Bent

I've been sat in the darkness for so long. Just waiting. It used to be a comfort, the darkness used to keep out the world I hated, hide everything I despised so I could pretend, that just for a second, everything was alright. But I know I can't pretend anymore. I'm so tired; I feel so damned drained and ill. And that's cos I'm running like a child to the darkness, trying to pretend Zoe's not so desperate for reassurance, that she's not my problem. Trying to make like there is no problem, like Sharon isn't looking at me in that way every time I slide so hesitantly into a room where she is waiting. 

Because she is. Because unlike me, Sharon's not afraid. She says she's past that and she knows what she wants. She wants me. She wants us, and I'm... I'm scared. Cos suddenly, everything in the world I'm trying so hard to understand don't make sense anymore. I wish I knew what I wanted... I wish I could pretend I didn't know. I'm with Zoe, I chose to be with Zoe and she's... she's great. But she ain't Sharon, she's never gonna be Sharon and that is why I'm here, just... waiting.

My hands are shaking, I can barely keep my cigarette steady between my lips as I take a much needed toke, my shivering breath pulling in the poisons like they are to be my last solace.

I flinch as I hear the door slam shut, I convulse almost, my every muscle uncomfortable and strained. Because somewhere, somehow I know that it's her. She's here. Sharon's home. And her heavy sigh beats the creation of my own, making me wince empathetically. I wish I knew how to remain quiet and still and unnoticed in the darkness, I wish I knew how to save her from the confusion, the wreck that I am, the every conflicting feeling I represent. 

But as I quash the smouldering remains of my cigarette in the bulky and laden ashtray, hunching forward across the leather of the settee to make sure the flickering embers really do die away, I can't deny that to turn away from her, after everything she's strived to show me, is the last thing she wants. And it's the last thing I want too.

And if I fall along the way 
Pick me up and dust me off
And if I get too tired to make it
Be my breath so I can walk.

I shift uneasily from the shadows, blinking furiously against the intrusion of the light. Give me back the darkness, make it make sense!

Sharon is slumped against the door, drumming her fingertips anxiously across the cushion of her lip. Her eyes dart expectantly as I press my weight unintentionally into the floorboard next to the radiator. She sees me, and worse, she knows why she sees me. I shouldn't blame her, it was my choice to come back here, to wait for this moment. I got up, I was the one to move across the room, out into the hall to meet her. But she knew I would. And I resent her for that; for knowing my strengths, for knowing she is my weakness.

And yet, maybe she held faith in my strength I never deserved. Because as she whispers my name, a note of surprise is there.

"Dennis..."

Inwardly, I'm pleading with myself not to go forward. To save myself the pain that beats anyway, to save her from... how this will hurt her. But I need her too much to step away. And it appears that my compromise is to stand there, shifting my weight uncomfortably, forward, back... forward, back, entirely unable to draw my eyes away from her hopeful face. 

Her lips flicker, and this breath escapes her as she dares to smile, dares to believe in why I can't help but move closer as I return it, a smile so insincere, a smile so uncertain. But there's nothing I can do, barely one disbelieving breath to our distance now. 

"Oh..." she says gently, stretching up, sliding her arms around my neck to draw me safe against her shoulder, quivering in her arms. "...c'mere."

And if I need some other love, then
Give me more than I can stand.

Her soft lips brushing my ear as I hold her so fiercely, feeling tears of relief burn that I will not let her feel upon her skin, she whispers warmly; "It's OK. You're here with me now..."

And when my smile gets old and faded
Wait around... I'll smile again!

I rock her, so gently before I feel her slip back onto the balls of her feet, her embrace lessening, my comfort gone. She smiles contently at me, and then she edges her way past. And to me, that's not right. That's not how I ever hoped or even imagined it would be. So I lurch for her hand as she presses into me, pulling her back, needing her to realise that I just... I can't let her go. Not yet. Not ever.

But I can't use my voice to make her see. It's like my ability to manipulate simple words for delivery has died in my throat. It's all I can do to pull on her hand. Her gaze drops to our entwined hands, travelling cautiously back up to my face. And somehow, I've never quite known how, she has read me. My begging words are ready on my lips. But I don't need to speak, because Sharon... she knows. That has been the problem for a long time. She knows it all... I've never dared to let another soul as close as she has been.

Her shimmering lips curve upwards as she takes me back into the safety of her arms, idly caressing the nape of my neck.

Shouldn't be so complicated
Just hold me and then,
Oh, just hold me again!
Can you help me; I'm bent.
I'm so scared that I'll never
Get put back together.

"It's OK." she whispers again, so gently I barely dare to hear her reassurance. Because as I hold her, she too has begun to tremor. "It is."

Maybe she's not so strong after all. She's just as frightened as me. She's just as scared to feel but I need her to dare. If she won't, then I can't be made to understand these crazy feelings, just as much as I can't make them go away. If I could, I would have done, so long ago. I'd have forgotten every breath I'd drawn in Sharon's presence and I'd have learnt to look at Zoe the way I can't help but look at her. I would have done. 

But still I would have been hiding, and Sharon would have been the only one to know it. And however frightened she might have been, I know that she has the determination to turn the world, our world on its head and had she still wanted to, she would have found the way to bring me out of myself. She'd still have led me back here, to her, as she tremored in my arms, me in hers. 

Keep breaking me in,
And this is how we will end
With you and me; bent.

I pull back, such a tiny way but she senses the threat of rejection, that crippling sensation that meant I saw the end of more bottles of vodka than I did days, just trying to forget how much I needed her. And just as I was, for so damn long, doubting she would ever want me as I did her, she is so tense. But her shoulders sag, comforted as I gently push her hair back from her shoulder, bowing my head and kissing the base of her neck. Her skin is so deliciously warm and she tastes as sweet as I have always remembered, too mesmerised, and recently... too tortured by every hint of her to forget.

She smiles so gently as I level with her gaze that I wonder if I simply wished it into being, if I imagined it. Because there are still no words between the two of us when we need to say so much. Or is it just me? Sharon's been perfectly clear. But it seems all I have is the need to apologise, and I daren't - because I know how insincere the words would seem to her, perhaps even to my own ears. So I just look dumbly to her and she sighs. I don't know what sort of sigh either... heavy, loaded... but not sad. Content maybe? I mean, I'm here right? And that's what she wanted.

Pressing into my frozen hand with her own, Sharon lets her own warmth sink through to my grateful skin before she turns away, her fingers locked through mine. And there's a ferocity in her hold that makes me believe it. But what am I believing?

The floorboards creak tellingly beneath the two of us as she leads me up the stairs. My fear can only increase. I might be many things, many things you might call Sharon a fool for loving me for despite them, but I'm not an idiot. And I know what this means. Anyone to have looked at her the way I do would know what this means and they'd welcome it. And I want to, I want to so much, aren't I proving that by not pulling back, by moving up with her?

But it seems that as yet, it couldn't matter to Sharon that she's the one person I've wanted most in my entire wasted life. Because we stand on the landing, her glittering eyes dart from door to door, and I can tell she's hoping and praying her unease does not read off in her face, but it does. Sometimes it scares me that I can know someone as well as I know her, every little thing about her. Because we should never have been that way. But I can't be sorry that we were, that we are. I made us happen... one of the few things I know I've ever done right. Just... trust me to make it so damned complicated.

So where is it I find the strength to move forward, guiding her towards my old room, untouched, waiting for the moment I'd admit I belong here... with her.

But she resists me and her look is so damn stern. I want so much to flinch, feeling like I've been scolded but she's all I have right now, so as she leads me by the hand she will not release towards her own room, I follow.

And I'm immediately engulfed in everything that is Sharon, weakened as I willingly drown - for I could turn round and run back to the idea of normal right? But I'd only lose my way, and one of these days, I know I'm gonna lose my mind with it. Because she is everything.

Pulling her hand free of my grasp, she backs up against the door until it clicks, her head tilted back and her eyes closed, like she doesn't want to believe a second of this is happening. And I understand that, somewhere inside, there's the compassion. But fear eclipses it all. In that one flickering moment, it's like Sharon has disappeared. And it hurts so much. So there's the daunting realisation - I am hurting right now just as she has been for so damn long - and at my hands too.

"Sharon?" I murmur nervously. As my palm falls around her forearm, her gaze drops almost frightfully to our connection. And I wonder... is she repulsed?

Apparantly not, but oh, that one fearful moment was enough. she wraps her arms around herself, as if she's cold, pressing her hand over mine as her eyes travel soulfully up to mine.

"Tell me you meant to come here Dennis."

I wince silently and I know it shows on my face. I hate that, I hate that she will hate that. But I can't tell her that. I never meant to come here, I never did. I just found myself here, hiding in the darkness, and I just knew I couldn't leave without... without letting her know...

So Sharon sighs, understanding and of course, hating it. But I hope she knows how much I'm pleading with her to hold strong for me, even if I don't have the words.

"OK..." she says slowly as she considers a new offer. "...then tell me you want to be here."

I tilt my head to the side, feeling my facial muscles scrunch with confusion as I sadly examine this veil of mistrust.

"I thought you understood."

"I'm trying to." she replies shakily, her voice waivering as she bites anxiously down into her thumbnail. "But what if... darlin'... I can't read this wrong, I can't!"

"Then don't." is all I can manage to say, even when I'm so acutely aware there is so much more. But maybe words just can't cut it.

So I step closer, knowing that the only thing to be heard between the two of us is the pounding of my heart. So I'm still breathing... and Sharon? Is she? Her eyes don't move from my face, studying me, questioning me, wondering if she knows me at all. She does, I'll make her see that she does.

Cupping her face, I slowly tilt her head, pressing my lips to hers and it... it's everything I've missed, everything that ever felt right to me. And the way she kisses me back, like it's some starved impulse, I just know that it's the same for her. Isn't that why she wouldn't give up her fight, leave me to my cowardice? Because we matter.
 
And if I couldn't sleep, could you sleep?
Could you paint me better off?

"I admit it OK?"

"What?" she questions, with a whisper of a laugh escaping the corners of her mouth.

"Anything. Everything. I can't make sense of anything without you."

And could you sympathise with my needs?
I know you think I need a lot.

"I noticed."

I humour her clear-cut knowledge with a weak smile she knows holds no sincerity. How can it? How can I expect to be believed when I strived so hard to delude myself, to hurt her for the sake of not remembering what she means to me?

"I just... I wanna make it right..."

I started out clean but I'm jaded
Just phoning it in
Just breaking my skin.

"And what's gonna do that Dennis huh?" 

Carefully, she turns over my palm and lets her fingertip slide over the thin sore lines that tell of how a glass shattered in my hand, as was the force of the every conflicting emotion I just couldn't ignore, however much I tried. I'd sat there, mesmerised by the gushing scarlet trails and I'd realised... I couldn't deny it anymore. Kissing Sharon... needing to so badly I'd thrown her against the wall, and she was willing to take it, just to feel the urgency of my mouth against hers, and I knew, for every second I was trying to forget how perfect that had felt that I could never be so taken by the pain of such wounds in Zoe's name. 

"More of this... more pain... more hurt?"

Can you help me; I'm bent.
I'm so scared that I'll never
Get put back together.

"Maybe." I answer, with such hideous honesty. "But... I wanna make it stop. For both of us."

I raise my eyes, almost guiltily to her perplexed face. Her hair is spilling down, her lips shining so treacherously. She wants to smile, I can tell in the daring flicker. She wants to believe me... she's trying so hard. I've given in and Sharon knows she has to do the same if she means to win at the game she couldn't help but set out to play. But the agony I have yet to take and destroy still beats inside of her. Still she is so tortured. 

"I don't understand.... you were trying so hard... you wanna believe you and Zoe... you don't want this!"

"Do you?"

The question is raised before I can think to stop it. Because right now, I'm just like her. I don't understand. It was in this haze I found my way back to her, too weak to leave, to deny myself the perfectness I know we have together if I'll just... stop hurting her, stop hating myself long enough not to hurt her, to block it all out. She was so adamant I'd find my way back to the protection of her promises, and now... now she's... rejecting me? I mean, it fits, of course it does; it might just be all I deserve, but I know it's not Sharon's style.

And it seems she shares in my vulnerability, tears brimming in her amazing eyes as she lifts her head defiantly and declares;

"So much."

Sharon laughs miserably, such a soft breath of a laugh as I stroke her tears away with my thumbs, pushing back strands of her hair, lying askew against her face. Who knew you could love another person's apprehension, their fear so damn much? It might be wrong of me, but I'm looking at her, and somehow I see everything she learnt to love within me, everything I never wanted to realise was there. And to take someone so completely takes guts. I don't wanna be so afraid anymore. I want to know that Sharon'd be there to wipe my tears away, cos I know so many will fall if I leave her now. I need her. And she needs me. That's everything... I can't let that go. I don't wanna leave her alone, to pretend she's fine without me when any other fool can see she's only holding the broken pieces together.

I want her in all completeness.

Her lips meet mine without hesitation, hands daring to treading the adventurous path across the other, somehow never forgetting a second, wound as close as is possible. Intoxication by release. So much more perfect than I could ever tell. But Sharon is not quite so serene, murmuring against my kiss and finding the will from somewhere inside to pull away.

"Dennis, I won't do this if... if you have one doubt darlin', I want you to go. Now."

"Can't go Sharon." And I wonder if she knows it's a confession, telling of emotional impossibility. "Can't."

"And I won't." she murmurs, peppering the base of my neck with kisses, moving across and letting her shaking hands tumble down to slide under my top and slowly ease it up over my chest. And I swear, just feeling the flesh of her wrist against me, skin on skin after so long, something happens. Something that only she's gonna understand cos I see it register in her face. Lust. "My place is here... if yours isn't then... go home. I'm thirty-five for God's sake, a few more years living a lie ain't gonna make much difference..."

Her words aren't having the impression she wants them to. She's saying them to save herself, I understand that, so implicitly and I respect her for it. But in herself, Sharon's giving them no chance to carry her away from this, because we're still so absorbed in undressing one another.

"You know I'll be here." I tell her steadily, pushing her trousers urgently down over her hips. "You've got me."

Keep breaking me in,
And this is how we will end
With you and me; bent.

"Mmm, but for how long?"

"Forever."

"Oh..." she breathes so lovingly. "I want to believe that darlin', you'll never know how much I... but I'm so scared."

That makes me go rigid, just for that one painful moment. I don't whether it's upset or whether it's understanding. I only hold her closer, my palms burning as they skim over her soft skin, cupping her shoulders as I leave a kiss of reassurance against the right, never over the perfectness of her taste.

"Me too."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

And in some utterly perfect way that makes absolutely no sense, that is all Sharon needs to know. She recognises it for its nervous truth. And maybe it tells that if I stay... then I'm never gonna know how to go.

So, pulling me closer, harder, she sinks back and lets me twist my hip into her to bring her back against the bed... to her bed. And in that moment of realisation, I thank God for that stern look. Because to be here, surrounded by everything that is her means so much more. Sharon always knew I would fall, that I'd crawl so broken back to her, and I can love yet hate that she knew it all in the same breath. But to be here means she's clinging to the defiance that pummelled at my defences til I knew there was nothing to do but return here, whether I'd admit to myself or not. It means she's going to trust in me to make her believe it.

At last finding the will to the will to leave the perfectness of her mouth, I press down into her, taking my kisses on a trail over every inch of her. I can leave nowhere untouched, I need to be assured I have not forgotten a breath of her. If I have... God, I don't know what I'll do. But Sharon seems to recognise what it is I will do, countering the pressure of my form by pushing up into me, inviting the insistence of my lips with a soft moan that builds and builds, making me tingle with refamiliarisation, with satisfaction as she cries out. She rocks against me, entirely wrapped around me, biting down into my shoulder to smother the level of the sound. I would wince, but I don't care for the pain. It's too much of a perfect sensation right now. It makes sense.

Start bending me 
It's never enough
Til I feel all your pieces.

"Mmm... Dennis, please..."

I'm almost reluctant but then... how can I refuse her anything when it's... her? She knows what this is, she knows what it means and she knows where it goes. And somehow, she still wants it. Sharon still wants me.

Start bending me
Keep bending me until I'm completely broken in!

I move up over her, covering her, loving how the sheen of her body mingles so perfectly with mine. But Sharon makes use of this temporary void, slipping her hands between us both, expertly greeting every beat of me her soft caress meets, knowing she makes me burn, that I need her more than words are good for.

"I won't go." I tell her breathlessly. "I won't."

 Registering my words, my suffocating need to drive my reluctance home, she looks right at me with those big shimmering eyes. I shiver involuntarily, so damn sure she's reading my soul, the one part of me I never dared to understand. She just bites expectantly down into her lips, words she never intends to speak shining there. She isn't waiting for me to go... she's only waiting for me to come back.

Tenderly, I raise my palm, lined with the wounds she wishes away and brush across her warm cheek, leaning down and forcing my kiss back upon her willing mouth, imparting her lips to thrust my tongue into her mouth.

Hers comes to me as I move into her, and she kisses me like I've never known. It's pain, it's pleasure, it's the most unbelievable passion and it's... Sharon.

And she writhes slowly, just enough to cause the most delicious friction between the two of us, so close, so tangled, skin still teasing the vulnerability of skin as we make love.

And I can hear in the shallowness, the rapidity of her breaths, the intensity of her every lustful moan that it builds inside of her with the same ferocity it does me. Why did I want to deny myself such opportunities to understand, to prove to her I know what she wants, what it is she needs from every touch? Why was I running from the pride that burns at knowing just this one perfect woman so well? It's the only thing that makes me feel alive, as opposed to living simply to exist, to cause her pain.

But that's not what she wants. She trusts I've returned as a lover... she wants me to cover her, to shield and protect her from the cruelty of the world that has kept us apart. And I... I have spent my life smothered, never knowing myself, like I've been underwater all my life, never knowing what it is to truly breathe. Sharon was the reason I fought so hard for that first breath but if she'll just dare to stay in my arms, then I'll willingly drown with her in our intimacy, escaping everything and everyone just to experience these few perfect minutes, these many incredible breaths.

Crying out again, her fingertips poised on my shoulders, her nails cut in unintentionally, Sharon tilts her head back into the pillow, leaving the slope of her neck merciless against my urgency, my kisses covering her feverish skin, the pulse in her throat pounding excitedly against my lips. And her own involvement in the pursuit of every sensation the two of us can create increases with a hunger that leaves me in no doubt that she is close. And it's in this one incredible moment that I am torn. Because I want so much to hear her, to know I made her feel everything she releases, but...

"Don't stop.... oh God, please don't stop."

Shouldn't be so complicated
Just touch me and then,
Oh, just touch me again!

...but I wanna adhere to her. I never want to stop. I wanna make this last forever because right now, in this haze of longing, everything's right. For the first time in so long, there's no fear, confusion. There's just us... me and Sharon together, so much better than we could ever hope to be alone. And that's why I came back here, there can't be any other reason. Sharon is the one that makes sense of me and wants me in this way despite of what she sees is wrong inside.

Can you help me; I'm bent.
I'm so scared that I'll never
Get put back together.

And as we succumb to the crashing waves that take us both, trembling against the other, I know that I've at last proved to myself I've achieved something. I told Sharon I was here to make it right, and I think I have. She brought me in and she let me try. I'll admit to still being afraid, maybe even uncertain. But I will not go. I will not run. Because I'm not alone anymore. 

I have found warmth in a bed that has been so lonely, holding Sharon, admiring the fever upon her face, the hunger in her eyes as she struggles, somehow in sync to my own erratic pattern to regulate her breathing. She seems almost amused to look at me, lying so close to her, our affected bodies still so tangled, molded around each other just to satisfy the desperation to touch, still burning at the realisation of skin on skin.

"I missed you."

I sigh, caught between happiness and guilt as I scooch into the pillow, so close to her, I barely have to lift my hand from underneath the warmth of the covers to lazily twist strands of her hair around her finger. "I know..." The words I long to speak get caught in my throat for a moment. I'm daunted, because they are so true and it's only now, lying with her in the warmth of her bed that I dare to admit the crippling truth to myself. "I missed you too."

She smiles sadly, wrapping her shivering hand over mine. "Tell me you'll stay... please Dennis..." 

Keep breaking me in,
And this is how we will end

I turn, her long apprehensive breath dancing slowly across my face. And I shake my head gently in disbelief, unlawfully stung at her words. My gaze drifts searchingly over hers, I see that she needs me, in the every way that I need her. She needs to understand. So, pressing fiercely into her hand, I kiss her bunched fingertips. 

"I'm here now."

With you and me landing
With our understanding
And I'll go there again!

The End