this is me trying

this is me trying 2/3

I've been having a hard time adjusting
I had the shiniest wheels, now they're rusting
I didn't know if you'd care if I came back
I have a lot of regrets about that
Pulled the car off the road to the lookout
Could've followed my fears all the way down
And maybe I don't quite know what to say
But I'm here in your doorway

Idiot, he chastised himself, after the fact, long after the ceremony was over. Long after she had won in her category and stood in front of all of her peers, the tears running wildly down the countors of her face, long after he was hit by a barrage of memories of a very different evening where she had won, too, an evening when he had gotten to share in the sweetness of the victory, when she had proclaimed her love for him without having to implicitly say so...long after the hurricane of emotions in him had finally died down, he lay in bed, Lauren sleeping peacefully next to him in a house without furniture, he could only reflect on how utterly blase he acted on the red carpet, how unaffected. As though they had just run into one another by chance. As if two years hadn't passed by in the most painful of manners until one day he had woken up and realized he was only a shell of a human being and that he was no good to Lea and certainly no good to himself if he remained in mourning over someone that was still alive.

He'd moved along; became physically and mentally healthy again. Met Lauren through friends, was able to live life with his heart patched up, if not completely healed.

But seeing her again, as he'd suspected it might weeks prior, had fucked with his head in a major way. She'd always been unabashedly beautiful, never failed to rob him of coherent thought but there was something about her that night...she was glowing, radiating light that was almost other worldly.

And all at once, it was as if a switch went off and he didn't know what to say to her and he realized that neither did she.

It was new dance for them; not having words. The idea didn't sit well, made his own victory later that night seem hollow.

Sleep was evading him, so he carefully got up in the dark, fleetingly touching Lauren's elbow when she stirred and made his way down the staircase and into the empty kitchen.

It was funny, he mused, opening the stainless steel refrigerator, they had just bought the house, had nothing in it to speak of, except for a bed, until their furniture arrived from New York, but there was most certainly milk and cereal.

Priorities, Bradley acknowledged wryly. Grabbing a coffee mug, he took the lone box of Frosted Flakes from the cupboard, dumped a few handfuls in and poured a generous amount of milk, digging into his midnight snack with a disposable spoon.

As he crunched, leaning against the counter, his eyes focused on the box and his thoughts went to midnights of the past where he had made emergency Fruity Pebbles runs, only to be rewarded with kisses upon his return. Then they would lie in bed, identical bowls resting on their stomachs and eat, sometimes in comfortable silence, sometimes rambling about everything and nothing, all at once.

Lauren only liked cereal with whole grains and she didn't like to eat anything after seven so he was on his own. There were just little things that he had trained himself not to miss, that he'd tricked his brain into believing he was fine without.

Actually seeing her again after so much time had passed and separating what he'd learned to let go of, had come colliding and instantly, he was transported back.

Most of it had been beautiful and full of a love that he couldn't completely voice properly but he knew, intuitively, that she comprehended. Lovemaking and conversations and so much laughter.

He had to address the fact, as he stared at the smooth tile of the counter he braced himself on, that there had been fear, too. Of how they could continue in a way that wouldn't be blown to smithereens when they were not able to protect it any longer...the fact he was going to be spending most of his time in New York for Lea when the summer concluded. That fear had reached a deafening crescendo, taking them both aback with its ferocity.