Pieces

His black hair was tucked back behind his right ear, the rest of it fell to frame his face. His brown eyes held the smallest amount of unshed tears, the water held there above dark lashes seemed to make his eyes sparkle more than they already did. Dark brows furrowed over those sienna depths, filled with confusion, pain, but most of all, need. I could hear it in his mind, over and over. “Don’t push me away, please” He was still wearing the suit he had worn earlier in the night, but now the shoes and tie were gone, the dress shirt unbuttoned from his neck. The stark white of the shirt was littered with deep maroon streaks, his blood. The sight made my breath catch in my throat, eyes searching him for signs of injury and finding none. But the blood was real. He was real.
He lifted his eyes to me again, searching my eyes for acceptance. He held his hand out to me, a gesture to me. Each step I took felt like a mile, as if I the space between us equaled the space we wished we could put between us, but it wouldn’t happen. I stretched out my arm, laying my hand in his pal . My breath caught in my throat as his fingers slid around my wrist. He pulled me against him quickly, his head resting against mine as we stood there. His arms wrapped around me tightly. I could hear his thoughts, just as he could hear mine. “Thank you” He spoke without saying a word, I felt him, heard him and held him even tighter then.
The world around us seemed to be falling apart, he.. he was something more, something beyond human as was I. We’d been thrust into a place we’d never asked for, given powers we were still learning, unsure of. That was how I’d met him.
He’d saved me, pulling me from where I stood on that bridge, ready to die for a power I couldn’t control, couldn’t get a handle on. I’d never met him before that moment, but he was instantly there, pulling me down and held me, soothing fears I didn’t understand, promising me that he’d be there. He thought I was beautiful, knew I wanted to end things, my ability to hear the thoughts and feel what others felt. I didn’t know how to stop it, how to control it. Three months we’d spent, talking on the phone, spending hours sitting on a rooftop, watching the city trying to make sense of what was happening and why.
His hands smoothed my hair down as he held me, rocking our bodies back and forth slowly, gently. I couldn’t do anything more than cling to him at that moment, wanting to say so much but there was no need. He could hear my thoughts, feel me the same way. He copied my powers, and those of others like us. He’d been my knight in shining armor, he’d been the answer to my prayers.
“Sometimes it’s nice to hear it from your lips, out loud” he whispered, tilting my chin up to look at him.
I couldn’t help but smile, finding his ability to read my thoughts at times as unnerving as I thought my own were. “Yeah, I guess it is huh?”
He smiled and gave a little nod. “I like the sound of your voice,” his finger slid down my cheek in a soft gesture. It comforted as well as excited. I couldn’t stop myself with the words that came out.
“Probably as much as I like yours”
“You like mine huh?” he asked with a crooked grin, head tilting as he gazed down at me. I nodded with a smile. It was hard to stop the thoughts, hard to stop thinking how I wanted him to kiss me, how I wanted to feel his chest bare under my fingers. I licked my lips as I thought again about kissing him.
“Don’t Kellan, don’t think things like that, because I can’t block you out, I can’t keep you out of my mind” he whispered.
“Who said I wanted to be kept out?” I asked, laying my hand on the side of his face. “I can’t hide, not from you and you’ve thought it before too, we think it all the time.” I could feel him, could see the images in his mind, his thoughts forming images of us, together, naked on his bed, sheets tangled around us as he made love to me. It drew a gasp from me, the image making me warm all over.
He shoved me backward, breaking the contact, shaking his head. “God I can’t…. we shouldn’t….” his words were staggered, fighting his own thoughts, his own desires and needs. I reached for him again.
“We can Peter. We have the right to be happy”
“And if I hurt you? What then?” he snapped, turning to face me, brows drawn together. He wasn’t angry at me, he was angry at himself, for his lack of control.
“You won’t hurt me,” I whispered, I knew his power, knew his potential. I knew my own. I wasn’t afraid, of him, of dying. I was afraid of losing him.
“How can you be sure.. what if… I can’t control it?”
“You’re afraid you can’t hold onto me” I replied softly. It was his fear, that he’d lose me, that I would leave him, or he’d lose me by some strange twist of fate.
“Stop it Kel, just stop, get out of my head!” he yelled. I stared at him, suddenly feeling cold. I closed my eyes and closed him off, shut him out of my mind as best I could leaving a coldness deep inside me that burned.
I turned and began to walk away from him, leaving him standing in that empty room, feeling much the same way. It always ended the same way, him pushing me away and me leaving, until we would run into each other once more, the attraction, the chemistry begging to be explored and always left unfulfilled and I had a feeling that would never change. He'd shatter my heart into a million pieces and I let him, because he was the only one who could put it back together. I let him because at least I had those moments, however fleeting.
I loved Peter but it would never be more than a dream.