A Faltering self (Distorted Reality book 2)

Chapter 64- It's in the in-between that I get you

(Madison's POV)

Going to sleep, I try not to think about today. I try to let the arms around me and the fingers brushing through my hair keep me distracted from everything I know I'll have to face eventually as the whispers grow louder and shadows linger in the corner of the room. I shut my eyes tight in the hopes that I can escape this reality to another. It's half way between sleep and still being aware that a face slips through. One that feels like home with those brown eyes. And it's almost like he is really there with me, staring back as something seems to register in those eyes.

I'm lying in a grass field that feels familiar, but I can't quite put to mind why. Someone walks up and holds a hand out to me. I can't recognize who it is by looking at them, yet, like the field, there is this familiar tie to him.

"I thought that was you, Princess, but how about we head somewhere else. It's not safe here."

I look at him curious as I grab his hand and he helps me up. I trust him enough to follow his lead.

"Why? It feels fine?"

He smiles, and it makes me have this warm feeling that I never want to go away.

"It's just not safe for you to be out in the open. But I know a place where we can go."

He keeps hold of my hand as we walk through the forest behind where I was lying. He takes me to a cabin that unlike before, there is no connection, even unplaced, to it.

We walk in and I look around, taking in everything. There is a kitchen past the front walk in with a living room to my right with a hall that leads off closer to the back wall of the space. It's an open area with a small wall backing the living room, but not cutting full off the kitchen, just what seems to be a dining area, and a back porch lining the back of the house that seems to overlook a lake.

The man with me looks at me, watching as I take the place in.

"What do you think, Princess? Honestly, I wasn't sure if I'd ever get to show you it. You, you don't recognize it? It's, okay, I get it. Wait... are you? Do you know who I am?"

I want to, but his name still alludes me.

He smiles warmly at me as he takes his hand from mine and to the right side of my face. There is something about him that feels like home.

"Are you even awake?" He tilts his head to the left after his words.

"I can't tell."

That word, awake...

I'm not sure what to make out of it, but somehow I know that I'm looking at Liam in front of me, even though I don't recognize him in his appearance, there is something deep in me that knows that's who is standing in front of me.

I'm the one now that's touching him as my hands come on either side of his face wanting desperately for it to really be him here with me.

"Why did you leave me?" The words come out and I'm confused because I don't know the details of us nor remember him actually leaving, but he had to for things to have ended with him no longer wanting me.

"I loved you, and you left. You said that you would never leave, but you did."

His expression breaks and his words are loving and hurt all at once.

"I did it to protect you. I hated hurting you. I hated watching you walk around oblivious to what we had, but it was the cost I was willing to live with if it meant that you still got to be you. If I didn't make you forget me, then they would have taken us away from each other, and I would have never forgiven myself for that."

So... he still loves me?

I want that to be true, and once again, that desperation for him and what we had burns in me. My mind is just consumed by him and how much I want him to never leave me again as I kiss him. His hands through my hair, and pushing for more tells me that he does. That even with how long it's been for him, it's like yesterday to him as much as it's becoming it for me.

I don't want to lose him again and begin to plead with him in between the kisses and more.

"I can't lose you again. Please, don't leave me. I need my knight."

His expression is broken again as he looks at me with a soft smile and longing eyes.

"I don't want to, but if we...You don't know how much I want you here with me, Princess, but I don't... It can't be more than this. We're safe here, but I don't want to ask that of you. I can't ask you to wait for a future we might never get."

But I want you!

"But you're not asking. Just please don't leave me again."

He caresses my hair with his next words.

"But I don't even know if you'll remember this in the morning. I never stopped loving you, Princess, so please don't come looking for me because I don't know that I could ever let you go again."

It hurts so much to hear him say that, but I know that I can't push him on this. I can't be the thing that makes him hate himself later for giving in to what he is trying so hard not to.

"Then don't. If I can't have you, then let me have you here."

"Okay."

We find each other again and I don't want to let him go.