Forever

99

Curled in a ball on the couch, Bree lays her head on her fingers to rub her temples, while her eyes stay glued to the floor in front of her.

"Hey, Pretty Girl, whats going on?" Pietro nods upwards, softly and her eyes flicker to him for a moment before away with furrowed brows.

"I'm just thinking." She excuses in an almost whisper tone.

"About?" He nods and she sighs.

"Hate."

"Hate about what, Anjel?" He pushes himself closer to her and she lays her head back to look at him with a certain message in her eyes. "Princezna, no." He shakes his head.

"Why not?" She whimpers tiredly. "Why can't I hate myself, when I have so many reasons?" She turns her body towards him and he tilts his head. "I hate my body, I hate my voice, I hate my face. I mean, sometimes I wish I could just rip my face off and get a whole new one, but I can't and I hate it so much." She states with wrinkled brows as his eyes focus between hers. "And I have so many issues, my brain is so fucked up, and the best I can do for it is force artificial happiness onto myself, and that's just horrible." She complains rightfully with tears in her eyee. "It's so fucking stupid." She states before she freezes at the loving look on his face. "Why're you looking at me like that?" She pushes her hair out of her face with a desperate tone and throws her hand down.

"Princezna, I'm just confused." He sits up with a soft voice while shaking his head. "I don't understand how you can be so sad and so insecure when you look how you do right now, it's odd." He holds her face to watch her eyes stare into his squinted pair. "And I know you don't have much of a say with this, your disorder controls it, but so do you." He nods with wrinkled brows. "If you want to be better, which I know you do, then you need to let yourself get better. You need to fight all these bad thoughts, I know you can." He states surely and scooches closer. "You've done it for years, I've watched you do it so well ever since you got here." He slides his hands to the sides of her neck. "You had your moment, yes, but it's time to really move on, like we've been trying to do since it ended. I have, I need you to do it too."

"But some things are just so much easier said than done." She whispers with the glisten of tears in her eyes.

"Believe me, I know." He nods with raised brows while pushing her hair behind her ears. "It took me a while to actually forgive you for what you said, so I lied." He breathes softly and her bottom lip starts to quiver. "I lied, because I knew, as long as you got better, I could forgive. But, instead, I had to watch you tear yourself apart for so long for the same reason I couldn't trust you and even more reasons that were just complete bullshit." He shakes his head with furrowed brows while holding her hands. "I couldn't hate you." He states softly. "I couldn't be mad or spiteful, I had to forgive you, because I couldn't stand it. It caused me so much pain to feel that way towards when I knew deep down that you didn't deserve it. What you said was not your fault." He states as a tear slips down her cheek. "In the moment, it was all just out of your reach, you had nothing to hold onto, but that is something that I can blame you for." He nods and she hangs her head with a deep breath. "Bree, you should've taken better care of yourself. None of this would have happened if you had been taking the steps that are necessary for a better recovery. And I don't even have to say this, because you know this already, you tell yourself this everyday and I act like I don't know, because I don't want to put you on the spot, but I think it's time." He nods surely and she looks up at him. "I need to call you out for far more things than I do now, because if I don't, I'm afraid you'll lose more of yourself when you've just gotten most of it back. And if that happens...and you do what you did again..." He hesitantly starts while shaking his head and she nods quickly, knowing exactly where he's going with that.

"I won't." She shakes her head while sitting closer. "I swear, I won't do it again. You won't leave me, right?" She whimpers while cupping his cheeks and his brows furrow. "Please don't."

"Briana, I'm not going anywhere." He shakes his head while sliding his hands to her back, just under her shoulders. "Why would you think that I'd do that, right now?" He asks and she bursts into tears and throws her arms around his neck.

He's pulling her around his waist within moments before he pushes his fingers in her hair and turns forward on the couch. She squeezes him tight in her embrace and turns her face into his neck, shaking as she tries to hold back and calm down her fear.

"As long as you're not leaving me, I'm not saying goodbye to you." He rubs up and down her back. "I can't do that." He shrugs. "I gave you that promise ring for a reason." He reminds and she sighs with a twitch of the corner of her mouth, wanting to be a smile. "You're way too beautiful today and everyday to believe that this is a rational way to think." He sighs. "That ring should be seen as a reminder of how much I love you, and I need you to remember. Can you promise me that?"

"Yeah." She sighs, muffled by their position.

"Say it, Love." He presses his lips to her hood.

"I promise."