Locked Away (GerIta)

Chapter 44

Feliciano was in the kitchen cutting up some vegetables for dinner. He clenched his jaw when he heard Ludwig come and stand in the doorway.

"Dinner'll be ready in an hour." He said curtly.

Ludwig nodded, shoving his hands in his pockets as he walked over to the window. He picked up the pack of cigarettes that were there and cleared his throat.

"Why'd you do it?" He asked quietly, adding more to the tension hanging thick in the air.

Feliciano set down his knife and pinched the bridge of his nose, answering tiredly. "What?"

"Why?" Ludwig repeated, tossing the carton onto the table. "The cigarettes. Huh?"

Feliciano shook his head.

"You shouldn't smoke." Ludwig approached him, standing a few feet behind him. "It's bad for you. Isn't that what you said? Why'd you do it?"

Feliciano flew around, eyes blazing with fury. "Because it reminds me of you, you fucking asshole." He snapped. "I do everything because it reminded me of you. Of what we had."

Feliciano pushed him back slightly. "Wanted to remember you, how you made me happy. I did it because it filled the hole you tore into my heart. I did it while I waited for you to come back." He clenched his hands into fists. "Now you're back. And you, you don't even remind me of you."

Ludwig glared at him.

"You wanted to remind me what it was like to be with you?" Feliciano's eyes welled up with tears but he never shed one. "Being with you was love, was truth, was honesty. It was passion. Not what happened last night."

"Last night I hurt you." Ludwig sneered, admitting it to Feliciano's surprise. "It wasn't my intention but it happened. I screwed you, there was no passion."

"Maybe there isn't anymore left." Feliciano said quietly, staring into his eyes.

"Maybe you're right." Ludwig replied sourly, staring at the floor as the Italian pushed past him.

~

It had all built up to an erupting peak and then exploded, crashing in on itself and only remaining was rubbled. Embers that struggled to glow without any oxygen feeding them.

Ludwig could barely leave that hotel room, could barely walk into his old home without crying, and he burst into Feliciano's life all at once. He came in and he filled him with a sense of togetherness but it was all patched together by weak thread.

At 3 in the morning, the night Ludwig invaded Feliciano's space like it was air and he was drowning, he realized he was broken.

Just like the perfume bottle he'd swept up.

Ludwig cried because what he'd dont to Feliciano was fit to be what he'd done to those men in his cell. He tried to find a difference, tried to justify it.

The only difference to be found is that Feliciano was still alive.

Nothing would ever be the same from that day forward. Ludwig drank at the kitchen table as soon as the clock struck 12 pm, Feliciano would sit there with pitying eyes and then he would retreat and read to distract himself.

They did not touch. Ludwig's hands shook when they did, he felt like he was being shocked all over again.

They did not dare step into each other's bedrooms. Feliciano changed the sheets and burned the ones that smelled of a night spent ignoring boundaries.

He came to the kitchen one evening. A few weeks had past and only tense words were shared. He sighed and sat across from Ludwig who stared at the caramel coloured liquid in his glass.

"You are not the same." He spoke, voice unwavering. "You won't tell me what happened, you won't let me see. You're locking yourself away from me." Feliciano's gaze faltered when Ludwig's blue eyes flickered up to his. "I love you. I will always love you. I waited for you everyday and I wish I had enough energy left in me to wait longer. It's not healthy, I can't do it anymore."

Ludwig took a sip of his brandy with a soft grunt.

"Somewhere inside is the man I fell in love with. You can't keep hiding from me but you'll try. I'm not going to play games with you, I can't chase you." The Italian shook his own head, rubbing his eyes. "You need to heal."

Feliciano stood up and it rattled as he took it out of his pocket, pressing them into Ludwig's palm.

"But you need to do it without me."

Feliciano walked out of the apartment and Ludwig looked at the dogtags in his hands.

He swallowed down the rest of his drink with ease.

It burned.

~

To be continued...