Reunited

Hey Sarge. Remember Me?

Pip read the message, heart racing, eyes frantically tracing the words over and over again.

Hey sarge. Remember me?

How could she ever forget? She thought about him every day. He had been the only thing, sometimes, keeping her going. Her fingers hovered over the keypad. Finally, she typed out her message.

Maybe. Are you that idiot from Little Kilton?

Ravi's reply came almost instantly. The one and only ;)

Pip's heart thundered as she typed it out. Do you want to meeet up?

But she couldn't send it, because what if he had a girlfriend? What if he didn't want to meet up? He was young, cute, funny... and he was a lawyer! Lawyer-in-training, but still. Who wouldn't want to be with him, now that Sal's name had been cleared? She hit backspace until all the words were gone. Maybe he had moved on. She didn't want to come barging into his life, messing it all up. She didn't deserve him. He was bright, happy, kind, funny, and she was... a murderer. Her breath hitches in her throat as she remmebers that night. Jason Bell. The tape. The death-mask. The warehouse. The hammer. The dead body. Max Hastings. And everything on fire.

She couldn't breathe, she couldn't think straight. The memories were suffocating her, drowning her.

Then Ravi's message lit up the screen.

Pip?

U ok?

She had to reply but all she could see was Jason Bell, and the tape moving in to cover her eyes.

Pip, r u alright?

She tried to snap out of it, but she couldn't, she couldn't, and -

The phone in her hands started buzzing. She fumbled with it for a moment before catching it and staring at the face lighting it up. Light brown skin, messy black hair, bright, happy eyes, grinning up at her. The face she had looked into so many times, before that night. The face she had stared at endlessly during her 'exile', silver light from the phone screen lighting up her face. The face of her one and only, the love of her life.

Ravi Singh.

Her fingers hesitated. She wanted him back into her life so, so badly. But the question was, did he want her back in his life?

Well... she'd have to confront it sooner or later.

She pressed accept.

His voice filled her ears, warm and bright and gentle, and damn it, she was in love -

"Pip? Can you hear me?" He was talking to her, and she sank down onto the floor, cradling the phone between her hand and her ear, just like she had on that night.

"Y-yeah," she smiled, huddled up in the corner, revelling in the warmth of his voice, the way it stirred something bright and happy inside her. "Yeah, I can hear you."

"Thank goodness," Ravi exhaled, the sound blowing through the phone into Pip's ear. She smiled. "Got worried for a sec."

"I'm alright," Pip stood up and plonked herself down at her desk. "How are you?"

"I'm alright," Ravi said. "You?"

"Didn't I just say I'm fine?" Pip said, trying to sound casual, though her voice was way too hearty to sound convincing. "I'm alright."

Well, no, she wasn't alright, but that was fine. Ravi didn't have to know that.

"Okay then," Ravi said. There was a long silence. Well, thought Pip, it was to be expected, of course, that they had grown apart. And then Ravi blurted out the words she'd been wanting to say.