The worst is over Who: Micah, Sky, and Clem When: Afternoon Where: Hospital, then her house
The hospital was swamped with them, so many of them. They had started coming in as the sun came down, those who were being saved, those who’d found the way out. Theyw ere hurt, all of them, but alive. Micah was triaging the worst of it, running from room to room to take care of the worst of it, giving his nurses direction. Heading into another room he barely glanced at the chart outside. That wasn’t going to tell him anything until he got inside and saw her. Clementine. He wandered into the room, setting the chart aside and focusing on the girl. “How’re you feeling?” he asked first.
Being alone was starting to freak Clementine out even more. She had introverted, tucked her mind away inside her body, and was just sort of staring at the wall when Micah had come in. The nurses had done something to her eye, to her throat, maybe there was supposed to be an ice pack on it and maybe that was what the cold bag in her hand was, but Clementine was just sitting on the small bed, not speaking. It took her a long moment to even realize someone new was in the room and when she did, she turned to look at Micah with this blank sort of confusion. How was she feeling. “...I don’t know,” She answered, because it was the shortest and most honest answer she could give right now.
That didn’t really surprise Micah as he nodded. She’d been tortured from the look of her alone. Moving closer he stood in front of her, eyes taking in her injuries. “What hurts the most?” he tried again.
She’d already started to shut down again when Micah filled her vision. She didn’t want to talk, didn’t know what to even say. What hurt the most? Everything. Her throat, her eye, her pride, everything. It all fucking hurt. How did she tell him that what hurt the most was the recurring thought in her mind that she almost died. “I don’t know…” She said again instantly, but knew she needed a real answer. “...throat.” The bruises were dark, purple and blue and definitely uniform all around her neck from the rope that was used. Her eye, while also bruised and purpled, would heal but passing out from Jericho’s attack now left her very, very focused on what she could remember, which was Anne Marie’s torture.
Micah nodded, leaning in to look at it, tilting her head up to look at the bruises. “How’s your breathing? Any struggles?” he asked. “You can just nod or shake your head if it hurts to talk.”
She flinched when he touched her, just like she had with all the other nurses that had tried. She wasn’t violent, but she definitely wasn’t thrilled with the fact that anyone was touching her right now. Exhaling slowly, she took another breath after a moment and then shook her head. It didn’t feel great to talk so she’d take that out for now, but breathing...breathing hadn’t been a problem since that fucking moment back on Anne Marie’s bed, when her vision blurred to black and the air rushed to her lungs just after. Breathing had been...exceptionally easy, way easier than it probably should be right now.
Micah nodded, pulling his hand away when she flinched. That made sense considering the wounds. “Here,” he said reached for the ice pack and setting it against her cheek. “Hold this here. It’ll help with the swelling. I’m going to give you something for the pain. And it’ll help you rest a little. You’re safe now. In my house, no one gets hurt. Promise.” He smiled then headed towards a cabinet to get her pain medicine. “Can I call someone for you?”
She didn’t even want the pills either. Anne Marie had given her pills and she hadn’t taken them, not trusting that they weren’t worse drugs than pain killers. Maybe he wasn’t going for pills, though. Maybe it’d be a shot. Either way, Clementine wasn’t sure she trusted it. She put the ice pack on her face like told, though even that biting pain didn’t really pull her out of her thoughts.
Who should he call? She wasn't even sure if Zania was alive. She’d been told that her friend probably hadn’t made it, though she had no idea if her attackers had known that Zania was a vampire. So she couldn’t really call Zania without knowing if she was alive. Exhaling a breath she intended to be shaky but instead felt very strong, Clementine spoke quietly. “...Skylar. Works at the greenhouse.” Skylar would know, he’d know everything...not to mention she really did just want to see him.
Micah drew up the shot and headed back towards her. “I know Skylar. He’s a friend of Nic’s.” Reaching for her arm he cleaned off a space. “This’ll help with the pain okay?”
Clementine stared at the needle and shook her head a little. “What is it?” She asked, already debating if the dulled pain was worth her dulled senses. She didn’t think so and so she was very intently staring at that needle in his hand. “...Can it wait? Until Skylar is here?” Sure, in his house no one got hurt. But she’d been kidnapped from her own damn house so no house was really safe.
Micah looked at the needle then capped it again. “Just so long as you’re sure. There’s no point in suffering when I can help.” He didn’t want her to hurt.
She wanted to trust Micah. He seemed nice. He had nice, kind eyes, but if Skylar knew Micah, then he could promise her the needle and the pain meds would be fine. Skylar could convince her that she could trust this doctor. “Please call Skylar,” She said again, feeling her voice quiet down even more.
“I will. I’ll take care of it.” Micah smiled again, taking the medicine with him. “Just rest for right now okay? I promise, you’re safe.”
“Ok,” Clementine said, looking back at Micah. “I might...I might take that, when he’s here,” She said, meaning the needle. But then she just leaned her head forward and shut her good eye, not ready to lie down and get the same flashes of being on her back on that bed that she did when she got here.
“I understand,” Micah promised, reaching out and squeezing her hand. “I’ll give him a call. Just sit tight.” He headed towards the door and reaching for his phone. He pulled up Skylar’s number calling the other man giving him the information.
Skylar wasn’t far away, having heard rumors that people were getting found, which meant he was just outside the hospital and within a few minutes rushing through the door that Micah had sent him to. “Clem?” he demanded bursting in the room, half out of breath, clothes askew, looking very much like he hadn’t slept in days.
Clementine was back again in her mind, trying to block everything out, trying to not think of what had happened. When the door burst open, she flinched at first, the sound of it scaring her like nearly everything was now. But then there was Skylar, real and Skylar, someone she trusted, and she felt a small sense of relief start to fill her. "Sky..."
“Oh thank god,” Skylar said, rushing to her side, half crawling on the bed with her to wrap his arms around her. He didn’t get far enough to realize what her injuries were, just that she was there and she was alive and he could touch her and touching her seemed really important right now.
Instantly, Clementine felt her eyes well up with tears. Even her swollen shut one was tearing up. He was here. He was here and he was safe and she could feel his arms around her. Somewhere deep in her she was still a little scared, a flash of fear sending a shiver through her at the idea of anyone touching her, but then she remembered it was Skylar and not some crazy bitch who was going to try and kill her again. And lamely, all she could say was a croaky, "Hi," because the tears were drying her already-hurt throat up.
Skylar almost laughed, burying his face in her hair. “Hi.” He pulled back to look at her, his eyes widening when he saw how bad the damage was. “Oh god...what happened?”
Clementine closed her mouth and leaned the good side of her head against his shoulder. When he asked that, she didn’t know what to answer. She didn’t even know she was ready to answer. So she shook her head after a moment and shut her good eye. “...Doctor Micah said he’d give me pain killers….” She said, hoping he’d go with it and not push her to answer yet. She didn’t want to relive that, not with Skylar there right now.
God she looked awful. He reached out and touched the good part of her face, frowning softly. That wasn’t good. Not good at all. He didn’t even know what to do. Or how to do anything. “Did you take them? Do you need them?” His eyes drifted to the bruise around her neck, which just made his stomach turn over in panic.
“I think...I think I want to, but I…” She trailed off for a moment, just staring at him. How did she even tell him what happened? Did she want to? Did she want to fill his head with those bad images? Not really. “I wanted to wait for you. I don’t trust medicine right now.”
“Well if you’re hurting you should. There’s no point in hurting.” He frowned though when she explained herself. “You don’t? Why don’t you?”
Sighing, Clementine was surprised again at just how easily, how perfectly the air left and refilled her lungs. She tried not to think on it just yet. “I just...don’t. I don’t know this guy. I don’t take pills or shots or anything from people I don’t know.” It was bitterly funny, how easily her nature had shifted. She was so trusting. Was. She’d been trusting before this and maybe even then she would have taken pills or water or something from someone she’d just met, but now? No way in hell.
“Oh. Well he’s a doctor. And he’s Nic’s boyfriend. So he’s a good guy,” Skylar said. “But if you don’t feel like you need it you don’t have to.” He didn’t want her to be hurting, but something bad had happened. That wasn’t like Clementine. She never doubted people before.
She needed to hear that Sklar trusted him. She trusted Skylar and if he trusted Micah, that had to mean he was a good guy. “...I want the meds. I don’t...I don’t want to go to sleep.” She was too afraid, too scared that something was going to happen while she was out, that taking the meds was starting to scare her. “Micah says...he says no one will get hurt here.”
“I’m sure he can give you enough so you don’t sleep,” Skylar said, thinking that had to be possible. “Did he say that? Makes sense. It is a hospital.” People didn’t get hurt in hospitals, they got better. “Want me to go get him?”
"Will you stay? After I get the shot?" She asked, reaching for Skylar's hand to hold it tight with the free one she had. Tighter than she had before. "Please don't leave…" She couldn't see him and then have him leave if she fell asleep. She needed him there, needed to know that he wasn't going to leave her alone.
Skylar shook his head. “I’m not going anywhere. Promise. I wouldn’t dare leave. I was looking for you. I was so scared.” He stayed close to her, pulling her back into his arms and reaching for the blanket to wrap it around them.
“Sky…” Clementine spoke only after a moment, having been so caught up in him holding her that she’d needed just to get her mind together. When she spoke again, her voice was quiet, cracking again from the tears that were starting. “...Is Zania dead?”
Skylar frowned, looking up from wrapping them up in the blanket to stare at her. “What? No. Of course not. She told me you were taken.”
She hadn’t realized that her heart felt like it was clenching up until now, when she felt it just relax and she gave a sigh. Almost immediately, her lungs filled again with air, some sort of strange reaction that her body was having to nearly being strangled to do. That had to be it. Closing her eye, she pressed her forehead against Skylar’s shoulder. “Thank god. She’s ok? I need to tell her I’m ok. She needs to know…”
“We can call her and tell her. Or message her. Whatever. She’ll want to know. You weren’t the only one missing, her mouse was missing too.” He sighed and snuggled closer to Clementine. He’d been so worried he’d never see her again.
“Her what? She doesn’t own a mouse…” It sounded really familiar. Maybe she’d heard Skylar say this before, but she also wasn’t in a mindset where it really made sense. But they needed to tell Zania she was ok. though it was even harder to focus when he shifted closer to her. She felt so secure here, inside of his arms and not inside of a cage in some basement. She gripped Skylar’s hand again, reminding herself that he wasn’t going anywhere.
“Um. Mickey. The mouse. The guy. The one who broke her heart,” Skylar said, but the words required more thought than it should have. He wasn’t really thinking about anyone but Clementine right now.
“Oh, Mickey. He’s been taken too. Is he ok?” She asked, eyes widening a little more at the thought. Poor Mickey. Poor Zania. Poor everyone. “I need to know if Eily is ok. Eily O’Reilly. She was with me. Do you know if she’s ok?”
Skylar frowned and shook his head. “I don’t know. I mean...I’m not sure who she is.” He didn’t know about anyone but Clementine and he was starting to feel bad that he didn’t know about anyone but her.
“She has to be ok,” Clementine said, shifting so she was even closer to Skylar though she didn’t know if that could even be possible. “Eily is strong. She has to be ok. She wouldn’t have let herself not be ok…” She had to tell herself that until she could get out and find Eily, see it with her eyes that she was fine. “How long do I stay here?”
“She probably is,” Skylar agreed, liking that line of thought. It wasn’t like he had much else to offer. He didn’t know the girl. “How long? I guess until Micah says you can go home. You’re not bleeding or anything so maybe soon. Want me to go with you?”
“Yes,” She said instantly, looking back up at Skylar with so much sad emotion in the one good one that even she knew what she looked like. “Please don’t let me be alone.” Everything hurt, everything was sore, but none of it would hurt her more than the worry that would come with being left alone. And maybe Zania was at home, but she couldn’t take that chance and not have Skylar there too. She needed him.
“Of course not. I promised remember,” Skylar said with a nod. It surprised him, the way she didn’t want to be alone, didn’t seem like she could be alone, and yet here she was, panic-stricken at the thought of him leaving. “For as long as you want. I’m right here.”
That gave her more relief than before and she sat with him for another long, quiet moment. “Can you ask Dr. Micah if he has any pills? I..could use them but I don’t want to take them here. I want to just go home.” Even though home might feel just as strange as this hospital.
Skylar nodded, getting out of Clementine’s arms, but pulling the blanket around her. “I’ll go find him, see what he can do. Be back in a few minutes.” He hesitated for a moment before leaning in to kiss her forehead, then left to find the doctor.
She was already nervous when he moved, but she’d asked him to and she had to keep herself focused, reminding herself that she’d asked him to. So she pulled the blanket closer with one hand, held the ice pack to her face with the other, and started picking nervously at the blanket’s loose threads.
It took a moment to find the doctor who was running around, but eventually Skylar did track him down and insisted that he come back to Clementine’s room. Micah had wanted to protest, to say he’d get there eventually, but he could tell by looking at Skylar that they didn’t need him to say no. Once back in the room he smiled at Clementine. “What can I do for you?” he asked, looking at her again. “Do you want the shot?”
She sat up a little straighter when the door opened again, already feeling her heart kick up, but when she saw it was Micah and Skylar she settled down again. “...Do you have pills? I just..want to go home and if I take the shot, I won’t make it there. Can the shot go to someone staying here?”
Micah considered that then nodded. “Yeah. I can get you something. I’ll have a nurse bring it in. If you’re breathing fine, then you’re good to go. Rest. Please. And stay safe. Lock the doors.”
Like I didn’t lock the doors before I got fucking kidnapped. Clementine thought bitterly, but hated that she had a moment later. She looked back at the doctor and nodded. “Thanks, Doc.” Readjusting the ice pack, she looked back at Skylar and put her hand out through the blanket so he could take it.
Skylar moved back closer to Clementine, holding her hand, squeezing it. “I’m taking her home.”
Micah didn’t want them to leave, feeling better about everyone who was hurt being safer inside the walls of the hospital, but he couldn’t stop her. She was well enough to go home and rest. She should be struggling to breathe, needing oxygen, but she was fine. It was weird, but Micah didn’t know what to make of it yet. “Not a problem. Take care of her for me.”
“Do I have to come back sometime? Check up or something?” She asked, looking at the doctor again. Slowly, she was starting to like the doctor. He seemed nice but the fact that Skylar knew him and vouched for him was what really mattered. So if he wanted a follow up, which might not be a terrible idea, she’d do it.
Micah looked at her for a moment before shaking his head. “Not unless something else starts to hurt or if the swelling on your eye doesn’t go down by tomorrow.” He pulled out her chart and started writing. “I’m going to make sure you get an anti-inflammatory as well. It’s help with the swelling. Keep the ice on it tonight. And rest.”
She was quiet for another long moment, listening to the doctor, and nodded again when he finished speaking. “Sure.” Easier said than done, but she had Skylar and she’d try. “Thank you,” She said, still trying to remember her manners. Carefully using Skylar’s hand, she pulled herself off the bed and stood up, feeling shaky but she was probably just overwhelmed. “Let’s go home.”
Micah nodded and headed towards the door. “I’ll send the nurse in while you get dressed. There’s a spare set of scrubs,” he said pointing towards the stack of clothing the corner. “Feel better,” he added before looking at Skylar once more and heading out of the room.
Skylar smiled a little, helping her up before his eyes cut to the pile of clothes. “Let me get those,” he said, hurrying over to them and bringing them back to her. “Change because it’s cold out, then home.”
Clementine held the scrubs in her hands, having changed into a hospital gown with the help of a nurse earlier. She stared at the clothing in her hands then Skylar and moved to pull the gown off, not at all caring anymore about the fact that he was definitely going to see her without her underwear on. Nothing mattered more than getting home with Skylar. Changing slowly, she pulled on the scrubs and pushed her hair over her right shoulder, she reached for her ice pack and looked back at Skylar. “Now can we go?”
Skylar was staring, but more than that he was trying to help. He didn’t want her to be alone. It wasn’t until she asked that the door opened to reveal a nurse who handed off Clementine’s medicine. “Take that and we can go.”
She took the pills and put them into pockets on the scrubs before taking Skylar’s hand again. She was quiet until they got out of the hospital, quiet halfway through the walk, but when they started to near her house she swallowed hard and this nervous feeling started to well up in her. “...We should have a weapon or something.”
Skylar looked around. “For what? I was just in there yesterday. No one was there but Zania.” He took a step forward then turned back to face her. “You should know that it doesn’t look good in there. Maybe we should go to my place instead.”
“What do you mean it doesn’t look good in there?” Clementine asked, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk to stare at him. Had the person that taken her destroyed their house too? Was it still wrecked? She couldn’t explain to Skylar yet why she might feel better sleeping with a fire-poker in her hand, but she did need him to explain what he meant by not good.
“There was blood. Some of it was cleaned up but the couch was in bad shape.” He didn’t want her to walk into something that was disgusting and scary. “Let’s go to my house.”
Blood. There was blood on her couch. Which meant that there had been blood other places too. Clementine swallowed hard again, feeling the ache through her body, and shook her head. “Not until Zania knows I’m safe. She won’t know to look for me there. And my clothes are there, my blankets…”
He thought about it but wound up nodding. “Alright fine. Inside, and to your room. Though you look really good in those scrubs. I’m not sure I want you to change.” Skylar led her up the stairs and to the door.
She normally would have laughed but not today. “I just miss my parka…” And her bed and everything that wasn’t a cage in a basement of some crazy chick’s house. She stepped up the stairs and stood outside of the door, watching it with a hand that was curling into a fist. Was she ready for this? “The house is safe now, right?”
Skylar reached for her hand, wrapping his own fingers around her fist. “Should be. It was when I was here last.”
“I got abducted from this house. Is it safe to be here, Skylar,” She asked, her good eye staring back at Skylar. She switched her fingers from a fist then grabbed Skylar’s hand with them. “The locks might not be good enough. The locks aren’t good enough…”
Skylar looked at the door then nodded. “It is. I’m here. I’ll take care of you.”
After another breath that once more miraculously just refilled her lungs, Clementine nodded and stepped inside. The house itself was in bad shape, but it looked like someone had really tried to make it look nice again. Which she appreciated. Maybe Zania had done it; it seemed like something she’d do. She studied the living room for a long moment and then started toward her room, thinking that if she could just get inside and lock the door, that maybe she’d been safer. Maybe she’d be ready to tell Skylar what had really happened. “...It doesn’t look all that bad.” She said on her way to her room, though she’d pointedly avoided looking at the blood stains when she could.
He looked back, having to shrug at the room. It did look alright. Better than it had even. That was good. “No, not really. Better than my place. Which is still leaking.” He followed after her reaching for her door though before she could to open it for her, smiling.
She wanted to respond to his comment about his place still leaking, but then he was there, opening the door and smiling at her. And it was that look, that smile, that just broke everything in her. She dropped the ice pack onto the ground and moved forward, wrapping her arms around his middle tightly and pressing the good side of her face to his chest, eye shut as she tried to steady herself against an impending wave of tears.
Well the joke wasn’t supposed to make her act like that, but he did respond properly, wrapping his arms around to hold her against him. She was okay. There was a sense of relief he didn’t fully know he could feel until that moment. She was okay. He rubbed her back and rested his head against the top of hers.
She tried to force her voice up, but she was surprised when it didn’t even really sound that sore. Yes, she was crying, but the inhalation of air wasn’t even shaky. It was so weird and was seriously freaking her out. “I want to tell you what happened…” She said, shifting her head so her mouth wasn’t facing his chest and her voice wasn’t muffled.
Skylar reached behind him to close the door. “Okay...” he said, taking a step back and guiding her towards the bed so they could sit.
Clementine sat down on her bed, feeling really strange about being back here. Being back on a bed where she wasn’t getting strangled to death was very hard. She looked down at her hands and then toward the closed door. “Out there...This guy, big guy, came in with a werewolf and just attacked us. He attacked us and this is him,” She said, pointing toward her swollen and bruised face.
Skylar knew parts of that from Zania, but he still nodded, holding Clementine’s hand, listening, waiting for her to go on.
“And I got knocked out and when I woke up…woke up in one of those werewolf cages in some girl’s basement. There were four in there and I was the first one...given over I guess.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out her medicine, hastily trying to open the bottle and failing. “And she..she was a crazy bitch. She had Eily there too and I...she gave me these pills and this water and I didn’t take it because she was talking crazy about bringing out these powers in me and making us turn off the sun….”
Skylar took the bottle from her, opening it himself and taking out her dosage. “That’s a special brand of crazy. What happened next? Did she hurt you too?”
She was quiet for another long moment, staring now at the pills in her hand and closing her fingers over them. Then she tilted her neck a little to show him the bruises that she was sure he’d already seen. “She almost killed me. She tied a rope around my neck and strangled me until I couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe and I thought I was going to die but...then the air came back. And the rope was still there, but I could breathe again. Like I can breathe now. It’s been so easy to breathe since…”
That made Skylar frown in confusion. “You could breathe, but she was still choking you?” How did that work? That was just weird right?
“I could breathe, but she was still choking me. When she saw it, she pulled away and sent me back to the cage but...Skylar, I almost died. But it was like the air...it all rushed into my lungs instead of struggling to get out. I don’t know what it means or why it happened but basically I could have died today. In that fucking basement, tied up on a bed with some crazy bitch on top of me strangling me with a rope…”
“Hey, hey,” Skylar said. He didn’t have an answer for it, but he could stroke her hair like he was, watching her. “But you didn’t. You’re alive and you’re here, back with me, and I’m not going to let you go.”
Wiping at the tears in her eye, Clementine turned to look at him again. Before all of this, they had the luxury to disagree on trivial matters like what they’d been arguing about before. Now, though, she couldn’t care less. She just wanted him with her, near her, and saying the things he was saying right now. “...I’m scared, Sky.”
He looked at her, reaching out to touch the good side of her cheek. “I am too. But we’re together. And I think we’re safe for a moment.” He hesitated for a second before leaning in to kiss her softly.
She didn’t want to cry anymore, but the kiss filled her with such a sense of relief that it was almost hard not to. She felt an overflow of tears from her good eye as she kissed him back, just as softly but maybe more needy than he was. And it felt good. It felt nice to have him there, kissing her, touching her cheek, caring for her and telling her things like ‘we’re safe’ and ‘I’m not letting you go’. She reached up with a free hand and held his arm, needing to really feel him there with her, to know he wasn’t leaving.
He drew the kiss out, enjoying it, more than he had the first time he kissed her. Maybe because now he felt like he really wanted to be there. With her. Not someone else. Or well, no one else seemed to matter as much.
Clementine didn’t want to pull away and when she normally would have felt like she needed to, she was surprised to feel the air just return to her lungs instead. She hadn’t really pulled back, only a little, but that wasn’t the thing that really confused her. As she sat there, so close to Skylar, she began to feel a small wind kick up around her and breeze through her hair, around her scrubs, lifting her hair gently.
Skylar didn’t recognize the breeze at first. Or he did, but he didn’t realize right away that he was in a place where there wouldn’t be one. After a moment though, the way it hit him had him opening his eyes, looking at her and realizing it was coming from her. Sorta. “Uhh...Clem…”
She was happy and all at once very unaware of anything other than heading in for another kiss from him. But that was when he spoke and she opened her eye, feeling the breeze lessen and then finally realizing that she felt it at all. “...Holy hell. What is that?” The breeze stopped altogether and she stared at him, her one good eye widening. “What was that?”
Skylar opened his mouth to answer, but he had nothing. After a moment he closed it, making a face while he thought. “I have no idea,” he finally settled on.
Confused, Clementine watched him then looked down at her hands. “The breathing...and this. I don’t know what happened back there, Skylar, but...what if this is me? Is that even possible?”
He tilted his head. “What if you saved yourself?” he asked seeing if that was what she meant. He was definitely confused by all of it. “I have no idea how it’s possible, but I mean...if it saved you…”
“I don’t...I guess? What if all this air is me? What if the breathing easier thing is me? And the wind, it can’t just come from nowhere, can it?” None of her windows were open, there wasn’t any sort of fan on… “This is crazy. This can’t be happening, can it?”
“You? That’s weird, but it seems like...the only answer.” He looked around with her then frowned. “I guess it could…”
She was believing it already, but she needed to calm herself down. Instead of trying to dwell on it, or at least visually look like she was, she shifted on the bed and settled into the crook of his arm again, pressing her back against his front as she got settled. “I don’t know…” It seemed so crazy, so farfetched, that admitting she kind of believed it was insane too. “Maybe I’m just...tired or stressed or scared or something.”
Skylar let her settle against him, smiling a little more because that was nice. Sure, talk of her causing the breeze, that was weird, but this, this was nice. “Maybe. Maybe there’s just a draft.” He reached for her hand, lacing his fingers with hers.
“Maybe. It’s probably that. It’s probably just a draft,” She said, finally popping the pills and forcing them down dry. She didn’t want to get up for water, didn’t even want to consider moving even if a shower sounded pretty good too. “...Can you tell me something good? Something...not this?” She asked, gesturing to her face and her neck.
He nodded, running his fingers through her hair. He pressed a kiss against the top of her head.” I was thinking, about what you said. About us. And I want to be here.”
Clementine stalled, not sure she’d heard what she hoped she’d just heard. But she replayed it over in her head and turned a little to face him, watching him with her one good eye widened. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
He shrugged. “I think so.” Skylar wondered if she didn’t want to. She might have gotten over it at this point. Which would be sad, but probably within her rights. He wasn’t really owning up to being a boyfriend or something else.
But right now, a label didn’t really matter. All that mattered was that he’d said he wanted them, that he had thought about them and he’d wanted them. And she couldn’t stop herself from leaning closer to him to press her lips against his, the breeze kicking back up with a vengeance this time.
The breeze would have bothered him if it wasn’t for the kiss. The breeze was almost too much. He kissed her back, but after a moment pulled away. “If that’s you, it’s kind of weird...but it’s a good thing right?”
When he pulled away, the breeze stopped and Clementine didn’t know why or how but it was just done. Looking around her for a minute to see if she could find any open windows or fans or anything that would make sense where she couldn’t find any, she shrugged. “I don’t know what it is, Sky. I don’t want to think about it right now. Can we just talk about that tomorrow?” She asked, settling in close against his chest again. “I just wanna stay here right now.”
Skylar was very good at avoiding issues. The best at it. Leaning down to kiss her nose, he smiled. “I like staying here.” That was as good a plan as any and really what he wanted to do instead of thinking about weird breezes.
She was quiet then, pressing the good side of her face into his chest as she pulled at the blanket nearest them to wrap them up in it. And then she settled down, letting the medicine slowly lull her to sleep in the safety of Skylar’s arms.