Blazed(27)

That morning, I had nothing but the buzz of music still playing outside and a text message on my phone.



Don't let me sleep.



Okay, so I had his phone number now, and he'd already saved it in my phone book with a heart next to it for good measure. He'd also changed the background to a picture of him curled up next to me, grinning into the camera while I slept. The image was new, obviously taken that morning. The glitter gave it away. When he wasn't around, I would at least have the reminders that he existed, evidence that he wasn't a reoccurring dream or another hallucination to add to the list. Flesh and blood man who cared enough to bunk on my back breaking furniture to keep 'us' a reality.

But I made a promise to myself not to text or call him unless he did first. It was like being back at the basic rules of dating etiquette.

When the room steadied enough, I crept through the lounge to the kitchen and watched him napping on my couch. I'd seen Chris, Daniel or Jonathan grace that camelback many times, but Blaze looked the most at peace there. He didn't have bad dreams like my friends and I did every time they slept, just lay naked, midriff covered with his jacket, mouth slightly open and one foot dangling over the arm rest. The muscles in his torso flexed and defined as he breathed steadily— in, out, in, out, almost hypnotic. I had no idea that watching someone sleep could be so entrancing.

I poured us both cups of coffee and tiptoed in to crouch next to him, finding myself smiling. He really was beautiful, and as far as the world knew, mine.

But he's not yours, is he? However much you think he wants you, you can never be the focal point in his life. You'll only ever be a part time lover— god knows what he's doing in the week.

Shut up, he's caring for someone. It's his job, he gets paid for it.

Unless he's lying. Maybe he does care for her, but maybe he's f*cking her as well. You don't keep yourself for him, why would he? You don't really have a right to complain, do you?

"Emmeline?" Two sleepy green eyes fluttered open at me and crinkled with an accompanying smile. It stopped my heart to see him so unguarded in those first waking moments, before his brain could start to process and produce his usual cockiness and wit. Shakily, I raised a hand to stroke across his hairline, feeling something I thought I'd obliterated from my emotional repertoire years ago. Tears burning the backs of my eyes and complete, pathetic, unreasonable dread.

He meant too much. I was already hurting. If I cut him off now, it might save me from years of obsession, but it would shred me to do so. And down the rabbit hole she goes...

"Hey, don't cry." Even the quiet encouragement couldn't stop me. I was 'feeling' the most I had in years and was a little resentful about it. All the framework I'd put in place so far to become indestructible had been burned to the ground and lay in sad little piles of ash at my feet. Back to square one, somewhere I'd come to London to escape.

"This is all just too much, Blaze. You are too much. I don't think I'll come out of this in one piece, even if I step back now."

"Oh, Emmeline." Shifting to sit, he pulled me up into the couch with him and manoeuvred me onto his lap, pressing his nose into my hair. "This time last week I felt the same way. I thought I'd come and see you again just once to say goodbye and limp home to lick my wounds because I was in too deep. But then I heard two words. Two words that perfectly epitomised our dilemma and told me how to proceed. Two words who came from a woman neither of us know; a woman who'd just been told that if she discharged herself from hospital and refused chemotherapy, she'd die."

"Go on."

" 'Fuck it'." I twisted to look at him and raised an eyebrow. He nodded briefly, then pulled me back into the warm snug of his arms. "Wonderful woman, ancient, vulgar to the back teeth, and she said 'f*ck it'. Her explanation was that life is too short and she'd already taken more time than she deserved. She said she'd wasted her life second guessing impulse decisions and saying no when she should have said yes, and 'damned if it isn't about time someone took it away from me so I don't balls it up further!' "

"She sounds wise." The hassle I'd have been saved from if someone had taken away my life or freewill...

"Not so much. She smoked sixty a day and had lung cancer. But I understood what she meant. I don't want to waste my life on 'what if's. How do I know this would turn out so bad if I don't even try? I'd rather walk through life saying 'oh well, at least I know' than turn my back on something that isn't so significant for no reason. I told you yesterday that nothing will get rid of me now, not when my mind is so made up and I've finished second guessing. We just need time. Do you have time?"

"Yes." I had time in bucketfuls because I was guilty of wasting it too. With or without him, I'd keep wasting it, but at least the scenery was better when he was wasting it with me. "I really don't have any choice but to sit here waiting for you, do I?"

"Sure you do. You can send me away and go on with your life as normal. But that doesn't mean I won't stop coming back."



SO waiting it was. This was my 'normal' now— door watching and making the effort to leave the house looking good every morning whilst trying to maintain my usual patterns of behaviour so it didn't look like I was too far gone, then intermittently being swept off my feet and spoiled with compliments and affection that would drive my feelings for him deeper, making it more painful every time he left.

As depressing as it may have sounded, I really didn't mind it. It was almost like my routine with Hunter except he didn't spare me the kind words and subdue me with orgasms at every chance. The roar of the cynical voice in my mind was easily blocked out when Blaze spoke to me and wanting him wasn't nearly as self-destructive. I was actually kind of happy about it.



WE stayed wrapped up on the couch while we drank our coffee, idly chatting and trying to piece together the fractured memories of the night before. I did fall off his shoulders, and Blaze caught me. How symbolic. Spending this kind of quality time together was peaceful and soothing, the fact of it being uneventful being proof that our strange relationship had substance beyond the alcohol and animal sex.

He looked like hell and he still looked great. We both stank to high heaven but somehow he just wore it like a movie role, cast as my party animal 'boyfriend'. The word still felt strange.

"I think I need to de-funk." The words lacked motive. I was still exhausted and heavy-headed, putting 'moving' fairly low on my to-do list.

Blaze lifted my arm and stuck his nose into my armpit, squeezing me to stillness when I tried to squirm away. "Jesus, you're right. You're noxious."

"You disgust me." I thought about daring him to sniff lower down but not trusting him to hold back from the challenge, I begrudgingly pulled myself away from him and made tracks through the bedroom to the en suite, groaning at the sight of my bed. I had to trim my fingernails.

"You're a natural blonde." Blaze caught me by the elbow just as I was about to step into the shower and smirked downwards. I followed his line of sight and grimaced. The point of focus was the fine muzzle of pubic hair making an appearance between my legs.

"I was about to deal with that." Grooming had never been essential but somehow it just made me feel feminine and a little more acceptable. "So if you don't mind..."

"You want me to leave while you shower?" I glared at him like the question was stupid. It was stupid, but he raised an eyebrow and leaned into the shower screen, not flinching at the ice cold sheet of glass pressing against his still very naked body. I didn't even try not to eye-f*ck him. "Why are you so body conscious? You have an amazing figure. Even with those god damn scars, you're still one of the sexiest women I've ever met in person." I was about to ask why I wasn't the sexiest when I remembered he'd been in a music video with Amelia Marsh. There was no way to compete.

Shuddering inwardly, I backed under the water and closed myself in before I confessed, "because I used to be f*cking fat." He had to hear it sooner or later, and there really was no time like the present. If he was insistent on throwing around claims of sticking with me despite everything, it was better I told him when it was easier for him to take back.

His scoff and disbelief rang over the hiss of water. "No, really."

"Really, Blaze. I was the fat, ugly, sweaty, blonde nerd who hoarded chocolate in her pencil case." The memory of looking like a two tonne whale made me literally gag.

"So what the hell happened?" I paused and closed my eyes, praying for the subject to go away. "Emmeline?"

"... Boys. One in particular. He was really nice to me when other people weren't and gave me and Daniel the time of day. I was mad for him to the point of being downright brazen but he ignored it, so I figured it was my weight. I took the weight loss to the extreme— I..." My voice broke. Reliving those memories was painful and talking about them now of all times— when I was naked— wasn't helping. No matter how hard I looked in the mirror, I saw fat and I saw ugliness. I couldn't remember the last time I looked at myself and saw anything I liked. Sure, I was a little more accepting of it since Blaze had been around, but still, Fat Emmy was always there.