dumb stuff } ellie&poppy

poppy clarke

I'm all hard edges. Four walls stacked atop each other with smiles sealed behind what was once so comfortably monotone. Raised a career with about a thousand other siblings - all more skilled than me - affection was never something that I craved. The touch of another was sweet and all, but words felt so much more intimate. To see the world within another's eyes is to see into their soul. Because I know that touches can lie, that they use and hurt and I learned it all the hard way even though I knew better. From the very start, I knew how our fairy tale would end.

And that was not with a happily ever after.

I cannot find a single hard edge upon Ellie, no matter how my fingers trace his skin, searching for some kind of callous that he has hidden from view there is nothing to discover and I thought that I would hate someone like him. With mysteries that needn't be coaxed from cracked lips because they spill out upon my lap and yet I still find myself collecting every syllable that he has let slip.

It didn't hurt waking up next to him. Skin against skin and warmth to hide within the dread that every hangover brings. Though I've always been slightly impervious to their effects, to black tides dragging the innocent into their depths and I have never felt as bad for someone as I did Ellie the morning after. True to my words, I didn't even try to leave that morning. Never will I live for the comfort of another and so if I am the regret that they must face after nights of lust and arrogance then so be it.

But it didn't hurt waking up next to him. I could not feel the regret that sunk beneath my skin and tore me open- not like the last time. And I don't think that he could even see the scars that Justice does not even know he left. But I know they're still there and I know that I should not have stayed.

Sometimes I forget that I'm just as stupid of a child as the both of them. Wrapped up in just as many bitter needs and sweet dreams- longing lingers in every one of my words and yet the hunger is sated when my arms are locked around his neck. Fingers tangled within his hair because it is always so soft and welcoming and easy to pull so that the space between us disappears the instant that I crave the sweetness of his lips against mine.

I miss him when we're not together. A weird kind of longing that does not sting so much as ache. It's uncomfortable, not unbearable. There's a warmth that's absent when we're not together, my fingers have found solace within the space between his and while it might not be everything that Justice and I could have been- it's all that I could want. A slow burn that sets me ablaze from the inside out, passion that hides between soft kisses and long moments.

Calling it love is terrifying. My heart is broken, shards slipping beneath my skin and it smells strongly of blood every time I exhale and I know that Ellie is nothing like Justice Fray and that I can love the both of them in ways that I have yet to comprehend but I'm still so fucking scared that the moment I open up to Ellie he's going to realize how much better he can get. That he can find a girl like him who does not hide her heart beneath steel toed shoes.

The night terrors have gotten worse. Unconsciousness is treacherous, waking with arms pinned to my sides and completely helpless as grotesque creatures come to run cold fingers along my jaw as they gasp and moan and utter incomprehensible phrases with molded lips pressed to my skin. It's torture to drift off alone, nausea a begrudging savior from the certain death which has plagued me since childhood.

Ellie doesn't know about them and I have come to dread their inevitable reveal. Like scum, the ugly cannot stay hidden beneath crafted currents. No matter how bad I want to play pretend, to convince him that I am the perfect girlfriend, this honeymoon phase will end with only crashing and burning. I'm scared that once it's over there'll be no reason for him to stay, we have nowhere near the amount of history that Justice and I have sewn into each other since that stupid victory tour where he near broke my little brother's heart.

If I become too heavy there's not a doubt in my mind that Ellie will find it impossible to stay afloat. He is naive and sweet, he is good, but I don't know if he understands just how shitty the world really is. That he holds so much of me within his hands and that he could break it the minute this shiny coat of paint begins to dull.

But for now, he is mine. And I'm fucking loving it.

I've only just finished getting sick by the time I hear knocking. Hair a mess and adorned in a bathrobe I figure that a poor, lost mailman has shambled up by mistake. The Clarke family is far too reclusive and up their own ass to want anything to do with the outside world. It's better I answer the door than, god forbid, my father, knife clutched between his sausage fingers and a sneer sewn to his lips; even looking as awful as I do.

"I got it!" I singsong, voice bouncing across the halls and filling a house inhabited by mannequins. Carbon copies only born to bring honor to a useless man with both an ego and an inferiority complex larger than this district can contain. Tugging a comb through knotted hair, not bothering to dress myself because a stranger's eyes mean next to nothing- I answer. Plastic smile taking up space between my cheeks before I realize that the boy stood upon my doorstep is none other than my boy.

The blush is instant, pulling the robe tighter around myself as my teeth dig into my bottom lip. Perhaps he cannot feel it but there is electricity stagnant within the air- and it's made my hair stand on end and my palms begin to tingle. Lightning is about to strike, I can feel it longing to close the distance between us but I know I look like shit and we are not alone. He speaks with the same nervous cadence he has for months now - I would have figured that he'd be used to this by now. To us. But there is something endearing about how often he loses himself when I am around. Something genuine about how bad he is at hiding it.

This is Tucker. Short and stout, eyes that droop along with his jowls. Large brown eyes and a tongue that lolls out the side of his mouth so that he seems to sport a soft grin. It can't be more than a puppy, with an innocent gaze that tore into my heart the minute my eyes met his and I don't think that I have been so speechless in a long, long time.

When Ellie holds out the leash I can feel myself falling for the both of them. He's for you. But I don't want to take him. I don't want to make him mine. The puppy is settled comfortably at his side, already such a good boy that I have to hide a toothy grin with the palm of my hand while kneeling to run my fingertips through his fur and feel the softness of new life and loyalty.

"Ellie." I can barely manage even those words, standing once more with the leash clutched to my chest so that I can feel my heart's thrashing. "I don't want him to be mine." The words are soft and cautious and I'm scared of taking things too fast or too far. "I mean look at him, he's already in love with you."

I feel as though I'm diving headfirst into a pit to which I cannot see the bottom. That I'm not sure even has one. (And if it does, hell, it'll hurt when I find it.) "He has to be ours."