Breathe
by Maia

The door was locked and all escape routes cut off in the dark alley. Breathing harshly, he frantically searched for footholds to scale the wall. Trying, his hand slipped, once and again, the rough surface ripping through skin in a grating abrasion, the darkness alerted him that he was not alone. He turned to face the unthinkable. Fear moved over his face as dread was chased away when the first searing rips of his flesh began, his screams echoing. He was alone—no one came to his rescue. There was no one.

Ric made a sound of disgust in his throat. “That’s what you get for venturing out alone. First rule of zombie movies, don’t go in a dead-end alley.” Ric turned off the television in boredom tossing the remote on the hotel end table.

Without the light of the TV, the room was dark except for the lighted patterns filtering across the ceiling from the crack in the drapes. Ric drank his whiskey slowly from the plastic hotel glass, the ice long ago melted making the gut ripping liquid a bit mellow for consumption.

That wasn’t what he wanted. It should burn like acid down his throat and hit his stomach like a burning lump of coal. Figures, he couldn’t have that either, and somehow drinking from a four ounce plastic cup was befitting.

A cold hotel room with generic furniture, a smell that reminded him of every other hotel in the world, and plastic cup for convenience, except—this wasn’t convenient. It was six steps back from where he wanted to be. It was miles from who he wanted to be with.

Sighing, Ric sat the cup on the table fluffing the pillow to settle into sleep. His mind was too active to work through the noise of living to a rest. Sleep, an elusive thing; a friend he desperately needed now that he was without a lick of human companionship, and yet it remained unattainable. If he could sleep, he could shut it off, stop thinking, and maybe rest just for a moment.

Sighing heavily he watched the ceiling. The clock ticked counting down the time. Turning, he hit the pillow trying to make it comfortable. Flopping to the side, his arm reached out for…

Ric was out of the bed that quick. Pacing the room, he stopped to pull on a pair of jeans leaving them unfastened as he skipped the depressing plastic glass and took the half empty bottle of whiskey.

Breathe.

Breathe through it.

He took a drink from the bottle. Closing his eyes, he wished he was drunk, but he wasn’t. This wasn’t even cutting through the edge. There it was still; deep inside, the cold hard lump that was he. It always came back to this. There was a core of ice so deep that nothing ever seemed to melt it—at least, not once that warming influence was taken away. Alexis, how you turned my world, you precious thing, you starve and near exhaust me.

Ric laughed bitterly staring at the bottle. He couldn’t even get drunk. He failed at that too. You would’ve thought in this one task, he could at least find a competence. Hell burned, but it was not from heat, but from bitter cold.

Everything I've done, I've done for you.

I move the stars for no one.

Staring out the window, his eyes went in the direction of Alexis’s apartment. Was she awake looking this way, unable to sleep alone? Ric put his forearm against the cold window leaning into the glass his other hand dropping to his side, holding the bottle as his forehead laid against his arm.

You've run so long; you've run so far.

Ric closed his eyes as her arms came around his waist, her hands moving up his bare chest one hand stopping on his heart while the other went to upward to wrap around the top of his shoulder, as her body came into his back tight.

Your eyes can be so cruel.

Ric moaned as her mouth moved along his shoulder. His tongue coming out to lick his lip as she sucked on the corded muscles of his neck, her breath was hot on his skin. The silky movement of her tongue rasped against him, tasting him. Exhaling deeply, he could smell her on his skin. Her mouth found his ear, and without a coherent word, she made a sound in her throat that he immediately responded to, the sound welling up from deep in his own throat.

She gave a soft laugh, as her hand dropped moving seductively and slowly down his front. Ric opened his eyes, to turn his head, to look behind his back meeting her darkened brown eyes. Licking his dry lips, he leaned in, his lips just touching hers as they shared breath, and he could breathe her inside.

Just as I can be so cruel.

Moving his hand upward, he grasped her head under her hair pulling her into him tightly as his mouth found hers in a deep open mouth sucking kiss, and when she would’ve pulled away, he tightened his grip keeping her trapped inside, refusing to release the only warmth he felt in days. Groaning, he increased the pressure of his mouth of hers, drinking deeply.

Releasing her suddenly, his eyes met hers, and there was a well of pain between them, as he gasped. The pain in her eyes, the betrayal, and the loneliness, it was all he could see. It haunted him.

Though, I do believe in you.

Ric rested his head against hers, his voice whispering that he was sorry over and over again, as her hands moved over his flesh, touching him, warming him to living.

Yes I do.

Ric opened his eyes, his head slowly lifting as he stared at his own reflection in the glass of the window, his dream breaking as the half bottle of whiskey hit the floor as it loosened from his grip. His own eyes echoing the pain and loneliness he saw in hers.

Closing his eyes, he shook his head to clear it of the illusion. His one hand moved over his face rubbing hard as the shaking hand moved down his own front in the path that hers had taken. Alexis.

Live without the sunlight.

Staring across the city, he could almost taste her, smell her, and there was an echoing sound of her in his ears as a loud sound of rushing blood banged against the temporal bone, leaving a thundering beat.

Love without your heartbeat.

Ric stood, his jaw firming as he stepped over the spilt liquor, his hands reaching for his jacket, forgetting his shirt. He barely stopped long enough to grab a pair of running shoes and his keys. This was stupid.

I, I can't live within you.

When he got there, he laid on the buzzer, refusing to let up. He would wake the baby if she didn’t hurry. One hand held the doorjamb opposite the buzzer, holding him upright.

Alexis pulled the door open, her hair in disarray as she stared at him in disbelief, taking in his shirtless front under the open jacket and his unshaved face.

Ric didn’t give her a chance to ask. Entering the apartment, he kicked the door close as his hand went up her neck to curve under her hair, his arm pulling her into him, his mouth taking hers in a deep kiss. Giving her no room to protest, he pulled her into his body, aligning them together in a perfect mesh, her softer body yielding to his harder one.

Breathe.

Breathe through it.

Moaning into her mouth, he made a sound of sorrow, and slowly his hips pushed hers to move, in a swaying dancing motion further into the room. His hands moved over her body registering that she was only wearing a thin shirt, long on her thighs.

It was his.

“You’re wearing my shirt,” he said thickly.

“Hmm.” Alexis breathed into his neck, her mouth open as she scraped her teeth along his skin, her hands already pushing his jacket off his shoulders as he dropped his keys, the clanging noise of them hitting the floor not even registering.

His eyes were dark and dangerous, lacking any mercy, as he bit her bottom lip, pulling it between his teeth. “I might want it back.”

“Fine.” Alexis let it drop as Ric’s eyes followed it to the floor, his eyes making the return journey slowly. “Why?” she asked needing to know why he came back.

“I can’t sleep without you,” he confessed.

The back of Alexis’s legs hit the sofa. “Are we sleeping?” she asked as her hand went behind her to direct her fall, her other hand curled around his neck, pulling him with her.

“Not likely.” Ric said as he followed her down his breath sighing as it filled his lungs, and something deep and cold thawed.