Enigma

4. How did it come to this?

"I'm so sorry, Jake." Are the last words she says before she tumbles into a fitful, restless slumber.

It's 2:34am when he staggers through the door and strips himself of clothing, collapsing onto the bed. He wraps his clammy, drunken limbs around the girl who's pretending to be asleep.

"Don't ever leave me, baby." He rasps against her neck, her baby hairs brushing against his lips in a strangely comforting way. She rolls over, pressing her forehead to his chest.

"Never, Jake. Never." She absentmindedly traces figure eights on his damp skin with her nails and sighs.

How did it come to this?

She breathes him in, and tries to push away the smell of liquor and someone else's kiss. Tries to push away the feeling of scratch marks under her fingertips, ones she didn't make. Tries to push away the agony of her heart breaking, breaking with jealousy, breaking with something that might be love but feels closer to need.

She pushes everything, every thought, away.

Everything, every thought, except Jake.

His chest is slick with Lowry's tears when, finally, their tangles bodies fall asleep.

***

Jake wakes before Lowry.

They'd lost each other in the night, moving to opposite sides of the bed.

She isn't wrapped around the duvet like she usually is.

She isn't breathing slowly and calmly like she usually is.

She's curled up, knees to her chest, a frown adorning her forehead. Her eyelids flicker and pulse, almost as if she's unconsciously searching for something. Slowly, her hand reaches out, grabbing at the air.

Is she looking for me? His mind asks.

Tentatively, he shuffles towards her outstretched hand and places his palm in hers. Even in her sleep, she pulls him to her. Her breathing calms and her frown dissipates, so he wraps his lanky body around hers and waits for her to wake.

You need me just as much as I need you, Lowry.

He wants to tell her, but she's obsessed with independence, so he lets her continue to think she's in control, when in reality, they're both lost; searching for something that might not exist.

"What're you thinking about?" Her sleepy voice startles him.

"You."

"Oh."

"I'm sorry."

"Me too," her words are barely audible over the crackling silence. "Why do we always fight?" He kisses her forehead before speaking.

"Because you're stubborn and I'm an idiot." He says. She smiles, exhaling through her nose.

"Yeah, pretty much." Her teeth, perfectly straight after years of braces, appear in a nose-crinkling smile. "W-where did you go? Last night, I mean." He sighs.

"Nowhere important. I don't even remember getting back."

"You don't?" The smile is gone now. He shakes his head.

"Why, did I say something?"

"Nope. No. You didn't." She gives him a sad half-smile before leaving the warm confines of the bed and heading to the bathroom.

The lock echoes.

Her arms are the only thing supporting her as she grips either side of the sink, tears spilling from her already swollen eyes.