Because I'll break your heart
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Freddie/Effy (some Effy/ Cook).
Summary: You can't stop loving someone just because you want to. (Random guess work post finale).
Disclaimer: As usual I own nothing.
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It takes him five months and four days to notice.
For a long while all he could see was her. Forget all the shit in the past, it was her and him together, finally as it should be. She loved him and she’d come home and suddenly he had her and Cook and the three musketeers and he was so utterly giddy with the rightness of it all he missed what should have been obvious.
Because really, how can you expect your best friend and the girl you love to spend months running from everything they’ve ever known, to throw themselves so completely to the wind they only have each other to cling to and then to return home and forget it all.
To be just Cook and Effy and not two halves of one violent, self-destructive whole.
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Effy loves him.
Freddie knows that as truth. He believes that as truth. Because she spent so long lying to him, to herself and in the end couldn’t hide her feelings any better than him.
She loves him he knows it but loving one person doesn’t define everything. There was a time when he turned away from both of them and they can forgive that but it’s not so easy to forget.
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On the fourth day of the six month the realisation goes like this:
It’s their customary post club 3AM wind-down, the three musketeers and Effy curled up in his shed.
It’s late and they’re tired and Freddie's getting up to find more weed and suddenly, as he's turning away , Effy’s leaning her head on Cook’s shoulder and he’s murmuring something to her, low and smooth.
It’s nothing and it’s everything and Freddie feels like he’s been walking around with his eyes shut.
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It’s as if they’re playing a game. Trying out roles, the loving girlfriend, the loyal friend.
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Freddie watches them as they watch each other and it’s nothing obvious, not anything said or done, just a knowledge of each other that can’t be unlearnt.
But Effy's his now and they’re happy and when Freddie wakes up next to her in the morning it feels so much like having everything he ever wanted it’s easy to tell himself he doesn’t care.
She’s stretched out next to him, all warmth and lazy smiles that make his stomach tighten and there’s no other option. He lets her and Cook have their sidelong glances and their private jokes, just puts his arm around her, pulls her close and tries not to hold on too tight.
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You can’t stop loving someone just because you want to. Thomas knew it, Emily knew it, and now Freddie knows it too.