Fly Away

48 - i love you

Song: The Neighbourhood - Sweater Weather / SLOWED

Rocco

You know the feeling when your heart is being ripped out of your chest and you can't breathe? Everything around you is closing in and your vision is blurring, you can feel each throb of the blood pumping around your body and the stabbing, unbearable pain in your chest that refuses to go away no matter how much you beg?

Beg.

I'm begging right now, for everything to stop and stay still, for things to turn out differently than they have and for my life to be just the ounce more fortunate than in this present moment.

But whoever said that life was ever fair.

"Mia, come on baby open your eyes. You can't leave me like this. I need you. I need you like I need air. Please." I grip onto the side of her face, cheeks cold and eyes fluttered closed, willing them open. Willing her to be okay. The pain she's feeling is imprinted on her face, her eyebrows creased and her mouth firmly shut in a harsh line that creates an open, raw wound in my heart.

Her chest is still, at an agonisingly slow pace, rising and falling, and the blood.

God, the blood.

It's as dark as her dress, staining it a new colour and sweeping across the floor around where I'm kneeling with her in my arms. It's funny, because I've seen blood a lot. I've been around blood a lot, but now? Now is the only time I can't seem to bear the sight of it.

I don't care about dirtying myself, I don't care about the crowd of people around us, some shouting, some offering words of comfort, some crying.

I want to cry, and I nearly let the pressure behind my eyelids release, but I force myself to be strong. Stay strong for her. For both of us.

The muted blare of an ambulance fills my head. Someone must have called when those fucking intruders came in, and in this moment I'm thankful for them having the right mind to call. What with me breaking down all over the floor with my life in my arms and my heart I'm my throat with how fucking unbearable this is for me.

The blood is continuing to pulse out of the front of Mia's chest now, and despite being hit in her back, the bullet landed not too far away from her feet, the exit wound directly where her heart is.

"Cherry. Mia. Come on. Just a little longer." I plead, pressing a kiss to her cheek, her forehead, trying to rouse her and make her open her eyes. Coax her into believing she'll be okay and live. I'll look after her and protect her like I should have tonight.

I should have been the one who got shot, not her. She doesn't deserve this at all. She deserves everything good, and if it means me dying I would willingly do so just so she's happy and alive to be.

A shuddering breath leaves her lips and hits the side of my face, and I desperately look up, seeing her lips now parted, throat bobbing like she's trying to say something but there's something stuck in her throat, blocking.

My heart constricts in my chest at the sight of her so helpless. I hate it so much because I can't do anything to help her except whisper words of comfort and love.

"Shh, don't try to talk." I say in her ear, hoping to hell she can hear me, but when she nods her head once, her eyes tentatively opening the slightest, I let out a rushed breath of relief.

It doesn't last long, and when the blare of the ambulance stops and people in bright yellow and green uniforms filter through the broken restaurant doors, the fear and the nerves and that piling anger claw up again.

That white hot rage is nearly consuming me, but somehow the sight of Mia's face growing paler, weaker, sobers me enough to grab a hold on her hand, linking our fingers together in a hopeless move to give my life to her.

Her eyes open then, her breaths laboured and prolonged, and the beautiful ocean blue is filled with rawness. She's scared, but there's another emotion that lingers visibly.

Peace.

She opens her mouth again, but nothing comes out, and I feel a long, single tear escape from my eye, spilling onto her white cheek and running down, lost.

Her fingers grow slack in mine, and her eyes haze over, closing further, and I feel a sob clawing up my throat, the splintering noise of my heart as clear as day in my ears, the desperation and want and despair and hate so fragile in me as I look at her.

So beautiful.

I bend down closer to her mouth, planting a light kiss on the paled skin, the pink colour faded into a sickly blue, but I don't care because she's still perfect and mine.

"I love you."

It escapes almost too quietly for her to hear, but I know she does because right before her eyes close, her neck rolling backward against my arm, the gentle squeeze of her hand in mine three times is the thing I cling on to.

And then.

Nothing.

i think i'm going to internally puke.

i know this chapter is short but i can't. i just can't rn. this whole scene is just...

this book is nearing the end, only about two chapters left maybe.

how are you.

what are you guys thinking.

I have a fucking cold and I hate it and my eyes a droopy n shit and I'm so exhausted so imma sleep after posting this but yeah.

ily