WHO: Julian Blackthorn and Emma Carstairs WHAT: Having a talk WHEN: Today WHERE: Alec's apartment WARNINGS: Nah STATUS: Closed/Completed Gdoc
Julian had been waiting for this for months, but now that it was here, it wasn’t quite as happy as he’d hoped. He should have known better, really. He should have known that all those emotions flooding back into her mind would be devastating. But he hadn’t really thought about that. He’d pretty much just thought about getting Emma back. He had her back now, but, well, he was still worried about her because she was taking this hard. He knew he would feel the same if it had happened to him, but somehow he thought maybe it felt worse since it was Emma and he cared about her more than he even cared about himself.
After school, he came home immediately, and went up to her room, knocking on the closed door.
“Emma. You there?”
He’d looked around for her after school but he thought maybe she’d gone home sick or just gotten out of there faster than he could.
***
It wasn’t Emma’s usual habit to boot it out of school as soon as it ended, but these weren’t usual times. She’d operated without feelings for so long now that she’d gotten used to it. So suddenly having to deal with the frustration of not understanding schoolwork, or the boredom of listening to Mrs. Haversham, or the annoyance of dealing with bullies.
Emma was good with problems she could punch in the face, but this was not a problem she could beat into submission.
So she’d left immediately after school, and went back to her room to take a breath from all that she’d encountered during the day.
Julian’s voice at the door brought a whole wealth of new emotions: love, fondness, frustration, and guilt. She knew he was worried about her and she wished she could just get over it, but she was struggling. But even if she was struggling, having Julian there made her feel better regardless.
“Yeah, come in,” she called.
***
Julian crossed immediately to her bed and sat down, looking at her with love and concern. The girl he saw was him Emma again, but she was a sad and unhappy version of Emma. He hated that. He wished he could have somehow gotten her emotions back for her without breaking her heart at the same time.
“Hey,” he said softly, after a moment. “You doing okay? I didn’t see you after school, and I looked for you.”
***
Not caring that it was forbidden, Emma leaned over and rested her head on Julian’s shoulder. She ached with the love she felt for him, and she needed him to be her anchor. He’d always been the one to keep her world upright and stable, and now, more than ever, she needed him by her side.
“Yeah, I just needed some peace and quiet,” she said softly. “Sorry I didn’t tell you.” She would’ve, if she’d been thinking straight.
***
He would be her anchor, because that was who Julian was. He’d never consider anything else. He would be there for her whenever she needed him, and even times when she thought she didn’t.
“It’s okay,” he said softly, leaning over gently to place a chaste kiss on her forehead.
“Are you okay? I know this can’t be easy.”
Maybe there was a small prick of guilt for what had happened for her, even if he knew that she was better off with her feelings.
***
“I’m fine,” Emma said automatically, because she’d never been one to admit weakness - even to her parabatai. Julian would know differently, though; he’d see her struggle, and she knew it.
So she pulled back and smiled gamely at him. “Is Alec back yet? We can make dinner.”
She knew that even with the stipend given to him for taking care of them, Alec still had to work hard to support them all.
***
Julian knew very well that she wasn’t fine, but he wasn’t going to push the point. He knew, she knew he knew, and that was all that mattered.
“He’s not back yet, no,” he said. He had worried about Alec when Ian went home...and he was still worried about him, although he wouldn’t bring it up to his Guardian.
“We could fix something. What do you think he’d like? Pancakes? Something more dinnerlike?”
***
“Something more dinner-like, if you’re up for it,” Emma said as she stood up. As tempting as it was to sit beside Julian for the rest of the day and feel his heartbeat next to hers, she knew she couldn’t. Fixing a full dinner would keep her occupied and give Alec a nice surprise when he came home from work.
“Just let me know how I can help.” She gave him a smile, and although there was weariness in her eyes, there was also genuine warmth and love that had been missing for months.
***
The weariness in her eyes saddened him, but the warmth and love almost made up for it. His Emma was back; he now only had to come up with a way to make her happy. It would be difficult, but he would find a way. Because making Emma happy was one of the main purposes of his life.
“Sure. We can make beef stroganoff maybe? We can make it in the crockpot and then it will be ready whenever he gets home. It’s good, too.”
Julian had lots of recipes up his sleeve. He’d had to.
***
“I know, it’s one of my favourites.” This time Emma’s smile wasn’t so weighed down with shadows. Despite everything she was going through, simply being around Julian brought her joy.
“Let me wash my hands, and I can be your sous-chef.” Not that she was a very good one - but she took orders from Julian very well.
*** Julian didn’t care if she really helped him with the cooking; he just wanted her there to talk to and to keep her company. Plus, she was really good with grabbing him ingredients and spatulas and all that sort of thing that he needed while he was cooking.
“So…” he said, after he had the beef in the crockpot. “How are you feeling? Are you feeling any better? Or worse? It has to be strange to get your feelings back all in a hurry like that.”
***
“It’s overwhelming,” Emma said honestly as she fiddled with the wooden spoon he’d used to stir everything together. She didn’t like to keep secrets from Julian. Sometimes it was a necessity, especially when she wanted to protect him, but where she could, she tried to be honest with him. Their parabatai bond would clue him into the times where she might be hiding something from him anyway.
“But it’s...getting better.” When her emotions had first come flooding back, she’d had no idea how to deal with them. She’d gone too long without them. Now, her emotional barriers were coming back, and she was able to filter them a lot better. Just not to the point where she’d been able to, before this had all happened.
“Do you feel it?” Her concern was for him. “Through the bond, I mean.”
***
“Yeah, I do,” he admitted. He didn’t want to violate her privacy, but he couldn’t help it. They’d sort of given that up when they’d become joined as parabatai. “I couldn’t feel you at all before. It was like you were just...gone. That’s the worst thing I’ve ever felt in my life.”
He started chopping the onions, not saying anything for a moment.
“I hate that this happened to you. I feel responsible. If I hadn’t been in such a worry to break the curse then maybe we would have looked closer into the spell and made sure that it wouldn’t hurt you.”
***
“Hey.” Emma stopped her fiddling to look at him intently. “Don’t you dare blame yourself for this, Julian. I was in as much of a hurry as you were, and I went into this knowing the risks.”
But that was what Julian did: he took the world’s cares as his own, and blamed himself for everything that went wrong. That was one of the things she loved about him, and one of the things she wished he’d stopped doing.
“No one knew it was going to do that,” she continued. “And who knows, it could’ve gone even worse. It could’ve been you who lost your emotions, and I know I wouldn’t have deal with it anywhere as logically or as with as much care as you did.”
***
“I hardly think I was logical or calm about it,” he said. He might have seemed that way to othe people, but anyone who knew Julian would have known how panicked he was. He’d avoided her, which he’d done before, but still. That was years ago when he’d done that and he was more mature now.
“What really matters now is that I have you back. There’s still the curse, but at least you’re Emma again. You have your passion back. Without that you just...were someone else. I felt so empty.”
He turned to face her, yearning to kiss her but resisting because he knew he couldn’t, no matter how much either of them wanted to.
***
It was okay to hug him, Emma told herself. He was her friend and parabatai, and it was okay to hug him to give him comfort. It was what she’d do for Clary, or Isabelle, or Alec, or Jace. Okay, not Jace - he’d just make a stupid snide remark about it. But for any friend, she’d hug them when they were obviously hurting.
The problem was, when she did step forward to wrap her arms around him, she was filled with a longing to do more. She wanted to lift her gaze to meet his, and draw his head down to meet hers, and lose herself in the love and passion that burned in them both.
Emma was glad she had her emotions back, but having emotions hurt.
***
He could feel the spike in Emma’s emotions - it echoed his own. Those stupid feelings that had been there for so long always got in the way of them just being regular parabatai. But the truth was, he didn’t know if he’d change it even if he could. His love for her was a part of him, and he’d be a different person without it.
“It’s going to be okay,” he said softly. “We’ll make it through this. I promise. We’ll figure it out somehow.”
***
“I know,” Emma said softly. Deep in her heart, she had no doubts they’d make it through, as long as they could do it together. “I’m sorry I left you alone for so long, but I’m back now, and I’m not going anywhere. Even if we have to live with the curse all our lives, I’m going to be right here. With you.”
***
Julian didn’t want to live with the curse the rest of his life, but he knew what she meant. She was right. He put the rest of the ingredients in the pot, then put on the lid and turned to her.
“And I’m not going anywhere. Ever.”
As if he could.
***
Emma smiled at him. It wasn’t the ideal situation - far from it. But given a choice between loving Julian but not being able to be with him, and not loving him at all, she’d pick the first choice any given day.