She was like fire: full of energy, running on adrenaline, in midst of the thrills life always had to offer her.
She was flustered: heart pounding, fists clenching, blood rushing, cheeks flushed. He had invited tonight to "have a talk". And her mind was rushing through all the possibilities. She was in love with , even if they weren't a couple yet.
But, she is surprised.
For he is lamenting. She is puzzled by his expression. A sudden sick feeling is causing her stomach to clench. It's foreshadowing something that she dreads to even think about.
He thanks her for the time they've spent together, reminiscing about them like a distant memory, he lingers in there for a bit after offering her his most sincere gratitude.
She's caught off guard by how he leans forward and closes his eyes, as if to hang on to the moment for just a bit longer.
Then he's gone.
And Jules just knows that their paths will never cross again...
It's been two weeks since then; And she doesn't think- no, refuses to think about it, about him. Instead she focuses on helping her friends with their life projects. Especially her dear old best friend, Lucas.
A year has passed, and she isn't the same girl she was.
It starts out slowly. First she has a few dreams, nothing too serious, just fluff stuff that makes her want to groan and smack herself upside the head. Flying in the skies, holding hands, secretive smiles, the whole pink stuff. Then the dreams turn to unspoken words through heated stares, going back to the night they broke apart. Only this time, instead of just a lingering thanks, it becomes a farewell between to lovers; his lips aren't just a few inches away, they're covering hers and she's kissing him back. She wakes up in tears.
She seeks solace in her oblivious friends: doing shopping, running errands for her parents, taking some walks with Lucas there and there, because the poor guy always seems a bit lonely. They're the little things, but they're distracting and so she keeps the charade up, complying with all requests and keeping up her unbreakable facade. Jules could never let them know about her slowly-crumbling heart...
But suddenly all these little things aren't enough and thoughts of him come rushing right back into her determined little mind. Dreams turn to nightmares and nightmares turn to restless nights.
An idea pops up in Lucas mind during one of their walks. "Hey. How about if we do a road trip around the country?" Jules dismisses it at first, but Lucas keeps insisting. "Come on, it'll be fun! You've been kind of gloomy lately, it might be just the thing that you need."
She ends up accepting the idea. If even the dense Lucas can tell that something's happening, then she must be pretty messy by now. It has gotten so painful that she doesn't even think about his name.
So they set off to the road trip. And she takes her time, relishing in the fact that he's always with her, they often camp in the open. And when he hears her cries from her nightmares that she still can't get rid of, he doesn't ask. He just lays next to her, out beneath the stars and rubs her arms gently after wrapping his around her. And she finds that the nightmares are slowly going away.
He helps her heal and find her way. But one night as they're laughing, telling stories by the campfire, she suddenly stops, she sees Lucas laughing face and for a moment she sees his face. She starts crying. And suddenly, Lucas's not quite sure how to comfort his friend. He's trying to put the puzzle together. He wants answers.
So they go back to their hometown. Jules refuses to talk. Lucas's getting desperate. Her nightmares come back and she has to spend her nights at Lucas's place. It helps... But she's ashamed, because as she looks through her tear filled eyes into his, she can tell he's hurting too. Her pain became his pain, and she wasn't sure when it had happened. But it needed to stop. Jules couldn't keep going back to him to fill the gaping holes in her chest. It wasn't right. So she left the next morning without a single word and never came back into contact with him. Her life becomes a cycle of partying, drowning herself in work, even modeling, something she discovers she's quite good at.
A few years had passed. And she has moved out of the town.
Then it happens. As she is walking through the crowded, lit up City streets to get to her apartment, she catches a glimpse of a familiar face. And she's frozen. Her eyes widen and her jaw slackens... But he's not there. She could have sworn she'd seen... Him. She was going crazy.
And she flies back to her home town. It starts to pour, but Jules doesn't even seem to notice as she stands outside a familiar door, soaked in her party dress and suddenly furious with herself. There had never been no 'I love you's, no undying love confession through heart-felt looks, or blazing kisses or searing touches. There had never been any substance of something between her and him, to have gained any real feelings from. Why had she deluded herself to ever think otherwise?
She'd set herself through agony and over what? Nothing, what-so-ever. Was she lonely? Did she just simply want to be loved and to know the feeling of loving someone else? Well that was absolutely ridiculous, she thought furiously as her fist beat wildly at the door in front of her. The door opens and Jules's hand nearly knocks into his face.
"It's absolutely ridiculous when I've had this waiting here for me loyally for years." - She thought.
To say Lucas was surprised was an understatement. One moment he was sleeping peacefully, holding his world. His beautiful, broken world, right there in his arms... Then the next, she was gone. Years flew by without a trace of the blue-eyed beauty left behind. Well that wasn't true. She was always there in his thoughts. She was everywhere in his mind.
Yet suddenly she was here, years later, as if out of thin air, banging on his door in the pouring rain and drenched to the bone in that little black dressed that clung to her skin and hugged her figure tightly from the rain. And that beautiful pink skin was suddenly on him, pushing firmly and impatiently, awaiting some kind of response as she held on tightly to the collar of his shirt.
He stood there motionless for a few passing milliseconds. Her fists loosened and let go his shirt. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pushed her lips against his a bit more harsh. And then he was kissing her back. He was kissing her fiercely and with a type of fire he never knew he possessed. He took steps forward and pressed her carelessly against the door, and she didn't seem to appreciate his roughness.
She found that he didn't care that much for wet clothes, and he found that she didn't very much appreciate being more vulnerable than him. His lips were intoxicating and his body above hers in his bed almost suffocated her, but she realized that she didn't mind it one bit. He was so quickly addicted to all the sounds she made, to every breath she took, every sigh, every gasp, everything. And the sweet noises she would make when he'd nip at the little sweet spot on her collarbone... They drove each other to their edges.
And by the end of it all, she knew. And she knew it when she woke up, sore, exposed, and warm in his arms. She knew it then, too. She knew just as well as she knew that his hair looked like a mess in the mornings and that he had this one stubborn, little cowlick that just wouldn't go away unless he used his hat to cover it. She knew it as well as she knew he had a little scar on the little crevice between his right hand thumb and his index finger. She knew it as well as she knew the number of steps it took to get from his room to her room in her old home.
She knew it as well as she knew now that a little part of her would always belong to that dreaded phantom. And as he opened his eyes and met her eyes in a soft gaze; as his lips curved up into a gentle, genuine half smile and his thumb gently caressed her bottom lip... She knew just as well as he'd known his whole life since the day they first met.
Lucas knew. He always knew. He knew everything about her. Even knew she'd pined after the ghost of a man who would become as if he never were. He even knew she would always have a few holes in her heart, missing pieces that would always belong to that guy. But he didn't mind. Because he knew just as well as she knew; he would always be there.
Filling in those empty spaces.
