Falling - Tom Holland imagine

Chapter 16

TW abuse flashbacks and extreme swearing.

We ended up being 30 minutes late to lunch and were the recipients of a lot of sarcastic smiles and remarks

 that we couldn't even go 30 minutes alone, 

that Tom had already eaten, after I pulled the neck of the hoodie to reveal a tiny mark on my neck, and other such witticisms. 

I felt really guilty that it was my fault we were so late and everyone was winding Tom up, so I was really quiet and withdrawn, not wanting to draw any more attention to myself hoping it would all die down. Sadly it didn't, with the twins continuing to push it too far, on the verge of tears I quickly excused myself to the toilet where I shut the door and began to sob quietly into my hoodie covered hands, just too overwhelmed by the last hour; the door was quite thick, but even so I still heard Tom raging at his family for picking on me, the actual words were muffled but the tone was enough, and managed to intimidate me even more - a male voice shouting in anger, a trigger I was super afraid of. I curled even more into myself, making as small a target as possible in the corner.

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As soon as Y/N practically ran from the room Tom lost his temper completely with the twins and by association the rest of the family, and began shouting at them for being utterly inappropriate and upsetting her, that there was a reason they had been so late and it was nothing along the lines of their gutter minds. "I found out her ex husband used to beat her" he blurted out to the family seeing their faces grow pale and horrified, "I tried to comfort her and she flinched away from me - FLINCHED, as if I was going to hurt her." he ranted, tears running down his face as his anger at the situation and her ex husband overwhelmed him. "And all you can think is we were fucking, what the hell is wrong with you! I spent over 45 minutes trying to calm her down as she was in hysterics, she was sobbing over what that cunt put her through, and you can see she's still scared of him, even now, and all you can do is make dick jokes" At this point Nikki put her hand on his arm, aware he might just throw it off and storm away, but instead he threw himself into her arms hugging her, just like he had when he was a small child, wanting her to help him and take the hurt away. She embraced him, running her fingers through his hair as he wept into her shoulder. It didn't last long, just a few minutes before he pulled back realising Y/N was still gone, and pulled himself together, brushing off his tears before heading out to the toilet. Nikki glared at the rest of them and hissed " NOT. ONE. WORD. ABOUT. THIS. She'll talk to us when she is ready to." before she went out to dish up the spaghetti bolognaise.

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I heard a knocking on the door, after a brief period of silence outside, and heard Toms voice gently coaxing me out. I unballed myself from the floor, once again utterly numb inside and opened the door a crack, to see Toms teary eyes and sympathetic face. He opened his arms and sighed in relief when I let him hug me. "I told them off, we should be okay now" he said into my hair as he stroked it down with one of his hands, "I'm sorry, they sometimes just go too far and encourage each other." I nodded into his chest. Nikki popped her head around the door of the kitchen "Foods ready, and believe me they'll not say another word if they know what's good for them!"

He led me back in and I sat quietly, looking down at the table as the twins offered apologies for being out of place and taking it too far. I nodded to them, but stayed quiet. It was an uncomfortable few minutes until Dom began to regale the room with tales about researching his latest book, which took attention away from me. Tom held my hand under the table rubbing it constantly, to let me know I was safe. I forced down about half the food, before it was too much, and as soon as everyone else was finished I stood up and offered my apologies but I needed to leave. Tom immediately grabbed both his and my coat, placing it around my shoulders as we quickly exited. We began walking  towards the park, and as we came to Tom's road, he stopped and hugged me.

"I want you to come home with me. I want you to stay and watch crappy tv, and cuddle and walk Tessa and wake up with me and let me look after you" 

"I know, but I've got work  and all my clothes are at home and my meds and everything; I just can't" I answered

"Soon maybe" he asked hopefully "I hate being apart from you, see me tomorrow?"

"Maybe," I said trying to push down the urge to throw myself at him and fall apart completely, and not in a good way, in a sobbing till you can't breathe and tears and snot are running down your face and you're clawing at your chest to stop the agony inside and your head hurts and you're dehydrated, and you're lying in a broken down heap and just want to die, kind of way.

"Okay, darling, but call me later, please. I want to hear from you, that you're okay. I'm worried about you. Stay with me all next weekend - will you?" he pleaded.

"Sure," I promised, thinking by then I'd have managed to get myself together. He continued walking me towards the bus stop and waited with me again till my bus came and sped me away from my comfort, my love.

I made it through my front door into my cold, empty sterile flat, no evidence that anyone really lived there with no personal momentos or photos, such a contrast to the warmth and life both at the Hollands and even Tom's, I thought with longing of his comfy leather sofa covered in throws and cushions where he made himself little nests, and regretted walking away from him earlier but I needed space to fall apart. I stumbled into the living room, not even making it onto the sofa before collapsing to my knees with the wracking sobs shaking my frame again, but still utterly silent, it had taken me years of practice to be able to cry this hard without making a single sound, lest it made things worse. I fell to my side curling up into a little ball with the agony ripping through my chest as the memories danced through my head once again. The fists, the blood, the beatings, the long sleeved, high necked blouses even in summer, the limping after another........no not that, I couldn't think of that, the bottles of concealer to cover the bruises, but nothing that would cover the bite marks, the sunglasses, the verbal putdowns, the excuses. My god, the excuses. No wonder everyone had distanced themselves from me.

I tried to fight the wave of agony, hearing every insult that had ever been spat at me, feeling the ghosts of beatings and assaults past. I could hear my phone ring, but left it, too swept up in my own personal hell to break free. As I lay there for hours, tears pouring down, fighting to breath, fighting the panic. Eventually I forced myself to move, and I took myself into the kitchen reaching once again for my tablets, noting the fading red scar on my arm, but all the silver ones from years ago laying alongside it, crossing it, years of pain scribbled onto my arm. I collapsed at the small table looking at the pills, wondering if I took them all I would finally be free of the voices, the memories, the pain and the fear. But then Tom's face came into view, his gentle brown eyes and soft hair, the small smiles he would offer me, the feeling of his arms and the warmth of his love. I pulled his hoodie tighter around me, placing my head in my arms, catching his faint scent still on it. And so I took just the one pill and headed off to find my phone.

It lay on the sofa where I thrown it earlier. I rubbed my swollen tired eyes to see 8 missed calls from Tom and about two dozen messages, each of them growing more frantic that I hadn't answered. Then it buzzed again in my hand, another message which i clicked on

Tom: Please answer me baby, just a single letter or something, I'm so worried about you. Anytime, day or night but please let me know you're ok. I should never have let you leave me. I love you. Please be ok. xxx

I clicked on the call button, hearing it ring just once before I heard his frantic voice.

"Y/N, are you okay, I've been calling and messaging and please tell me you're ok....."

"Tom" I interrupted in a rough voice from all the crying "I'm here."

"Baby, talk to me, you don't sound right, please sweeheart"

"I'm....... I'm not okay. Its all too much, everything just crashing down and I'm not okay anymore. I can't do this. I don't want to live like this, I can't live like this, I just want it all to stop" I began to cry silently again, trying to hold back the desperation I felt inside as my demons clawed at me with all the bile of years of not being good enough. Of wanting to end it all.

"Move in with me" he blurted down the phone implusively. I stopped in shock. "Please, I hate that you're not here and I can't hold you and protect you and make all this better, so move in with me, live with me, be with me."

"Are you sure" I asked quietly.

"More than anything I've ever been sure of. Its late now but tomorrow, grab the important stuff and move in with me."