Private Finished There's a Fine Line Between Love and Hate

Lochlann looked considerably better than he did the last time Addy saw him. For one thing, the swelling in his face had gone down considerably. There was a series of mottled bruises across his jaw, but the cuts had scabbed over, and he only had one black eye and that wasn't even puffy anymore. His hand was still bandaged, but Lochlann was already on the mend. His tooth had even started to come back already.

He suspected that if he went and submerged himself in the lake for a day or two, things might heal faster, but Lochlann wanted to avoid that.

He was dressed normally--jeans, a t-shirt--although he'd thrown his jacket on despite the relative warmth of the day. He walked casually, but that changed when he saw Addy.

He grinned at her and when he walked, he seemed lighter somehow, as though some of his happiness was leaking out into his footsteps.

"Hey," he said. "You beat me here!"

He held the door open for her, and then Lochlann motioned to a booth at the far end of the restaurant, where they could have some privacy. He led her there and slid into the seat across from her.

"So," he said. He was surprisingly nervous all of a sudden, but he forced it away and shook his head. "This has to go better than last time, right? How are you doing?"

When she told him that he looked horrible, Lochlann gave her an even bigger grin.

"Why thank you," he said, bowing as though he'd put on a stage performance. He was in a surprisingly good mood. He hoped it would carry over and make this conversation easier.

That being said...Lochlann was relieved when she said Al didn't know they were here. He didn't say 'oh thank the gods' out loud, but her certainly thought it. When she said she talked to him, Lochlann was...surprised. Not that she did, because it was a very Addy thing to do to look out for him like that, but because Alaude agreed not to kick his ass anymore. At least, that's what he assumed. Maybe Alaude just agreed not to go for the face. Lochlann said, "Thank you."


He considered what she said and then admitted, "You know, it's kind of fucked up but...this is actually one of the least painful things I've had. Like it hurts, but only if I touch it too much."

To demonstrate, he jabbed one of his fingers into his own jawline and then flinched. That was stupid. Why was he being stupid?

Probably all this nervous, fluttery energy he had.

When Addy told him her news, though, the other news, Lochlann did two things impulsively.

The first one was to reach over and squeeze her hands.

The second was to lean over the table and kiss her on the forehead.

"Oh baby girl, I am glad you are safe," he said. He considered her news and then asked, "How are you feeling about it?"

Lochlann did not have a woman's body. He could never carry a child. He had no idea what it would feel like to have that kind of responsibility, that kind of weight on the mind. He imagined she was relieved, but he wondered if that's all she felt. Was she happy? Angry? A little sad?

Lochlann had long believed he wouldn't live very long so he never quite pictured a future. But even when he did, he anticipated children were probably never going to happen.

"It's uh...pretty unlikely I would ever, you know," he said, trying to find a phrase better than knock someone up. He settled on, "Conceive with someone. It's not impossible...just unlikely."

The conditions had to be very, very specific. Though he could mate with anything that had the compatible parts, he was fairly certain he only had to worry about pregnancy with another water horse--they were rare so that was unlikely; a horse--Lochlann didn't swing that way; or a human.

He was a fairytale monster, so human compatibility became ever harder. It had to be mutual love and even then, he could probably fuck someone thousands of times before it might result in conception....and then carrying the conception to term? Hell, his parents were both pure water horse and they'd been together for...sheesh, decades, and they only had the three kids.

"What I'm getting at is that I want to make sure I'm being supportive in the right way," he said, giving her hand a squeeze. "You can tell me if I'm being an idiot. I don't want to go 'FUCK YEAH LETS DO SHOTS' and then find out you're not feeling celebratory. I can only guess it was probably really scary."

Lochlann was not good at this.

But he was trying

He also really wanted to order a shot in the daytime now just to spite Alaude. Maybe he would.

"I'm glad then," Lochlann said, and he didn't not take his hands away because Addy traced the edge of the bandages and her touch lulled him. "And I don't think it's selfish."

When she talked about running into the man she'd slept with, there was no change in Lochlann's outward appearance. Was he jealous that someone else had slept with Addy?

A little bit. He was mostly jealous that he hadn't. But not that someone else had.

Lochlann nodded.

"I'm glad than," Lochlann said. "It's probably less stressful to have that experience with a friend and not a stranger. I hope he's good to you."

He was tempted to ask her right then and there: would you come home with me after this? Would you let me love you just once?

He remembered that day they were so close and Lochlann's hands squeezed hers a little tighter at the thought of kissing her, of trailing his hands down between her jeans and how he wanted his mouth to follow. There was so much more he could give her.

But right as he mustered up the courage to ask, Addy's face flushed and she asked about ordering. He nodded and contemplated.

He didn't want to eat meat around her. He was too afraid to, too nervous about how the connection between the delicious tang of meat might make him think of it when he was hungry around her. And Lochlann was almost always hungry. It was just a matter of how well he could ignore it.

"Pizza?" he asked her. He wouldn't place a food order in until he knew what she wanted.

When the waitress came over, Lochlann ordered them both a shot anyway, and when she delivered them he picked his up to cheers with hers. He was not always great at thinking of the best things to say, and this is one of those moments.

"To...the start of something new," he said, and he clanged his glass against hers. To the start of something new with her friendship with the man she'd slept with, the start of a memory of sex that might not be tainted by the fear of pregnancy, the start of...

something new, Lochlann hoped. Not the start of the same old story.

He took his shot fast and then slid the small cup to the end of the table. The familiar sting of the whisky was a welcome comfort. He'd missed it.

The whisky and her touch and the general mood made telling her the rest of his story seem not...not as painful as it could be.

"I guess I should just suck it up and tell you the rest of what happened," Lochlann said. He chewed on the inside of his cheek, biding for time regardless. Maybe he'd tell her after they ordered.

Addy wouldn't let go of his hands while he spoke. For some reason, that made it easier.

Lochlann nodded. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and tried to remember where he left off.

"Juvie was hell," he admitted. "And so was the hospital. I barely remember most of that, i was really sedated, but I do remember that Guin came to see me."

He frowned at this, wondering if he'd ever told Addy about Guin before. In the past, he would have warned to her stay far, far away from that gun wielding psychopath, but now he wasn't so sure. Lochlann used to be so certain that it was Guin who got him sent to juvie, but now he knew it was only himself. it was what he did to Addy.

"I met Dani while I was in juvie. She was...like me, sort of," he said. He looked away when he said this, because Lochlann hated it. He hated that he had to try to put himself in the fae category. He hated the reminder that he was a monster. "Not exactly the same, she was a banshee, but we hit it off and...well, then I was released. And we promised to meet up when she was out."

Then there was Guin. It's not that Lochlann didn't want to tell Addy about her. Just that he wasn't sure what to say to his best friend. Yeah the girl who tried to kill me multiple times? Well, i make her come for me multiple times.

"I thought I could love her," Lochlann said. His voice was quiet. "I thought with Dani, things could be different, because she knew what I was. She knew what it was like to be fae, and be death, and I thought, maybe if I couldn't pretend to be human with other people, I could do it with Dani."

Lochlann wanted to shrug, as if this didn't matter. He should be used to death by now.

"I didn't kill her, but Dani still died," he explained. "She was shot six times in my apartment. And after that, I guess being here was too much. Addy, I couldn't do it anymore. I was exhausted. I was.."

He hesitated and then he said, "Do you know what my parents would do to me if they found out another girl died because of me?"

There was a two part question to this. His hands were in Addy's and in many ways, Lochlann felt like his life was in her hands, too. He was giving her information that would condemn him.

He didn't know if he ever told him what his fate was if he killed another girl.

And he didn't know if Addy knew how high is body count really was.

Lochlann was glad Addy's hands kept him anchored to the present.

She was quiet, but the silent shake of her head let him know the answer. No. He hadn't told her, of course he hadn't. Lochlann swallowed.

"The academy is my last chance," he said. "I cannot stay here forever. I am supposed to go back home and help my family stay hidden. But I keep slipping up, Addy. I keep making mistakes. And this is it for me. This is it for my family. They're out of places to go. We left Ireland, Scottland, The Isle of Man, we left so many places in the states. This is it for us."

His voice sounded oddly detached, as though he was talking about someone else. Somehow, that made the story easier to tell.

"If I slip up again, my family will kill me. My father and brother will take me into the river and rip me into pieces and feed me to the horses," he spoke the words with no doubt, no uncertainty.

It was the reality that had been hanging over Lochlann's head since he came to the academy.

It was part of the reason why he'd never told Addy what he was.

Being with her made him feel....normal.

Lochlann's very life depended on him keeping a secret. Only, he was lying to himself as much as he was lying to everyone else by pretending to be human.

He was surprised by how steady his hands were. He took another deep breath. He was glad Addy was holding onto him. He leaned forward and rested his head ontop of her hands, and then sat back up, resolving himself to finish.

"And I don't want to die, Addy," he said. "I know it would be easier if I did. I think about it all the time. But I'm selfish. So I dropped out of the academy. I just left. It was that easy. And when I went home, I was hoping that maybe the decision would be made for me. I'd either live or I wouldn't. Only...when I came home, there was someone there. From the academy. Guin."

He swallowed.

His time with Guin was difficult to explain.

"She wanted me to come back and I didn't listen. She left, and a few days later I got a call from the police, and they wanted to investigate my involvement in Dani's death, and I panicked. My parents could not find out. They wouldn't believe that I had nothing to do with it. So I came back to the island, and I was pissed, because I figured this had something to do with Guin, only she had the shit beat out of her. This woman has made my life living fucking hell since I came to the island, and she had the shit beat out of her."

Lochlann shook his head, too quickly, his dark hair falling back into place.

"And Addy, for the first time in my life, I wanted to kill someone," he said.

It was another confession. It was another implication that was this: Lochlann hadn't wanted to kill anyone, but he did. Everyone he'd ever started to love died.

"So when the tsunami came, I just...let it take me, and I was just...gone, for a year, I went everywhere I could, I tried everything to find out why the people I start to care for keep getting hurt, even when I do every single thing I can," Lochlann said. "And then I came back to look for answers, and instead, I found Cat."

The guilt was starting to creep into his voice.

He managed to keep her eyes for this one.

"She reminded me of you so much," he said. "So I did everything I didn't do with you, everything I should have done. I told her everything. And for a while, I thought it would work. But Addy..."

Everyone he'd ever killed came willingly to him.

"I don't think I'm supposed to be alive," he said. "But everytime I'm with you, I feel alive. I feel like kissing you. I feel like...like I don't know, I feel like things could be different. I picture loving you and I picture waking up in bed with you, and I want it so damn bad it keeps me awake at night," he said. "The day you came back I thought I'd died and this was it. I was, and I still am, so happy to be with you."

His voice got quiet now.

"But I'm afraid I'll do to you what....what I think I did to Cat," he whispered.

That was the worst part. He couldn't even remember. But he woke up dripping wet, drenched from the lake, and Cat was gone.

His tone shifted suddenly, his voice dripping with sex.

"I wouldn't just fuck you, Addy," he said. "I would love you. I would tell you everything with my body that I couldn't tell you with my voice for two years. I would explore every part of you, find every place that makes you feel good, and I would make you feel good over and over again. I would give you as much pleasure as you could take....and then I would give you more. I would make it so you couldn't breath without moaning my name. I can promise you this."

Lochlann licked his lips, locking his eyes with hers.

"That day when we were so close, Addy? I think about it all the time. I think about how you taste and I think about how we were so, so close, and I want to picture a future where I wake up in bed and you're there in my arms," he said.

It wasn't just about sex. That's what he was trying to tell her.

When he pictured her, he was picturing the future. A future he didn't think he was supposed to have.

But....

He was terrified.

"Losing you would be it for me."