a perfect contradiction • lrh

chapter forty-one

The usual evening silence settled around Eleanor and Chase as they focused on their food. This had become the new norm after Eleanor had shut out the world when her heart cracked in two.

In the weeks following their break up, her voice fell silent. Her eyes, dead and gray, fixated, unmoving from her plate of food. Sometimes she ate it but mostly she just stared until her friend guided her back to bed.

She looked different too. Her cheekbones were more accentuated, from lack of nutrients (despite the salad Nate bought her for lunch everyday) and her skin beneath her eyes had darkened.

It wasn't just her body that changed, her style too. Her signature cropped tees and jeans and cardigans had been replaced by whatever trend was happening, clothes purchased and gifted to her by her new knight in shining armor.

Nowadays, her color was gone, replaced with monochrome attire. Her hair was almost always straightened, her natural waves a thing of the past and her make up, heavier and darker. It shadowed and overpowered her natural beauty.

Chase cleared his throat, ridding his mind of what used to be. "You look... lovely today," his lips turning into a smile that didn't quite meet his eyes.

"Thanks," she returned the smile. "It's new, nobody else can even buy it yet," she patted down the white frills that wrapped around her torso and her fingers grazed the frilly shoulder pads too.

Chase went to speak his name but Eleanor had already beaten him to it, "Nate got it me," though she said it with a smile. The faint lines of his frown disappeared to be replaced by his forced smile.

*
Eleanor blinked a few times as she sat in her car. She had been parked up for a while now but her motivation to get out had vanished. Her bones ached and the vast vacuum in her chest gaped. After twenty minutes of staring at the car park walls, she eventually made her way up to her apartment.

As she dug through her bag to find her keys, the sound of the door to her side echoed down the corridor. She froze like a deer in headlights as Luke emerged from his apartment.

Her eyes remained on the lock at first, willing him to just disappear. She hadn't seen him since he had destroyed her world.

"El?" His weak voice strained as he took a step towards her.

Her shoulders tensed at the name, fire, cold fire, lit in her eyes. "You don't get to call me that anymore," her voice dry and raw. She held his stare. "You made your choice," her voice reduced to a faint whisper, her throat daring to wobble.

Her eyes widened against her attempt at control as she took in the man before her. Stubble amassed his chin, longer than she had ever seen it. His eyes shot with tiredness and darkened beyond recognition. He wore exhaustion painfully. He retracted his step, his eyes widened too at the girl he barely recognized.

He turned and disappeared down the hall before he emptied the contents of his stomach or demolished the nearest wall.

*
No amount of distance would free him from the chaos that always followed him. From the hurt he always seemed to be the center of. No amount of goodness ever stayed with him long enough. Even the stars lost their light around him. And he deserved it too. Deserved the blackness that consumed his soul. But she hadn't. And that ate him alive.

She was the gentle, beautiful bloom of spring and he was the bleakest winter.

His nightmares had returned. And they were the epitome of a contradiction. Dreams laced in color and light; smiles and laughter; closeness and love. Memories from a part of his life he mourned. The dreams forced him to relive every happy moment he had been blessed to experience with her, his girl, the girl he once had. These perfect, heaven hazed dreams twisted him awake with a violent, suffocating realization; a sugar coated nightmare; an immobilizing truth of what he had lost.

But yet in those moments, the nights his mind let him sleep, he held on to her, even if she was only a part of his subconscious now. Only if she loved him during the deepest stages of his sleep. He wished to sleep forever, to be paralyzed in this dream state.

He sighed as he forced himself out of bed. His focus drifted to the sheet of paper on his bedside table. He reread the letter that had been sent to him yesterday. A letter from the bank, requesting for his funds to be transferred to another account.

He hadn't initiated the transfer. But he knew who did. The other co-signer of his savings account, his father.

Part of him considered just doing it, transferring every penny he owned. What did it matter anymore?

He scrubbed away the stress as he showered and dressed for work. He dreaded his shifts now. They were slow and uneventful.

"Hey bud," Jack smiled as he handed Luke his coffee order. Jack had taken on a protective role over Luke in Eleanor's absence. It was hard for Jack, he had seen Luke revert back to the boy that had first entered his store; utterly broken.

Jack thought it was a great shame that they had never managed to make it work and even though she was now close to his mate, Nate, he couldn't help the sympathy he felt towards the Aussie.

"Talk to me," Jack pressed as he leant against the counter top.

Luke signed as he pulled out the letter shoved in his pocket and dumped it in front of him. Over the past few weeks, Luke had poured his heart out to Jack, he hadn't wanted to but the alternative had to be avoided.

"This is ridiculous, he can't take it from you can he?" Luke shrugged, the grave look on his face unbearable.

"You need legal advice," Jack started, "Go take the afternoon, go to the bank and get support!" He insisted. Luke simply nodded as he left the till.

*
Across town, Eleanor had been in the studio since ten writing, recording and losing her mind. She preferred it when she was busy doing other things. She found it easier to create when her head wasn't permanently in that bubble.

"I think I need to go back to work," she huffed, slinging her notepad onto the sofa seat.

"Not this again," Nate sighed, "we've been over this."

"Not for money, for my sanity, I can't be here all day!" She rested her head back on the sofa and rubbed her temples.

Nate shook his head. "No."

She lifted her head and stared at the man sitting across from her, his features unreadable.

"What?" her shock was unhidden.

"No."

She was taken aback by his lack of half smile, lack of softness and for the hard glare he held.

She frowned, "you can't make that choice."

"I can and I will." He sighed, sitting beside her. He took her palms in his, "because I love you and I know what's best," he kissed her cheeks as they blushed beneath.

"Go for a walk, that'll give you inspiration," his smile returned and she followed his orders.

a/n
Thank you for reading ⭐ I love you all
Two chapters in two days 🤭 hopefully I can keep going...