keptherwaiting

It had been easier, in the immediate aftermath, to focus on what needed to be done, to not think about things that weren't get Jasper out of there, away.

Now though, in the dim lighting of this dinky motel room, Alice's fingers tremble as she closes the heavy curtains. They tremble as she twists them together and apart over and over, shoulders tense, worry seeping through her.

She hadn't seen it fast enough. She doesn't think it would matter if she had. Her stockings are torn and muddy at her knee--a side effect of Jasper pushing her away when she tried to stop him, the blood lust too strong, overwhelming him.

She worries he thinks she's upset at him. She's not. Really, she's not. Mistakes happen. She's made them. Only, Alice can't feel every emotion of the humans she's drained (though, sometimes, their possibilities flickered in her mind--birthdays, graduations, children they'd never have now).

Alice steps to the bathroom door, fingers curled to knock. Her hands are still dirty, from picking herself up off the forest's floor. She drops her hand to the door knob instead, turning it to peek in at Jasper, folded in on himself in the tub.

He's too big for it. He looks miserable. She moves to kneel at the side of the tub, fingers curling around the porcelain lip. "Hi," Alice's voice is tiny, a fractional whisper. "Hey, love. You...you ready to get out?"

It takes a lot of effort to keep the emotions at bay, but he’s trying. He always tries, and it’s evident in the effort that it takes for him to look at her, his movements far too controlled and restrained as he turns his head toward her and pressing his cheek to his knees drawn to his chest.

Only, his gaze drops to her hands, to the fingers curled around the edge of the tub, and the restraint cracks. Panic seeps into his red-eyed gaze. Terror, fear, pain. All of it coming back, rushing in. Because -

“Your hands are dirty,” he whispers.

And he did that, didn’t he?

He’d pushed her away -

His breath quickens, and the slow, controlled movements are replaced with a frantic, desperate touch as he grab her hands in his.

“Your hands - Alice - “

"Hey, hey--" Alice breathes, her eyebrows drawn together. She lets him take her hands, even as she shakes her head. "It's just dirt--I've gotten dirty before, it's okay. It's okay."

She takes one of her hands away from him, dipping it in the water, wiping it dry (and clean) on her skirt. Carefully, she combs her fingers through his hair, making soft shushing noises--not to tell him to be quiet, but hoping to soothe.

"Do you want to get out now? Or stay in longer?"

Jasper’s shaking his head.

In answer to her question, in not answering it, in ignoring it. At himself, at nothing.

“Did I hurt you?” he gasps as he scrambles out of the tub to kneel beside her on the floor. To frantically check her over. Her hands, her arms.

“Al-Alice - “

His voice cracks on her name his hands hover shakily over her, wanting to touch, afraid to touch. Touching, and then not touching.

“ - Did I hurt you?”

Oh, God. If he did -

"Jasper--" Alice takes his hands, curling her fingers around his, shaking her head almost frantically. "I fell down. That's it. Just dirt on my hands and a tear in my stocking--I've done far worse on my own."

Her hands move, pressing to his cheeks, trying to get him to focus on her, on what she's saying. "I'm fine, I promise. You didn't hurt me. Let's get you into bed. Just...here--"

She reaches for the towel hanging on the wall, shaking it out one-handed, loathe to stop touching him, to give him the foundation of her, if he'll take it. Alice wraps it around him, finally moving her hand so she can start toweling him dry.

"I promise," she whispers, again, her eyes sad as she focuses on him intently. "I'm okay. I'm worried about you--I need to take--you need to get up, okay? We're going to go lay down."

He tries to calm down, one steadying breath and then another, as he tries to let her assure him that he hadn’t hurt her.

He doesn’t see anything to suggest he had and yet he still looks her over for any thing that may.

His gaze flits to hers only when she starts towel-drying him and she says -

“We?”

His voice is nearly a whisper.

She’s not going to leave him?

Edited 2020-08-18 00:52 (UTC)

Her hands freeze on the towel and she jerks her head up to look at him, stricken by the way he whispers that one word.

She can't read minds. She can't read emotions. But she can read Jasper. Twenty-eight years of him living in her visions and the last few months of spending every second of every day with him--she knows him.

And she thought he knew her.

Unkind thoughts drift through her mind for the woman who created him--because it has to be her, right? It has to be Maria that made him scared of Alice leaving. Anger bubbles, but she's careful, damping it down so it doesn't hurt Jasper, as raw as he is right now.

"Come on," Alice murmurs instead, standing, pulling him up with her. She wraps the towel around his waist to finish drying him, guiding him out of the cramped bathroom and into the equally cramped bedroom. She busies herself with sitting him on the edge of the bed, with pressing a kiss to the top of his head before flitting to the corner of the room.

There, she kicks off her shoes, peels off her ruined stockings, the dirty skirt and sweater. There's dirt on her knees and she scrubs at her skin with the balled up clothes before dropping them to the ground. She grabs a shirt--one of the ones she bought for him--and slips the garment on, too big for her; it reaches her knees and engulfs her hands as she buttons it up.

Then, she's by his side on the bed, her hand rubbing circles against his skin--only seconds had passed since she set him there. "We," Alice promises, her voice cracking. "I'm right here, Jasper. Until you tell me to go."

And even then--probably not.

For as quick as she is, Jasper tracks her every movement around the room.

His heart twists in anguish when she peels off her ruined clothes. He doesn’t like how torn the stockings are, how dirty her dress. She’s normally so put together. Unless he’s tearing them off of her.

God, he just ruins everything, doesn’t he?

She was a good girl before him.

And then she’s before him, kissing his forehead and he shudders at the touch.

It’s sweeter than he deserves.

He fiddles with the hem of the shirt.

“Are you angry at me?”

Even though he can’t feel it now, he’d felt it before, the brief flare of it before it’d been dampened down.

“No,” the word leaves her in a rush, her hand stuttering in its circles on his back. “No, not you. Not anything to do with...that.”

Alice watches his fingers at the hem of his shirt. It dwarfs her completely but it makes her feel safe, comfort. Like he does.

“I’m upset that you think I’m going to run away. I’m angry at those who made you feel that way before.” Her words are soft, and it’s like she has to pull them out of herself. “But I’m not angry at you, Jasper. You slipped—I’ve done it too. It happens, my love. I’m not angry.”

“I could have hurt you,” and he knows he hadn’t but the thought terrifies him still.

His breath quickens again as the the fears takes over again, overwhelming the sadness.

“Or, what if there’d been someone else with her? I could have made you slip. What if it was in a town? I could’ve exposed us - I could’ve endangered you.”

He knows he’s smarter than that, he’s always been smart about his kills - lethal and hungry but smart - and he’d realize so if he was thinking clearly. He’s still cycling through the emotions. His own, the girl’s.

He clings to the shirt Alice wears, fingers twisting in the fabric.

“Alice - You shouldn’t - I’m not good for you. You’re so good.”

“No,” the word is harsh this time, desperate. “No—you—stop.”

Alice grabs at his hands, trying to still them, a strange urge to free herself from his grasp. She doesn’t want to leave his side, but she needs him to calm down—needs herself to calm down.

“Jasper. It doesn’t matter. It didn’t happen. I’d know if it were to turn out that way—you wouldn’t hurt me. I know that too. Falling down in the dirt is nothing.”

Alice grips his fingers tight. “You are good. You’re not leaving me over this. I won’t let you.”

“I don’t want to leave,” Jasper gasps, struggling against her grip on his hands, even though he doesn’t even understand the struggle on his part. Not truly.

Sensing her urge to free herself from him, maybe. Trying to keep her close, even though she’s not trying to leave, just trying to calm him down.

“ - I don’t want you to leave. I just - I don’t want you chained to me. I don’t want you to regret it. You’re going to regret me.”

He shudders again.

“I want it, Alice. I want it so God damned much. Even now. I want more. How many times? How many times will be before you give up on me? I can’t control it. I can’t control this.”

“You can,” Alice begs, her fingers unrelenting on his hands. “I know you can—I’ve seen it, Jasper.”

But hasn’t she also seen numerous slips and falls in the decades to come? Centuries? But her, always by his side, to pick him back up again, to lend her strength.

“It won’t be easy. And there will be more mistakes. But Jasper, you are worth it to me. I will never resent being by your side.”

Her voice breaks, small and sad. “I will never regret you.”

He wants to believe her.

He does believe her. Doesn’t he?

He feels so mixed up right now that all he can do is nod his head as he clings to her again. He tries to find that little tendril of hope he’d felt when he met her.

What he feels even now, under all the layers of grief and pain.

Wants to draw on that and the strength she offers.

He takes a deep breath, and another, each accompanied with a little shiver.

He nods again, a little clearer, a little more sure.

“Come here,” Alice whispers, sliding her hands up to his shoulders, tugging him to her, guiding his head to rest in the crook of her neck.

“I love you,” she murmurs against his hair, hand scratching at his scalp. “I love you so much, Jasper. I’m not going anywhere.”

“I love you too,” is a whispers, a mumble, as he buries his face against her neck.

He can feel her love for him, making itself known between all the other feelings that plague him. It helps. He still worries, the other emotions still eat away at him and his confidence, but it definitely helps.

He wraps his arms around her. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“I know,” Alice soothes, pressing kisses into his hair. “It’s going to be okay, I promise.”

The girl will be missed, but deer related accidents aren’t uncommon here. Her car shows the right damage, the gash in her throat now has a piece of the windshield there, to account for it.

She was on her way to a party—the last glimpses of her possible life had fled before Alice’s eyes, in time with her heartbeat.

Alice’s fingers tighten fractionally in Jasper’s hair. “Do you want me to read to you?”

“Do you - want to read to me?”

Jasper pulls back with something like a sniffle to look at her.

His expression is hard to place. Too many feelings, too many thoughts. One possibility -

- his hand disappearing under the towel, trying to trudge up the desire -

- more forefront than most.

It’s what he used to.

Edited 2020-08-18 15:39 (UTC)

She blinks rapidly at the vision, her ire raising and she has to bite back the vitriol that almost spills out of her.

“Jasper,” Alice stares at him, with wide eyes, horrified. “No—I wouldn’t—that’s—“

Beyond her. Unfathomable. To force herself on him, in any situation let alone this one? Her hands shake and she feels sick.

“I’m going to kill her if I ever meet her,” it’s a rush of words, falling from her before she can stop them. It’s truth though—her thoughts on Maria growing colder and angrier by the millisecond.

Jasper frowns at her sudden reaction. Her anger spiking, cold, hard.

“Why’re you mad?”

His voice, soft, starts to take on a tinge of panic again.

“I don’t want to! I just thought - Don’t be mad. We can read. I don’t care. I don’t even want to do anything!”

Then softer, still panicking, “You knew we were lovers. I told you that. Why does it matter now?”

“That’s not—thats not just sex, Jasper.” Alice takes his face in her hands, trying to calm herself down. But it’s hard. She loves him so much.

“Or love. That’s rape.” She chokes on the word, that sick feeling climbing up her throat. Everything hurts her when she says it. She wants to rip Maria apart.

She wants to cry. She wants to pull Jasper into her arms and never let him go.

“Jasper—oh, God.” Her mind is a whirl of thoughts and emotions and she can’t get them straight—his panic feeding into hers. “Just, come here.”

Her arms wrap around him, pulling him close again to hug him tight.

“I’m so sorry.”

“What - ?“

Her arms around him, he’s pressed close to her, his face against her shoulder.

Her emotions are all over the place, and his are still. He’s confused. He’s angry? He wants to kill - but he doesn’t? He just did.

And grief and the pain, still.

He grabs hold of the anger, the strongest of the emotions, to push away from her. Try to reclaim some rationality.

“No, Alice - No,” he growls, though he doesn’t mean to, the anger just working it’s way through him. “That’s not - You’ve got the wrong idea. It was just a distraction from all of this!”

He pushes away from her.

The surprise of it, the burst of anger, knocks her back, her hands flying out to catch herself on the mattress.

Her anger rises—his? No, this isn’t right, she’s aware enough to try to fight it down.

But he defends her. He always does (and always will, she knows it) and it breaks her heart every time. She wants to argue the point.

A distraction.

Instead, Alice looks away from him and presses her lips together. “Okay. I’ve got the wrong idea.”

Jasper stares at her, the anger - Why is he so angry? - making his hands shakes.

“You do. You - It wasn’t like that,” he says again, as if he has to convince her of that.

And then he’s off the bed, the bathroom door slamming shut behind him.

He just - (feels sick and wrong, angry and upset, like he could scream or cry) - needs a moment.

She focuses on a spot on the bed. Focuses on it until it swims before her eyes.

Picks at it.

Waiting.

Wanting to follow, wanting to go after him but afraid of what she’ll say if she does.

Jasper sits on the floor by the door. Blocking the door, rather.

He can’t stop shaking.

He runs his fingers through his hair, pulls at it a little, as he tries to calm himself again.

Why.

Why’d he follow the scent.
Why’d he kill that girl.
Why’d he think Alice would leave him.
Why’d he think she’d try to distract him like Maria used to.
Why’d Alice say that.
Why'd he get so angry about it.

He squeezes his eyes shut and takes a few deep breaths. He wants to stop thinking and feeling so much.

Minutes pass and he hasn’t come out yet. The minutes feel like hours.

Alice makes herself get up, calmer now but sadder. It hurts her, him hurting like this.

And she added to it. Maybe it is better to think it wasn’t that bad, with Maria. Maybe that’s what he needs.

She presses her fingers against the door, her forehead, hair falling like a curtain around her. “Jasper,” she whispers, voice hoarse like she hasn’t used it. Like she didn’t just throw something he couldn’t handle at him. “Hey—I’m sorry—come back out, okay?”

“Don’t. It’s fine,” he murmurs.

His voice is soft, gentle. Any anger gone now as he’s calmed himself enough.

He made a mistake; it happens.
Alice loves him, and he loves her; they’re mates.
She can’t see the past; she doesn’t know what Maria and him were like.
He’s fine.

He is.

He’s numbed himself enough to be, anyway.

“ - Can I have some clothes?”

“Y-yeah.”

She doesn’t trust the calm with which he speaks. But she trusts him.

Alice grabs an undershirt, some pants, her fingers fiddling with the fabric as she steps back to the door.

“Here,” she murmurs, opening the door fractionally and pushing the clothes through. “If you want a button down, I’ll grab one. Or this one I’m wearing if you want.”

“No, this is enough,” he says when the clothes are passed through to him.

He hasn’t been shy about being naked around Alice and yet walking around in a towel or less seems wrong at the moment, given everything.

He dresses quickly before he opens the door again.

“I’m sorry, I needed to calm down, and your feelings - and mine - I just - needed to.”

He gestures vaguely. Not that she can see it - other than in the way he stands a little straighter, that he no longer shakes, and that he doesn’t look as pained as he had before - but he’s wrapped himself in blanket of calm. She might even feel it, a little, when he takes a step toward her.

“And I’m sorry about getting angry. I shouldn’t have fed on that.”

She's quiet as he moves toward her, feeling as small as she is in stature, nodding at his words, eyes focusing on his hands, shoulders and finally his face.

He feels calmer, in that strange press around him. For some reason, it doesn't seem to reach her though. Instead worry and the tiny flare of panic stay ignited.

"You're allowed. It must be...terribly hard, to say the least. I'm sorry I got angry. It wasn't anything to do with you or your actions."

Alice picks at the button at her cuff. The shirt is a pale yellow, one she bought because it made her think of his hair and how his face lights up when he smiles or laughs. She'd do anything to make him smile right now.

"Go rest," she urges, softly. "I'm going to just tidy up the bathroom--pick out a book if you want. I found some happy ones last stop. There's poetry too, if you're wantin' a more...lyrical set."

She smiles at him, small and quick, but it's there and real enough.

Jasper hesitates.

He can feel her worry and the panic in her still, for all his calm.

He should let her go, with the hold on his feelings so tenuous still where one touch could easily unravel him, but he wants her with him more.

“Come lie with me?”

He reaches out for her, a hand offered.

There is no hesitation in her hand sliding into his, though she glances over at the bathroom and its vague disarray of towels and still-full tub, water tinged vaguely pink.

“Of course,” Alice whispers, threading her fingers through his and moving with him to the bed. She presses kisses against his knuckles before letting his hand drop so she can pull the sheets down, fluff pillows and slip in. “Come here.”

Edited 2020-08-19 04:06 (UTC)

Jasper immediately climbs in after her, to curl up beside her, tucking himself under her arms.

He must look funny, making himself as small as he can, as small as he feels, to fit in her arms. He doesn’t care. He rests his head against her chest, eyes closed.

His unnatural calm bleeds from him, into her, blanketing them both in it. It wavers, though. As he says again, “I’m sorry.”

Because he is. More than the simple word can convey.

The calm settles on her shoulders and part of her brain demands she fight it—to cast off this unnatural feeling.

But Jasper is safe, in her arms, tucked into her side like they’ve suddenly switched heights. So maybe the calm is warranted.

She doesn’t tell him not to be sorry. Not to apologize. Sometimes you need to say the words. Maybe he needs to say them.

“I love you,” Alice says instead, turning her head to kiss into his hair. “It’s going to be okay.”

She’s too gentle with him. More than he deserves right now, or so he feels.

He hides his face from her but he can’t hide the shaking that starts when the calm slips, nor the soft sounds of distress that he tries to muffles as he quietly sobs against her without tears.

Her fingers tighten around his shoulder, her heart breaking at the sound.

Alice presses her cheek against his hair, her lip trembling. “My love,” she whispers, her voice shaking. “It’s okay, I promise. Jasper—just let it out okay?”

Jasper has always avoided crying. He doesn’t like feeling so exposed. He’s better at being numb. He can still operate at numb. This is weak, too vulnerable. What does it do anyway? Crying won’t take back any of what has been done or said.

And yet, he feels so safe in Alice’s arms, her soft words in his ears, and he can’t stop. His arms tighten around her and he continues to sob against her, helpless.

He keeps apologizing too, the words gasped in between gulps of unneeded breaths. He has so much he’s sorry for, that he feels he needs to apologize for again. From the killing, to her ruined dress, to pushing away from her and defending Maria, to now crying helplessly, and more. The list just pours out of him, hurried and muffled, overlapped by more apologies.

Alice hates this. Hates that he’s hurting. Hates that she can’t fix it magically, somehow.

She strokes his hair, fingers combing through the curls, listening to his sobbed words, apologies, worries about things she wishes he wouldn’t cry over.

“Jasper,” she whispers, her lips disturbing his hair. “You are the best thing to ever happen to me.”

Just a reminder. Of how much he means to her.

Closing her eyes, Alice snuggles closer to him, pressing kisses against his forehead.

Jasper wants to be the best thing that’s ever happened to her. He doesn’t feel like it right now.

But, he draws on the love he feels from her. It helps to calm the crying, to stop him from apologizing for everything he’s done or said since they’ve met. Even the good stuff.

(Which is stupid, because he’s loved every minute with her, good or bad. Because - )

“I love you,” he manages once he’s calmed down enough, snuggling into her embrace instead of sobbing into it.

“And I love you,” Alice says, so softly it’s barely there. “So much—I didn’t know I could feel this way. I mean, I knew but to actually feel it, be a part of it with you.”

She sighs, shaking her head a little. “I promise it will be okay.”

“I worry you don’t know me,” Jasper whispers, fiddling with the buttons on the shirt, as he stays as closely pressed to her as he can. “But then I feel you know me better than I know myself.”

He’s not sure if he makes sense; it sounds like nonsense to him. How he can worry so much about not being understood and yet feel so understood at the same time by her.

“We have forever to truly know one another,” Alice covers his fingers at the buttons with her own. “Life is about discoveries and working through things together.”

Her fingers fiddle with his. “What I don’t know yet, I will learn as you teach me. And what you don’t know about me, I’ll show you. I know this happened fast—us—but it’s because it’s meant to be and we are meant to take this life on together.”

Another kiss is dropped on his head. “Just let me come along for the ride, okay? I’m here—no matter what.”

Jasper nods, and he takes her hand in his, kissing her fingers.

He feels the certainty of them as surely as she says it. Meant to be. More than: He can’t imagine not being with her now.

He stays another apology, for not thinking clearly. For getting so overwhelmed.

“I want that,” he just assures her in a murmur. “Working and learning together. I do.”

“Then you’ll have it.” Alice runs her fingertip over his lip. “We may stumble and we may make mistakes—there will be times when we hurt each other’s feelings but...it’s always going to be okay.

She cups his face, turning his head so he’s looking at her. “It will always be okay, in the end. Because we love each other.”

Jasper hates the idea of hurting her at all. That he already has with some of the things he’d said today. How he’d shied away from her.

And he can believe her when she says they’ll be okay. He still feels her love for him, even now.

He sits up to kiss her gently.

“I do love you.”

"I know," Alice smiles softly, her thumbs stroking his cheeks, forehead coming to press against his. "And I do love you."

She looks over at the stack of books on the bedside table, nodding her head over to them. "Shall I read to us? I hear Alice in Wonderland is a must-read for anyone named Alice, after all."

Jasper’s still embarrassed about earlier with the way he’d reacted when Alice first offered to read to him. He might be for awhile still, despite any assurances he needn’t be.

He just tries not to squirm with it now and simply reaches across to the nightstand. (He has the longer arms, after all.) He grabs the Alice one from the stack and hands it to her.

“Please,” he murmurs as he settles with his head on her chest again. And, quieter still, again and always: “I love you.”

“I love you, too, my wonderful, amazing Jasper.”

She holds no upset at him, even with the way they both reacted the last time she offered to read.

No, that malice is held for Maria.

Clearing her throat, Alice reaches for the book, looking at the woodcut cover depicting a tiny Alice in Wonderland. She runs her fingers over it, smiling a little before shifting to get comfortable, Jasper settled next to her.

“All in the Golden afternoon,
Full leisurely we glide;
For both our oars, with little skill,
By little arms were plied,
While little hands make vain pretense
Our wanderings to guide...”

1948,

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject