The Artist [h.s.]

two

Carter came home to an empty flat; Jacob was probably out with his friends. Her face hurt and she was still crying.

It was stupid of her to think that he wouldn't find her and it was even more stupid of her to think that he would just let her go and move on with his life.

He was an artist, just like her, and he held on to what made his blood pump and what made his mind tangle in itself.

She regretted leaving him with every single fiber of her being, but she was with another man now and he didn't give her a good reason to leave him. With Jacob, she would be safe because he was head over heels for her and she was indifferent so, if he ever cheated on her or anything, she really wouldn't care.

But, with Harry, she cared far too much. She was terrified to take their relationship to the next level for many reasons. The first of many being that she had been engaged before and things between them were the same as they were with Jack. The second was that he had already cheated on her and, even though he had made her a permanent promise, she was still worried that he would do it again.

Seeing him again hurt more than she had expected and she couldn't stop crying. Her eyes hurt and she couldn't breathe through her nose, but her chest hurt the worst because her heart was hurting.

The ink just above her heart burned and she wanted it to go away. She wanted him to go away for doing this to her.

Everything was going perfectly fine when she was just having one night stands and random flings with a few of her friends with benefits and then he had to come along and ruin it.

She searched the drawers frantically for something, anything, to stop the terrible pain but she couldn't find anything save for a sharpie and some vodka.

The bathroom wasn't far from the kitchen and, in only moments, she was standing in front of the mirror, pulling the collar of her shirt down to expose the ink that haunted and burned her.

She scribbled over it frantically with the sharpie, but the pain was in her mind and it hardly made a difference.

Back in the kitchen again, she hastily grabbed the bottle of vodka and locked herself in the bedroom. She was still sobbing and her chest hurt almost as much as it had when she left him in Paris only a day after he had asked her to marry him.

Jack had scared her away from love at such an early age and she hated him for it, but she hated herself more because she could have faced that fear with Harry and she choose to walk away from it all.

The bottle was half empty when she'd grabbed it and now it was nearly a quarter of the way full as she took another swig, grimaced, and continued to cry.

"God, I hate myself. He was so damn good."

Jacob stood in the doorway hours later, when the bottle was empty and she had cried herself to sleep at the foot of the bed.

He frowned deeply, picked up the bottle and stood it on the dresser, and carefully picked her up to put her in the bed.

Clearly, she had been upset about something, but he hadn't seen her this bad since they first started seeing each other-when she thought about Harry all the time.

Carter unconsciously cuddled closer to him as he held her, muffled words caught between her lips.

Jacob stood very still and quiet to make sure that he had heard her correctly.

"No, Harry. I want you to...I want you to leave."

Had she seen him earlier? Was she just having a bad dream this time? Was she finally over him?