Scarred Cliff

Chapter 5

Chapter Five

Dylan

Having everything out in the open feels good, as good as being ripped apart by loss and sadness can feel anyway. I knew that we had to tell Mia about Poppy and Tom and everything, even though I wish we didn’t, but she’d have found out soon enough anyway, better from us than from someone else.

Mal is his high-intensity-almost-panicky self as he keeps going from thing to thing, cleaning something in the kitchen, checking for food, hunting through some boxes with his stuff stashed in one of my closets. One thing, next, next, next, never staying on the same thing for more than a couple of minutes. It’s exhausting, even to watch, but it’s how he deals with his pain. We just have to let him be when he’s like this.

Mia is curled up on the couch, under a blanket, and it looks like she’s not just hurt from hearing about Poppy, but also things from her own past that she won’t talk about, not yet anyway. I have no idea what happened to her when she was gone, but the moment I saw her, I knew that something was wrong. For now, we just have to wait for her to open up by herself, or Mal will have to get it out of her some way.

No, it’ll probably be Tom who’ll be the one to get her to talk, he’s like that. He’s always the one who gets us to open up, even if we don’t really want to.

I let out a deep sigh and go through my work bag. Even when I get sudden visitors, doesn’t mean that I don’t have work to do in the evening, lots of work, for the classes I’m teaching. And with the coming two or three weeks, the hard times coming up, it’s better if I get ahead now, so I won’t be too behind later.

I spread my notes out over the table, stacking a couple of tests together to grade later, and start looking through them, when Mia sits down in one of the other chairs, her eyes curious as she leans over, still wrapped in her blanket.

“What do you actually do for a job?” She moves some papers around a little. “These look like maths exercises.”

“They are.” I nod. “I teach maths at secondary school.”

“Ah.” She leans closer to one of the pages, smiling softly. “Do you like it?”

“It’s fun. I like teaching. It’s the students that can be more difficult.” I smile back at her. “Keeping all of them in line, especially at the end of the day.”

“I can imagine.” She pulls the blanket closer around her. “I was a good student, but also a hell to teach, back in secondary school. I always knew better than anyone else. I bet my teachers sometimes would have liked to silence me.”

“I can’t imagine that, at all. Nope, totally not the girl that I knew...” I raise an eyebrow at her and she flashes me a grin before sticking out her tongue. She seems to have relaxed somewhat now. “What do you do for work?”

“I... I worked at a book store.” Her face falls and her voice goes quieter. Crap, I keep going the wrong way...

“Worked?” I reach out, carefully touching her arm. “What happened?”

Letting out a soft frustrated sound, she shakes her head, her jaw setting. “I don’t think they’ll want me to come back after the way I ran out on them yesterday.”

Whoa, back up there. “You ran out? Why?”

“Stupid reasons. Not worth talking about.” She stands up, but her jerky movements tell me something is seriously wrong, so I get up too, wrapping my arms around her before she can walk off, trying to get her to relax again.

“You know you can always talk to me, right? No matter what it is.” She doesn’t fight my embrace, even leaning into it a little, letting out a soft sound that sounds almost content.

“I just suck at relationships.” She sighs. “That’s all. Family, friends, work, lovers, all relationships. It’s nothing in comparison to what you’ve all been through, not worth talking about. It’s nothing big.”

“Hey, hey.” I turn her in my arms, making her look up at me, and her eyes are filled with tears. “If it’s hurting you, it’s always worth helping you and sometimes talking helps.”

“I don’t think it’s worth it, not this. I had a relationship, I had a house, I had a job. Now I don’t have any of that. That’s all.” Her voice is so dejected that it takes me off-guard for a moment, and she breaks out of my embrace. “Don’t worry about me, really.”

Mal comes back into the house, probably back from going for a smoke. “Why aren’t we supposed to worry about you, Mia?”

“No reason.” She grumbles as she goes back to the couch, making herself comfortable. “Honestly.”

Mal meets my eyes, raising an eyebrow, and I shrug. Yeah, he doesn’t believe it either. Mia didn’t give me much to go on, but it’s obvious that something is seriously wrong.

“I’m going to take a shower, anyone joining me?” Mal looks around, smirking, but Mia slowly shakes her head and I don’t think it’s a good idea if we both go in there when she’s still out here, not now. Even if I’d really like to hold him right now, feel him against me, just to touch him, get out of this spinning mess and ground myself.

“I’ve got work to do.” I nod at the papers on the table, like he doesn’t already know that, like he doesn’t usually try to tempt me away from it ‘for just ten minutes’, which always ends up being an hour or something.

“Fine.” He rolls his eyes dramatically. “I’ll be allll by myself then.” He grabs a towel and disappears into the bathroom, and I can’t help my smile. He can be silly, but he also always tries to cheer people up, even in strange ways.

I go back to my pages, the house quiet.

I’ve got a good chunk of work done, putting me at least a little ahead of where I’m supposed to be, when I hear the shower turn off. As I look up, Mia is fast asleep on the couch, looking very cute. Looking much more like the girl we used to know than the one I saw on the cliff just hours ago, and it makes me realise how much her face has changed because of it, the lines of pain and sorrow a constant reminder.

I slip out of my chair and sneak over to the bathroom. Mal never locks the door, so I go in, quietly closing it behind me again.

“Hey...” Mal smirks, his eyes going a little wider, as he wraps a towel around his hips, the light colour of the towel a contrast to the tattoos on his chest and the trail of hair going right down behind the fabric, going places I’d love to put my mouth right now. “Deciding to join me? It’s a little too late now, though.” He tries to flash me a smile, but his voice is rougher than it was before he went in and his eyes are red. As I suspected, he was too ‘energetic’ before, he crashed while he was in the shower, on his own.

I step forward, closing the distance between us, and kiss him, hard. I don’t know if it helps right now, but at least it makes me feel like not everything is spinning out of control.

He grips my shirt, deepening the kiss, before pulling back, looking at me with a serious look. “I’m not sure this is a good idea... What about Mia?” He glances at the door behind me, keeping his voice low, but his breathing betrays how much he wants this too.

“She’s already asleep on the couch.” I slide my arms around his waist, needing to feel more of him. “She won’t miss us any time soon.” I try to smile, but the mask of ‘keeping everything together’ is slipping every second I’m here with him, I’m starting to unravel. I need him. I need him to make me forget, to make me feel something that isn’t this oppressing darkness inside me.

That seems to be enough for him as he pushes me back against the sink with more force than really needed and starts kissing me roughly. f*****g hell. That tongue piercing of his can do things that make my c**k hard even though he’s nowhere near it... Making my head spin each time, and that’s with his hands still in very non-s****l locations, just his body pressed against mine and his tongue in my mouth. It has me trying very hard to keep my moans inside and only somewhat succeeding at it.

Then his kisses turn more desperate, his fingers gripping my shirt tighter as his own mask slips. He starts nipping at my lips, his desire turning more intense, almost painful, frantic. Having Mia suddenly show up here, during a time that’s already dark for us, is definitely messing with our heads.

I break away from the kiss, but he just starts nibbling down my jaw, each nip sharp, sending electricity through my body. “She keeps staring at your lips, makes it really hard not to kiss you.”

He lets out a low laugh, his lips on my neck. “You think that’s bad? When she looks at you, man, she... She’s undressing you with her eyes.” He sighs and his body changes, losing energy, slumping against me, his head on my shoulder. “We’re f****d. We’re f****d up in our heads, all of us.” He shakes his head, his fingers slipping from my shirt. “How are we going to protect her? We couldn’t protect... How will we do better this time? We’re all holding on by a thread as it is...” His hand moves over his arm, going up to one of his tattoos, his nails digging into his skin, as he steps back, his eyes averted.

“She’s...” I remember the look in Mia’s eyes, how lost she seemed. “She’s hurt, deeply. She needs us.”

“Poppy needed us.” Mal finally meets my eyes again, and they’re filled with tears, his lower lip trembling. “And look at what happened then. What if we mess up again? I can’t lose... I... I can’t do that again... I...”

“No.” I shake my head, grabbing his arms, pushing him against the opposite wall with a little too much force and a gust of air leaves him, but he keeps my eyes, desperation in them growing. Desperation, a need for pain, a need to forget, a need to make him forget.

I crush our mouths together again, giving him everything I have, giving him everything I can give him. Anything to help him, to keep him with me.

Mal is still with us, but I’ve seen that same look in his eyes as we saw in Poppy’s eyes, that same pain. And for him it’s even worse, having lost his sister, having lost so many important people in his life. I don’t want to think about what he might do if he wasn’t with us and got into one of these moods... I can’t let my mind go there, as it will shut off when I come even close to that thought. Too scary to consider.

Mal breaks the kiss, letting out a pained sound. “D... D...” He leans his forehead against mine. “You don’t have to hold me that hard.” His voice is soft, careful, and when I open my eyes, I realise I’m gripping his arms so hard that my knuckles are all white.

I immediately let go of him. “Sorry...” I stumble back, leaning against the sink, gripping that instead. “Sorry.”

How can I protect him, how can I protect Mia, when I can’t even keep myself under control? What if I only drive them further away if I hold on too tightly?