It felt like the world had slowed to a halt, leaving just Ava and I alone together. The warmth, as though Ava had been the sun on a warm summer afternoon, began to seer into me - melting the ice that had been formed so long ago. Time had stopped, alone we felt the embrace of another life, the warmth shared between two live beings. Closeness, the filling of another's voids - to close a hole that had been so savagely torn open.
The feeling of life had began to swarm through me once again. The hollow cold, even if only for that moment, had been destroyed. Ava had ripped my soul wide open, searching for a similar warmth - something she would likely never find. Had I let her in, or was I going to reject her, metaphorically and physically? Was I going to open myself up to Ava, or was going to continue to run and hide?
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Staring into a blank whiteness that had been the roof above me, I had been brought back to earth by a soft echo vibrating throughout my upper body.
"Aiden?" I heard Ava speak as she sat up, wrapping the thin blanket around her shoulder. Nervously, with slightly reddened cheeks, she turned her eyes to me. "Why aren't you answering me?"
"Sorry. I was just thinking about some stuff." I tugged the sheet out of her grip, slightly grinning. "What did you want?"
Ava had momentarily looked at the sheet and then me, possibly contemplating if it was okay to pick it up. "It wasn't important. I just wanted to talk about us, I guess."
"What do you mean?" my hand crawled up her lower back, following the slight bumps of her spine.
"Like what do you want to do for a career, or what are your hobbies? That's the best way I can put it." Ava answered, now shying away from the topic. "We've been together for almost a month now, and I feel like we don't know anything about each other."
What had my hobby been, selling drugs? Had that been my career? How would have Ava reacted if I had told her that I was just as worthless as my resume looked? That I was just as full as my bookshelves, empty? What had I been doing for so long, while I was running and fucking around? I hadn't done a damn thing for myself, or anyone else. My worth, with just a simple question, had been brought to light.
As though Ava had somehow sensed my lack of an answer, she rested her head on my chest and began to speak of herself - as to rid the room of silence.
"I want to dance, competitively. Like Ballroom dancing." Ava hid her face from any prying eyes using her hair. "Nobody knows about it, not even my parents. I practice at a nearby studio with my partner when I can, and I try to make a competition once a month."
As she spoke on her aspirations to dance professionally, I had come to the realization of why she had been in such good shape. It hadn't been for herself, for anyone else, or even her health. As I studied her body, it had all come together; her thin waist, her posture, and even the washboard abs that lied on her stomach. That once sentence had explained so much about her.
I took a breath, brushing the hair out of Ava's face. "Take me with you to practice. I want to see you doing what you love. I don't mind spending every day watching you practice, if that's what you want to do, Ava. Don't hold yourself back because of some stupid guy like me."
"Who said I was holding myself back because of you?" Ava lifted her head, smiling as her eyes squinted. "Would you actually do that? You'd just sit there and watch?"
"Well, yeah. It's not like I have anything better to do." my hand began to travel downwards, creeping past Ava's waist.
"But right now, I do have someone better to do..."
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The final bell of school rang, and the students had seemingly exited the classroom as quickly as the sound of the bell went off. Just as I had began to stretch myself out, I felt a small hand on my shoulder, wielding thin, feminine fingers and pitch black nails. Continuing my stretching, my hands slowly fell and my head went backwards, giving me the sight of the beauty I had just seen the other afternoon.
"Hey." Ava looked under the desk. "Where's your backpack?"
"Probably in a some kid's happy meal, or maybe a junkyard?" I unconsciously rubbed my chin. "Why? Who cares about that piece of cloth?"
Standing up, I met Ava's small frame. Adorned in skin-tight black jeans and a plaid button-down that covered a tank top, I had taken a short moment to watch her movements and figure. Her body language had been vague, leaving me to guess how she had been feeling. Instead, I walked right past past her and had stolen her own backpack in the process.
"Give it back." Ava followed me out of the classroom and into the hallway. "I didn't ask you to carry it."
"Or you could try not to make me look like a total asshole." I sarcastically responded, turning my head back as I walked towards the exit. "You carrying something while I'm carrying nothing doesn't look too good, you know?"
Since when did I become the type to care about my image?
Exiting the school with Ava, I had taken out a cigarette and lit it. I had slowed, letting myself fall a stride behind Ava. While I had done it, and had caught myself doing it, I hadn't been quite sure as to why I did it. It was then that I had remembered Ava bringing that very thing up - how I had walked behind everyone. It hadn't been because I wanted to stare at her, or anyone else's rear end, it had been for a completely different reason. The reason had been much more illogical.
While more metaphorical, it had still applied; I hadn't wanted to get stabbed in the back. If I had stayed behind everyone, there wouldn't have been risk of that. It had been that simple, yet it had also been so convoluted - pointless, even. Avoiding the said metaphorical blade had somehow transferred to me walking behind everything, and everyone.
"What are you thinking about now?" Ava asked, ever so slightly frowning as she looked out of the corner of her eye.
Ava shook her head, brushing her hair behind her ear. What should I have done, changed immediately? Right on the spot? Had she expected me to just break a habit that had taken time to create? It had been like breathing, I had always followed people like inhaling and exhaling, like it had been the most normal thing in the world. Had I done something wrong to Ava by doing this?
I stopped walking, my hair falling slightly over my right eye.
"Who do you want me to be?" I asked, unsure if I had even known what I was going to say. "If you're expecting anything more than what I am right now, you're just bound for disappointment."
"Who? I want you to be yourself. If this is the you I'm going to get, I'm fine with that. I'll always be happy with this you, I wouldn't change a thing - not even your filthy mouth." Ava stopped and turned around, brushing her hair behind her ear once again. "What I want you to do is fucking talk to me. You're always saying the things I want to hear, and it feels like you are never being honest with me. How do you think that makes me feel? Is that how much I mean to you, where you feel like you have to lie to me?"
Heh.
Honesty, in essence, had been laughable. It was nothing more than someone simply using the word itself as a security blanket, leaving that someone hoping for the real, unaltered answer. Leaving your hope in someone else's hands is never a good decision. They'll always use it against you in some way, at some time.
In what had felt like a complete millennia, I had something special in my grasp again. Had I been ready to stick with my old ways, my habits over that special something? Had I been ready to lose my ways, to start over for that special something? I had two paths in front of me; lose everything I knew for something new, or lose something new and keeping everything I knew? Which way had been the right way, the way where I could keep both, and the way where I could finally be happy with something in my life - someone in my life?
I took the left path. I had chosen to lose everything I knew for the woman that stood directly in front of me.
"I was thinking about how you mentioned why I walk behind everyone." I looked away. "I don't want to be stabbed in the back anymore, I don't want to feel that pain anymore. Not again."
Ava's light footsteps echoed through my head. "Isn't that what a relationship is, in some way or another? You're supposed to shield the one you love from hurt, and vice versa. I'm not going to say that I can stop it, but I'll try my damnedest."
Snickering, I smiled as my hair nearly curtained my face. "Ain't I supposed to be the man here? I feel like such a bitch right now."
The feeling I had experienced at that moment was so new - or rather, it had been so long since I had been near it, that I had forgotten what it had felt like to feel it so fully - so deeply. It had been anything but a derogatory statement towards Ava. She had said the line I was supposed to give to her, that I would protect her. Yet, her words; they held so much more meaning in them then mine would have.
Ava turned and began to walk again. "I'm going. You said you would come every day, right?"
"Yeah." I brushed my hair over the back of my head, smiling as I lifted my head. "I'm coming."
Slowly, Ava had continued to pry me open. This small woman, so little yet so strong, had given a herculean effort towards me. She had tried her hardest to see within me, to see and absorb some of the pain within me. That, alone, had been more than anyone had ever done for me. I had truly thought that Kylie had been the only person who understood me, and the only person who ever would - yet I had appeared to be wrong.
Ava turned once more, walking backwards with a small bag in her left hand. She smiled, exposing the sheer brightness of her own white teeth. That was what had been so special about Ava; the portraits she painted of such simple actions and emotions - smiling, laughing, and even crying - they had all been amazing, as though they were something entirely new to this planet. She was, in one word;
Otherworldly.810Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY4uRoCEFnf
