Damon's P.O.V
I plead, voice heavy with need as I grip the frames to keep from going any closer. "Tell me how to fix it, t-tell me how to fix it and I will."
"Damon, I don't w-want to be someone's secret." She replies through gentle sniffs as she rubs at her eyes. "I can't d-do that to myself again."
"You're not a secret." I protest but she only shakes her head.
"I am." She says sadly. "W-When someone you knew saw us, you p-pulled away."
I shouldn't have pulled away.
I close my eyes. Wishing and wanting the perfect words to show her that'd it'd just been a moment too much. A moment of panic and fear that'd made me release her. A single moment where my old life met my new one in a brutal collision, leaving me to pick between the two. Switching back to the person I'd been before Will left me scared with the new one, the lines becoming blurred and I let go.
"I-I was surprised." I try but it only seems to make her retreat further into herself. "I just panicked for a single second Will, I'm not ashamed of you or us. I-I'm not, I promise. I j-just got scared for a second."
She nods slowly, swallowing around the lump in her throat as she digs her fingers into her arm. Tears still falling as she looked at me, eyes pleading behind their barricade to be freed but also too distant to reach right now.
"So then I think the time apart will be good for both of us." She whispers, eyes darting away the minute the words were spoken.
"I don't need time apart, I need you." I press desperately making her grip on herself tighten. "I need you, Will."
"And I needed you, Damon." She replies with her first sob, the sound tearing a hole straight through me. "I n-needed you and y-you weren't there. Y-You said you would be, promised to stay with me and you didn't."
Scorching misery flickers to life at her words, growing and conquering until it's flame take me whole with a different, foreign type of suffering that shows no mercy in its administrations. Bleached images of Will in the same state as the one I'd found her in the first night we met making guilt ripple through me until it was drowning me under it.
"I-I know you had to deal w-with your family and I hope they're okay, but I o-only have me, Damon." She confesses voice strained as she reaches for the door. "I h-have to take care of me because no one else will."
I will! I'll be there.
The words don't come out because I knew they'd fall on deaf ears, I hadn't been there when she needed me today, why would she believe me now.
"W-Wait," I say desperately, putting a hand in front of the door before she can close it. I try to breathe, try to keep my voice steady to hide the pure terror clawing through me as she leaves the distance between us uncrossed. "Just wait a second Will. I'm sorry I let you down and I'm sorry I didn't stay with you, I'm sorry. Please just, let me fix this, I'll fix this... I-I need you, I can't do this without you, Will."
Please don't shut me out.
"We need time apart Damon." She sobs gently before pressing the door forwards against me. "I-I need t-to be away from you because I don't think about m-myself when you're here. I t-think about you, a-all I think about is you."
I loosen my pressure against the door, her words portraying a burdened state having me around created, her plea to be alone unconsciously rejecting everything mates represented. I step away and let her shut the door one me, eyes holding her wet ones until they were hidden behind her new barriers.
The sobs haunt me, her pain casting one larger in force against me knowing I was the cause of it. I push away, locking myself inside my space and crashing to my knees, unable to hide from the sound of my mate's agony. I shake in my place, this new version of guilt making me burn with self-hatred which sparks all the other emotions leaving me adrift in my own expanse of pain.
The need to hurt stronger and louder than ever before, a strained mate bond fueling it to lay waste to everything that had breath and peace while I suffered. The pain of my family, the pack and now Will all gathering to push me into a deep well of torment that makes the anger viscous with the need to escape. I cling to myself when I see Blaze coming towards me, scrambling away from him when everything lurches to hurt him. I sink my talons into my legs, sob as I beg Goddess to make it go away.
But it doesn't, only grows and grows.
Theo - I call through my sobs as I close my eyes, trying to steel myself away before I hurt one of the few things I loved in this world. It hurts.
You can control this Damon - Theo urges desperately as I cry. You are strong enough to control this.
No, I'm not - I sob back, the sound of Will crying only spurring the neverending spiral of dismay. I'm not and Will... oh God, I've lost her, Theo.
You haven't lost her - He assures me despite the hesitance in his own voice. You haven't, she's just hurt.
I can't do this without her Theo - I say shakily, holding myself tight as the anger pulses beneath me with the need to be released. Will...
It's okay Damon, it's okay.
Take over Theo - I beg desperately feeling my control slipping quickly. Please take control.
You're in distress and you know that it can b-
I don't want to hurt anyone, Theo. I don't want to hurt anyone and I will - I say desperately as the shift begins to press against me. I don't want to hurt anymore.
Damon try to f-
T-Take over - I beg not carrying about the dangers of it. Just make the pain go away Theo, please...
Okay - He whispers sadly, letting me fall in the background as he slips forward. It's okay, I've got you, Damon. I'll bare it for you, rest Damon.
Rest.
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