Walk the Line

three

~You put a fever inside me and I've been cold since you left...I'm hoping you could save me now but you break and fold. You've got a fire inside but your heart's so cold~

For the first week after their fallout, Callie can hardly get out of bed. She just lost one of the most important people to her, all because of her adoption, all because they are too in love with each other to handle being near the other. And yes, she wants him and wants to be with him desperately, but at this point, she just wants to be in his life.

And it's not any easier for Brandon. He misses her terribly. He misses hearing her laugh and seeing her smile and tasting her lips. He misses the way her eyes would sparkle when she looked at him. Gosh, he misses the sound of her breathing. He misses everything and he's not sure how much longer he can handle being away from her.

He still makes up some lame excuse so he doesn't have to go to dinner at his moms' that week. He puts up a façade to his dad and AJ, in hopes that they won't even realize something is wrong. But his dad can tell something is off, he just doesn't say anything.

The moms and Mariana can definitely tell something has happened to Callie but when they try to ask her what's wrong, she of course deflects and blames it on stress and hormones. They don't buy her excuse, but they let it go.

At one point, in the next coming weeks, Callie hears a car pull up outside. She peeks her head out of the window and sees Brandon getting out of the passenger side. He walks around to the driver's side and bends his head down to kiss the driver.

Callie sucks in a breath. He pulls away and she sees it's Lou. She moves away from the window and ten seconds later, he comes through the door. She looks at him and he looks at her.

"You're with Lou again?" She chokes out.

He can't show her any weakness. He can't show her how badly he wants to scream at her that it's her and that it's always been her and always going to be her, not Lou. He can't show her how badly he wants to get the taste of Lou out of his mouth by kissing her. So he gives her a hard look.

"Callie, don't," he replies harshly. He walks away and she's left there sad and empty, but at least he talked to her.

----

Conversation and interaction between them remains minimal. He's always with Lou now, so much so that Callie believes he's just using Lou to stay away from her.

And being estranged from Brandon hurts Callie so much, she starts to feel physically sick. She'll get dizzy and tired. She'll get bloody noses. But she doesn't think anything of it. Rather, she hates herself for allowing a boy to affect her so much.

The first time she faints, she's able to convince Stef and Lena she just hasn't eaten enough. But after it happening a few more times, and numerous bloody noses, they don't buy it anymore and they take her to the doctor.

But there's nothing wrong with her, right? These are just the effects of a broken heart, right?

But then they get the results and those results are what bring her to Brandon's door.

When he opens it and sees her there, he almost shuts it immediately.

She pushes on the door to ensure he doesn't shut it and pleads, "Brandon, please. I need to talk to you."

After a second, he relieves the pressure on the door, even though he knows he shouldn't, and she walks in, following him to the living room.

"Callie, you need to stop doing this," he says, annoyed, as he turns to face her. His heart feels like it's gonna explode because they haven't been alone together for this long in weeks and it's making him lose all his progress in getting over her.