Someone Out There Loves You

*Gerard POV*
I woke up before Chloe did, not that I had expected anything else. The girl loved her sleep, that much was obvious by now. I didn’t move from my current position; my chest was pressed tightly against her back, with my arm holding her tiny frame. I also had one hand cupping her breast, which wasn’t a terrible way to wake up. Her breathing was slow and easy, and I found myself just relaxing to the rhythm of it. Inhale, one, two, three, exhale. Her chest would rise gently, then fall, but no sound escaped her. Her long eyelashes were still coated in mascara, though she didn’t really need mascara. I had seen her without makeup, and her eyelashes were naturally long and dark, so the mascara was moot, in my opinion. Maybe she just wanted the world to see that she put some kind of care into how she presented herself. She cared so much about how people perceived her, what people thought about her, and the tough ‘I’m a bitch, deal with it’ exterior, was her way of trying to cope with that. She was weird.She was a little nerdy, but not in the false way I’d seen many a girl try to pull off when I was in art college. She was self sufficient while living in the real world, and I was envious of that. I had taken a road that lead to me living on the sidelines, afraid of revealing who and what I was to the world. What I did to survive wasn’t particularly skilful, and while it was something I had enjoyed for so long, it was now beginning to leave a bitter taste in my mouth after every appointment. Part of me was resentful that she was here right then, forcing me to re-evaluate just how content I was in my life, and the choices I had made.
I wasn’t happy with the path I was leading. The money was good, and the lack of real responsibility was something that I was proud of, in a strange way. It was a life that had many upshots, and yet…I just wasn’t getting the same fulfilment I used to. She made me want to be the kind of person I wasn’t, and the kind of person I wasn’t sure I could ever be. She would want the same picket white fence, with the big house in the suburbs, and a few brats running around, causing sleepless nights and mini heart attacks, that her friends were all destined for. She wanted it so badly but, she was afraid of never attaining it. I was equally terrified, but for different reasons. I had no idea if I could be the kind of person who could have that kind of normalcy. I didn’t know if I was capable of holding down a nine to five job, taking shit from other people and becoming nothing more than a slave to the system. Could I really spend forty hours of my life stuck in a cubicle, or an office, if I were lucky, and then come home and be a lover, a partner, maybe even a father one day? I was so afraid of failing that I had stopped trying to fit into the norm that was expected of me as a college educated man who ‘had endless possibilities’. I had faced too many rejection letters after pitching my ideas to various publishers, and I had forced myself to give up on the hope that I would get my own comic one day. More than anything, I wanted to see my name on a glossy cover, proudly proclaiming that I had made something of myself, that I had achieved the dream I’d held close to my heart since I was a five year old drawing scribbles on my first sketchbook.
I had forgotten about that desire a long time ago. I hadn’t succeeded in becoming the comic book artist I’d strived to be during my years in school, and in anger and frustration, I had struck out and left the field before I let the defeat kill who I was, but I suppose I had let that happen anyway. Now, I was stuck in a place that left me with little possibility and little hope for any kind of a future that could lead to happiness. There was only one thing in my life that made me want to achieve more, and she was curled up against me like a sated kitten after a day of playing. She had come here the previous night, drunk as hell, but she had let the wall around her heart down for once. God knows how much alcohol it had taken for her to get the courage to do it, but she had been brave enough to let me in, to admit that she finally wanted more in her life than the safe little bubble she had created for herself.
“Or maybe I’m just not good enough for you for to give it up.’
Her words were swimming around my head, goading me and prickling my skin with a feeling that was akin to guilt. That wasn’t even a question – in fact, she was the only person who had ever made me even reconsider what I was doing with my life. There were so many other issues involved, like finances, and job hunting, and facing up to what I had become. Did I want to give up everything I had right then? I had savings, but they would be gone in a matter of months, unless I downgraded my apartment dramatically. Even if I got the smallest, dankest, filthiest apartment I could find, it would still take a lifetime to find a job when I have such a big, unexplainable gap in my cv. It wouldn’t look good to a potential employer, and there were no explanations that would sound anything but vague and dodgy.
Chloe moved, twisting her body to face me and letting out a loud sigh. Her large brown eyes fluttered opened, landing on my face with an unfocused glaze. It was quite adorable, watching her wake up and put the pieces of the night before back together. I could see the moment when she was truly awake, and I held in a chuckle when her eyes widened. She blushed, embarrassed that she had woken up in my bed, once again.
“Have I ever told you that you’re an asshole?” She muttered, giving me a shove that wasn’t very effective when she saw my smirk.
“You may have mentioned it last night before you stormed in here. Nice entrance, by the way. It was by far the classiest moment I’ve seen from you.”
“You’re also a dick.”
“You may have also called me that too at some point. You’ve got a real filthy mouth for someone so tiny.”
“Ugh, I’m too tired to think of anything emasculating and insulting right now. My head hurts,” she muttered.
“If you promise to be nice when your headache goes away, I might get you some aspirin,” I offered.
“You know I can’t promise any such thing.”
“That’s too bad. I was thinking of putting some death metal music on, put the speakers on full volume, like I do on Sunday mornings.”
“Don’t you dare!”
“You’re right, it’s a bit too early for that. Maybe I’ll just put some Misfits on.”
“Fine, fine. I’ll be nice.Just get me some aspirin!And, for the love of God, no music!Please.”
“Well, since you asked so nicely.”
I didn’t really want to get up, and it was nothing short of a struggle to get my ass out of bed and into the bathroom, where I stored my painkillers. Since I was up, I grabbed a glass of water for her, guessing that she was probably as dehydrated as the desert right then. She had the covers over her head when I came back, and for a few seconds I wondered if she had fallen asleep again. I crawled back under the covers, and her head came back out.
“Why is everything always so much brighter when I’m hungover?”
“Why is the world round? Why is the sky blue? Some things we’ll just never know.”
I handed her the water and pills, which she devoured greedily. I don’t know if it was the hangover, or if maybe she felt she was passed the point of embarrassment, but it was nice to see her so…relaxed, so uninhibited. She curled back into a ball when she handed me the glass back, and out of some sort of weird instinct, I curled up behind her, spooning her again, without the boob grabbing. She welcomed my embrace, and the silence that fell between us was comfortable in a way I’d rarely experienced with a woman. I took in the smell of her shampoo, a mix of coconut and what smelled like vanilla. I don’t know how long we stayed like that, just wrapped in each other. It couldn’t last forever, though, unfortunately. Chloe shuffled onto her back, staring at the ceiling with a blank expression.
“Headache gone?”
“Not completely, but it’s much better.”
“You know, there’s another way of getting rid of a headache that’s proved effective.”
She must have still been too tired to catch my drift when she murmured a dumb "what?”.
She caught on a few moments later, when I rolled on top of her, pinning her arms over her head. She flushed, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, but she didn’t stop me when I planted a kiss on her jaw, then licked my way to her ear. She arched her back when I nibbled on the shell of her ear, loving the shocked gasp of pleasure that spilled from her mouth. I held her in place when she wiggled, rubbing her hips against me to hurry things along. I ignored it – torturing her to the point where she was begging for me was an opportunity I couldn’t miss. I kept my attention on her neck and collar bone for a while, with light bites and kisses that left her panting with exertion. It was always an ego boost to see a woman moaning underneath you, but having a woman normally so ice cold melt under your ministration was nothing short of exhilarating. By the time I was in her, she was already a writhing mess beneath me, and it wasn’t too long before we both came hard and fast.
“I think your method for getting rid of headaches is better,” she giggled once she recovered her breath, her head resting on my chest and heart still beating widely, something she could probably hear from her resting place.
“Sixty percent of the time, it works every time.”
“Did you just quote Brian Fantana?”
“Why not? The guy’s my hero.”
She giggled, still breathless from our recent activity.
“What is this, Gerard?”
The question was sudden, and though I had been prepared for it, it still caught me off guard that it was being sprung upon me with no warning.
“What do you want this to be?”
The little bubble we’d been in vanished when she sat up, letting reality in, and destroying the peaceful atmosphere. It felt like we were back to the tension that so often filled the air between us. This was a conversation that could go very, very wrong, and as much as I didn’t want to have it right then, it was inevitable that it was going happen.
“I like you,” she sighed, “despite the fact that you’re the most annoying, infuriating human being I have ever met. You crowd my space when I don’t want you around, and you make me laugh even when I just want to punch that irritating smirk off your face. You’re arrogant, smug and-“
“Amazing in bed?” I couldn’t help cutting her off, knowing it would bring a blush to her cheeks.
“You’re not that good.” She rolled her eyes.
“Good enough to make a living off it,” I teased, though I soon realised that I said exactly the wrong thing.
“Yeah,” she said, turning her gaze to the covers with a look of defeat on her face.
I sat up, hating that I had put that look on her face.
“I…I meant what I said last night. If I could change the choices I made, I would… You’re the biggest bitch I’ve ever met, and way too violent, but I like being around you. You’re a nice person on occasion…and I wish I could give you what you need.”
“You could stop, you know? Would that be so hard?” she sounded angry, and a little distraught. I was surprised she wasn’t lashing out at me, but her eyes remained fixed on the covers, her hand picking at some imaginary hole in the fabric.
“It’s not so simple. I haven’t had a legal job in the last five years, Chloe. Even if someone was willing to hire me to work a shitty low paid job in a field I have no interest in, it’ll be tough to explain a five year gap on my CV. I have bills to pay, I need to eat. I have savings, but they’ll dry up within months. Maybe they’ll last a year, if I move apartment.”
“Do you want to give it up?”
“Yes,” I spoke without thought.
“You…” she stopped herself, biting her bottom lip, “what if you didn’t have to worry about bills? You could try getting back into comics, or something?”
“If you find someone willing to keep me, let me know,” I chuckled darkly.
“I do have a good job, you know,…” she trailed off after a heartbeat of silence, looking at me beneath her lashes for a flicker of a second before she looked away again, her cheeks reddening to a deeper shade, if possible.
“What?” my tone was shaper than intended, but I was stunned by the words that had left her mouth. I was certain that I had misheard her. There was no way she was suggesting what I thought she was. Or she was joking.
“I earn a good wage, more than enough to pay for rent and bills,and…I have a spare room, I mean…fuck,” she groaned, bringing her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. She gripped her hair with one hand, frustrated and flustered. I realised with a lump in my throat that she wasn’t joking.
I didn’t know how to respond. She was offering something so freely, and I doubted she even knew what it was she was giving without thought. On one level, it was an offer that sounded perfect. It was a way out of prostitution, a chance to get back into the field I had once tried so hard to break into. Without money worries, things would be perfect, on paper. I wasn’t used to depending on others, though, and I wasn’t stupid enough to think that I wouldn’t eventually become resentful, or that she wouldn’t resent me if it took too long for things to work out. That was without considering if we’d even make a relationship work. Could she ever really get over what I had been…what I still was, as of that moment?
“Chloe…not that I don’t appreciate what you’re offering, but…do you realise what you just offered?”
Her eyes narrowed, a little offended bythe question, as though I was questioning her intelligence. It was legitimate to ask, though. Maybe she had a fairytale notion of what life would be like. Maybe she wanted a ‘Pretty Woman’ ending, where she could just take care of me and things would just be rosy.
“You said you wanted to stop. I’m offering you a chance to do that. You’d find a job, Gerard. It might take a while, but I know a few people, and so do the girls… You can fix your CV up a little, smudge a few facts. Maybe you could try and sell some of your sketches as well? I don’t know why you aren’t doing it already. You’re good. I’m not trying to emasculate you, or save you. I’m just…offering you a chance. Is that so bad?”
“No,” I spoke softly, my chest tightening and constricting my oxygen intake. Fuck, how could someone who cut me down with vicious insults half the time, turn around and suddenly give me a chance to be something else, something better.
“Then why not? Fuck, I can’t believe I’m saying this. I just…I spent so long not wanting anyone. I wanted to be alone, terrified that I would meet another guy like my ex. I didn’t believe I would meet someone who could make me forget about all the shitty things I hate about myself. Then I met you and I…I don’t expect anything of you, I really don’t. I don’t know where this will go, but I want to find out. I don’t care about your past, I can deal with it. I just…I can’t pretend that it wouldn’t kill me to be with you, knowing that you're with other women, even if it’s just sex for money. I could try, but it wouldn’t work. And you can’t do it forever. Maybe you’ll get another ten years, if you’re lucky. Then what will you do? I know this is a bit heavy, and yes it’s fucking crazy that I’m asking you to live with me, but I’m more afraid of you saying no than anything else right now.”
“Who knew the ice queen could be so emotional?” I quipped with a smile, trying to break the tension a little.
She glared at me, hiding a smirk.
“I’m not expecting an answer now, but…think about it?”
“I don’t need to think about it,” I spoke my thoughts out loud.
Her face fell, disappointment setting in her eyes.
“I’d be a fool to say no. And I think I kinda wanna see where this goes too.”
Then she smiled. An honest to God, warm-hearted, happy smile. It was the prettiest thing I’d ever seen, and I knew right then that no matter what happened, it was worth it just to make her smile like that.

Notes

Aaww, a sweet and fluffy chapter. Surely this can't last, I hear you say? Well, maybe, maybe not...you'll have to wait and find out. This has about...four chapters let, I'd say. So, hold onto your hats!

Oh, and feedback is awesome, so if you can leave some I'd appreciate it!

Lyra