Fade Into You

Favourite Crime

What about when Robbie comes home?

Lorna's pointless digs kept running around my mind, every time I looked at Lizzie, all I could think of was the words she said.

Do you think she'll choose you over him?

She was right and I think that's why I was so caught up about it, would she really prefer a lifetime of hate and discrimination with me or a happy and financially stable future with him?

I knew she wanted kids eventually and so did I but I don't think she knew how hard it would be for us to have kids together and now I can't stop thinking about our relationship and how, for her, if it was anything more than a phase.

I hadn't spoken to her about it, of course, the last thing I wanted to do was bring up Robbie and make her more anxious than she already was. He's still MIA, none of his team knew where he was but they think he's somewhere over the South Pacific. That uncertainty was enough for Lizzie to wake up in the middle of the night hyperventilating. I don't think she's had a full night's sleep in about a month. The only time she'll sleep more than five hours is when we've spent the night out drinking, she'll sleep straight away but still wake up at 6/7 am. I love the girl but the bags under her eyes were growing darker and darker by the day and the last thing she needed was for me to express my anxieties and add them to hers.

"Babe?" Lizzie asked, leaning her head back on my shoulder as we lay in her bath together.

I hummed in response and kissed the side of her head.

"Are you all right? You're really quiet," she mumbled, her hands gently running over my thighs.

I hummed once more and nodded, "sorry, I've been thinking about uni work a lot."

"Not about Robbie?" she asked quietly.

"What?" I replied, picking my head up as my eyes widened.

"You haven't touched me since last week and you can't look me in the eye for more than two seconds ... so I assume it's about Robbie," she sighed.

"I've just been- I don't know," I exhaled, "I'm okay, I don't want to make you more anxious."

"Please talk to me," she whispered.

I bit my cheek and exhaled, "what if Robbie comes back?"

"What do you mean?" she asked, sitting up and looking over at me, "like, what if he survives? What a selfish thing to think."

"No, that's not what I meant," I groaned, "what if he comes to win you back and what if he succeeds and then you- you realise that I'm just a phase ... when he comes back, what if-"

Lizzie cut me off by kissing me firmly until I kissed her back.

"You're not a phase," she mumbled against my lips, "he's not gonna turn up in Ireland, he's not going to try and win me back because I love YOU. I love you so much that nothing is going to get in the way of that."

"Yeah, but how many times did you say that to Robbie?" I sighed, my chin quivering, "how do I know that you won't do what you did to him, to me?"

"I won't," she frowned, "what can I do to show you that I won't hurt you like that?"

"I don't know," I admitted, shrugging my shoulders.

"I'm not going to leave you, okay?" she sighed, "I really really love you, more than I've loved anything ever before, I want to spend the rest of my life with you if you'll have me."

"I want that too," I smiled sadly, "you're just going to need to be patient with my trust ... I love you but I don't know if I 1000% trust you after everything."