The Truth Shall Set you Free...Or Break you up.

Yesterday was wonderful. All they did was …nothing. Okay, not exactly nothing, but they lazed around and just…talked. Lenn Greaves was never a talker up until this point. She was very good at skirting around her painful childhood past. In fact, she wanted to know more about him or how his day went and even those silly moments like any normal person eventually had.

Normal. Hmph.

There was a nice bench she picked out and texted him where she was at. She texted that ‘she had just sat down’. Technically that wasn’t a lie because she did at some point sit down…two hours ago. She just sat there, wondering where her life really was going and how the hell was this going to happen. So many possibilities ran through her head and most of the outcomes she thought of weren’t pleasant at all. He was going to hate her for what she did for a living and that was it. He was a pacifist and she wasn’t—yet they clicked so god damn well together.

She stared off into the pond. This was probably going to be it and she would go back to her ‘normal’ life and just kill things to get rid of the heartache she knew was bound to happen. Once Jacob showed, she smiled, but her heart was pounding as dread began to grow. Best do this now before it hurt later. ”Hey, luv,” She got up from the bench just to greet him with a kiss and sat back down, patting the seat beside her.

Really, why was she doing this.

He was probably feeling her tension, especially since he had his arms around her tense shoulders. ”Yeah? H-Heh! You’re good lookin’ like always…” There was a rattle in her voice. Why was she so nervous? Her heart was racing and her mouth felt as dry as the desert. There was a lump in her throat that refused to go down no matter how hard she swallowed. Right now she felt like that kid who broke grandma’s urn while playing ball in the house and blatantly lied to her parents about it. Her foot was tapping nervously.

Just say it.

No..

Say it. It’s the least you can do. You owe him that much.

She sucked in a deep breath and looked at him straight in the eye like she normally did when she wanted to tell him something really important like how she felt around him and all those lovely things. Now was a perfect example. She had that hard gaze as she tried to figure out the best possible way…and the only thing she could think of doing was winging it. ”Oy’ think oy’m fallin’ in love with you, Jacob,” There was one hunk of problem off of her shoulders. It felt relieving spilling that out and she let it hang for only a second. She didn’t want to hear him say anything yet. ”Which is woy oy’ need to tell you the truth.” God That sounded just awful to say. The next part was harder because she knew that she had just brought him up a second ago and now he was going to—

Just say it.

”Remembah when you joked about me being a hitman?...Well, back in th’ club, oy’ was waitin’ on a client…To get information on m’target. The modeling is just a cova’ oy needed…”

It pained her to say it. He was going to hate her forever, wasn’t he? ”Jacob, oy’ really am a hitman. Oy’ kill people for money.”

Oh god, he was walking away—Nope! He was just pacing around like she somewhat expected him to do. That was something she thought of okay so there was at least some progress with this instead of him storming off or worse—attempting to bring the police to her. There would be a lot of bloodshed and unfortunately it wouldn’t be hers.

Then he finally spoke up, wanting her to lay everything on the table. It was probably a good thing she picked a secluded spot to have this conversation. He had this incredulous look on his face that told her his mind was literally blown. Just a simple little detail mushroomed into something bigger because she felt the need to hide that dark passenger. She pinched the bridge of his nose. Everything, huh? ”Then you might wonna sit down fer this. Don’t worry, oy’ won’ ice you, oy’ promise,” she joked just a little, her finger crossing over her heart before she began…

She laid everything into him, starting with her lack of childhood because of her illness, to the brutal experiments and military training, to her escape, and how she took up her freelance ‘work’. It was a long gruesome storytelling session, something she never thought in a million years that she’d ever share with another human being. She contemplated on writing a journal, but paranoia told her that it was a bad idea in case the enemy infiltrated her base of operations. It was a long-winded story that held so much detail as if this all happened last week. Everything was as clear as day for her—even down to the fact that she lost count at fifty-three casualties and she was by no means considered human anymore. Hopefully he had sat down because if not, he was going to drop onto his ass regardless.

She sighed, pulling out her cloves for the first time in a week and lit it up. God, she missed the nicotine. Right now she was rattled. Not much did to pinch Lenn’s nerves; not even a gun in the face did the trick. What was more painful right now was the silence between the two. She exhaled a plume of smoke. ”An’ there you have it…You deserve t’know because I love you, dammit.”

So she let the cat out the bag. There it was; all over the nasty table that was called 'truth'. He just sat there, taking it all in and judging from his reaction to all of this, she wasn't sure what he was thinking. That was the scary part. Normally reading or profiling people was second hand nature, but Jacob had made things so difficult. She couldn't read him and that scared the living hell out of her. What was he going to do? Tell her to leave the island? Report her to the authorities?....Attempt to kill her? She dreaded that last thought.

The silence between them was almost too much to bear. The dread had a vice-like grip on her heart that brutally twist it. In reality, this was all her fault. For fuck's sake he couldn't even look at her! She bet he thought of her as vile; disgusting even and this was all her doing. M-Maybe this was a mistake. All she did was...hurt him.

and that...stung.

She thought she was going to be able to handle both worlds but as the days went by, she couldn't stop thinking about the consequences. This would only be ten times worse in the future. Better to nip things in the butt rather than leaving the problem to grow.

Alright fine, maybe she should just do them a favor and leave him be to his thoughts. Just as she was about to get up and do just that, the warmth of his hand caught her by surprise. She sat back down and listened. Yes...She did lie to him and even if it was for a legitimate reason, it still didn't keep her from feeling absolutely terrible about it...Which is funny because in her line of work, she was required to lie on a daily basis. That was faking I.D.s, Passports, conning targets, etc., etc. She really didn't need to go and think about all of those things. She felt worse enough as is.

" Oy'm sorreh...oy' neva' meant to hurt you..."

He was squeezing her hand now. Was it to keep her from running away or himself?

God, he sounded so pained, torn even about learning of her as a whole. She understood where he was coming from and there was no way of really telling him please believe me; everything is real. Even she wouldn't be able to discern anything. In a way, he talked as if there were two of her; two personalities that formed. Maybe...in a way he was right about that. When it came down to business, she was back to her usual self. When it was with him however...That was a completely different story. It all felt so real to her and like Jacob, she didn't want things to end. She wanted to keep these feelings. For once in her dark career, she took her feelings first over her job. This wasn't going to work. It was one or the other because she knew if she balanced both, it was going to tear Jacob apart.

She loved him too much for that.

"Oy' undahstand...and oy' don't expect to gain your trust roight away again. You've...Shown me a whole new way of livin..." she smirked just a little, her gaze drifting down to her boots that now had ashes all over them. She let the clove hang and burn. "In a sense, you helped me foind a new way of livin'...Oy' had to have some kind of covah'...and it's good. I like it...I like this normal life...Oy' was so scared of tellin' you this because I know wot you stand for..." She squeezed his hand in return. Enough rambling.

"Oy' can't do this, Jacob..."


...

...

"This is my last job. Afta' this, oy'm putting m'gun down. You're too precious to me t'let go."

She had been honestly thinking about putting her gun down since things got serious between the both of them. It wouldn’t be fair to Jacob at all and she knew it would tear them apart. She didn’t want that. Right now, she felt like she was being given an opportunity for something better than just earning a kill. Did she enjoy it? Well, no. It was all business, not fun and games. There was no real attachment other than the fact that she did scrub the world clean of some questionable people. She couldn’t do it all on her own and no matter what, there were always be more to take their place. It was almost pointless save for the fact that she got paid well for it at least.

It was impossible to keep both worlds apart. Eventually they would meld into one and it was a dangerous outcome she wanted to avoid. She even considered the outcomes of what could possibly happen when she retired; His concern was one of them. Could she do it? Of course she could. She nodded, her eyes focused on the ground. It took a while to register his embrace. This was a huge decision she was making and…It felt overwhelming—terrifying even just because of that small percentage that this just might not work.

Better to try than never and think about ‘what could have been’, right?

She looked to him again, the clove much smaller now though it wasn’t because she was smoking it. ”Then let them come. They’re stupid if they come after me,” she challenged in a menacing tone. Her gaze was hardened with sheer determination. ” Oy’ won’ let them take away wot oy’ want,” Then she relaxed a little, offering a hint of a smile. ”It’ll be fine. Oy’ll tear their whole company down an’ ruin their lives if I have to. Oy’ don’t want this. It hurts you an’ oy’ can see it. Oy’ don’ eva’ wan’ to see that look on your face again.”