I woke up in Louis' bed. We had been together pretty much every moment of every day since the boat.
Yesterday, Aj asked me what had happened, and I reluctantly explained to him.
In response to me, he asked for more independence and I allowed him to, as long as he promised to always stay with someone if his adventure was dangerous and to always come get me if he ever needed anything.
Yes, I cared about Louis. Louis kept me happy, but Aj was family since I was eleven, so Aj would always come first. Now Louis just followed... shortly behind him.
We made a deal at dinner: he would talk to me whenever I wasn't with Louis unless it was an emergency. I agreed but also assured him that I'd be there to talk regarless of who I was with. He had friends too, so he had them to pay attention to them too, or at least that was how he saw it, which was good for him growing to his own person but bad for me because... well, my "not" child was growing up.
Louis being cuddled up behind me seemed to soothe both of us and rid of both of our horrid nightmares at night. He would stop tossing so much, and that ended with me getting a lot more sleep.
As soon as I moved from his grasp, he shot up as well, asking if everything was okay. After I assured him, he just stared at me with a smile on his face. He seemed like he was perfectly content with watching me all day which, admittedly creeped me out a very little bit but I guess he thought I was pretty, and I'm wasn't complaining about that.
"We're spending the day together. I owe it to you. Screw everyone; today is just about us." I said, grabbing his hands and staring intently into his eyes.
He hugged me back.
We managed our way down to the library, and as soon as we entered, he slowly went to sit at his piano, motioning for me to sit next to him.
He scooted me closer. He seemed like he couldn't play, so I reached my hand over top of one of the keys and lightly pressed down. Him repeating my motion with a different key and soon enough, wouldn't you know it? We had a song...
...and I finally got him to smile at something other than me.
"I'm not going to sit here and tell you I'm here for you all the time. That gets super boring. If you feel comfortable, can you just talk to me about things you've been going through the past few days? I know with Aasim... it can't be very easy." I carefully pushed.
I secretly wanted him to vent to me. I wanted to make him feel better. I wanted to feel like I could fix him. In the end, it's not something I could do, and I know that because trauma isn't fixable but it feels good to think you're doing something nice for someone else, even if it does virtually nothing in the end.
He signaled a piece of paper and pencil again. I raced to get the things and set them down in front of him, giving him a hard surface to write on, too.
"Find something to do while I write this all out." His first sentence read before he flipped the large paper over and went to sit on one of the couches to work.
I tried playing some music while he stood and wrote on the paper.
I was terrible at playing but he acted like it was soothing and music to his ears, even though it probably made him die a little inside, considering his small lessons had done nothing for my musical ability. Time to throw my "famous rockstar" dream out the window.
He finally handed me the piece of paper. His handwriting was getting better, at least.
"I honestly feel like Aasim and all the other kids have run their course with me. Whenever I'm around, all I get are pissed-off sighs and eyerolls that roll so far back they've got to be able to see their brains in there. You haven't given up on me, and while I thank you for that, I think you really should reconsider. I'm not exactly the most useful. I mean, you tell me when was the last time anybody allowed me out of the school? What do I contribute? I'm not allowed to lift heavy things, I can't cook for shit, I can't even lift the spirit of everyone with my heavenly music anymore. I can't do other things for you even. Its not fair to you and you really need to reevaluate your standards and priorities... which should not be me." The paper read in sloppily placed letters.
YOU ARE READING
~Please, Say You Won't Let Go~ Clouis
FanfictionThat night was a fever dream for both of the Ericson kids. Clementine had finally found someone she felt safe fully confiding in since she was 12 years old and Louis had finally found someone who would go to the ends of the earth if it meant protect...
