Romancing the Pain - Part 26 (Epilogue)
Title: Romancing the Pain
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Pepa/Silvia
Summary: Post episode 104 as well as my last fic, Come Back to Me. It’s basically its sequel; the events that occur after Silvia was released from the hospital.
A/N: Oh gosh, look at this, last chapter. *heaves sigh of relief* It’s not what most of y’all would expect and I’m sorry but I wanted to end it this way. It’s been 25 chapters of so much angst and it is actually kinda draining to write so much agony and pain. For me to write and for you to read, I bet. I just wanna let all of you know that I appreciate all the support y’all having given to this story and for leaving really fantastic comments. Thanks for taking the time to do so. I hope you won’t be too disappointed by this last chapter, I just really don’t have the time to do anything better.
ROMANCING THE PAIN - Part 26 (Epilogue)
One Year Later
Silvia sat out on the beach, staring out at the ocean. She watched as the waves swelled and grew, curling into itself before colliding with the edge of the beach and exploding into foams of white. Sand, marred and darkened by the water at the ocean’s edge was sucked into the waves’ swirling depths before being promptly spat out by the next self-destructive wave, intent on tearing its perfectly formed swell and curve apart by crashing angrily onto the beach.
The actions of the waves matched Silvia’s mood perfectly. So did the weather. The redhead glanced up; clouds of ominous gray marked the otherwise blue sky like tattoos of bruises. Some were large smears, others a bare smidgen. Nevertheless, they all signaled the tears to come. To Silvia, the gray clouds reflected nature’s pain; all its hurts and sorrows gathered together in gloomy gray masses; twisting and churning beneath the deceptively fluffy material of the clouds before the coagulation turned the white clouds gray and the gray clouds cried. It cried to release the pain, release the sorrow. And with the rain, it washed away the gray, cleansed the world. And when it was done, the blue skies would return, the bruises would fade and the world’s rooftop would once again become unblemished.
Silvia sighed. If only it were that easy. But life never was. The redhead twisted her body slightly, enough to glance back at the beach house that loomed behind her. She knew who was inside. Trouble was, the one person she wanted to wash away her pain, was ironically also the cause.
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Pepa paced within the confines of the beach house. Concealed by its walls and corners, Pepa took refuge in the knowledge that no one but the house could see her agitation. Unfortunately, for the floor, it bore the brunt of the brunette’s pent up energy; Pepa paced with a determination that if kept up long enough, would eventually wear a hole through the wooden floorboards. As if in protest, a floorboard creaked under the abrupt weight of Pepa stepping on it. The sound penetrated through the aggravated smog that had clouded the taller woman’s mind and she paused momentarily, scowling in response.
The creak and near silent scowl did not last long. Silence swept over both audio intrusions, lording over the house’s atmosphere, blanketing each room in a tangible quiet. Pepa released a silent sigh and leaned against the wall. She looked down at the shell that she was absentmindedly twirling in her hand. How to explain this? How to ask the one person you love more than your own life itself a question that would irrevocably change both their lives?
Pepa tugged a frustrated hand through her smoky black hair. She had officially come to the conclusion that this entire idea was a bad one. Her insecurities battled with her fear. Her fear battled with her desire. Her desire was smothered by her insecurities; it was one vicious mental cycle that Pepa was sure would in no short time drive her insane.
The brunette thought that by accepting Lucas’ CIA boss’s offer of his private beach house on a private stretch of beach on the island of Seychelles, she would be able to kill two birds with one stone. She would finally be able to take Silvia on their honeymoon. She would be able to broach a subject that remained a delicate and overtly sensitive issue for the both of them.
They had both come a long way since the whole mess with the mafia. It was one long year of physical and mental healing. One long year of seemingly never leaving a hospital room let alone the building, being poked and prodded like some fascinating medical discovery and excruciating physiotherapy. And just when Pepa thought the torture was over, there came the mental therapy. Whilst it wasn’t in a hospital, it was nevertheless a clinic. White walls, white reception desk, white lab coat, white everything. Pepa had never hated a color with so much intensity. Nor did she ever hate questions with such passion. Questions about her feelings, her thoughts, her plans, the events that occurred. By the end of the year, there was not a part of Pepa that did not feel interrogated and exposed to by complete strangers. Not her body, heart nor soul. And it all had served to leave her drained.
Then Lucas sauntered in, all smiles and secrets that twinkled behind those dark set eyes. He told Pepa that his boss had a proposition for her. He had paused for the mental drum roll before informing Pepa of his boss’s offer. The brunette had been speechless. Thrilled, but speechless. And suspicious. The events that had occurred did nothing to improve her trust in humanity. It had taken some cajoling, some pleading and ultimately some emotional blackmail before Pepa came to the conclusion that the offer to use the private beach house in Seychelles was not a scam or an offer with strings attached.
So here they were. Pepa sighed and pushed off from the wall she was leaning on to peek around the corner. She looked out of the window, eyes immediately finding its target. Silvia was sitting on the beach, knees drawn up to her chest, shoulders tensed and hunched. Pepa’s heart sputtered and clenched, knowing that it was her erratic behavior the past few days that resulted in Silvia’s dejected position. The brunette heaved yet another seemingly endless sigh before steeling her nerves. It was now or never. She glanced down at the shell; the shell that during one of her lowest points of her life, had been bestowed upon her by a small child that alarmingly reminded her so much of her wife when she was little. She had taken it as a sign for something more. She drew strength from that knowledge and thus began making her way to her wife.
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Silvia felt more than heard Pepa approach; it was like some innate instinct she had when it came to her wife. The redhead was still sometimes afraid of just how emotionally attuned she was to the taller woman but she had learned to temper down that fear. Of course it did not help when she could feel the nervousness and overwhelming panic emanating off her wife in waves. Silvia did not know what to think; Pepa had been acting oddly the past few days. When asked what was wrong, all Silvia got was the brush off or mumbled responses that rang distinctly of half truths. By the third day, Silvia had given up. They had just finished their last therapy session over a month ago, emotions were still very raw and sometimes ran far too high. So the redhead had given Pepa her space. Given her the time she so obviously needed to work through whatever it was she needed to work through.
However, it seemed that now Pepa was ready to talk to her. Silvia remained the perfect imitation of a statue, her form in perfect stillness save for strands of unruly red hair flowing gently against the fingers of the wind that gently blew around her. The redhead felt Pepa sit down next to her but did not turn her head.
“Silvia?” Her name, spoken in a breathy whisper, escaped out of Pepa’s mouth like smooth velvet.
“Si?”
“Will you look at me?” Each word laced potently with an unspoken plea. And try as she might, Silvia could never refuse Pepa anything. Slowly, the redhead turned her head until her vision came face to face with Pepa’s liquid brown eyes. As always, the meeting of their gazes sent an electric current to sizzle down Silvia’s veins before it settled in the pit of Silvia’s stomach, giving off a warm, comforting glow.
Silvia watched as Pepa fidgeted; an uncharacteristic trait for the seemingly overly confident attitude the brunette always tried to project to the world. The redhead wanted nothing more than to smooth away her wife’s obvious turmoil but was half afraid that Pepa would bolt. So she remained where she was.
Pepa was fast losing her nerve. She sucked in a mouthful full of salty tinged air, allowing it to center her before she spoke. “Do you remember when you asked where I ran off to after I...ran off?”
A small tentative smile rearranged itself on the corner of Silvia’s lip. She nodded.
“Do you remember me telling you how I met this little girl on the beach?”
Another nod.
“She gave me something,” Pepa stuttered. Her panic was beginning to engulf her and she was fighting hard against the instinct to tuck tail and hide. Pepa needed a lifeline for her to hold on to; fortunately for Pepa, Silvia was always and unconditionally hers. Silvia could weather away any storm that brewed from Pepa’s sometimes overly excited emotions. She took that fact into account as she reached out for Silvia’s hand and turned it so that her palm was facing up. Muscles quivering from anticipation and expected rejection, she reached up with her other hand, the one with its fist closed around the object that was for days the cause of her grief, and promptly dropped it into Silvia’s hand.
Silvia stared at the shell that was now in her upturned palm. It was almost identical to the shell Pepa had given her as a child. With its pinkish white color and wavy ridges that ran along its surface, it was unnaturally almost the same. Silvia traced a finger over it in wonder; the pad of her finger coming in contact with the shell assured the redhead that she wasn’t dreaming. “How?”
Pepa shrugged, a feat in itself as the brunette’s body was ridiculously tensed. “That moment when she gave me the shell, it was as surreal for me as the shell is for you now,” she admitted. “But the reason I’m giving it to you now is because…” Pepa paused; the next sentence had taken to sticking itself to the walls of her throat. Pepa gulped, hoping the last drops of moisture that still resided in her mouth would aid her voice. “I’m ready,” the brunette finally blurted out.
Silvia’s face adopted a look of perplexity. She looked up into Pepa’s face, eyebrows knitted together in a slight frown when she noticed the paleness of the brunette’s skin; the creases caused by her frown deepened when her eyes traced the faint scar on Pepa’s cheek. A reminder of the hardships they endured. The redhead forced herself to focus. “What are you ready for Pepa?” she asked quietly, soothingly.
Pepa fidgeted where she sat; perhaps half hoping that her actions would create a big enough hole for her to sink into. “To start a family,” she whispered finally. She looked deep into Silvia’s eyes. “With you.”
Silvia fought every instinct that screamed for her jaw to hit the sand. Her ears began ringing with an unnaturally high pitched sound; it encompassed all her hearing capacity that she was not sure if she heard right. “What?” the redhead asked, her voice nothing but a strained creak.
Pepa backpedaled. “Not now,” she fumbled. “I mean, of course not now...we just...we’re just started to get our lives back together. But I just want you to know that I’m ready. I don’t want a family because you want a family only. I...that moment with that child on the beach...” Pepa kept her eyes fixed onto Silvia’s. “She reminded me so much of you, I was afraid for a moment that I was hallucinating.” She chuckled, remembering back to that period where the appearance of that little redhead, made Pepa momentarily question her sanity. “Then she gave me the shell...and...and I’ve come to interpret that meeting as a sign for something more.”
Pepa took the incredulous and bewildered but otherwise blank look on her wife’s face to be a very bad sign. “You think I’m crazy,” the brunette stated unhappily. She carded shaky fingers through her messily wind-blown hair. “I know it sounds nuts, but I just thought...with everything that happened and with what we...”
Silvia cut Pepa off with a kiss. It wasn’t overtly passionate but a simple merging of lips that moved over and under each other, caressing and tasting. Silvia finally pulled back, cheeks slightly flushed. “I love you,” she declared simply.
Pepa sighed in relief. She used one hand to cup Silvia’s cheek; the other she wrapped around Silvia’s hand that held the shell and closed both their fingers over the object that in the future would become a precious family heirloom. “I love you too,” Pepa replied. She brought both their closed fists to her lips and pressed a kiss to Silvia’s knuckles. “So you don’t think I’m crazy?”
Silvia chuckled. “I think you’re always crazy,” Silvia teased, loving the crooked grin that tugged Pepa’s lips upwards. “But that’s one of the things I love about you.” Silvia sobered a little. “Thank you for telling me, Pepa. It means a lot that you can talk to me like this.”
Pepa nodded, knowing just how much it meant to her wife. One of the things that had both come to grudgingly acknowledge during their therapy sessions was that they were both appallingly horrible at communicating with each other especially when they knew what they were going to say would hurt the other. Both so afraid of hurting the other’s feelings, they inevitably hurt each other by not saying anything.
“But not now, yeah?” Silvia continued. Things were still fresh, emotional wounds were still healing, they were still healing.
Pepa smiled. “Not now,” she agreed. “But soon.”
Soon. As Silvia scooted into Pepa’s warm embrace, they both enjoyed the company of the other knowing that now they had a good future to look forward to.
THE END