon turns the volume higher on the raucous heavy-metal music that he's chosen. She hates that music, he knows, and somehow that just makes it all more fitting. He's through the hard drive now, he thinks....just a little more to go and she'll be out of his computer and his life forever.
~~her nose wrinkles and she covers her ears with her hands as she leans forward to see exactly what it is that he's doing. Damn him, calling her here like that, just so he could try to drive her back again with loud music and that mad grin. She's worried about the grin, he doesn't seem quite functional right now. But, she can only do what is within her power so she touches his head lightly and smiles as he sneezes from the light brush of her hair against his face. Oh, he knows she's here alright, he just doesn't want to admit the fact that its what he wanted~~
He closes his eyes for a moment, trying to hold off a second violent sneeze. What is it with this allergy all of the sudden. He looks for the cat, but knows that is not the problem. His head, thank goodness, is a little better now. Quickly, he decides to finish the process of removing her as effectively as possible. He works on, till he finds a file with her name on it and page after page of letters inside. And, though he knows he should just hit the button, he doesn't hit it immediately. Instead, he reads what she has said.....or what the woman she pretended to be said...and his body shudders from the memories that brings.
**There's the letter where she told me that I was lucky to have such a good girlfriend**
**Here's the one where I told her that I wanted to be more sexual...oh, and the one where she told me if I was any more sexual she wouldn't be able to survive**
**a note just to tell me she loved me.....yeah, sure, she didn't even tell me her name**
**Here is the letter that changed my life forever. The one that said goodbye, but didn't say why**
With a bit of a sarcastic laugh, he reads through the mails over again. From first to last, watching a relationship bloom from a very casual comment into a promise of lives together. She had written so much in those mails. Everything from explainations of how she believed love should work to promises that she would never try to love him. Those promises, of course, were in the beginning.....and she didn't keep them, just like all the rest. Damn her, damn her for all the lies and for letting him believe in love. Damn her for saying that he was worth more than the others were offering.....for making him want more. He had been content, or at least determined to pretend to be content, until he had met her.
~~she begins to cry softly as she reads the mails she wrote to him. So many times, so many ways, she could have explained her lie and asked him for forgiveness. Instead, she had tried to create a world that was safe for both of them by taking the reality completely away. She can feel his heart thumping inside his overstressed body and she bites back a scream as he hits the table with the palm of his hand and scatters disks aross the floor. He's so angry, and she can't blame him. But, she can't leave him, either...because he screamed and called and pleaded for her to come again. Because the basis of those letters was the truth of her feelings. Damn HIM for being so much what she needed. Damn him again, for falling in love with her when she warned him over and over not to do it. And, most of all, damn him for still wanting her after all she'd done. Because, that is what hurts the most.....that fear that she'll get lost in him again~~
He takes breath after breath as he makes his way into his bedroom and covers himself, curling up and sobbing into his arm and the pillow. He whispers for her....uncertain still what to call her.....until he ends up just crying over and over under his breath..."ohh, god..I just wanted to love you. I just wanted to love you. I just wanted to love you" And, he falls asleep with those words on his tongue and her presence in his heart and her voice in his ear.
~~stretching flat behind him, arm brushing across his forehead as she lets her tears slide unstopped down her cheeks and onto the pillow to mingle with his. She cannot speak, because he would hear her now.....now that he is lost into the dreaming. And, she doesn't want him to tell her to leave yet. So, she presses kiss after kiss into his shoulders as the tension starts to fade and she gradually slips into her own body, her own pain and leaves him to his dreams~~
Her heart pounds as she tries to write a mail again, to him again, for the first time since the last time that they hurt each other. Maybe he is ready to let go of the past, but she is just as determined to hold on for the future. And as she writes, she sends a prayer up to whatever deity may listen and wipes away her tears of pain as she ends the letter with the words she's so recently heard him say himself.....
"I only wanted to love you. I only want to love you. I only love you. I love you."