melting magnets } justice x poppy

I'm a fast learner. Bones broken again and again until I began to craft them from steel and smiles become the same thing as sobs when the world is viewed through black lenses. Weakness are the cracks in my foundation, weakness is the way I break when he wraps his lips around the neck of another bottle and it's underneath my skin. He's underneath my skin. Wearing away at everything I have ever needed to be and I know I need to be here for Justice but he's making it so fucking hard to keep a straight face.

He does this often. Throws temper tantrums when things do not go his way. Like an indignant child left without attention a second too long and he has to be doing this on purpose. Silver knives against my neck - the pain reaches into my empty chest and I have never felt anything more excruciating. He wants to hurt me. He wants to see me bleed and I have presented my wrists bound my four letters. Love. I'd do anything for him and yet he cannot find happiness within that truth. Unless he can freely claim me as his own, present me to the world as absolutely his, consequences be damned.

Happily ever after will only ever be for him.

"How do you do this?" Already slurring with his head upon my shoulder and it's all I can to keep from crying out in pain at the scent of rot upon his breath. He's killing me. He's killing me and he doesn't even know it.

"Cedric, go to Daddy." I mumble through teeth clamped shut. Sleepy boy scampering off into the crowd and I crane my neck to make sure that he has found himself safe within his father's arms. I offer them both a smile, even as Cedric's head falls onto his shoulder and I gesture for the both of them to go with a soft nod. I'm okay. He needs sleep. Justice can never be the most important thing to me, but I'll not have my son bear witness to someone throw his life into the ground. Grind it to dust with a plastic heel. Especially not-

the man he bears such a strong resemblance to.

"You make it look so easy." His breath upon my neck sends shivers down my spine and my knuckles have turned white against the grey fabric of my ruined dress. Eyes closed when he pulls away, begging for my heart so stop from clawing its way into my throat and I'm certain I've always been good at hiding the truth.

I simply thought the truth was something that he alone could see.

He holds out a drink to me and even as I take it within shaking hands my lip curls in disgust. It's never been me. Scorching liquid to feed my flames- I've never needed the sweet numbing that it offered. I drank because of him. I drank because he makes me so fucking weak and yet there he stands- oblivious with poison on the tongue previously curled against my skin. And I wonder, as I stare into the amber liquid churning within expensive crystal, how Justice can claim to love a woman he doesn't know at all.

"It's never been easy." I grimace, even a small sip makes me want to faint. I've not the strength to keep this up, not with whiskey replacing my heartbeat. Control, it's all about control and he's willing to ruin it all for the sake of his own ego. I'm not angry anymore. Steel bones are scrap metal at my feet and he is the light seeping through my shattered glass. I'm tired."But I've always had to be the strong one, haven't I?"

My smile is laced with spite, fingers dancing at his collar as I straighten it.

"It's killing me." Soft words - barely there - mumbled into the brim of my glass and for once it feels good to wash the words away. Life is easier to bear when I pretend I cannot feel pain at all.

Frustration bubbles upon the tip of my tongue and my hands twitch when he falls to the chair. Yearning to touch him. It's nothing like the visceral want- the collision of us earlier today. I simply want to push my hands through his hair and rest my head against his chest. I want to feel his heart's beat against my ear and promise him that it will all be okay. To do something more than watch him crumble with my teeth dug into my bottom lip. Swallowing the secrets shared between us.

"You don't have to be the strong one." I know, I know, I know. Hands caught drifting toward his cheek I swiftly clench my fist around my thumb and alcohol stains my tongue. Burns my stomach. He doesn't understand. He doesn't get it. He doesn't get me and the look in his eyes is making me weak at the knees. Hurting. Crumbling. Falling to pieces and there's not one thing I can do to fix it.

"I want to." Pulling up a chair beside him just to feel the warmth of his skin close to mine and my voice is cracks like thunder across the navy sky. "I fucking want to, Justice. I-" Lump in my throat, bitter words as I lean back and watch for black eyes trained upon my lips. The flash of a camera and I do not know how Justice continues to smile so pretty. Long since have my cheeks grown tired. "that's how I love you."

I pretend to be telling a secret, hand cupped around his ear with lips pressed to the base and I laugh when I pull away. As though we merely shared an old joke meant only to be shared between friends. And although I have simply spilled myself across his lap now slick with my blood and truth, I resort to pulling my hair into an absent minded braid. I don't want to look weak. That is not who I will ever be.

"Why can't we be happy." I laugh. Soft and long with palms pressed to my lips and I'm holding back tears with every syllable.

"We have to learn to be happy with what we already have." The truth that hurts. Finding comfort within our lies and my fingers linger across the place we know my bruise now lays. It feels almost good, as though a part of him has stuck to me and as much as I want to be mad my heart feels all the heavier. Full to burst and the words are just as swollen. "I'll try. Fray, I promise I'll try to make you happy."

Because I always do.