i_atetheapple ...loneliness like a heartbeat drives you mad
She was running through a forest. It was thick and dark, and the air was cold and moist as she breathed heavily, panting and puffing as she tried to get as much air into her lungs as possible. She ducked under low-hanging vines, and leaped over logs that lay across the path. Occasionally, she'd frantically glance behind her, where she saw flashes of something menacing. It was chasing her, and she knew the minute that she stopped running, whatever it was would waste no time in devouring her whole.
One shoe-less foot landed in a shallow puddle, and the slime and goop squished between her toes disgustingly. She powered on, though, ignoring the discomfort, until her slippery foot landed on a strangely smooth rock. Between the rock and her wet toes, she lost her balance, and flipped head over heels, landing on her stomach, face planted in the thick mouldy leaf-litter of the forest floor. Whatever it was that was chasing her was only a few seconds away from her, but when she tried to push herself off the ground, she found her legs weak and unresponsive, barely able to move by themselves.
It was like a horrible flashback to her rehabilitation. The disgusting amount of effort it took her to do the simplest things, like walking, or even rotating her ankles, had returned, and she was just as crippled as she'd been before. Her hands moved wildly, trying to press herself up into a crawling position, but by then the monster was looming over her. Sharp wolf teeth glistened inches from her eyes, before the huge mouth opened wide and took her head off with one bite.
Snow thrashed out frantically, kicking out through the tangled bed sheets, and hitting something particularly solid, snapping her out of the dream instantly. Her eyes opened wide, and she looked around disorientated-- she was lying on her stomach, in the room Charming had provided her with...
And she wasn't alone.
She let out a quick shriek.
His eyes snapped open and his ears had perked up as soon as Snow started turning in bed. The unnatural movements in the bed woke him instantly, there was no grogginess, no moment of 'where am I', he just snapped right to attention.
Bigby growled slightly under his breath, looking around to see what was affecting her so. But there was nothing. He couldn't see, smell, or hear anything out of the ordinary; it had to be in her head. Just a bad dream.
Hesitantly he moved up slightly, ready to nudge the blankets up on her again as he did every night. But then the unexpected happened.
Suddenly he was looking into her blue eyes, which he could see clearly even in the room's darkness. He could hear her shriek too. It almost hurt his sensitive ears as he hadn't been expecting it and it was in such close quarters. But that wasn't his biggest problem.
No, his biggest problem was that those bright blue eyes were staring straight at him. He'd finally been caught.
Too damn right he'd been caught.
"GET OUT!" she screeched, simultaneously kicking out at the creature in her bed, while scrambling for the blankets, to tug up and hide beneath. She wasn't decent. She wasn't even wearing real pyjamas, just an old t-shirt she'd found in one of the dresser drawers of the room she'd been given, but she hadn't found underwear, and had had to go without.
Waking up to a strange animal in her bed, made her rightly feel violated, in the worst possible way. Snow roared again, "GETOUTGETOUTGETOUT!".
He had expected a not so pleasant response. A very unpleasant response, even. He'd prepared for it, braced himself for it. But somehow the fury he was imagining in his mind didn't compare to what erupted when Snow shot up in her covers.
Her foot hit his flank and he let out a surprised yelp as he jumped down from her queen bed. Landing on his bad paw, Bigby sprawled slightly before catching his footing and circling around so that he could see her. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to feel in this situation. Guilty probably, but that feeling was immediately roused within him.
Snow wouldn't want to hear it, but he was worried. Yes, worried, because that reaction --though there was a chance he'd deserved it-- had been slightly over the top.
Bigby looked up at her, wondering if he'd missed something when he'd drifted off. But, no. There was nothing out of the ordinary.
He was off the bed now at least, which calmed Snow a little, but her heart was still pounding like a jack-hammer, and she was still furious. The covers were clutched tightly around her neck, as she finally regained enough composure to figure out who she'd woken up to.
"What the FUCK are you doing in my room, Bigby!"
The question now became, would he get in more trouble lying or telling the truth? Well, either way, he was just one step away from becoming a rug, so perhaps it was better to die an honest wolf.
He looked up at her, trying to keep his gaze straight. "Watching you." Simple answer with plenty of horrible connotations. "I just wanted to make sure you were alright," he added on, his voice slightly softer.
Snow White didn't care that his voice was filled with concern. She cared that he'd been watching her while she'd been sleeping like some kind of psychopath.
"I'm fine." She snapped. "I'm going to continue to be fine. So get the fuck out of my room!"
Bigby wasn't a psychopath. He only a concerned father. Former father-to-be, as it were. It was the former part that he was having trouble coping with. And more-so than that, accepting that this Snow did not love him. No where even close, as far as he could tell. Even though he knew that she was the one he was supposed to be with.
It had gotten to the point where he could remember the days they hadn't been together, but... they seemed so very far behind them.
Bigby shook himself slightly, still hurting from the kick and landing. "You were shaking... you weren't 'fine'."
"I had a nightmare." Snow hissed, the memory of sharp white teeth tearing into flesh flashing back to the front of her mind. "Everyone has nightmares, people get over them. They don't need people sitting on the end of their bed to scare the living daylights out of them."
She stopped, and took another deep breath in and out, calming herself down. Although she had every right to get angry at the man, it wasn't becoming, and she was still painfully aware that she wasn't clothed. "Please leave." She said, with a lot more self control than she had been in the last few minutes. "We'll talk about this in the morning. But you need to go. Right now."
"I wasn't trying to scare you, Snow." That much was probably obvious, but he felt he had to tell her anyway. That was she couldn't accuse him of it, which was probably coming next. "I was just..." There was no innocent way to explain this. "Watching. I wanted to make sure you were alright."
But since he couldn't read her mind, it seemed he had failed on that front. Nothing had attached her physically, but nightmares could be just as bad, if not worse.
"I don't care!" She said. "Just leave."
She wasn't going to be sleeping for a little while anyway. She was a little too riled up, and a little too awake to just roll back over and close her eyes and continue to sleep. But she wanted her space back. She wanted him out of her room. She wanted to be able to have a little room to breathe without having him looming over her, being over-protective.
Bigby wracked his mind for something to say to that, but it was no different from what she'd been saying since waking up, and he'd used up all of his excuses.
And the way she kept repeating it... Snow didn't want him here at all. Again, no different than what he'd been expecting, but he hadn't even been able to wear her down. She was just as adamant the fifth time she made the demand; it made him feel guilty, proving that he shouldn't have been watching her in the first place.
He turned awkwardly, looking over his shoulder. "Fine. I'll see you in the morning." The limp added to his dejected aura as he left her room.
Snow let out a deep breath, half choked, when Bigby finally left the room.
She needed to get out of here. As soon as possible. There was absolutely no delaying it anymore.