Chapter Text
The pain tore through your heart again. It was pointless to keep up the fight. Everything hurt. It was just pain, this misery called life. It was nothing but hurt and suffering eked out in blood, at the expense of soul. There was no light that did not fade, that was not snuffed out. Over and over your phoenix of a soul tried to take flight only for reality to smash you back down. You were spent, tired and sore. You had been on empty before this latest hit, leaving you in such a deficit of hope that the sticky dark was pulling you down, was winning.
You looked at the bathroom door and turned away. Too quick. You wanted long, you wanted painful. Death should not be the first easy thing to enter your life. You wanted the blood and hurt to finally fade it all away. You wanted the last battle to be fought and leave evidence of what might be called a victory. A victory carved out of your flesh when it felt like nothing else would take. Dying would be your final defeat and only victory all in one.
The tears raining down your cheeks, dripped to your hands, were wrong. They were clear. What fool made something so totally full, so completely empty of color? Inky black should have been pouring from your eyes as your very soul rended. It should have been red as your heart’s failing beat. That it was clear was a crime.
You pulled open a drawer in the kitchen, sourcing the item needed for such a task. Sharp but serrated. It would work well but hurt all the more. Perfect. There was no point to staining the tub, no logic to getting nude. You climbed to the sanctuary of your bed, nest of bedding collected to help save the floor from your final act.
The blade was at the flutter of your pulse visible at your wrist, soft skin unable to totally hide this vulnerability from the world. You were about to press down, rich paint of red coming to finally reveal to the world your hurt, when your phone rang. You looked at it. Watched the screen of your cell light up with a number you did not recognize. Your voicemail took the call and no message was left. You felt the stab of disappointment in your chest. Not even the universe wanted to save you one second more with the curiosity of an unknown caller’s message.
You returned to your task, blade once more set to the spot needed to cut you free of this hurt. Your phone rang again, the same number. Before your voicemail could pick up it ended, just to start ringing again. You glared at the interruption. You were not in the mood for some wrong number or scammer call. The relentless noise was too distracting though. So you answered.
“What?” You could not even play at a polite hello. Your drowning in sadness was belied by your irritation.
“Please don’t.” The masculine tone on the other end sounded as sad as you felt.
“The hell are you saying?” You had frustrated tears erupting anew. It hurt too much having this stranger speak to a wish they could not possibly be answering.
“Please. I don’t know what I’d do if you died. Please. Don’t.” He got quieter as he spoke, voice cracking with his final plea.
“Who... How...?” You could not even fully understand what you were asking.
“We’ve never met. I don’t... shit. Telling you might only make this worse. Please. Don’t kill yourself. I... shit... I think I love you. Please. Don’t go.”
The urgency of his words punched you in the heart. You could not hurt someone that spoke with such conviction. Someone that could sound so sincere and had called you to stop you. You could not understand what was happening, too deep in the darkness of your own private apocalypse to remember that the rest of the world still even existed.
“Who are you?” You tried again to get some handle on what was going on.
“Levi. I’m Levi. I’ve been watching you for years. You... you are online.” He paused a long moment as you kept yourself still, consciously kept from looking for cameras you had never noticed.
“I thought it was all a show at first. I wanted to believe that. The way you seemed to never look yet... I guess I liked the idea that I wasn’t actually doing what the site said I was doing. Like how a porno has them saying no but the reality is it’s just acting. No one is being forced. No one is being hurt. It’s all okay, it’s fiction. No more real than dragons and unicorns. I wanted it to be that you just didn’t want to interact with us, but wanted to let us watch you. Care about you. Fall in love with you.”
He stopped talking. You were shaking, so totally scared that you had no clue what to think. You had forgotten how to think. Your feelings were too loud to navigate, to jumbled to be sorted. You could not understand anything but one thought got through, one truth that you had total confidence in. This person did not want you to die. You had not met him, never once before this shared so much as a smile while passing on the street. Yet here he was, pleading with you, begging you to keep living.
“I figured it out eventually. I’m scum. I know. I watched. I didn’t alert the proper authorities. Didn’t tell you. I... I kept you because I... I don’t have anyone else.” He sounded so hollow. You could not help but empathize with him. You were so utterly empty yourself.
“I’m alone Levi. I can’t face this alone.” You whispered your needs to the stranger that had been watching you without your knowing, like it was even close to a good idea. Nothing about this was a good idea, but the alternative was too absolute for you to not grab at this flicker of hope. He said he loved you. Maybe that was true enough.
“You aren’t alone. I’m right here. I’ll... I can come to you. If you want. I’m not far.” He sounded as cautious as you should have felt. You did not feel cautious though. You felt reckless. You had been seconds away from giving up. This light at the end of the tunnel might have been hellfire, but you had to go look, to see for yourself.
“Levi, I need your help. Please. Could you-“ he did not let you finish.
“I’m on my way. I’m not hanging up, but I’m headed out the door. You stay with me.”
You could hear the sound of the call going outside then getting muffled again. You listened to the drone of the silence on the line. You waited patiently for another word from him. He was a ragged breath followed by empty air. You just listened, ear pressed as hard as you could to the earpiece of your phone. You leaned into the hum of the active line. Until it disconnected.
Your heart hammered, you looked at the dark screen of your phone, momentarily forgetting that it worked as a two way device. You were so suddenly untethered to his security by the line dropping, your mind stalled out. It was a vast dark ocean you had been set adrift on. It was only a spark of panic, not yet the full storm when the number reappeared on the screen. You did not even let the ringtone start before accepting the call.
“Tch, fucking cell towers. Burner cells are crap. Just in case you were curious. All of them. Crap.” He sounded calmer than when you had first started the call. “You want me to knock or just tell you when I’m there? I... if you don’t want me to come in, I understand.”
“Don’t knock. I’ll jump out of my skin and you’ll have to help me climb back in. Never fits quite right after that. Tell me you’re here and I’ll let you in.”
You had every manner of alarm going off in your head. This was a total stranger that had opened with he was watching you, unbeknownst to you, online. You had no reason to think he was anything but some disgusting pervert that you were going to allow into your home. You should have hung up, called the cops, and sat on the front step until the police showed up to make you safe.
“So what do you do for a living?” You tried for a conversation that might be harmless enough.
“Not sure you’ll believe me. I’ll prove it once I’m there. I’ll show you. I’m a cop. A detective. I... shit. I’m not going to hurt you. I promise. I know you have no reason to believe me, but I won’t hurt you.”
“Levi?”
“Yes, (F/N)?”
“I believe you. You can’t lie to me right now. I can’t deal with it if you do. I can’t seem to care if the truth should horrify me but if you lie... it’ll hurt me so badly I don’t know how to recover.” You warned him as best you could of the mercurial swings that your struggling self might make.
“Hard truths are better than candied lies. Got it. I can do that.” His tone was once more empty sounding. It was oddly comforting.
“You said you were watching me. Is it a paid service?” You frowned as the idea of the cameras came back into your mind.
“Yes. You aren’t cheap either. Fucking expensive in fact.” He had a hint of a growl in his voice. “You really aren’t seeing a penny of it are you? Fucker. I’m helping you find this pig and getting you what you deserve. You have me now.”
“I... yes please. I am not even sure how to feel about this.” You were caught between the gratitude of Levi coming to save you and the confusion of it being him that brought the threat to light.
“I’ll make it up to you. This... fucked up introduction. I’ll show you I’m not some nut job.” His confidence faltered at the end, almost like he knew there was no way to disprove that he was, in fact, a nut job.
You were silent for a long couple of minutes, Levi muttering obscenities under his breath at traffic lights but not speaking to you directly. You were putting together a few things about this man, even before you had seen him. Firstly, he was a total potty mouth. Second he felt deeply even if he was trying to hide it behind bland tones. Thirdly, he lived close enough to you that you probably should have been afraid. And finally, you were, probably foolishly, not the slightest bit afraid of him.
You heard the wind on his end of the line. It was the thunk of the car door that started you heart hammering. Common sense kicked in and you had the reality of the situation register. A total stranger was walking from his parked car to your apartment.
“I’m here. At your door. You can let me in, if you want. I have my badge. I can show you, if that’ll help. Or I can sit out here. My coat is warm enough. I’ll talk to you through the door. Just sit here with you. Long as you need.”
You went to the door, looking out the peep hole. You saw the back of his head, onyx hair done in an undercut, black leather coat lighter from the contrast. He was holding a phone to his ear. He had on black jeans and heavy boots. Had you seen him at the end of a dark alley it would have made you panic, even if the view through the peep hole also told you he was rather short.
“I thought you’d be taller.” You spoke more through the door than into your phone.
You watched the man hang up his phone. He turned slowly, your mind using the extra time to process everything you were seeing. Initially your eye was drawn to the shine of the badge at his hip, but his eyes quickly stole your attention. Those irises were cold as winter skies. They were grey and ice and empty of any affection you might have expected to see. He was strikingly attractive for what might have been your impending doom. He was in all black, just as you would imagine the grim reaper. The button up and tie he wore finished off his dark assassin chic to a T. His china pale skin looked all the lighter under your porch light. There was a faint pink to his edges, but it seemed even the cold could not dramatically move this man.
“Tch. You are seriously going to have our first introduction be a conversation about my height?” His tone was as nonplused as his expression.
“We could discuss how you look like a serial killer instead.” You offered the subject brightly but your heart was actually thundering in your ears.
He paused a moment. A slow blink later and he looked directly at the peep hole. “I should have had better nutrition in my youth. Grew up poor, you see. Must have stunted my growth. My uncle is nearly a foot taller than me so I doubt it's genetic.”
You had to cover your mouth to keep in the macabre giggle. He had just jumped in on the lesser evil of the two options you had offered him. You could hardly hang on to your leeriness. “I hope you are eating better now.”
He took a step closer to the door, head tilting a little as he chewed his tongue. “I’m trying to get better about it. I eat takeout too much. No one around to take care of me. End up asking strangers to do it. Guess I shouldn’t be surprised that it doesn’t always work out.” He was frowning a little deeper. “You can tell me to leave. I will.”
He was resting his hand on your door. You looked at the door like you expected it to melt away under his touch. You wanted the divide to vanish as much as you needed it to stay. If you opened the door you were going to hug him. It was that simple. You were so messed up that you were going to grab a total stranger that had watched you for years and driven to your home, without you granting any information as to the location of it, into a tight and needy hug. Just to have something alive under your palms.
“Don’t go.” You swallowed. “I want to open the door but....” You knew there were so many reasons not to. You did not know him. You had been crying and were every sort of disheveled. You were in pajamas that were not really appropriate for company. You wanted to cling to him so tightly it would break his bones. So many reasons to keep that door safely closed.
“You can open the door whenever you want. Or never. I’m not going anywhere until you ask me to.” That stoic mask and dry tone left his eyes as the only thing to give you a hint about his feelings. You would have sworn you saw a flicker of blue, of passion, of fire in those eyes.
You could only hope he would forgive you. You turned the bolt and opened the door.