Eyes closed [&Romeo]

On a moonless night like that one, Elodie would’ve stayed in her room. She didn’t have to leave the ship to enjoy the sight of the stars, and perfectly knew that even if the ‘Captain’, as people of the crew called him, allowed her to roam freely, he would’ve been happier if she stayed on board. It had been quite a while since she was taken on that ship and she had never really left it, except for when she took a stroll on the shore a couple of times.

Somehow, she was getting used to that life, even though she was still angry and upset because, of course, that life wasn’t her choice. The crew never bothered her, and talked to her only if it was strictly necessary or if it was ’order of the captain’. She was alone all the time, unless the Captain needed her for some reason and spent her days locked in her small room and her evenings on the deck, looking at the stars.

Elodie assumed that it was pretty late. Some people of the crew were below decks, probably resting, while the others were chatting loudly, sitting pretty far from her. Anything else, beside the voices of the pirates, was silent and still, as it always was.
What broke the status quo of the night, was a soft thud on the wooden beams. It was probably louder than what she heard but she was too far to understand what was happening. She didn’t really pay attention to that noise, up until she heard fast steps, as if people were running towards something. Panicked, thinking that someone was attacking the ship, the girl slowly stood up and walked towards the source of the noise, trying to avoid making any kind of sounds.
What she saw a moment after shocked her. A body, blood. Her mind brought her back to when she first really saw a similar scene. The woods flashed by her and the same feelings of disorientation she felt back then struck her. That was her chance to be free, that was her chance to run away. But if that was the case, why was she moving towards the man laying on the floor, almost lifeless? Why wasn’t she jumping off that ship and never go back? She was now kneeling down next to his body, the same way she did the first time she met him. For how badly he was injured the first time, it was nothing compared to what she was witnessing now. Blood was everywhere, on his hands, on his face, all over his clothes. It looked like someone was trying to kill him and had almost succeeded. ’Save him!’ Someone was shouting, but she heard those words as if they were a whisper. As if they were words coming from within herself, not from someone else.

She still wasn’t sure about her abilities, she wasn’t sure about what she could do, but she also knew that she somehow had to try. Not because she really wanted to save him, at this point she couldn’t care less about the man that hurt her, kidnapped her and locked her up, leaving her to the lonely life she was trying to run from in the first place. She had to try for herself, she had to learn her limits and try to cross them. It was with that determination that she leaned further closer to the man, cupped his cheek with one hand, while placing the other on his left eye, were the biggest wound was. Eyes closed, ears numb, world shut.

&Romeo

Inhale. Exhale. Elodie kept on repeating those two words in her head to remind herself to breathe. Unlike everyone else around her, she has to maintain her calm and focus on what she was doing, but it was easier said than done, since she didn’t know what she was doing exactly. Maybe that was the right moment to find out, although it might’ve been better if she already knew how to control her powers. ’This is not the time for this.’ She said to herself before slowly shaking her head and focusing back on her feelings, her eyes still shut.

Movement. That was the first thing she noticed was changing. A small change that may have meant nothing for him nor the crew around them, that probably didn’t even notice, but that meant the world to her, because it showed that whatever she was doing, was working. Not even a moment after, she felt a strong grip around her wrist, followed by a excruciating scream, that completely ripped her focus apart. Her gaze immediately met his, one of pure panic and shock, his voice pleading her to end his pain. It wasn’t the first time he was about to die and she had already seen him in really bad conditions, but this was on a whole different level. The redhead would’ve never expected to see him so vulnerable, so broken. That small boost of confidence she had was slowly breaking along with her hopes of saving him.

She was a disappointment, her stepfather always told her that. She perfectly knew her place and was now overstepping, trying to do something she surely wasn’t able to do. ’Make it stop’ was the only thing she could hear, those words, said with that suffering tone, became her new goal. She had to make it stop, she wanted to make it stop. Her other hand went to grab his, that was still holding tightly onto her wrist. He was wounded there as well, and even if it wasn’t as serious as his eye injury she might’ve alleviated his pain a little. This time though, the girl didn’t close her eyes, but focused on the color of the only eye he could look at her with. It looked like melted gold, dense and incandescent, and captured her full attention right away. He was clinging to her as if she was the one who was causing him that pain, but at the same time, as if she was his only way out of it, and that was what she intended to be.

’...take care of me when I need you to.’ The Captain’s voice rang in Elodie’s mind. It was a soft and calm voice, which was in complete contrast with how he was actually screaming. It was that contrast that ripped her focus apart completely. Did he needed her to take care of him now? He didn’t look like he was enjoying it. What if whatever she was doing, wasn’t what he wanted her to do? The sounds that were coming out of him sounded inhuman and the people around them suddenly felt too close. ’Everybody leave!’ She screamed at them, raising her voice like she never did before in her whole life.

Her hand was still tightly holding his and when the rest of the crew finally gave them the space they needed she turned around to look at him again. He was suffering, looking inconsolable and miserable, probably two of the last adjectives he would’ve liked to be associated with. She knew she had to stop this and that she couldn’t leave him hurting like that. Their gazes locked and she could see he was clinging onto her eyes with his. He needed her to save him. That small confirmation, changed her state of mind once again, as fast as it changed the first time. She now knew she could do something for him and that she had to prove what she was capable of. Not to him, not to anyone but to herself.

It was then that she heard him gasping for air, while trying to talk. It sounded like he was trying to be strong, to hold onto her, to hold onto life, but at the same time, it felt as if he wasn’t strong enough to do what he really intended to. ’Shh, it’s okay…’ She whispered, leaning in slightly closer to him. She didn’t want to get too close, fearing that she could scare him or suffocate him. Feeling that his hand was now healed enough, she slowly let it go, making sure he was slowly calming down. He was still in pain and the girl felt as if that moment was crucial. She put both hands next to the wound in his eye, hoping that it would fasten the process, even though she didn’t really know if that could’ve worked. Suddenly she wished she could’ve practiced a little bit more before actually throwing herself in such a difficult task, but it was there, unexpected and she had to learn to always be ready to face any situation.

Elodie knew that the whole crew was sticking so close to them because they were concerned about him, but they had to understand that they weren’t really helping him by doing that. At the same time though, the girl didn’t really know why she was so desperate to help him. Everyone else around them cared about him more than she did, even if just slightly, but she was the one who was helping him, she was the one that he needed the most right now, she was the only one who could’ve stayed this close to him without being a burden.

The healing process seemed to take a lot more time than it did the first time in the forest. Clearly his injuries were extremely severe this time around. He had lost so much blood that was now all over her hands and her clothes, but she knew that that wasn’t the right moment to worry about that. She started focusing on his eye injury only, after letting go of his hand, which fell on the wood of the ship with a soft thud. He was with her for a long and intense moment, in which the both of them stared at each other, gave each other strength. It was then that he admitted something that Elodie felt he didn’t say that often. He couldn’t do it, he was too weak to hold on to it, but he was holding onto her nevertheless. It looked like he used his last energies to tell her that, to ask her for help. He needed her. She wasn’t expecting those words to motivate her not to give up, but they actually did. Someone finally needed her, she wasn’t useless anymore.

It was when her whole focus was on healing his left eye, that she missed the fact that the right one was now closed. She realised he had passed out only when his tense body finally relaxed under her touch. The girl knew that she couldn’t give up, not now that she could just feel that his wounds were almost healed up. The bleeding in both his hand and eye had stopped, but few bruises were still keeping her from looking closer at his eye, to make sure of its conditions. Her knees had started hurting, so she dropped on the floor and sat down next to him, without interrupting the direct contact between her hands and his injured eye. Then she moved on to try and heal his throat, moving only one hand towards his neck.

Only moments had passed when she finally took her hand off of his throat, but it felt like an eternity. He looked better, his body finally at peace. She felt like she had to work a little bit more on his eye later on, but she couldn’t really know right now. So focused on her thoughts with a concerned frown, the girl didn’t notice that a member of the crew stepped closer to them until he cleared up his throat. Elodie looked at him, clearly looking like someone had completely ripped her off her thoughts, which was exactly what had happened. She was good at keeping her emotions hidden, but she was also too tired to actually try and do that now. The man who was standing next to them, and who she knew was extremely close to the Captain, offered to take him to his room below deck and the only thing that Elodie could do was nodding in agreement, at least he could’ve slept in a more comfortable place. He took him in his arms and started walking towards the room, while the girl was still sitting on the floor. Exhausted, she sighed deeply, inhaling and exhaling a couple of times before actually getting up and following them. She entered the room only to find the Captain sleeping on his bed, almost looking peaceful. Elodie sat on the couch, not wanting to stay too close to him when he would wake up and started her guard duty. That was going to be a long, long night.

When that member of the crew took the Captain in his arms, Elodie had a hard time grasping right away what was happening. She was starting to feel confused, out of place, as if what was happening wasn’t real at all. Somehow she managed to get up and follow them, but she didn’t know how she was doing that. Neither she knew why exactly she was following them and why did she help him in the first place. Would you help someone who physically hurt you? Someone who kidnapped you and kept you locked in a room without any social interaction allowed, except for those rare times in which the both of you talked? Would you save the life of such person? Why would you do that? Elodie was asking herself those questions in the back of her mind, but that voice sounded too weak, too uncertain, even though it was supposed to be the exact opposite.

The sofa in which she sat was far enough from the bed for her to feel safe to say that she was respecting his personal space as well as her own. She wasn’t obliged to watch him, to be sure he was okay and she honestly shouldn’t have been there in that room, but there she was nonetheless. As soon as she sat down on the comfortable cushion of the couch, a sudden feeling of exhaustion crashed on her whole body. She leaned back, her elbow on the armrest and her head on her hand and watched him. He looked peaceful for once, not threatening at all but not innocent either. Somehow the fear he instilled in her was still there, a small sparkle, compared to the fire it was when they first met, but was there regardless.

”No”, a far and feeble sound reached her brain, which completely blacked out for who knows how many minutes, hours, days even. Elodie slowly opened her eyes, which at first had some troubles focusing on what the picture in front of them was. The man who she found peaceful just before, was now extremely distressed, almost on the verge of a panic attack. She saw him pushing himself up after swearing and trying to deny something which she wasn’t really aware of. The girl didn’t flinch though, not when he first woke up, nor when he finally met her gaze, when he understood that she was there in the room with her. She wasn’t really frozen, or scared, she was just calm and somehow curious on what reaction he would have once he realised he was still alive. In the end, all that she saw was a man who was crushed by what looked an overwhelming physical and, even worse, mental pain.

The silence that was hovering all over the room was almost scary. Neither of the two dared to speak a word while they only stared at each other, she with a neutral look, which kind of hid her curiosity, while he didn’t look himself at all. He wasn’t confident anymore, he was scared, confused ”I’m sorry”, he was sorry, and he had the courage to say that out loud. He didn’t look like the type of person who would say that and Elodie didn’t expect to be the one hearing those words, but there they were, one sitting in front of the other, in a situation she had never even dreamed of. ”What are you sorry for?” Her voice came out a little raw, her energies completely drained out, making her believe that she wasn’t asleep for that long if she was still feeling so tired. But she forced herself on keeping her eyes open and keeping her attention high even though she didn’t stand up, she didn’t try to get close to him, she didn’t try to comfort him in any way.

Looking back at what she did when she first found him lying almost lifeless on her road to Navarre, Elodie could guess why she saved him. She was afraid to see someone dying in front of her eyes once again and somehow wanted to prove herself that she could help people if she wanted, that she could change her life for the better and be someone superior from the person she had been until then. But now, what excuse did she have? It could’ve been her only chance to leave, to finally live the life she wanted to live in the first place, the life she wanted to take when she left Nordshal, her only chance to escape the man who mistreated her, but then took care of her, the man who she had seen weak and who had seen her in the same conditions. At this point, she thought they might as well be the same kind of fucked up persons who didn’t have anyone else other than themselves.

Helping him wasn’t exactly something she did out of pity, it wasn’t something she did because she didn’t want him to suffer anymore. She told herself that it was to test her powers, to prove to herself her skills, but it might as well have been something she did because she was scared of ending up alone all over again. In a sense, her life on board wasn’t exactly the social life she somehow hoped she could have and that probably was because he kept her away from everyone other than him. At the same time though, the only reason why she felt somehow secure was because he was the one who was guaranteeing for her safety. Her mind was all over the place, she couldn’t give herself an answer to all the questions that were roaming in her mind and ended up falling asleep out of exhaustion.

When she woke up, she felt like she had slept for days, however she couldn’t keep her eyes open because of how tired she still was. It was like her body wasn’t connected to her mind, which was now fully awake, focusing on what was happening in front of her. The thought of him hurting crossed her mind a couple of times, given the fact that he was struggling so hard to keep his composure. He was about to cry, he was in a total state of panic from which she didn’t try to drag him out. She simply looked at him, observed his demeanor while keeping a straight and composed expression and posture, her muscles were completely relaxed as well as her thoughts. After seeing how much he was struggling, she felt good being in his presence for once, because she finally could be the one holding the power, the one who wasn’t subjugated to the other, and the fact that she wasn’t really doing much, that he was the one bringing himself down, made her feel even better.

It was when he finally decided to speak up and to say something she wasn’t expecting him to say at all, that she felt entitled to push him over the edge a little bit more. Her question clearly made him uncomfortable and she could understand why. She was trying to make him deal with his feelings in a moment in which he was probably feeling a lot more than what he could handle. He was moving, distressed and somehow scared to look at her and Elodie was solely looking at him, not moving, not flinching. ”Why are you still here. I can’t stop you from leaving no more”, his voice broke the silence that was once more created, making concrete what she had thought until now. Of course she knew that was her chance to leave and that question took her by surprise. It was the most obvious question for him to ask, but the hardest question for her to reply to, because she didn’t know. ”Take care of me when I need you to.” She said, recalling the words he told her once, lowering her gaze and looking at her fingers intertwined on her lap. ”Did you need me to?” The girl then asked, moving her gaze back to him, in her eyes a tension she felt that was visible but couldn’t hide, nor she could explain the reason why it was there.

Falling for a stranger’s trap was the last thing she expected to happen to herself so early in her journey. She didn’t even have the chance to get to see another city before she was locked up again, this time against her will. Seen from an outsider’s point of view, it could’ve seemed that Elodie was actually giving up on her freedom over again, surrendering to a life of loneliness and self pity. The girl honestly wasn’t sure if that was what was actually happening. Maybe her body had subconsciously stopped trying a long time before, maybe she was just tired of everything but still had to realise that.

The way she was acting with him was beyond her own control. She wasn’t thinking straight, she was tired, drained out from the internal fight that she was having right before on the deck of the ship. One part of her was working extremely hard to save him, the other one, was battling the other to avoid that and in the meantime, it was also trying to find a reason, an excuse for the other part to act like it was acting. Torn between her own feelings, the girl couldn’t help but try to hold a grip onto the only thing that she found being weaker than what she was at that moment: the Captain. Asking her to leave wasn’t going to help neither of the two, which looked as if they were in desperate need of support, but were too arrogant to admit that to themselves, more so to each other.

His weaknesses were now Elodie’s only certainty. She wasn’t sure of herself, she needed someone to tell her that what she did was right. She couldn’t do that herself, because she perfectly knew she fucked up again by saving him a second time, but maybe he could’ve been grateful to her. The redhead was setting her hopes too high, not moving, waiting for him to say something, to do something, anything. And something he said, trying to push her away, crushing every hope she had for him to thank her in less than a second. It was in that moment that the conflict with herself started again. He was letting her know that she was now free, she could’ve done everything she really wanted… But what was that exactly?

With those uncertainties and doubts, the girl knew that she couldn’t just simply leave the ship and never come back. She briefly looked at the door, that looked extremely tempting for a split second, but she had to understand the reasons hiding behind his behaviour, what happened for him to almost die and, most importantly, she hoped that those answers to her questions could’ve explained the reason why she was now looking at him, talking to him and still looking for someone like him to acknowledge her. ”Don’t make me admit that out loud”, he replied and it was enough. His body was tense and she knew he was trying to hold back his thoughts, he was trying to keep himself whole, trying not to fall apart. ’Can I come closer?’ The question rolled out of her mouth before she was able to understand the meaning of it. Her voice was a whisper, but she knew he’d heard her since everything was silent around them. Somehow, she was glad that her impulsiveness was just limited to her words right now. She couldn’t even imagine what his reaction could’ve been if she simply stood up and got closer to him without a word and she was pleased with her own judgment, knowing that she avoided a bullet right between her eyes just now.

For her whole life, she had been living inside four restricted walls, which made her feel safe and secure. Nobody would’ve harmed her if she kept herself inside, away from everyone. It was ironic how it was there where her stepfather used to make her feel useless, worthless and unwanted, yet that was her safe place. For how much it was worth, she may have sought comfort in her pain, ending up being miserable for her whole life. Somehow, that looked exactly what she ended up doing now. He mistreated her, physically hurt her, yet there she was, sticking close to her pain.

‘Passive’ was probably the word that most described her behaviour. But that attribute didn’t necessarily mean she wasn’t going to fight for her life, fight to stay up in the surface, fight not to drown. Using the source of her own pain as an anchor, she managed to sound fierce, almost too aggressive with her inquiries, as if she was trying to push him from the edge he was holding onto. The thought of him actually struggling in the same way she was didn’t even cross the redhead’s mind. She solely saw him as the reason why her second life was falling apart like her first one did.

Finally, the girl had some reaction from him but it was one that she didn’t expect. He turned around to look at her, finally showing her his face, which he tried to hide since he woke up. It was then that she realised how much he was suffering. That brief look that he gave her before he fell again into the pain’s grip, displayed his vulnerability to its fullest. Reflexively, Elodie frowned and slightly gasped, right when a groan escaped the man’s mouth and she moved her legs away from her chest, sitting up and planting her feet on the ground. Her body was stiff, alert while she was looking and pondering every move he was making.

For a second, he looked like a real fighter, battling his pain and maintaining a lot more control than what Elodie expected him to have over this whole situation. The moment after though, he looked defeated. His shoulder dropped while he turned back again, to avoid eye contact with her. He looked tired of the pain he was enduring and the girl wondered if there was anything she could do about it. She was about to stand up and get closer to him when she heard him rejecting her again. The redhead froze on the spot, not able to put pressure on her legs, not able to move and make her way to him. What was she doing? Why did she feel like she had to help him again? New questions clouded her mind and she woke up from her trance when she realised she was standing next to him. She didn’t know how she ended up there, nor in how much time. She couldn’t even see him, but she knew he was there. He was probably looking at her, but she wasn’t able to perceive that even though her eyes were locked in his now. Another freeze of her whole system happened when she saw her hand almost touching his face again. ’Sorry’, she muttered, while stepping back with a frightened look on her face. It was as if he was a magnet that was pulling her closer and closer to him without her being able to realise that.