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 Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 6:01 pm
Evan was gone. Cambria hadn’t waited too long before going to check on him. She had given maybe twenty minutes and when Zac hadn’t shown up she had knocked.
And then knocked again…and then gone inside.
The absence of Maxim’s small barks or scratches against the door had worried her, and her suspicions were confirmed when she entered the empty room, her spirits sinking quickly.
She hadn’t wanted to rush Zac into coming home…but the situation had gone from bad to worse and now Cambria felt more high strung than she had in…in a long while and with her teeth grit, she sent a quick text to Zac.
‘Evan’s gone. Get home now.’
She hoped he would be able to tell that she was angry. She hoped that he would be able to realize that she was angry at him.
Because she was. This was partially her fault, sure…but she had wanted to tell Evan. She should have done it.
She had been an idiot, and now Evan was suffering for it.
And now Evan was gone.
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 6:07 pm
For nearly fifteen minutes, the message went unread and then, suddenly the notification flashed just a second before a car door slammed from the driveway. It took him seconds to get from the car to the front door and he opened it with more strength than he needed. A bag in his arm indicated he’d gotten off of work and stopped at the store; he’d been on his way home when she texted him and apparently decided that today was a good day to drive safe and not check his phone.
He wished he had.
“What do you mean, ‘gone’?” he asked, before he’d even found Cambria. He was moving to the kitchen, eager to put away the cold food he had just picked up but more eager to figure out what had happened. “What happened, did he say where he was going?”
There were a million questions racing through his head but he had to bite his tongue to keep from asking them.
He needed to give Cambria time to answer; she was the one who knew what had happened and it wasn’t going to do either of them any favors if he didn’t give her time to fill him in.
The faster he knew what was going on, the faster he could go get Evan.
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 6:14 pm
Cambria huffed, and her gaze was hostile…it felt…wrong. Her face wasn’t supposed to be contorted with such rage but…here she was.
“I mean he’s gone. He ran into some Negaverse person who I guess knows you, and who spilled the beans that You used to be Sanidine. He got angry that you and I kept it from him, and he left in the twenty minutes I gave him to cool down. He took Maxim with him, so I don’t know what’s going to happen now. There’s no note, but I’m going to assume that he went to be with Tobias, since that’s the only other place that I know he has, but in the state he was in…”
She shrugged, glaring at him and finally shook her head.
“I told you! I begged you, we should have told him months ago! I don’t know why you were so…why you were such a coward…”
Cambria’s hands were balled into fists. She wanted to hit him. She wanted to just hit Zac with everything that she had in her…she was just…
“God damn it, Zac. This was something that we could have avoided! He heard it from some rando Negaverse officer…how the hell do you think that made him feel? He thinks we just lied to him for the hell of it.”
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 6:21 pm
Zac’s worried expression hardened in response to Cambria’s expression; he seemed like he was ready to jump into being defensive, to pull out the aggressive hostility that usually came whenever he was faced with an accusation. His jaw clenched and he froze where he stood, clutching the bag of groceries.
“He wasn’t ready,” Zac insisted.
“He’s unstable enough as it is, he still has nightmares too regularly. It wasn’t going to help him to know that Sanidine was living in the same house as him, not when he was to blame for all of this.”
It was so easy to pretend like Sanidine was someone else for a second; it was a name, an identity, that Zac didn’t have recollection of. He knew about him, and he identified with him, but without all the memories it felt like he knew someone else’s history. He knew it was his own, and it had always been easiest just to bury it and pretend like it was someone else responsible.
…And yet, he was still trying to atone for things.
Even if he didn’t remember what he did, he knew it was him. He just didn’t like to admit it.
“So don’t call me a coward, we had a good reason. He’s only started to get better recently. I didn’t want to ruin that for him. Evan’s not stupid, he’s just emotional. He’ll understand.”
His jaw clenched and he tried to keep his breathing even; he was tense and racking his mind for anywhere Evan would go. With the dog, Tobias’ place was the best bet.
He would go get him, bring him back, force him to listen.
Everything would be okay.
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 6:30 pm
Cambria shook her head, gritting her teeth and finally let out a half scream of frustration, crossing over to Zac and shoving him backwards. “That wasn’t your decision to make, Zac McKinney. It wasn’t mine either. I shouldn’t have kept listening to you. He might not have been ready, but he damn well deserved to hear the truth from one of us rather than a stranger. He deserved to know as much as Malcolm deserved to know, and Malcolm knows the truth. He forgave you, didn’t he? Even after you almost killed him!”
She shoved at him again and shook her head, breathing heavily. “I understood in the beginning, but Zac, he’s a ******** senshi. We should have told him when he awakened. He’s not helpless. He hasn’t been helpless for a long, long time, and damnit, what if he doesn’t want to come home? What if he just thinks we’re putting up with him, what if he thinks you’re only doing it out of guilt for what you did? This could have all been prevented—this is so <********> stupid, and you had better go and fix this. Because he doesn’t want to talk to me.”
Cambria’s voice broke on the last word and she swallowed hard, blinking back the sudden onslaught of tears. “He’s…I’ve always been his safe harbor, and now he doesn’t want anything to do with me…”
And it’s all your ******** fault.
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 6:47 pm
Zac was a strong man, but Cambria’s shove was enough to send him back a half step. He kept a strangely stoic face, but it was clear that something had soured in his mind. He wasn’t good at holding his thoughts, and when met with a conflict it was his instinct to lash out with violence.
He hadn’t hit anyone in a long time, this wasn’t like a high school fight. His hand clenched at his side but he didn’t respond with physical violence.
Not after the first shove, not after the second.
“So ******** sue me,” he muttered, but it didn’t seem to be a complete thought. “Is it easy to justify that this is, what, all my fault? Because—I did it out of, what, spite? Neglect? Cowardice?”
His voice rose in volume but he tried to temper it. Because, maybe she had a point. Maybe there was a bit of cowardice in his actions.
He shoved the bag down on the table next to him as if it disgusted him.
“I have notes about what happened. I don’t have the answers to his questions. I thought maybe I could have some time to figure out what had happened. To figure out how to tell him. I never thought I’d be able to get out of telling him, I just thought I’d be able to do it when I was ready. Because maybe I wasn’t. Maybe it was selfish of me to want time to figure it out—these things don’t come with a manual. He doesn’t come with a manual. But I’ve known him for long enough to know that he’d have gotten upset no matter who told him, and it’s s**t to pretend like it was as easy as telling him ‘Oh, by the way, I accidentally broke your favorite dish’ or something stupid—I ruined his life.” Or, at least, a good part of it.
“And not just the ******** youma part—I ******** things up before then, too.”
Those things, he remembered.
His face was flushed with anger; he didn’t like seeing her cry but he felt like a cornered animal.
He faltered. “I was going to tell him. Not today, not this week. But it was supposed to be me.” He inhaled sharply, as if the weight of it all had just come crashing down on him. There was a lump in his throat and his brows furrowed but he still seemed like he was stuck in defensive mode. “I don’t know who told him. Bellite, maybe. She’s not a bad girl, but she shouldn’t have said anything. She knows what he went through, she would care about him. God damn it,” he muttered and reached up to rub at his face.
“I wasn’t trying to hurt him, Cambria. I wasn’t ready to tell him. I didn’t know how to tell him, but he wasn’t supposed to get hurt by this. You know I didn’t want that. I don’t want him to get hurt, or you. Look,” he sighed and reached out an arm invitingly. “Come here, let me hold you. We’ll figure this out. I’m sorry for what I said. I just. You don’t have to yell at me, Cambria. I can make this right, I know how to talk to Evan.”
He didn’t need her guilting him; he might not show it, but he felt enough of it on his own. Even now, with his demeanor as tough as he was making it out to be, there was worry in his eyes.
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 7:07 pm
Cambria stiffened, she looked as though she were ready to lash out again, to hit him this time as he began yelling back. Maybe she wanted a fight. Maybe she wanted to be violent for once. Wanted to lose control and just…deal with all of the emotions that had been building up. It was so hard to be the strong one. The reasonable one. The one with all of the answers who could calm nightmares and fix…everything.
But she couldn’t fix this and she didn’t know what to do.
When Zac opened his arms to her, she resisted for what felt like a long time, at least ten, maybe fifteen seconds before she took two quick steps towards him and buried her face in his chest, sobbing brokenly.
She always thought she had a high breaking point, but she was quite sure that it had just been passed…and she didn’t like how small she felt right now.
“I just…hate this…he’s never…been so mad at me before. He thinks that everything we’ve said to him and done for him have just been lies and…I’m not used to this, Zac…you’re supposed to be the bad guy in everything…not me.”
Cambria pulled away and rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand, looking up at Zac with a watery smile. “…That’s a joke…I promise…”
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 7:18 pm
He had been so certain that she was going to reject him. She had taken so long, she had such resolve; he thought he was going to stand there like an idiot and she was going to come over and push him or something.
But she didn’t. It took longer than he’d wanted, but it didn’t matter because she was in his arms. Crying, but that was something they could work on now that she wasn’t yelling at him.
He wrapped both his arms around her and held her tightly, resting his chin atop her head.
“It’s the truth, though,” he mused, eyes drifting across the room to an empty spot on the wall. “Good cop, bad cop. I’m always bad cop, always with the hard truths, always the one who takes the blame. But I’ve done a lot of shitty things, so it doesn’t matter. I’m thick skinned.”
It didn’t bother him as much as it bothered her. Her heart broke any time she saw Evan cry. Zac could at least do what needed to be done without breaking down, even if now he wound up pretending like things didn’t bother him as much as they did.
He used to not care. Now he couldn’t turn it off.
“…I’ll take care of it. I know Evan. He’s been mad at me enough times that I know how this works. I’ll go pick him up. He’s probably with Tobias, I’ll just go grab him and bring him home so we can talk. I don’t want him over there, festering on the idea. Thinking up the worst case scenario. He’s not good alone, and even if he’s got Tobias there, I don’t know what he’s saying. He won’t tell him about us powering up, but that means he’s going to bottle things up.”
He shook his head and exhaled. “He’s not good when he’s bottling things up. But this’ll be okay. I’ll just go talk to him. I’ll tell him it’s not your fault. You know he can’t stay mad at you.”
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 7:29 pm
Cambria nodded, letting her head rest once more against his chest and sighing softly. “Okay. Just…just bring him home and please just…remind him how much I love him, okay? Because I do. He’s…he’s so important to me, Zac. He’s just as important to me as you are and I just…it would honestly most likely kill me to lose him, okay?”
She was quiet for a moment. “I’ve already lost him once, and I don’t care to repeat that…so…please. Go and get him, and bring him back. He belongs here…we can talk through this together…the three of us…but…”
Swallowing, Cambria wiped her face on Zac’s shirt, not caring about the trail of snot and tears that she left behind. It was a just punishment or at least it seemed that way to her.
“Do you think we should do it tonight…or give him the night to cool off? I don’t…I don’t know what to do…but…you know him best so…I’ll…trust you with this okay?”
Cambria glanced at the mess on Zac’s shirt that she had just left and pursed her lips.
“…Though you should change if you’re going tonight…sorry about that…”
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 7:43 pm
At the sudden wetness on his shirt, Zac leaned back just slightly as if he meant to examine it. While Cambria’s eyes were elsewhere, he didn’t bother to conceal the look of modest disgust on his face. He forced a mask of relative calm as soon as he could manage it. “…Yeah, I’m going to change,” he promised. He didn’t think she was sorry but right now he wasn’t interested in arguing over her suddenly mistaking him for a giant tissue.
“I’m going to change, and then head over. I don’t want to give him time to stew and get any ideas in his head. He’ll only convince himself that we meant to hurt him if I don’t go over, so I’m not going to give him the chance. You just stay here and hold down the fort. There’s a chance he didn’t go to Tobias’, so if he comes back I want someone to be here.”
He was mad, but he wasn’t sure if it was misplaced. He didn’t like Cambria’s accusations, but the need to fix things was so much stronger than the need to defend his pride. He needed to make this right, and he wasn’t going to let everything he’d sacrificed go to waste. He was mad at Bellite for telling Evan, even if she’d had good intentions. He was mad at Evan for running, for always being so dramatic, but he was sure he was just telling himself that because it was easier to be mad at someone else.
…If anyone deserved to be dramatic, it was Evan. And, maybe, this wasn’t so dramatic when he thought about it.
Zac forced himself to stop thinking about it; he wanted to stay angry because that meant he didn’t have to worry about messing up. If he was angry, he didn’t have to be afraid.
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Posted: Thu May 24, 2018 7:48 pm
Cambria nodded and hesitated for a moment before kissing the blonde’s cheek lightly. “Be gentle with him…he’s really upset. I’ll get these put away and…I’ll hopefully see the two of you soon, okay?”
She forced her voice to be light, hoping that her little punishment for Zac would be enough…and that in an hour or so all of this would be resolved and…and things would be okay.
Letting out a heavy sigh, Cambria made her way to the bags that Zac had bought and began sorting through the various groceries, her mind firmly on her new task. Zac would bring Evan home. She knew he would. There was no doubt in her mind about that what so ever.
At least none that she would let out.
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