The Intern

Chapter 48

I couldn't lose him.

That was the only thing running through my mind, the single thought driving my entire body into any kind of motion. Consuming me in every way with a level of fear I would have never thought possible until this moment. Until I knew I was only seconds away from losing everything that mattered to me. And I was. I was losing him. I didn't even need to see his eyes to know that. He was done with me now and I was sure there wasn't a damn thing I could do to change that.

But like hell if I wasn't going to try.

I moved so quickly that I wasn't even sure of what I was doing until my hands were on the door. I slammed it shut and fumbled with the lock as if it would actually have any chance of keeping him inside. As if he couldn't just open it himself, even though I knew he would. But right now I was just hoping to buy myself a few seconds of time, a few moments where I might actually manage to say the right words before losing him entirely. If he would even give me that much.

It wasn't like I could say I deserved it.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"

His words trembled unsteadily over the tightness in his throat, and I knew it was because he was fighting against the pain. Fighting against the tears that were still in his eyes; unable to hold them back but unwilling to let them fall. It almost made it impossible to face him. I would have rather seen anger and hatred in his eyes over what I saw there now. But it wasn't like those emotions weren't there, too.

"I know you." I whispered the broken words into the silence, my hand still gripping the doorknob. I had so much more to say after that, but his laugh stopped it all in my throat.

Soft, sad. Barely a laugh at all.

"Do you?" Levi tilted his head to the side and stared at me as if truly I'd lost my mind. "Do you really?"

"I know that you're going to leave," I pushed the words out of my throat, urging them past the fear that wanted to hold them in place. I had a feeling anything I might say now would only make this worse, but the other option was letting him go. And I couldn't bring myself to do that.

"You think I'm just going to run from this?" His voice was stronger now. Growing stable. And the words caught me by surprise.

Maybe this wasn't over after all.

"You're not going to run from us?"

The laugh that left his lips this time would have sounded just as sad as the one before it if it weren't filled with disgust.

"There is no us to run from, Eren. Not anymore." He struck his finger against a key on the console and paused the video in its place. "You saw to that with this."

I stared at my face on the screen, paused midsentence and caught forever between words I wished I would have never said. Words I couldn't take back now. Words that had stolen away everything I'd ever wanted.

It was over now.

"Don't say that."

I wasn't sure if I was talking to him or myself, but somehow I knew it was both. And they were the words I needed to hear, even if they had come from me. Because I couldn't just give up on what we had when I was the only one willing to fight for us. He was ready to end it all and walk away, and I couldn't just let that happen. Even if I had no ground to stand on, even if he had no reason to forgive me, I wouldn't let him go. I wouldn't lose everything we had because of some stupid lie.

I was going to fight, tooth and nail, kicking and screaming, until there was nothing left of us.

Until there was nothing more to fight for.