under you || taylor hawkins - foo fighters

chapter 𝐒𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐍 - M.I.A

Nine days had passed since Taylor had driven to the middle of nowhere with Emmalyn by his side, not a care in the world worrying his mind.

Emmalyn hadn't spoken to him since and it was driving him insane. His friends had laughed at him for being so worried as it "wasn't like him", but that made it hurt even more.

Maybe Emmalyn had heard of his reputation and didn't want to get involved with him. But Taylor couldn't blame her.

"Taylor I can't live like this."

"Baby, please,"

It had been 1 and a half years since they'd broken it off. Taylor and his ex. She stood in the doorway, ripping into him continuously as tears rolled down her red cheeks whilst she yelled.

"Don't call me baby, Taylor. Don't," Her tone was stern and aggressive but her breath continuously hitched in her throat, presumably from the sobbing which had overcome her when she'd walked into the apartment seeing Taylor in bed with another woman.

"I'm really sorry, I promise."

Taylor was sat on the bed, shirtless as his skin was on fire. Guilt consumed him whilst he watched his girlfriend cry. He didn't want to make her cry. He was just plain stupid.

The memory felt like a knife impaling him right in the chest, exposing every time he'd fucked things over just because he couldn't control himself. Everything was shown in painfully vivid detail.

"Please just let me explain-."

"Explain what," She backed towards the door, clutching a bag underneath her arm, her breathing speeding up, "That you're unable to comprehend anyone's feelings other than your own? That you have consistently failed to keep your empty promises every single fucking time? I've heard your explanations, Taylor, and I'm not listening anymore. I'm done."

And with one final half-finished breath, she stormed out, leaving Taylor to loathe himself for the next sixteen months. It was the way every relationship ever ended for him — half-finished.

The words hung heavy in his mind once again, the finality of them sinking back into his chest for probably the millionth time since it had happened.

He couldn't do that every again.

Especially to Emmalyn.

♫⋆｡♪ ₊˚♬ . ♫⋆｡♪ ₊˚♬ﾟ.

Emmalyn sank back into the velvet chair which was positioned in the corner of her living room, trying not to let the guilt in her head get the better of her. She hated the way she left things.

She'd spent the past week and a half steeping in her own regret of believing she could survive away from home. Not having the comfort of full loneliness, the comfort of being somewhere she knew like the back of her hand, the comfort of being able to visit Kurt.

Having distanced herself from Dave, she started to fall back into a grieving self-destructive cycle of getting high and playing whatever instrument she could find until the early hours of the morning. The only good thing about where she had chosen to live was that no one was anywhere near her. Just how she liked it.

Dope still lingered in her mind when the phone rang from beside her, like it had every day. An overly concerned Dave was usually on the other end, wondering where she'd gone. Sometimes it would be her best friend Amanda, wondering when they'd get to jam. Most often it would be Taylor, to which every time she left the phone to ring out. She couldn't face him.

After letting it ring for a moment or so, she inevitably picked it up and read the number. It was Dave's.

Emmalyn dog-eared the page of her book and placed it to the side whilst she curled her knees to her her chest and accepted the call.

"What's up?" Emmalyn sighed, her mind drained as her had messily scattered over the coffee table, looking to find a pack of cigarettes to drown out the sorrows.

"Taylor called me."

"And?" Her voice was coaxed in sass and annoyance. She needed a break. From life.

"And he's wondering where you've gone? Totally M.I.A, Lins," Dave tried to put on a soft voice but it was Dave. Constantly screaming or shouting, whether that was through music or not was a different story.

The only time his voice has ever genuinely been scarce was the day Dave visited her after Kurt had died.

"Linny."

"David."

She pulled him into a tight hug, the collar of his shirt soaked in tears as it seeped through onto the bottom of her chin. The droplets of salty water rolled down her cheeks, after desperately trying to conceal the agony inside all day.

Dave's eyes were now dry, having let put as many tears as he could before he arrived. He knew Emmalyn had it way worse than he did, even though in her eyes it was never a competition.

"I didn't want to call you, I'm sorry," Dave said, his voice barely above a whisper as he moved back slightly, Emmalyn still clutching the fabric of his clothing as though it were the only thing holding her together.

Her eyes were puffy and red, while her cheeks were soaked in a mixture of sweat and tears as fresh ones seemed to well up in her eyes as the man spoke, still stood outside the door.

"I didn't want to make it real," Dave muttered, wiping his under eye; just looking at her made him want to break down once again. Her shoulders sagged with the weight of the grief, unsure what the hell would happen next.

"Saying it out loud would make it real. I don't want it to be real, Linny."

Emmalyn's bottom lip trembled as she grasped onto Dave's back, like she was going to fall under the torture of what had happened.

"Tell me it isn't real," Emmalyn mumbled, "Please, Dave."

"Kurt's dead, Linny."

. ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . . ݁₊ ⊹ . ݁˖ . ݁

"Tell him I'm fine," Emmalyn muttered, lighting one of the cigarettes she'd found in the table beside her and placing between a hole in her lips.

As she inhaled deeply, Dave let out a sigh, "What's goin' on Linny? I thought you two hit it off?"

They did hit it off. She really really liked him. But she didn't want to face him. She couldn't.

"We did, but he said something," Her voice trailed off, ending the sentence much quieter than it had started, hoping that Dave would brush up her comment and hang up as soon as possible.

"What did he say?! I swear to God, if he hurt you, I will beat his ass until he's black and bl-."

"He called me Ems, Dave."