I'll Love You For A Lifetime [Heartstopper, Tara x Darcy]

Growing up: part 3

Tara's pov

I was sitting on the couch, watching Darcy walk in and out as she did the home chores. I had said I would help her, but she insisted I should relax. A little smile crept up my lips as she went down on her knees and changed my socks for me.

"Damn, had I known I would get treated like a princess, I would have done this a long time ago," I said, grinning cheekily at her.

Darcy stood up and leaning down, she kissed my lips, her hand placed softly on my belly, "You can do it again, if you want a premium extension of this service."

I laughed and she left the room shaking her head.

It had been two years since we had met for the first time again, and it had been a year since we had gotten married. Everyone only saw the good parts of it, the happy marriage picture, the smiling faces as we stand in from of our new house, but what happened between all of it, it's just between me and Darcy. And well, a little bit of it is with George.

Vanora threw a gruesome fight when Darcy came to told her that she was going to leave. "She is going to leave you like she is leaving me now, Tara. You don't even know who she is anymore," she shouted at me. Darcy was ready to throw punches, but I held her hand. Vanora had her own problems too, we had no reason to hurt her more than she already was.

"You are not taking this apartment," she said hysterically, "I pay for it too."

"I'm not gonna take it," Darcy said quietly and then we left, leaving Vanora to her mad hysteria.

Soon, Darcy and I rented an apartment for ourselves and I immediately started looking for a job. As soon as I did find one, I knew what I had to do.

"You are going to rehab," I told her firmly. She was not rid of the pills and cigarette lighters yet.

Darcy did not put up much of a fight.

Less than a year later, Darcy was back. They would later tell me that it was astounding how quickly she had recovered, considering how deep she was into her addictive behaviours. She had a very strong will to recover they said.

But things were not so simple. You see, addiction is not just about drugs, it is also about the person. And when Darcy moved back, I realized she had swapped her addiction from drugs to...me.

We were not kids anymore, and whenever Darcy got anxious when she found me absent from home, it pissed me off. In addition to that, she did relapse back to the pills again a couple of times, but she would stop herself again after I threatened to leave her.

Soon, Darcy stopped relapsing and I saw the dark circles going away. She started going to work again and she stopped dying her hair black. Instead, she would dye her hair different shades of pink and wear more colours and she started helping me with the household work too. Most of the time, she was good, but there were times she would have terrible meltdowns.

The pain she had carried around with her for so long would flow down her cheeks like weak tributaries. It hurt me so bad, because I loved her. I could not bear to see her dark phases, but I saw them anyway, and I held onto her hand during those dark times. She would hold mine too, when it was my turn.

She would hold my hand and press me down on the bed, crawling on top of me. I could momentarily forget about all our worries during moments like these, relishing her touch as she raised my legs above her shoulders, her nails sinking into my skin, my hands in her hair and then all around her, her body moving against mine in deliberate movements. I hate to admit it but while I was gone, she had gotten better at it.

In the beginning of the next year, we got married. It was a beautiful event. With close friends and family around us and a pretty beach, we could not have wished for anything better. We bought a home, and a cat.