Whether it's a feeling that can be trusted or not, Lucky does trust it. He wasn't built another way. He cannot take that love away. Even in the anger, he loved her. It doesn't stop as much as it can be drowned out by other feelings, as much as he treated her in a way that he will never forgive himself for.
It's the sound of the jangle that brings his attention to her wrist and to the bracelets that are there. It almost makes him smile but then it doesn't because Valentine's Day feels like so long ago when it wasn't at all. "I don't know that... I didn't want you to have to see me unless you wanted to, I guess. Even if it was only long enough to tell me to go away again."
He didn't know how angry she was with him, and Lucky recognized that his yelling at her after what she had been through, it had put him in line with someone he never wanted to be, someone that could make her feel terrible. It is a part of love too... or apparently, it's apart of his previous relationships.
Lucky steps toward her again, and his arms fall down again after she speaks. He looks away from her again, swallowing past the tightening in his throat. "Whether it's expected or not, I'm still-- I'm sorry for it. I'm so sorry. I never wanted you to see that side of me, and I never, ever wanted you to be on the other side of it. The way I treated you after it had happened. I couldn't see straight. I just--"
He sucks in a sharp breath, and it hurts. It burns and the burning reflects in his eyes, jaw locked.
"You did everything right, and I did everything wrong that day. It was never about not trusting your judgement, and I'm sorry that I gave you that impression. I didn't know where he was taking you or who he was. I saw his hands on you like that, and I couldn't-- It was like I couldn't breathe. There was just this red, and I kept seeing what could have happened to you because of this man that doesn't think anything of women, that thinks they're-- merchandise."
It makes him sick to say it out loud. It makes him physically ill.
Couldn't stop seeing Elizabeth in the snow or hearing his father admit to what he'd done.
Lucky looks back up at her. "I'm sorry, Lena." He never wanted to make her feel like he knows he must have made her feel after that.
Lena isn't sure she trusts it anymore. She always used to. Or maybe what she's fixating on isn't love at all. They said they made each other better and that's what love means. How amazing and how terrible that in five days, in one night, that can all be placed in such a far away thing that's out of her reach. Maybe he does love her. Maybe he's mistaken it for something else.
She just can't feel it since that night. Maybe she hasn't let herself. She honestly doesn't know.
"I was..." Lena takes a deep breath and looks away, wiping at her cheek. "I was furious and I was confused and on top of all of that, I felt like the scraped gum at the back of someone's shoe. And on top of all of that, I was scared. Do you--do you even realize if you hadn't been wearing that ring, you'd be dead? You'd be dead."
Her voice cracks on the last word and she can't help it. That's what got to her the most. It wasn't the yelling, because she was yelling and berating him herself, and what happened with Vlad had taken a back seat to the pure panic that took over when she literally thought he'd die. That they wouldn't make it out alive. That Sonny would be told he's lost one or two more of his family.
It isn't that she doesn't trust his abilities or she doesn't think he's good at what he does. But when it came down to it, they were outnumbered and a good chunk of them were demons, wired to be inhumanly strong and he was the one they'd attack with the intent to kill since he was the one that threw the first punch. The thought of losing him--that is what made her physically ill.
Lena only looks back his way once he starts explaining. She starts to get that feeling again as the pieces click into place. It's a pattern, it's a trigger, something similar if not on a lesser scale happened with Rick and that strip joint. His anger wasn't really about her and Vlad. She'd ask what it is, what happened to him or someone he's loved. She'd press if she had any idea where they stand. But she doesn't, and the uncertainty wins. And maybe it's important that she accept the apology before she knows the exact reasons.
It requires a level of faith that isn't always in someone to give. But she'd want that. She'd want someone to see the demon and still care and see something not ugly. Still look and see Lena despite whatever else she did or felt or said. There isn't a more difficult test in love, she thinks.
"I don't--" she shakes her head and curses herself inwardly for the blur of tears that don't let her see straight. "I don't know what impression you gave me anymore. Everything about that night is just a big blotch. I know how difficult it must've been for you to see someone you care about being treated that way. It was a horrible mission where nothing went right and I never want to do any thing similar to that again. Sonny and Gates and John, none of them would've reacted any differently if they'd seen me or Zoe like that. Not even Lou."
Some of them would've reacted worse. Especially John if it'd been Zoe. There'd have been murder, no questions asked.
She sighs and turns to look at him, face crumpling slightly at the burn in his eyes that mirrors her own. I'm sorry, Lena. "I know you are. And I forgive you for it, for all of it. You're still Lucky to me, I just didn't have the words till now."
Lucky would fight to prove it to her if she ever tried to say that what he felt for her isn't love, if he ever understood that she thought that for even a moment. He knows in his heart that it isn't a mistake.
He knows that you can love someone so much and anger can drown it out for a short time and then it can return, but it doesn't take anything away from that love. It doesn't mean that what it isn't love. He had to learn that the hard way and multiple times. It's no easy lesson.
Love is a perfect notion. People expect too much out of it.
People are flawed. People fail. I fail. Regularly.
It comes to him suddenly, how much he misses his father, how much he'd like to hear his words right now and hear that faith that his father had in him in his darkest moments. Somehow Luke who had done the worst of things could look at him and know that he wouldn't follow that same path.
Lucky cannot watch her wipe that tear away and not move even closer to her, closing the distance between them. Do you even realize if you hadn't been wearing that ring, you'd be dead?. "I know," he says, and his voice sounds as shaky as he feels. "I know. I didn't... I didn't think about that before I jumped at him, and there's no excuse for it. I realize that I put you at risk too, and that it was a miracle that we got... out of there alive, that you got out of there alive, and that's on me."
In any other situation, he would have thought of something else to do instead of running at him. He would have thought of some subtle way to get back there. Lucky studied the plans too, and he could have realized where they were going. He could have moved closer to the office to listen for sounds of a struggle.
If he'd been thinking, he never would have been so reckless. Never. There hadn't been room for thought in his head. He saw that man with his hands on her like that, forcing himself on her even if all logic told him that she was playing a role and that she could take care of herself in a one-on-one situation with him.
"I never want to-- I don't think Sonny will be running missions like that ever... again. From the conversation, he had with me. It seemed like he-- like he wouldn't put anyone in that position again, you or Zoe or anyone else. It was terrifying to see you treated like that, and it was painful, and sickening and-- Sonny didn't sound like he'd be running those missions again at all."
He sounded guilty, not as guilty as Lucky felt but close enough. Through the yelling, there'd been guilt.
When her face crumples, Lucky does not keep his distance at all. He hasn't been questioning what she feels or where they stand if only because, he still trusts in it. He trusts that he loves her and she loves him beyond everything else. Lucky steps forward, cupping the side of her face.
His throat tightens further, and tears slip down his face as he breathes her in. "I shouldn't have left either, but I didn't--" Lucky breathes out and breathes in again, breathes her in again, reminding himself of the familiarity of his hand against the side of her face, the warmth of it. "I didn't know what else to do."
What he went through in his life to make that a trigger for him is something he will tell her. He feels that he can, that he wants to, and that he has to, but it's a matter of finding the words.
It's not something she'd have been able to take without losing parts of herself to the demon for good. She's known this for a while now, that she wouldn't be able to bury someone else in their family without being damaged beyond repair.
And she was doing so well, with not being afraid of what could happen down the line, with not letting that rule her life or her decisions, but she feels like she's back at square one.
Lena doesn't answer when he says he knows. She believes he does, but it doesn't take away the dread of knowing how differently the outcome could've been.
People do expect too much of love. That it's stronger than anything. That it can save you. That it can be enough against each and every odd stacked against you in some other corner that's too big to be any sort of competition to your own. "It's not about pointing the finger, Lucky. It's not about who's to blame. or holding someone accountable. It's the fact you could've died and I wouldn't have been able to live with that."
She was the one that brought him to the Crowbar. She was the one that started it all in motion, knowing how dark it can get and knowing, as good as it can be, how many demons can be brought out by the work they do and the life they lead. She's known it. She's known it from the start, but it's always been a step up from the life she had.
"They're important," she says, running a hand through her face, shaking her head in refusal. It's not aimed at him, but at the decision. "I agreed to the mission and I knew what I was getting myself into. It's not like I ever thought it'd be a walk in the park, but it's important. He doesn't have to send us to anything similar ever again, but we did a good thing. You can't do the right thing without getting your hands dirty sometimes."
And she'll talk to Sonny about it, and she'll be honest with how hard it was but how she does not regret doing it, not for one moment.
So many girls live their whole lives thinking they're not worth loving. They afall into abusive relationships like Lena, or they're sold to the highest bidder, or they grow up without zero sense of self-worth. They believe that there isn't a God, there isn't anything to save them, there isn't anything but these animals that ship them from one place to another, making them do horrible things starting from the age of ten. She doesn't regret it at all, despite what she believes it's cost her.
Lena's face crumples further when he cups the side of her face, and her cheeks are suddenly flooded with warm tears. She's practically radiating the doubt and the fear and the paralyzing thoughts in her head. She doesn't want him blaming himself or thinking she hates him. But as for the rest?
"Maybe you had the right idea." In leaving. In getting away from them.
Lena looks down at the space between them and works at the lump in her throat before she tries to speak again, before she has the courage to look back up at him now that he's so close. "I'm not suggesting this because I'm mad at you or I want to hurt you or because I don't love you anymore. I said it to you once. There's more to this life here than the Crowbar. There's more to it than the job we do and the people living there and... me. Maybe this happened as some sort of stop signal. To avoid more hurt in the long run or to help you find something better or before you get killed."
She inhales sharply and says the words quickly before she can't get them out at all. "You just don't belong with me, after all."
Lucky knows that she lost so much and that she wouldn't be able to take his loss on top of all the other losses in her life.
It hadn't occurred to him in that moment. If he had been able to take a moment to think about it, he would have realized the dangers that were present not only to himself but to her if he dared making a wrong move.
He could have died then. He could have died two days ago when he fought a monster on the sidewalk during patrol. As long as he lives, he has a chance of dying. He will always be human, always be more vulnerable than the rest to death.
"You could've died too, Lena," Lucky says quietly. "Every day that we fight and every day that we don't fight, there's a chance that we could die."
If she had said that out loud, he would argue it. He made the choice to stay. He followed her down during her mission and he needed something more. There is no doubt in his mind that if she hadn't found him, he would have found something worse. What could be better than a family?
It's all he has ever wanted in his life.
"They are important. I don't think he is stopping the missions to go in after those people, just stopping the ones that force someone to be in the position that you were in," Lucky says, and he doesn't think those are missions that the Crowbar can do if all the men would react violently to Zoe or Lena being treated that way. "I know... we did a good thing. I was almost afraid the key would be wrong, and I'd have... but it was the right key."
Thank God, it was the right key. Lucky is not a women, but he has seen the treatment that so many of the women in his life have suffered through. Elizabeth, his mother, his grandmother was kidnapped by the Cassadine brothers and drugged for years, Maxie was assaulted, his sister had an abortion and was kidnapped by Franco. He saw the other women at that bar, and he wanted to save them all, wanted that place to never exist.
When her face crumples further, he presses his hand against her face further, fingers slipping back into her hair and leaning forward to rest his forehead against hers.
Maybe you had the right idea. Lucky almost takes a step back, but he doesn't. He doesn't. His hand remains against the side of her face.
He shakes his head instead, insistently, and his hand slides down until both hands are holding on to her shoulders. "No, no, that's not why this happened. It wasn't a sign. You're saying that because you're scared, and I told you that I would fight you, fight for us, and I meant it-- It's not you that almost got me killed, Lena. It was my decision to join the Crowbar, and it was my mistake, my inability to take a step back."
You just don't belong with me, after all.
That hurts. That hurts more than he could have anticipated it hurting, because he never expected her to say it. It feels like a knife has buried itself in his chest, and he still shakes his head, tears in his eyes, spilling down his face.
"That isn't true," Lucky says when he can speak through it, and he wipes his own face, but he hasn't created any further distance between the two of them. He remains that breath away from her with his hands against her shoulders still to keep her centered, to keep them both centered. "Do you know what I did for the five days that I wasn't here? I was drinking. I went on patrols with people at the Tower to find monsters because there was nothing else to do, and I drank, and I didn't feel like I belonged or like I had a purpose at all or like it mattered if I had a purpose or if I didn't. It was just... it was existing, and I missed you and I missed that place and I missed having a family. I don't know if... I had my doubts about whether or not I can do this job after how much I screwed up five days ago. I thought I would be a liability to everyone here, to you, but--"
His breath hitches, and he shuts his eyes before opening them again to look at her.
"If I don't belong here with you, where my heart is, where am I supposed to belong?"
Silence, thick and sharp and crackling like muted static.
It takes a moment for his words to roll over her, but she doesn't recoil. It doesn't have the same impact it does when they speak of his death. She's going to die soon, no matter what. A bitter voice wants to say, it'll only have come a year early, anyway.
She doesn't. But it's true, a tiny voice says.
You don't know that, Lena argues internally instead.
She bites the insides of her cheeks until she tastes blood.
"I know I would've," Lena says instead, considerably calm considering the conversation they are having. It's real, like any other conversation they've ever had, but nothing's ever hurt as much, she doesn't think. Nothing has ever felt as uncertain and it's like navigating through very, very thick fog with not a lighthouse in sight. "I wouldn't have wanted to make it out alive if you didn't."
And she doesn't care if that makes her weak or not because at least it's honest.
As for Sonny, she says nothing further. She nods in agreement and scrubs a hand against her cheek in exhaustion. She's slept less in the past five days. Less than she usually does, even.
It was hard to when she was thinking about him.
Do you know what I did for the five days that I wasn't here?
Lena shakes her head, stifling a noise that sounds suspiciously like a sob cut off by her teeth biting down on her lower lip when he answers. What he says hurts. Picturing him drinking without any sort of purpose hurts. There's some relief he was at the Kashtta instead of the many other places that would've loved to get their hands on him instead, but most of all there's just this raw, constant ache that keeps pushing at every wall in her chest.
There's a quiet, quiet voice that wants tear it all down, his pain and hers both.
If it can't take anyone else's pain and use it, if Lena keeps depriving it of what it wants, it'll eat itself from the inside out. Until they're both mad. Won't it? "I know what I feel and I know what I think and they're not the same thing," Lena finally says shakily. She doesn't remember what it's like anymore to live without that division of demon and human. She doesn't remember what it's like to experience love without that something else. "I know what I--what I want to say, and I know what a part of me... that isn't me wants to say" (demon) "and it's not the same thing, either."
And she's fighting, she's fighting past that ugly voice that's twisting everything beautiful she could possibly feel for him into something that isn't beautiful anymore, that says it doesn't want it anymore, that says it wants to kill it. That's bathing in the hurt and the guilt and the anger because the rest feels so far away. She isn't insignificant. This isn't insignificant. It isn't ugly. It's not. It's not.
Lena rests her forehead against his gently somewhere amidst the silence. She breathes out, breathes in, lets the tears flood down. I don't want to hurt you, she thinks. I would never want to hurt you.
And she just did. She sees it in his face, in his eyes when she opens her own to look into them. He hasn't moved away and surprisingly, she hasn't either. There's still that breath-away-only distance and she breathes out, the soft warmth of it fanning across his cheek. It's meant to steady her, ground her, but his hands on her shoulders do that more than anything else.
"We broke so many promises to each other, Lucky," she whispers brokenly. She can still remember when she made hers, and they feel so long ago when it was just over a month ago.
Lucky notices the difference in reactions from her reaction to his death to her reaction to her own. It's glaring, but he knows that her death hurts him so much more than the thought of his own so he understands. She doesn't actually say the words, but it is like he can hear them in the thick silence between them. It would have only come a year early.
He'd asked her how much time she had, and she had said one to five years. He will always remember that. Lucky will always remember how it felt to hear her tell him how limited her time truly was. While he isn't constantly aware of it (if he was, he would drive himself crazy with it), he knows.
She was dealt a terrible hand, and it's why it's important that she get the most out of what time she does have. They all should. No one has guarantees, but most people don't have expiration dates like hers either.
Lucky closes his eyes at her words, and he's not-- It isn't a surprise to him that she has said it, because she has told him before that she couldn't handle another loss. After losing six of their family, he doesn't know that any of them can handle another person in their family dying. He doesn't know how the world can expect them to continue on.
"I know," he says again, quieter this time, at trying to imagine them both dying in that bar together, at how the Crowbar would have reacted when they found out. "The world couldn't ask any more of you."
She has already been through so much more in a few years than what most people go through in a lifetime. She has already lost so much more than most people will ever have to lose.
Lucky reads the exhaustion on her face. He is certain that neither of them have been sleeping or eating much in their time apart. They're better together. He meant that when he said it.
The noise that she makes cuts something deep within his heart, and he tightens his hold on her to reassure her. He's here, and he's not drunk. He didn't tell her what he did to hurt her. Lucky would never do anything with that wanting to hurt her, but he told her so she could see how the Crowbar grounds him, how she does. Why it's so good that she stumbled into him that night in October after he'd just fallen through.
He could have ended up somewhere else. There are more bad places for wanderers to get sucked into than good ones in this city. Whatever kind of person he is, he has demons of his own and darkness of his own, and he had already been at the end of his rope when he fell through the rift.
I know what I-- what I want to say, and I know what a part of me... that isn't me wants to say and it's not the same thing, either.
A sharp pain hits in the center of his chest, because he understands what she means without her saying it. Demon. Lucky doesn't tell her that he wants to know what she wants to say, that that is what he wants to hear, because he knows that she knows it and that she is fighting with all that she can to send that demon's wants and words away.
It's why instead of telling her to say it. Say it., he reaches for her face and kisses her, intensely, hard. It's still there. The good is still there, more than the bad. Love hurts but it heals too, but it feels like this kiss feels, and he prays to God that she will feel it, feel what he feels when he so much as thinks of her.
The love that pushes up above all the rest, all the pain and regret and guilt. It's not ugly. It's beautiful, and he wants her to remember that and not that mission, not the person that he was then because it wasn't him and it was.
Lucky rests his forehead back against hers, hands still cradling her face and sliding along her cheeks to wipe away the tears. His hands slide back down against her shoulders, holding her in place again.
He winces at that broken whisper, and it hurts as much as the sob did, and he wants to apologize again but doesn't. Lucky's hands slide down her arms. "We did, but that's... It will happen. You can love someone so much, and you can still hurt them. You can still break the promises that you made to them, and it doesn't mean that you didn't mean those promises or it takes away from those promises. I'm... going to tell you something that my dad told me after the affair that I thought destroyed my ability to love. I stopped believing in it, and my dad told me that... love is a perfect notion. People expect too much from it. People are flawed. They fail." Lucky pauses, because the rest is him and not his father. "I fail. Frequently. We will both fail, but that doesn't take away from what that love means, from what we mean to each other. If it was always happy and perfect, it wouldn't be real."
This next part is harder to say.
"This is not the first time that I'll hurt you," Lucky says, and it's the hardest thing that he's said tonight, because the thought of hurting her hurts him like nothing else could. Her pain hits him more powerfully, more intense than his own does. "If that's something you... don't want in your life despite knowing what goes with it, knowing what we do for each other, I..." He has to swallow past the tightening in his throat, "understand. It hurts sometimes. It can hurt more than anything, but I think it's always-- it's always worth the hurt. It's the most powerful feeling there is, and it's not-- it won't always be good."
She isn't proud that it's true and she isn't proud that he knows.
It feels like weakness but more than that, it feels selfish. Lena knows what it would do to the Crowbar, she knows what it would do to Sonny, and that she'd still prefer to die than to face it goes to show she's a lot more terrible than she's ever given credit for.
That she was dealt the terrible hand, that she got the short end of the stick, it doesn't excuse it. Nothing excuses it when she loves them so much. She doesn't care what the world would ask of her, but she does look up at him at that, gaze sweeping across his face. "What are you asking of me?"
She isn't asking what he has the right to ask of her or not. She wants to know what he'd ask regardless.
"You're sorry. I know you're sorry. From the bottom of my heart, I know it and I do not hold anything against you. My fear and what I can and cannot handle is not on you. That's all me."
She always does sleep better when it's with him. He's had a way of holding her in the past that makes her feel safe and cherished, and the time she spends with him is the time she allows herself to slow down. It allows her to savor life the way it's meant to be savored, and she honestly couldn't say that about herself up until a few months ago.
Lena wasn't really living, either. She'd been existing, and she'd been making some really poor choices, and she'd been distancing herself from those that only had her best interests at heart. She doesn't want to know what would have happened had she botched the mission and she hadn't met him halfway through it. She just doesn't. And when she isn't bogged down by the fresh sting of what's happened or the weight of the doubts clouding everything else, she does see it clearly. She sees how good they are for each other and how much they help each other. There's adventure but there's also stability, and there's trust and there's honesty.
She wouldn't want to lose that, and she knows it, is starting to remember it even before he kisses her. She isn't expecting it and it hits her like an open bruise, but in the best way. Her hands had remained unwillingly at her sides, or in her pockets, hesitant to even reach out but once he reaches for her they reach out in turn, too.
They frame either side of his face and when she kisses him back it's not the way she usually kisses him. There isn't playfulness and an edge of softness to round out the intensity. It's just as hard and it's full of bare need. Her hands remain there, curved over his jawline, and she uses her thumbs to wipe at his cheeks, as well. Her mouth brushes against his cheekbone and she closes her eyes, feeling the fresh tears there. It says what she can't find in words. I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. I love you.
Lena doesn't flinch, but she feels it somewhere inside, the jolt in her chest that's already raw and aching.
It's not as if he has said something that isn't true. This won't be the last time he hurts her. This won't be the last time she hurts him. It may hurt just as bad as this and she can't imagine anything ever making it hurt like it hurts right now but life gets creative on you in that sense. It will hurt just as bad. It may hurt even worse. At some point, one of them is going to have to grieve the other. Whether they stay together or not, that's going to be true.
"It wasn't... my feelings I was worried about." Lena shudders quietly, and when she speaks again, it's just as impossible and hard to say them. "This is not the last time I will hurt you. This is not the last time I will have a knee-jerk reaction of pushing you away and saying what I know will wound deep. I just don't want there to come a time when something inside me is going to want--" she cuts herself off and it's not me she wants to add, but it is, in a way. It is. "It won't want to just hurt you. It'd want to destroy what you feel and how you feel it. It wouldn't just hurt. It'd twist into something unrecognizable so you don't remember it was ever good at all."
And I just want to be normal. And they've talked about it and she hasn't told him anything he doesn't know but then, she knows all of this, too. Or she thought she did. She really did need to hear the words. She wasn't trusting anything anymore, not even her own feelings because which were those?
"I know you'll hurt me," she whispers, voice raspy and tired and something close to bittersweet. "I know you won't want to. I've never once thought it wasn't worth it. Even after--what happened, I don't think differently of it or of you. I don't feel differently." It's important that he know that. She doesn't see him differently and she isn't scared of him or what darkness he could possess.
How could she when she's so intimately acquainted with her own? "Lucky, I..." and she lets out a shaky breath. She wants to bet on them. She does. As vividly as she is aware of all of the rest, as much as she struggles with it, the struggle never has to do with doubting what she feels and what she wants. Her hands curve on either side of his face again and she leans up in tiptoes to kiss him.
Softly this time, but just as intense, in a way. "Come home," she whispers against his mouth, fingers threading into his hair at the nape. "Come home, please."
Lucky doesn't think any less of her for wanting it even though she thinks less of herself for it. He doesn't think that he can. Would it be better for them to watch her reaction to his death? If she got so scared from his brush with death on this mission, how much more powerfully would she react to his actual death if she had lost him but survived?
It's not that he thinks himself so self important that he doesn't think she can make it through his death, but he knows that she has already lost so much and he knows what grief can do to a person. He has seen it. He has felt the effects of it himself and watched his father suffer through the grief of losing Laura, how he spiraled into alcoholism so quickly after that.
What are you asking of me? It's that question when she looks at him like that that almost steals the air from his chest. It's the way that she looks that makes it hard to breathe for a moment. He sucks in a breath when he can manage it. "For you to be with me for as long as possible. I promised you forever, and I thought that promise went both ways," Lucky says and there's a small smile on his face, because he remembers her making that promise and he is trying to hold back the tears instead because it will never be forever. "I'm asking you to not hold your love back from me, not an inch of it. you never have before, and it's all that I want from you. I want you."
It's the only way that he knows how to put it. He would ask of her what they've always had even if it felt like they were in danger of losing that these past five days, when he watched her walk away from him.
"Okay," Lucky says, and he nods because she has forgiven him. She understands that he's sorry but she has doesn't hold it against him. It is easier to really believe it, the more times that he hears it.
The way that she is in his arms, the feel of her close to him makes it easier for him to sleep too. He is reminded that she is near, that he knows where he is in this universe that he doesn't technically exist in. There's no being lost, searching for a path that cannot be found.
His path is with her. His journey is here. It centers him, stabilizes him, and he is able to sleep. They are so good for each other, and he can remember that because as painful as it feels right now, it's better than the aching, emptiness, lost feeling that he had in the five days that he spent without her.
Lena kisses him back with intensity and need, and he meets it with need of his own, with the strength of his feelings in his chest without holding any of it back. He dives into that kiss as intensely as she does, because he didn't know. He didn't know that they'd be back here again like this after what had happened. There had been moments that he had been terrified that that was it. I love you, the kiss says back to her, his hands say to her skin. I will always love you. And this is love, what he is feeling. It is so much more than lust, beyond friendship, past anything else. It's love, and he can feel it breathing through the whole of him as he grabs hold of her like if he doesn't, the rest of the world will rip her away.
Lucky closes his eyes when she responds. He knows. He knew deep down that it wasn't her own feelings that she would be worried about, just as it's not his feelings that he is worried about, even knowing what the demon within her wants. His hand reaches up for her face again, cradling the side of it. It's difficult to hear what the demon would make her want, but he knows he needs to listen to it and to respond. "It's worth it. You're worth it to me."
They've talked about it before but he'll say it again and again. As many times as she needs, it's his choice. He chooses her.
"I'm glad you never thought it wasn't worth it. This has been the most important relationship in my life. It's been worth so much. It gave me another chance, a real chance to live, and I--" Lucky closes his eyes, swallowing and looking down. It is love. It is real love to know that your darkness does not scare the other person away, doesn't warp their view of you.
His throat tightens, and he swallows again though it doesn't stop the tears or the shakiness of his voice. It's something that scares him but he's relieved that it doesn't scare her too. "Thank you. I needed... I needed to hear that."
Lucky, I... And he pulls her in close again, sliding his arm around her waist to keep her there close against him. It's like he can hear what she doesn't say even after these days apart and the distance that they both felt when he stepped into the room and on the day of the mission, he hears it. She wants to bet on them. She wants to have them even knowing all the reasons that it can and will hurt. She wants them and that hasn't changed. Lucky leans in to the kiss, free hand slipping back into her hair.
He closes his eyes and then nods, resting his forehead against hers again and resting his hand against her neck as he feels her pulse against his palm. It's comforting. It's comforting like the feel of her hand on his face.
"I never completely left," he breathes, and he doesn't know that he ever could.
Hundreds of miles away, a part of him would still be here, wherever she is.
Oh, Lucky. The narration does not want to really know how Lena would be if you'd died in that bar and she'd had to go back to Sonny. There wouldn't have been much of her left. If any of them lost someone of their family, the narration just would not want to write them anymore. Unless it's a horrible AU, of course. :x
It isn't that one person's death is more important than the other.
No matter who it would be, a death in the Crowbar family would hit like a final train wreck. But everyone relates to each other in different ways. Within the family, there are several different dynamics and different ways of loving each other.
Lucky's partner in a way no one else is. She's given him her heart in a way she hasn't to anyone before. It's a different sort of closeness and if that was ripped away from her, she'd just be less. There wouldn't be a spiral into alcoholism but there would be a spiral into madness, and they all know that.
I promised you forever, and I thought that promise went both ways. Lena tries smiling too, but her voice is still shaky when she answers. "It did. It does," she says, and it is painful to be promised forever when she won't be here to bank in on it someday. And while no one gets forever, and everyone dies someday, it's different to have this very finite certainty over your own mortality. It's one thing to say, I'll die someday. Everyone dies. to saying, In one year I won't be here.
She won't be standing here across from him in this room and all these things that she's had and she's lost and she's had again won't be hers. None of it. Not even the fights. "I didn't mean to hold it back from you," she says, though she realizes now that's what she was doing every time she ignored a phone call or refused to look at an entry. "I'd just never felt that far away, and I didn't want to... have you stand in front of me and find that things were changed beyond repair."
She hadn't wanted to finally see him and find that all those things they promised to each other were things they couldn't promise again, because there wasn't anything there anymore to build promises on. And that makes more sense than anything else has in a while, and it's amazing how she hasn't been able to upt it into words or even realize what it was until he's helped her along with it. It's not the first time. He's always been able to tell.
Lena doesn't balk when her intensity is matched. He's intense, even in his quiet moments, and she loves that about him. She leans further into him, forgetting there was distance in ths first place. Even when she breaks away to catch her breath, she stays close, pressing against the side of his face. She feels it. The doubts are slowly melting away and the demon's voice grows so quiet in the background she can't hear it against the loud thrumming of her ears. "I missed you," she says, almost inaudibly against his mouth.
"Lucky, I mean that," she says, hand resting against the side of his face. It hurts to hear the shakiness in his voice. It hurts to realize how he must have felt about himself for losing that control, needing to hear otherwise because... what exactly was he thinking? Her other hand slides into his hair and she makes sure he can see her gaze, honest and open. "You're still the best person I know. One bad night doesn't change that. You know that, don't you?"
It would be easy if it did. One terrible event can erase all the good that's happened previously for many. But it doesn't for her, when it comes down to it. One night of everything going wrong and them failing each other doesn't hold a candle to the countless nights when he's been nothing short of perfect. Love really isn't anything without forgiveness. There will be times when she will need it most, and when she least deserves it.
I never completely left. Lena laughs against his neck, hiding her face there. It's half-breathless, half choked on tears. Her arms slide around his neck at the same time her legs wind around his waist. She hugs him almost bone-crushing tight, the way she wanted to from the moment he walked in. And she's crying, but she's not upset anymore, she's just not holding back, like he asked. For five days, that's all she's done. Shove everything down back so she wouldn't have to feel it. Until it was all so hard to reach.
Somewhere in Chicago, John is feeling very smug.
John, get out of this tag, it ain't yours.
The studio is small and cozy, and there isn't a whole lot of furniture in it yet. There's one couch, which is where they end up somehow, legs tangled together and a blanket covering them from the waist down. Lena's explaining why it was bought and why it was handed to her to oversee. "... I think he just mostly couldn't stand me or anybody else right now. And so, it was decided I'd fix some of the space here. It'll mostly serve as an extra storage room or if one of us needs some downtime. But I'm also thinking darkroom at the back for some of our photo work. Case-related and non-case-related."
She quiets down, looking around the space of the place. It doesn't surprise her Sonny would snatch it up the moment it was up for sale. It's right across the bar and it could serve well for the bar in many ways. Besides, he wouldn't want anyone else taking up residence there. Lena looks back at Lucky, settling her gaze on him, remembering snippets of the previous conversation and what she missed the first time around.
"What you said--before. You're not a liability. I wouldn't say this if I didn't believe it. You're really good at what you do. We just all have our... hot buttons, for whatever reason. It's happened to all of us."
Horrible AUs are always used for these reasons. One can experience the pain of it and then keep canon safe from such utter destruction that the Crowbar would not be able to recover from. ;_;
There is only so much loss that one person can take, and the Crowbar has practically reached their limit. Another loss within their family would undoubtedly pull them apart, despite the fact that anyone that died would never want their death to be the catalyst for that.
He has given his heart to her in a different way than anyone else, because they are so many of these rolls for one another. The thought of her death can tear him apart to think of, but he's still here. It's worth it. They have all suffered through so much, but they must all understand that what they do share is worth feeling the pain of the loss.
It did. It does. The shaky sound of her voice has him cradling her face again, smiling for her thought it's hard. It's so difficult. They are both thinking of that expiration date that she has, and he knows it. It's not fair.
There is nothing they can do to stop it. It's fact, and someday she won't be able to smile at all. Someday he won't be able to put his hand against her face like he is now, and she won't be able to touch him back, fight him back.
Lucky looks at her across the room. His hand falls down, reaching for her hand and holding it in his own. He links their hands together, eyes burning and throat tightening. "I never... want to think that that's possible. That something like this, something that we have can be broken beyond repair," he says, but he knows the truth of it. He knows that there are actions taken that can break love, no matter how good and strong that it may be. It can break it and rip it away and leave an aching shell in its wake. "Even if we'd stood here and it felt like that, I would have fought. I would have fought to try to fix it. I will always fight for us."
Even when it looks like she is broken beyond repair, he will keep fighting until the end. It's another promise that he is making her, and there may be times when he goes away in the future, but he knows it is a promise that he will keep.
It's hard to remember that there had ever felt like there was distance with how easy it is to be back like this, close with her. His hands rest against her, and they slide down her waist and pull her in against his chest as the kiss deepens. "I missed you," Lucky says in response. His hand drifts up to her face again, thumb tracing the corner of her lips. "I missed you so much."
It was only five days, but it felt like so much longer. He hadn't known what she thought of him. If he would be back. It all depended on what she wanted, and he hated those five days apart. He couldn't get her out of his head, or how she sounded and looked when he last saw her, or how he had acted.
Lucky, I mean that. He looks into her eyes when she urges him to, and his chest hurts. It feels like fire, and he reaches up to rest his hand over hers against his face. It is not the person that he wants to be but it's him, it's a part of him, and it scares him, but he believes her. He can see the honesty in her gaze, and he nods, swallowing thickly and looking down between them. "I know." Deep breath. "I know you mean it."
He knows that she forgives him, and it makes it much easier for him to handle what he was and what he did that night, knowing that she is able to not let it change the way that she sees him.
It feels wonderful to have her laughing against his neck even if it's half chocked on tears. His hand slides behind her head and against her waist to keep her close, hugging her back as tight as he can. Lucky can feel the difference. He can feel the walls come down and leave nothing behind them. It's all he could ever ask of her.
Oh, John. :x Your cameo is hilarious and appreciated.
Lucky is quiet as she explains why the studio space was bought. There's almost a smile when it's the fact that Sonny couldn't stand anybody right now. He doesn't find that too surprising considering how he'd seemed that night before Lucky left. "It's nice. I think we could really use it like you said for the pictures... and a place away but not too far away."
It's something else good that came out of all that mess. Sonny has been teaching them all to look for the silver linings in every situation. He shifts on the couch, arm around her so that he can keep her close, no space between them.
"I'm glad... I'm not a liability. It-- I thought I had failed in every way, failed all those women. I couldn't--" Lucky pauses, breath hitching in his throat and he closes his eyes. He wants to talk about it, but he hasn't talked about it in years and not with anyone that didn't already know. It's important. His hand slides down her back. "I want to tell you why. What happened that makes it so-- where I go red, and I can't see or think... straight."
It might help to talk about it. It might help him get in control, because there is no guarantee that something similar won't happen again. If not to her, it could be to someone else, and it's still a trigger for him that he will react violently with even if he doesn't know the person.
"When I was sixteen, I... was walking through the park in Port Charles. I was supposed to meet Elizabeth at the dance, but she... never showed up so I went looking for her, and I--" He rubs the back of his neck as he takes in a deep breath, trying to work through the words. "She came crawling out of the bushes. Her dress was torn almost to shreds. She was bruised all over, cuts on her chest, bleeding... bleeding down by her legs, and terrified. She was holding just... the one shoe in her hand. She didn't know what'd happen to the other one. She was just a kid then too, and she didn't say it in words, but I knew what had happened. She'd been attacked. She'd been... raped, and I knew it. I could see it... in her eyes like something terrible had happened but she didn't want to remember it."
His throat tightens, and Lucky shakes his head. It happened ten years ago, but it still stays with him. What happened after, what he found out about his father, it happened ten years ago but it's part of what terrifies him about his own darkness.
It's the sound of the jangle that brings his attention to her wrist and to the bracelets that are there. It almost makes him smile but then it doesn't because Valentine's Day feels like so long ago when it wasn't at all. "I don't know that... I didn't want you to have to see me unless you wanted to, I guess. Even if it was only long enough to tell me to go away again."
He didn't know how angry she was with him, and Lucky recognized that his yelling at her after what she had been through, it had put him in line with someone he never wanted to be, someone that could make her feel terrible. It is a part of love too... or apparently, it's apart of his previous relationships.
Lucky steps toward her again, and his arms fall down again after she speaks. He looks away from her again, swallowing past the tightening in his throat. "Whether it's expected or not, I'm still-- I'm sorry for it. I'm so sorry. I never wanted you to see that side of me, and I never, ever wanted you to be on the other side of it. The way I treated you after it had happened. I couldn't see straight. I just--"
He sucks in a sharp breath, and it hurts. It burns and the burning reflects in his eyes, jaw locked.
"You did everything right, and I did everything wrong that day. It was never about not trusting your judgement, and I'm sorry that I gave you that impression. I didn't know where he was taking you or who he was. I saw his hands on you like that, and I couldn't-- It was like I couldn't breathe. There was just this red, and I kept seeing what could have happened to you because of this man that doesn't think anything of women, that thinks they're-- merchandise."
It makes him sick to say it out loud. It makes him physically ill.
Couldn't stop seeing Elizabeth in the snow or hearing his father admit to what he'd done.
Lucky looks back up at her. "I'm sorry, Lena." He never wanted to make her feel like he knows he must have made her feel after that.
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She just can't feel it since that night. Maybe she hasn't let herself. She honestly doesn't know.
"I was..." Lena takes a deep breath and looks away, wiping at her cheek. "I was furious and I was confused and on top of all of that, I felt like the scraped gum at the back of someone's shoe. And on top of all of that, I was scared. Do you--do you even realize if you hadn't been wearing that ring, you'd be dead? You'd be dead."
Her voice cracks on the last word and she can't help it. That's what got to her the most. It wasn't the yelling, because she was yelling and berating him herself, and what happened with Vlad had taken a back seat to the pure panic that took over when she literally thought he'd die. That they wouldn't make it out alive. That Sonny would be told he's lost one or two more of his family.
It isn't that she doesn't trust his abilities or she doesn't think he's good at what he does. But when it came down to it, they were outnumbered and a good chunk of them were demons, wired to be inhumanly strong and he was the one they'd attack with the intent to kill since he was the one that threw the first punch. The thought of losing him--that is what made her physically ill.
Lena only looks back his way once he starts explaining. She starts to get that feeling again as the pieces click into place. It's a pattern, it's a trigger, something similar if not on a lesser scale happened with Rick and that strip joint. His anger wasn't really about her and Vlad. She'd ask what it is, what happened to him or someone he's loved. She'd press if she had any idea where they stand. But she doesn't, and the uncertainty wins. And maybe it's important that she accept the apology before she knows the exact reasons.
It requires a level of faith that isn't always in someone to give. But she'd want that. She'd want someone to see the demon and still care and see something not ugly. Still look and see Lena despite whatever else she did or felt or said. There isn't a more difficult test in love, she thinks.
"I don't--" she shakes her head and curses herself inwardly for the blur of tears that don't let her see straight. "I don't know what impression you gave me anymore. Everything about that night is just a big blotch. I know how difficult it must've been for you to see someone you care about being treated that way. It was a horrible mission where nothing went right and I never want to do any thing similar to that again. Sonny and Gates and John, none of them would've reacted any differently if they'd seen me or Zoe like that. Not even Lou."
Some of them would've reacted worse. Especially John if it'd been Zoe. There'd have been murder, no questions asked.
She sighs and turns to look at him, face crumpling slightly at the burn in his eyes that mirrors her own. I'm sorry, Lena. "I know you are. And I forgive you for it, for all of it. You're still Lucky to me, I just didn't have the words till now."
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He knows that you can love someone so much and anger can drown it out for a short time and then it can return, but it doesn't take anything away from that love. It doesn't mean that what it isn't love. He had to learn that the hard way and multiple times. It's no easy lesson.
Love is a perfect notion. People expect too much out of it.
People are flawed. People fail. I fail. Regularly.
It comes to him suddenly, how much he misses his father, how much he'd like to hear his words right now and hear that faith that his father had in him in his darkest moments. Somehow Luke who had done the worst of things could look at him and know that he wouldn't follow that same path.
Lucky cannot watch her wipe that tear away and not move even closer to her, closing the distance between them. Do you even realize if you hadn't been wearing that ring, you'd be dead?. "I know," he says, and his voice sounds as shaky as he feels. "I know. I didn't... I didn't think about that before I jumped at him, and there's no excuse for it. I realize that I put you at risk too, and that it was a miracle that we got... out of there alive, that you got out of there alive, and that's on me."
In any other situation, he would have thought of something else to do instead of running at him. He would have thought of some subtle way to get back there. Lucky studied the plans too, and he could have realized where they were going. He could have moved closer to the office to listen for sounds of a struggle.
If he'd been thinking, he never would have been so reckless. Never. There hadn't been room for thought in his head. He saw that man with his hands on her like that, forcing himself on her even if all logic told him that she was playing a role and that she could take care of herself in a one-on-one situation with him.
"I never want to-- I don't think Sonny will be running missions like that ever... again. From the conversation, he had with me. It seemed like he-- like he wouldn't put anyone in that position again, you or Zoe or anyone else. It was terrifying to see you treated like that, and it was painful, and sickening and-- Sonny didn't sound like he'd be running those missions again at all."
He sounded guilty, not as guilty as Lucky felt but close enough. Through the yelling, there'd been guilt.
When her face crumples, Lucky does not keep his distance at all. He hasn't been questioning what she feels or where they stand if only because, he still trusts in it. He trusts that he loves her and she loves him beyond everything else. Lucky steps forward, cupping the side of her face.
His throat tightens further, and tears slip down his face as he breathes her in. "I shouldn't have left either, but I didn't--" Lucky breathes out and breathes in again, breathes her in again, reminding himself of the familiarity of his hand against the side of her face, the warmth of it. "I didn't know what else to do."
What he went through in his life to make that a trigger for him is something he will tell her. He feels that he can, that he wants to, and that he has to, but it's a matter of finding the words.
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And she was doing so well, with not being afraid of what could happen down the line, with not letting that rule her life or her decisions, but she feels like she's back at square one.
Lena doesn't answer when he says he knows. She believes he does, but it doesn't take away the dread of knowing how differently the outcome could've been.
People do expect too much of love. That it's stronger than anything. That it can save you. That it can be enough against each and every odd stacked against you in some other corner that's too big to be any sort of competition to your own. "It's not about pointing the finger, Lucky. It's not about who's to blame. or holding someone accountable. It's the fact you could've died and I wouldn't have been able to live with that."
She was the one that brought him to the Crowbar. She was the one that started it all in motion, knowing how dark it can get and knowing, as good as it can be, how many demons can be brought out by the work they do and the life they lead. She's known it. She's known it from the start, but it's always been a step up from the life she had.
"They're important," she says, running a hand through her face, shaking her head in refusal. It's not aimed at him, but at the decision. "I agreed to the mission and I knew what I was getting myself into. It's not like I ever thought it'd be a walk in the park, but it's important. He doesn't have to send us to anything similar ever again, but we did a good thing. You can't do the right thing without getting your hands dirty sometimes."
And she'll talk to Sonny about it, and she'll be honest with how hard it was but how she does not regret doing it, not for one moment.
So many girls live their whole lives thinking they're not worth loving. They afall into abusive relationships like Lena, or they're sold to the highest bidder, or they grow up without zero sense of self-worth. They believe that there isn't a God, there isn't anything to save them, there isn't anything but these animals that ship them from one place to another, making them do horrible things starting from the age of ten. She doesn't regret it at all, despite what she believes it's cost her.
Lena's face crumples further when he cups the side of her face, and her cheeks are suddenly flooded with warm tears. She's practically radiating the doubt and the fear and the paralyzing thoughts in her head. She doesn't want him blaming himself or thinking she hates him. But as for the rest?
"Maybe you had the right idea." In leaving. In getting away from them.
Lena looks down at the space between them and works at the lump in her throat before she tries to speak again, before she has the courage to look back up at him now that he's so close. "I'm not suggesting this because I'm mad at you or I want to hurt you or because I don't love you anymore. I said it to you once. There's more to this life here than the Crowbar. There's more to it than the job we do and the people living there and... me. Maybe this happened as some sort of stop signal. To avoid more hurt in the long run or to help you find something better or before you get killed."
She inhales sharply and says the words quickly before she can't get them out at all. "You just don't belong with me, after all."
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It hadn't occurred to him in that moment. If he had been able to take a moment to think about it, he would have realized the dangers that were present not only to himself but to her if he dared making a wrong move.
He could have died then. He could have died two days ago when he fought a monster on the sidewalk during patrol. As long as he lives, he has a chance of dying. He will always be human, always be more vulnerable than the rest to death.
"You could've died too, Lena," Lucky says quietly. "Every day that we fight and every day that we don't fight, there's a chance that we could die."
If she had said that out loud, he would argue it. He made the choice to stay. He followed her down during her mission and he needed something more. There is no doubt in his mind that if she hadn't found him, he would have found something worse. What could be better than a family?
It's all he has ever wanted in his life.
"They are important. I don't think he is stopping the missions to go in after those people, just stopping the ones that force someone to be in the position that you were in," Lucky says, and he doesn't think those are missions that the Crowbar can do if all the men would react violently to Zoe or Lena being treated that way. "I know... we did a good thing. I was almost afraid the key would be wrong, and I'd have... but it was the right key."
Thank God, it was the right key. Lucky is not a women, but he has seen the treatment that so many of the women in his life have suffered through. Elizabeth, his mother, his grandmother was kidnapped by the Cassadine brothers and drugged for years, Maxie was assaulted, his sister had an abortion and was kidnapped by Franco. He saw the other women at that bar, and he wanted to save them all, wanted that place to never exist.
When her face crumples further, he presses his hand against her face further, fingers slipping back into her hair and leaning forward to rest his forehead against hers.
Maybe you had the right idea. Lucky almost takes a step back, but he doesn't. He doesn't. His hand remains against the side of her face.
He shakes his head instead, insistently, and his hand slides down until both hands are holding on to her shoulders. "No, no, that's not why this happened. It wasn't a sign. You're saying that because you're scared, and I told you that I would fight you, fight for us, and I meant it-- It's not you that almost got me killed, Lena. It was my decision to join the Crowbar, and it was my mistake, my inability to take a step back."
You just don't belong with me, after all.
That hurts. That hurts more than he could have anticipated it hurting, because he never expected her to say it. It feels like a knife has buried itself in his chest, and he still shakes his head, tears in his eyes, spilling down his face.
"That isn't true," Lucky says when he can speak through it, and he wipes his own face, but he hasn't created any further distance between the two of them. He remains that breath away from her with his hands against her shoulders still to keep her centered, to keep them both centered. "Do you know what I did for the five days that I wasn't here? I was drinking. I went on patrols with people at the Tower to find monsters because there was nothing else to do, and I drank, and I didn't feel like I belonged or like I had a purpose at all or like it mattered if I had a purpose or if I didn't. It was just... it was existing, and I missed you and I missed that place and I missed having a family. I don't know if... I had my doubts about whether or not I can do this job after how much I screwed up five days ago. I thought I would be a liability to everyone here, to you, but--"
His breath hitches, and he shuts his eyes before opening them again to look at her.
"If I don't belong here with you, where my heart is, where am I supposed to belong?"
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It takes a moment for his words to roll over her, but she doesn't recoil. It doesn't have the same impact it does when they speak of his death. She's going to die soon, no matter what. A bitter voice wants to say, it'll only have come a year early, anyway.
She doesn't. But it's true, a tiny voice says.
You don't know that, Lena argues internally instead.
She bites the insides of her cheeks until she tastes blood.
"I know I would've," Lena says instead, considerably calm considering the conversation they are having. It's real, like any other conversation they've ever had, but nothing's ever hurt as much, she doesn't think. Nothing has ever felt as uncertain and it's like navigating through very, very thick fog with not a lighthouse in sight. "I wouldn't have wanted to make it out alive if you didn't."
And she doesn't care if that makes her weak or not because at least it's honest.
As for Sonny, she says nothing further. She nods in agreement and scrubs a hand against her cheek in exhaustion. She's slept less in the past five days. Less than she usually does, even.
It was hard to when she was thinking about him.
Do you know what I did for the five days that I wasn't here?
Lena shakes her head, stifling a noise that sounds suspiciously like a sob cut off by her teeth biting down on her lower lip when he answers. What he says hurts. Picturing him drinking without any sort of purpose hurts. There's some relief he was at the Kashtta instead of the many other places that would've loved to get their hands on him instead, but most of all there's just this raw, constant ache that keeps pushing at every wall in her chest.
There's a quiet, quiet voice that wants tear it all down, his pain and hers both.
If it can't take anyone else's pain and use it, if Lena keeps depriving it of what it wants, it'll eat itself from the inside out. Until they're both mad. Won't it? "I know what I feel and I know what I think and they're not the same thing," Lena finally says shakily. She doesn't remember what it's like anymore to live without that division of demon and human. She doesn't remember what it's like to experience love without that something else. "I know what I--what I want to say, and I know what a part of me... that isn't me wants to say" (demon) "and it's not the same thing, either."
And she's fighting, she's fighting past that ugly voice that's twisting everything beautiful she could possibly feel for him into something that isn't beautiful anymore, that says it doesn't want it anymore, that says it wants to kill it. That's bathing in the hurt and the guilt and the anger because the rest feels so far away. She isn't insignificant. This isn't insignificant. It isn't ugly. It's not. It's not.
Lena rests her forehead against his gently somewhere amidst the silence. She breathes out, breathes in, lets the tears flood down. I don't want to hurt you, she thinks. I would never want to hurt you.
And she just did. She sees it in his face, in his eyes when she opens her own to look into them. He hasn't moved away and surprisingly, she hasn't either. There's still that breath-away-only distance and she breathes out, the soft warmth of it fanning across his cheek. It's meant to steady her, ground her, but his hands on her shoulders do that more than anything else.
"We broke so many promises to each other, Lucky," she whispers brokenly. She can still remember when she made hers, and they feel so long ago when it was just over a month ago.
They'd been so happy and in love.
Where is that? Where is it?
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He'd asked her how much time she had, and she had said one to five years. He will always remember that. Lucky will always remember how it felt to hear her tell him how limited her time truly was. While he isn't constantly aware of it (if he was, he would drive himself crazy with it), he knows.
She was dealt a terrible hand, and it's why it's important that she get the most out of what time she does have. They all should. No one has guarantees, but most people don't have expiration dates like hers either.
Lucky closes his eyes at her words, and he's not-- It isn't a surprise to him that she has said it, because she has told him before that she couldn't handle another loss. After losing six of their family, he doesn't know that any of them can handle another person in their family dying. He doesn't know how the world can expect them to continue on.
"I know," he says again, quieter this time, at trying to imagine them both dying in that bar together, at how the Crowbar would have reacted when they found out. "The world couldn't ask any more of you."
She has already been through so much more in a few years than what most people go through in a lifetime. She has already lost so much more than most people will ever have to lose.
Lucky reads the exhaustion on her face. He is certain that neither of them have been sleeping or eating much in their time apart. They're better together. He meant that when he said it.
The noise that she makes cuts something deep within his heart, and he tightens his hold on her to reassure her. He's here, and he's not drunk. He didn't tell her what he did to hurt her. Lucky would never do anything with that wanting to hurt her, but he told her so she could see how the Crowbar grounds him, how she does. Why it's so good that she stumbled into him that night in October after he'd just fallen through.
He could have ended up somewhere else. There are more bad places for wanderers to get sucked into than good ones in this city. Whatever kind of person he is, he has demons of his own and darkness of his own, and he had already been at the end of his rope when he fell through the rift.
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A sharp pain hits in the center of his chest, because he understands what she means without her saying it. Demon. Lucky doesn't tell her that he wants to know what she wants to say, that that is what he wants to hear, because he knows that she knows it and that she is fighting with all that she can to send that demon's wants and words away.
It's why instead of telling her to say it. Say it., he reaches for her face and kisses her, intensely, hard. It's still there. The good is still there, more than the bad. Love hurts but it heals too, but it feels like this kiss feels, and he prays to God that she will feel it, feel what he feels when he so much as thinks of her.
The love that pushes up above all the rest, all the pain and regret and guilt. It's not ugly. It's beautiful, and he wants her to remember that and not that mission, not the person that he was then because it wasn't him and it was.
Lucky rests his forehead back against hers, hands still cradling her face and sliding along her cheeks to wipe away the tears. His hands slide back down against her shoulders, holding her in place again.
He winces at that broken whisper, and it hurts as much as the sob did, and he wants to apologize again but doesn't. Lucky's hands slide down her arms. "We did, but that's... It will happen. You can love someone so much, and you can still hurt them. You can still break the promises that you made to them, and it doesn't mean that you didn't mean those promises or it takes away from those promises. I'm... going to tell you something that my dad told me after the affair that I thought destroyed my ability to love. I stopped believing in it, and my dad told me that... love is a perfect notion. People expect too much from it. People are flawed. They fail." Lucky pauses, because the rest is him and not his father. "I fail. Frequently. We will both fail, but that doesn't take away from what that love means, from what we mean to each other. If it was always happy and perfect, it wouldn't be real."
This next part is harder to say.
"This is not the first time that I'll hurt you," Lucky says, and it's the hardest thing that he's said tonight, because the thought of hurting her hurts him like nothing else could. Her pain hits him more powerfully, more intense than his own does. "If that's something you... don't want in your life despite knowing what goes with it, knowing what we do for each other, I..." He has to swallow past the tightening in his throat, "understand. It hurts sometimes. It can hurt more than anything, but I think it's always-- it's always worth the hurt. It's the most powerful feeling there is, and it's not-- it won't always be good."
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It feels like weakness but more than that, it feels selfish. Lena knows what it would do to the Crowbar, she knows what it would do to Sonny, and that she'd still prefer to die than to face it goes to show she's a lot more terrible than she's ever given credit for.
That she was dealt the terrible hand, that she got the short end of the stick, it doesn't excuse it. Nothing excuses it when she loves them so much. She doesn't care what the world would ask of her, but she does look up at him at that, gaze sweeping across his face. "What are you asking of me?"
She isn't asking what he has the right to ask of her or not. She wants to know what he'd ask regardless.
"You're sorry. I know you're sorry. From the bottom of my heart, I know it and I do not hold anything against you. My fear and what I can and cannot handle is not on you. That's all me."
She always does sleep better when it's with him. He's had a way of holding her in the past that makes her feel safe and cherished, and the time she spends with him is the time she allows herself to slow down. It allows her to savor life the way it's meant to be savored, and she honestly couldn't say that about herself up until a few months ago.
Lena wasn't really living, either. She'd been existing, and she'd been making some really poor choices, and she'd been distancing herself from those that only had her best interests at heart. She doesn't want to know what would have happened had she botched the mission and she hadn't met him halfway through it. She just doesn't. And when she isn't bogged down by the fresh sting of what's happened or the weight of the doubts clouding everything else, she does see it clearly. She sees how good they are for each other and how much they help each other. There's adventure but there's also stability, and there's trust and there's honesty.
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They frame either side of his face and when she kisses him back it's not the way she usually kisses him. There isn't playfulness and an edge of softness to round out the intensity. It's just as hard and it's full of bare need. Her hands remain there, curved over his jawline, and she uses her thumbs to wipe at his cheeks, as well. Her mouth brushes against his cheekbone and she closes her eyes, feeling the fresh tears there. It says what she can't find in words. I'm sorry. I didn't mean it. I love you.
Lena doesn't flinch, but she feels it somewhere inside, the jolt in her chest that's already raw and aching.
It's not as if he has said something that isn't true. This won't be the last time he hurts her. This won't be the last time she hurts him. It may hurt just as bad as this and she can't imagine anything ever making it hurt like it hurts right now but life gets creative on you in that sense. It will hurt just as bad. It may hurt even worse. At some point, one of them is going to have to grieve the other. Whether they stay together or not, that's going to be true.
"It wasn't... my feelings I was worried about." Lena shudders quietly, and when she speaks again, it's just as impossible and hard to say them. "This is not the last time I will hurt you. This is not the last time I will have a knee-jerk reaction of pushing you away and saying what I know will wound deep. I just don't want there to come a time when something inside me is going to want--" she cuts herself off and it's not me she wants to add, but it is, in a way. It is. "It won't want to just hurt you. It'd want to destroy what you feel and how you feel it. It wouldn't just hurt. It'd twist into something unrecognizable so you don't remember it was ever good at all."
And I just want to be normal. And they've talked about it and she hasn't told him anything he doesn't know but then, she knows all of this, too. Or she thought she did. She really did need to hear the words. She wasn't trusting anything anymore, not even her own feelings because which were those?
"I know you'll hurt me," she whispers, voice raspy and tired and something close to bittersweet. "I know you won't want to. I've never once thought it wasn't worth it. Even after--what happened, I don't think differently of it or of you. I don't feel differently." It's important that he know that. She doesn't see him differently and she isn't scared of him or what darkness he could possess.
How could she when she's so intimately acquainted with her own? "Lucky, I..." and she lets out a shaky breath. She wants to bet on them. She does. As vividly as she is aware of all of the rest, as much as she struggles with it, the struggle never has to do with doubting what she feels and what she wants. Her hands curve on either side of his face again and she leans up in tiptoes to kiss him.
Softly this time, but just as intense, in a way. "Come home," she whispers against his mouth, fingers threading into his hair at the nape. "Come home, please."
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It's not that he thinks himself so self important that he doesn't think she can make it through his death, but he knows that she has already lost so much and he knows what grief can do to a person. He has seen it. He has felt the effects of it himself and watched his father suffer through the grief of losing Laura, how he spiraled into alcoholism so quickly after that.
What are you asking of me? It's that question when she looks at him like that that almost steals the air from his chest. It's the way that she looks that makes it hard to breathe for a moment. He sucks in a breath when he can manage it. "For you to be with me for as long as possible. I promised you forever, and I thought that promise went both ways," Lucky says and there's a small smile on his face, because he remembers her making that promise and he is trying to hold back the tears instead because it will never be forever. "I'm asking you to not hold your love back from me, not an inch of it. you never have before, and it's all that I want from you. I want you."
It's the only way that he knows how to put it. He would ask of her what they've always had even if it felt like they were in danger of losing that these past five days, when he watched her walk away from him.
"Okay," Lucky says, and he nods because she has forgiven him. She understands that he's sorry but she has doesn't hold it against him. It is easier to really believe it, the more times that he hears it.
The way that she is in his arms, the feel of her close to him makes it easier for him to sleep too. He is reminded that she is near, that he knows where he is in this universe that he doesn't technically exist in. There's no being lost, searching for a path that cannot be found.
His path is with her. His journey is here. It centers him, stabilizes him, and he is able to sleep. They are so good for each other, and he can remember that because as painful as it feels right now, it's better than the aching, emptiness, lost feeling that he had in the five days that he spent without her.
Lena kisses him back with intensity and need, and he meets it with need of his own, with the strength of his feelings in his chest without holding any of it back. He dives into that kiss as intensely as she does, because he didn't know. He didn't know that they'd be back here again like this after what had happened. There had been moments that he had been terrified that that was it. I love you, the kiss says back to her, his hands say to her skin. I will always love you. And this is love, what he is feeling. It is so much more than lust, beyond friendship, past anything else. It's love, and he can feel it breathing through the whole of him as he grabs hold of her like if he doesn't, the rest of the world will rip her away.
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They've talked about it before but he'll say it again and again. As many times as she needs, it's his choice. He chooses her.
"I'm glad you never thought it wasn't worth it. This has been the most important relationship in my life. It's been worth so much. It gave me another chance, a real chance to live, and I--" Lucky closes his eyes, swallowing and looking down. It is love. It is real love to know that your darkness does not scare the other person away, doesn't warp their view of you.
His throat tightens, and he swallows again though it doesn't stop the tears or the shakiness of his voice. It's something that scares him but he's relieved that it doesn't scare her too. "Thank you. I needed... I needed to hear that."
Lucky, I... And he pulls her in close again, sliding his arm around her waist to keep her there close against him. It's like he can hear what she doesn't say even after these days apart and the distance that they both felt when he stepped into the room and on the day of the mission, he hears it. She wants to bet on them. She wants to have them even knowing all the reasons that it can and will hurt. She wants them and that hasn't changed. Lucky leans in to the kiss, free hand slipping back into her hair.
He closes his eyes and then nods, resting his forehead against hers again and resting his hand against her neck as he feels her pulse against his palm. It's comforting. It's comforting like the feel of her hand on his face.
"I never completely left," he breathes, and he doesn't know that he ever could.
Hundreds of miles away, a part of him would still be here, wherever she is.
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It isn't that one person's death is more important than the other.
No matter who it would be, a death in the Crowbar family would hit like a final train wreck. But everyone relates to each other in different ways. Within the family, there are several different dynamics and different ways of loving each other.
Lucky's partner in a way no one else is. She's given him her heart in a way she hasn't to anyone before. It's a different sort of closeness and if that was ripped away from her, she'd just be less. There wouldn't be a spiral into alcoholism but there would be a spiral into madness, and they all know that.
I promised you forever, and I thought that promise went both ways. Lena tries smiling too, but her voice is still shaky when she answers. "It did. It does," she says, and it is painful to be promised forever when she won't be here to bank in on it someday. And while no one gets forever, and everyone dies someday, it's different to have this very finite certainty over your own mortality. It's one thing to say, I'll die someday. Everyone dies. to saying, In one year I won't be here.
She won't be standing here across from him in this room and all these things that she's had and she's lost and she's had again won't be hers. None of it. Not even the fights. "I didn't mean to hold it back from you," she says, though she realizes now that's what she was doing every time she ignored a phone call or refused to look at an entry. "I'd just never felt that far away, and I didn't want to... have you stand in front of me and find that things were changed beyond repair."
She hadn't wanted to finally see him and find that all those things they promised to each other were things they couldn't promise again, because there wasn't anything there anymore to build promises on. And that makes more sense than anything else has in a while, and it's amazing how she hasn't been able to upt it into words or even realize what it was until he's helped her along with it. It's not the first time. He's always been able to tell.
Lena doesn't balk when her intensity is matched. He's intense, even in his quiet moments, and she loves that about him. She leans further into him, forgetting there was distance in ths first place. Even when she breaks away to catch her breath, she stays close, pressing against the side of his face. She feels it. The doubts are slowly melting away and the demon's voice grows so quiet in the background she can't hear it against the loud thrumming of her ears. "I missed you," she says, almost inaudibly against his mouth.
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It would be easy if it did. One terrible event can erase all the good that's happened previously for many. But it doesn't for her, when it comes down to it. One night of everything going wrong and them failing each other doesn't hold a candle to the countless nights when he's been nothing short of perfect. Love really isn't anything without forgiveness. There will be times when she will need it most, and when she least deserves it.
I never completely left. Lena laughs against his neck, hiding her face there. It's half-breathless, half choked on tears. Her arms slide around his neck at the same time her legs wind around his waist. She hugs him almost bone-crushing tight, the way she wanted to from the moment he walked in. And she's crying, but she's not upset anymore, she's just not holding back, like he asked. For five days, that's all she's done. Shove everything down back so she wouldn't have to feel it. Until it was all so hard to reach.
Somewhere in Chicago, John is feeling very smug.
John, get out of this tag, it ain't yours.
The studio is small and cozy, and there isn't a whole lot of furniture in it yet. There's one couch, which is where they end up somehow, legs tangled together and a blanket covering them from the waist down. Lena's explaining why it was bought and why it was handed to her to oversee. "... I think he just mostly couldn't stand me or anybody else right now. And so, it was decided I'd fix some of the space here. It'll mostly serve as an extra storage room or if one of us needs some downtime. But I'm also thinking darkroom at the back for some of our photo work. Case-related and non-case-related."
She quiets down, looking around the space of the place. It doesn't surprise her Sonny would snatch it up the moment it was up for sale. It's right across the bar and it could serve well for the bar in many ways. Besides, he wouldn't want anyone else taking up residence there. Lena looks back at Lucky, settling her gaze on him, remembering snippets of the previous conversation and what she missed the first time around.
"What you said--before. You're not a liability. I wouldn't say this if I didn't believe it. You're really good at what you do. We just all have our... hot buttons, for whatever reason. It's happened to all of us."
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There is only so much loss that one person can take, and the Crowbar has practically reached their limit. Another loss within their family would undoubtedly pull them apart, despite the fact that anyone that died would never want their death to be the catalyst for that.
He has given his heart to her in a different way than anyone else, because they are so many of these rolls for one another. The thought of her death can tear him apart to think of, but he's still here. It's worth it. They have all suffered through so much, but they must all understand that what they do share is worth feeling the pain of the loss.
It did. It does. The shaky sound of her voice has him cradling her face again, smiling for her thought it's hard. It's so difficult. They are both thinking of that expiration date that she has, and he knows it. It's not fair.
There is nothing they can do to stop it. It's fact, and someday she won't be able to smile at all. Someday he won't be able to put his hand against her face like he is now, and she won't be able to touch him back, fight him back.
Lucky looks at her across the room. His hand falls down, reaching for her hand and holding it in his own. He links their hands together, eyes burning and throat tightening. "I never... want to think that that's possible. That something like this, something that we have can be broken beyond repair," he says, but he knows the truth of it. He knows that there are actions taken that can break love, no matter how good and strong that it may be. It can break it and rip it away and leave an aching shell in its wake. "Even if we'd stood here and it felt like that, I would have fought. I would have fought to try to fix it. I will always fight for us."
Even when it looks like she is broken beyond repair, he will keep fighting until the end. It's another promise that he is making her, and there may be times when he goes away in the future, but he knows it is a promise that he will keep.
It's hard to remember that there had ever felt like there was distance with how easy it is to be back like this, close with her. His hands rest against her, and they slide down her waist and pull her in against his chest as the kiss deepens. "I missed you," Lucky says in response. His hand drifts up to her face again, thumb tracing the corner of her lips. "I missed you so much."
It was only five days, but it felt like so much longer. He hadn't known what she thought of him. If he would be back. It all depended on what she wanted, and he hated those five days apart. He couldn't get her out of his head, or how she sounded and looked when he last saw her, or how he had acted.
Lucky, I mean that. He looks into her eyes when she urges him to, and his chest hurts. It feels like fire, and he reaches up to rest his hand over hers against his face. It is not the person that he wants to be but it's him, it's a part of him, and it scares him, but he believes her. He can see the honesty in her gaze, and he nods, swallowing thickly and looking down between them. "I know." Deep breath. "I know you mean it."
He knows that she forgives him, and it makes it much easier for him to handle what he was and what he did that night, knowing that she is able to not let it change the way that she sees him.
It feels wonderful to have her laughing against his neck even if it's half chocked on tears. His hand slides behind her head and against her waist to keep her close, hugging her back as tight as he can. Lucky can feel the difference. He can feel the walls come down and leave nothing behind them. It's all he could ever ask of her.
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Oh, John. :x Your cameo is hilarious and appreciated.
Lucky is quiet as she explains why the studio space was bought. There's almost a smile when it's the fact that Sonny couldn't stand anybody right now. He doesn't find that too surprising considering how he'd seemed that night before Lucky left. "It's nice. I think we could really use it like you said for the pictures... and a place away but not too far away."
It's something else good that came out of all that mess. Sonny has been teaching them all to look for the silver linings in every situation. He shifts on the couch, arm around her so that he can keep her close, no space between them.
"I'm glad... I'm not a liability. It-- I thought I had failed in every way, failed all those women. I couldn't--" Lucky pauses, breath hitching in his throat and he closes his eyes. He wants to talk about it, but he hasn't talked about it in years and not with anyone that didn't already know. It's important. His hand slides down her back. "I want to tell you why. What happened that makes it so-- where I go red, and I can't see or think... straight."
It might help to talk about it. It might help him get in control, because there is no guarantee that something similar won't happen again. If not to her, it could be to someone else, and it's still a trigger for him that he will react violently with even if he doesn't know the person.
"When I was sixteen, I... was walking through the park in Port Charles. I was supposed to meet Elizabeth at the dance, but she... never showed up so I went looking for her, and I--" He rubs the back of his neck as he takes in a deep breath, trying to work through the words. "She came crawling out of the bushes. Her dress was torn almost to shreds. She was bruised all over, cuts on her chest, bleeding... bleeding down by her legs, and terrified. She was holding just... the one shoe in her hand. She didn't know what'd happen to the other one. She was just a kid then too, and she didn't say it in words, but I knew what had happened. She'd been attacked. She'd been... raped, and I knew it. I could see it... in her eyes like something terrible had happened but she didn't want to remember it."
His throat tightens, and Lucky shakes his head. It happened ten years ago, but it still stays with him. What happened after, what he found out about his father, it happened ten years ago but it's part of what terrifies him about his own darkness.
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