Touched By You

"Fix each other."

"It's been two weeks." He started, his eyes taking note of every single movement Vero made in her seat.

"I know." She tries not to shift because she knew he analysed everything about her. "It still doesn't quite make sense to me."

"Death never does, it's why as humans...we fear it. We always fear the unknown."

"I just-" Vero closed her eyes for a moment, pushing away Lucy's face telling her to breathe. She knew she had to breathe, she didn't need Lucy to tell her that. "She still feels so...here."

It was like Vero could still feel her in everything. In every dream, every breath she took, in every word she spoke. Lucy was so ever-present Vero almost believed she was still around.

She started seeing a therapist midway through the last week, knowing there was no way she would be able to get through everything on her own. And as much as the girls were helping, she couldn't speak to them the way she could to a stranger. The stranger didn't know Lucy, they were too subjective when she needed complete objectivity.

Her sessions always lasted an hour and every time she came out feeling as if her words were heard in a way she never imagined they could be again after Lucy. But the man understood because he knew of many people that have felt the same loss as herself. So he knew how to talk to her, what she needed to hear, what they should discuss and she felt her heart exhale a little every time she stepped out of the door.

And that day was no different, though this time she'd been sent out with homework.

And that's how she found herself in the elevator travelling up to the penthouse suite. She'd mentioned how Lauren was coping with everything and how it brought pain to her own heart to see the person Lucy was closest to so...broken. So her therapist asked her to sit down with the green-eyed girl and just...listen. They didn't have to talk or be there for each other, but it might help them both to just...be there with one another.

Camila was surprised to find Vero in the apartment and for the first time, Vero understood what people meant by a cold home. Because her apartment was cold due to lack of sound and movement...here it was cold in the sense of a broken love. There was no warmth from the heart and it was evident in the apartment. Camila barely spoke and when she did, it was to Vero or the dog.

As for Lauren, the girl sat perched on a windowsill with a joint between her fingers and her head tipped back against the wall behind her. Where Lauren was once alive with humour and love for the people around her, now she sat as hard as a statue.

"You can try," Camila sighed softly, her eyes falling on her wife. "But she doesn't really care. She doesn't want to hear anything. I don't know what to do."

And Vero understood that, because even she didn't know what to do to alleviate the gaping hole in her heart. And it seemed the hole was breathing in bouts of fire, causing the edges to burn with every inhalation. It was agonising and Vero had no idea what to do to make it all feel better.

So part of her understood Lauren, but where Lauren pushed people away, Vero wanted to keep everyone as close as possible, knowing how easily they could slip through her fingers.

Vero nodded to what Camila had said and made her way over to the windowsill, perching herself opposite Lauren and holding her hand out. The green-eyed girl didn't so much as look at her as she passed over the joint.

"I'm seeing a therapist." Vero inhaled the relaxing green herb, her eyes following Lauren's out of the window. People were walking by, completely unaware of the magic they had lost through the soul of her wife. "He said I should come see you."