Chapter Text
Day 11, Monday
Wanda: Why didn't you come for class this morning?
Eleven and a half days, that was how many days worth of messages that were piled up on your phone right now as you sat at the back of this Lyft crawling into the woody lands of upstate New York.
The days had begun to blur into one another and even though you had requested from your telecom to close your voicemail for now, their daily messages hadn't stopped since you broke off all forms of contact from the two women.
You couldn’t talk to them, let alone see them. Even a floating memory of what happened two weeks ago set your cheeks ablaze with shame.
You stared at the message with a neutral expression. It felt as if nothing would phase you anymore. No threat, no ultimatum, no humiliation, no promise would pull you out of this hole that you had dug yourself. Though you had decided to react to every message indifferently– for the third time since this morning– you found yourself scrolling through your phone finding past messages from the two women.
You shifted in your seat, craning your neck as your hand reached up to give it a comforting rub. The skies outside your Lyft mirrored the growing darkness in your soul. Yet, in an odd and inexplicable way, you found their messages just enough to sufficiently ease the growing lump in your throat.
Day 1, Friday
Wanda: Hi dear, Don't worry about the essay that's due today as I am giving you an extension until next Friday. I hope this will ease some things.
Wanda: Kate says you're down with a cold. I shouldn't have made you stand out there in the cold for so long last night. It was my fault. Are you feeling okay?
Day 2, Saturday
Wanda: Hey there, are my messages getting through? Are you okay?
Day 3, Sunday
Natasha: How are you? Heard that you were down with a cold on Friday. Have you seen a doctor? Are you feeling better?
Day 4, Monday
Natasha: Wouldn't ask if this wasn't urgent but Wanda and I would appreciate your help with the boys around noon tomorrow. Are you up for it?
Day 5, Tuesday
Wanda: Hi, you haven't replied Nat so we assumed that you were not free today. Are you able to come around 8pm tomorrow night?
Wanda: Hi, are you avoiding our messages because of what happened last week?
Wanda: If this is what I think it is, I just want to affirm you. You are a lovely girl and you have helped us so much in the past 6 years with us. We have seen you grow into a beautiful young woman. I am sorry we were so ignorant to your struggles. And I am sorry for making things uncomfortable last Thursday. Nothing has changed. I am so worried for you. Please give us a chance to talk.
Missed call from Wanda.
Missed call from Natasha.
Natasha: Our family loves you and misses you very much. The twins can't stop talking about you, they keep asking where you are. We told them you were on vacation. We cherish you so much, more than you know and we are sorry that it didn't come across that way to you. Please text us back?
Wanda: Nothing has changed. We are still here if you want to talk. Let us know when you're ready?
You paused at this longer string of texts from a single day, reading and re-reading it as glassy drops began to crowd your eyes. You weren't sure if you were touched or angered. They knew nothing. You were strangers to one another. How did they dare treat you with such tenderness?
You hated this. The push and pull of this relationship. The push towards accepting love as a norm and the pull of your reality.
Day 6, Wednesday
Natasha: Are you able to come by tomorrow 4-6pm? We want to talk to you, see how we can set things right again.
Missed call from Natasha
Day 7, Thursday
2 Missed calls from Natasha.
Natasha: Hi. I just wanted to apologize on behalf of the both of us. We were very concerned for you as you haven’t replied in a week. Please text us back. Please.
Day 8, Friday
Missed call from Wanda.
Missed call from Wanda.
Wanda: Asking Kate to submit your essay on your behalf is not acceptable to me. Please drop me an email explaining your absence and late submission. I expect to see you personally at my office on Monday with essay in hand.
Missed call from Wanda.
Wanda: Please don't walk further away from us… We want to help.
Day 9, Saturday
Natasha: Hi, can you reply to either of us please? Or at least go to class? How will you graduate if you keep this up? We will understand if you are mad at us, and maybe we are annoying you with all these texts but we just care so much for you. Please text us back?
Day 10, Sunday
Missed call from Wanda.
Wanda: Please see me after class tomorrow.
Day 11, Monday
Wanda: Why didn't you come for class this morning?
You shrugged as you reread the latest message from today again, imprinting it into your mind.
Wanda: Why didn't you come for class this morning?
Wanda: Why didn't you come for class this morning?
Wanda: Why didn't you come for class this morning?
You couldn't have been able to make it for class today even if you wanted to. With your household's sudden loss of income due to your pathetic inability to face your two employers, you had to take on a new job. Housesitting.
However, this job also meant that you wouldn't be as close to home as you'd like. The thought of this sent a pinch through your heart. Your first assignment was almost an hour and a half away from home. But your initial hesitancy about the distance was curbed when Kate offered to keep a lookout for your siblings while you were gone.
Although this morning when you looked at them, they suddenly looked all grown up.
Without the income from babysitting, the two older boys have gone and done odd jobs, with James, who was 17 and a junior in highschool taking up a cashiering job at Bergdorf while John, despite only being 13, was taking time after school to tutor Lotte's friends. Little Charlotte or Lotte, who was 9 and the baby of the family, would help out at Kate's family bakery after school, although you weren't sure if she was more help or trouble.
Even though part of you knew that the day your siblings going to work would be inevitable in a household like yours, the other part absolutely detested yourself because you had always wanted to shelter them from this reality as long as you could but you had failed so miserably.
So this job would be perfect to tide the family over for a month… At least until you could make a decision about what to do on the Maximoff-Romanoff's end.
Your hands hovered over the phone, contemplating a reply to Wanda that would be mercy on your end but you were interrupted by the car coming to a halt before a beautiful cabin.
"Hi Miss, we are here," the Lyft driver said as the doors unlocked with a click. You quickly shoved your phone into your pocket before joining him at the boot of the car where he lifted your luggage to the ground.
You stared at the house as the mechanical whir of the car rolled further and further away, your ears becoming acutely aware of the nature around you. You had forgotten how it felt like to be amongst nature. After your mother died, your father uprooted the whole family and moved into the shoebox apartment you all still lived in. Better job opportunities, he had explained. But really, you knew it was because the woods reminded him too much of your mother.
You believed in the concept of fate. The only thing one could do to stop it from catching up to them was to keep moving. That was why people were always asking other people to move on. Let go. Forgive. Forget. Do it as fast as possible. It was integral that we moved on– to stop fate from growing arms and gripping us in its steady hold.
In the end though, fate still caught up with your father.
Because fate has it that he was to be with your mother. So when fate finally caught up with him, it led him to a metaphorical cliff where there was nowhere else to go but downwards. When he fell, you could hear his tranquil scream crawl against your skin and you could feel, smell, hear and see him everywhere, though you were too young– you weren't sure how to catch him.
That had been six years ago. Today, you were twenty-one years old. Those years felt lives ago. Yet, you found yourself still struggling with this raging self-hatred. Why? Why me? You questioned. But there were never any answers.
You took in a deep breath of fresh green notes and allowed a quiet smile to appear on your weary face.
The door opened with a creak as you were let in and you made a beeline for the kitchen, hoping to get a glass and when you couldn't find the right ones, you headed back to your own luggage and pulled out a bottle of pinot noir that, ironically, was gifted by the two women on your twenty-first.
The phone was vibrating in your pocket and as you pulled it out, you saw that Natasha was trying to call you again.
Ping!
Natasha: This has been going on for too long. You wanted space and we have given it to you. But we are done giving you space. It has been over a week.
You rolled your eyes at her message and turned your phone off even though you knew that there would be endless messages for the next two weeks. But it would hurt to read the messages and hurt even more to look at their futile attempts of communication.
The bottle popped open as you hit it hard against a wooden pillar, planning to drink straight from the bottle. You made a feeble attempt to fling your phone to the back of your luggage because you knew that an hour from now, you would be drunk enough for the melodramatics and your phone would have found itself at the bottom of the garbage disposal.
Then about a half bottle in, you ran yourself a sub-zero bath and sank yourself into it, fully clothed. It was enough to shock your system but you persevered, knees, waist, breasts. The unhealed angry slashes on your arms were both soothed and angered by the frigid water. As they soaked, tiny red wisps escaped them. Blood. You swirled your arms around in the water, watching as the red wisps diluted with the water molecules to disappear.
Finally, you closed your eyes and lowered your entire head into the water where you allowed yourself to suffocate for a while until the little aveolis in your lungs were bursting with un-exhaled carbon dioxide. The feeling of your finger pads ghosting over the slippery edges of the bathtub was numbing.
When you finally pulled yourself up and out of the water, you were shivering so hard it became a great struggle to barely contract your diaphragm enough for full breaths. The oakwood floor hungrily soaked up all the fat water droplets dripping from you until you made it a point to wrap yourself in a towel, wet clothes still on your body.
And you sat there in a growing dark spot on the couch where you stared outwards into the woods and contemplated the state of your life.
____________________
Day 12, Tuesday
Wanda: Why didn't you come for class again?
Natasha: If you’re wondering why we haven’t called the police on you, you may thank your friends who have been keeping us updated about your life status but their lips are sealed. Are you really this mad at us?
Natasha: This incident has led us to realize that we don’t know you as much as we would like to. And for that, we are sorry. We would like to get to know you. Please reply us…
Missed call from Natasha.
Natasha: When are you going to stop being angry at us? We are trying to help.
Day 13, Wednesday
Wanda: Please come for Friday's class as I am going through important information for the upcoming test. And if I don’t see you essay by Friday, I will be writing you up to the student services and I will definitely be seeing you again in my class next semester.
Wanda: I can’t believe Nat and I are only now realizing that we don’t know your unit number. If we don’t see you on Friday, Nat and I will be personally ringing up every door in your block.
Missed call from Natasha.
Missed call from Natasha.
Natasha: Hi, Wanda’s pissed. Maybe just send us an emoji if you’re well?
Day 14, Thursday
Natasha: Please be present at Wanda's class tomorrow. The both of us would like to talk to you after the lesson.
___________________
Day 15, Friday
Radio silence. That was what Wanda was at the receiving end of. It had been two weeks. Natasha and her were worried sick about you. Although she knew you were most likely still alive, having seen your other friends around in school, the feeling of not being able to keep track of where you were still made her uneasy.
Wanda whipped out her phone. It was ten minutes past her evening class which would be the last for most of the students here. Except, your group of friends were obviously missing from the hall.
"We are still missing some people. I'll just give it 5 more minutes before we start," Wanda reported uncharacteristically before whipping out her phone to text you.
Wanda: Class is starting soon and I don't see you here. This is not okay. Where are you?
The door opened with a click and a hopeful glint was in Wanda's eye as she looked up. She saw your tall dark haired friend. The professor craned her neck to try to spot you amongst your usual group and her heart sank when she realized that you weren't with them.
"Kate," she called out as your friend made her way into class.
Kate looked at her friends for a bit before moving down the small seminar room and towards the brunette.
"Yes Prof?" she feigned innocence.
"Where's she? She didn't come with you?"
"She's not coming today." She shrugged.
"Why? She's supposed to submit her essay today." Kate hesitated for a second and Wanda caught on. "You know why. Tell me," Wanda requested sternly.
"She told me not to tell anyone, especially you."
"Tell me."
"I don't know– I–"
"Tell me," Wanda insisted, before adding on a reassuring note, "I won't look for her."
Kate sighed deeply. She knew that the brunette professor was not going to start class until she had gotten something out of her. "I– Well– She got a new job. It's upstate. She started on Monday so she's going to be there for another week or so. I don't know where she went exactly because she knew you were going to get it out of me. Sorry," your tall friend shrugged, "Wish I could tell you more. But she's safe and she's doing okay."
"She's still in contact with you– and your other friends?"
"Up until Monday when Lila updated Prof Nat. But she did say she'll be offline for a while."
"Okay– Okay, okay. Thanks Kate. You may go back to your seat."
She took out her phone and began typing at it again.
Wanda: When you're back from your upstate job, Nat and I would like to speak with you whether you–
The professor was so focused on crafting her text that she failed to notice the appearance of her wife in her lecture hall. A murmur was spreading amongst the students which was atypical of this class.
She looked up, confused at the growing loudness of the class and was shocked by the sudden appearance of her wife who was already at the bottom of the steps.
Natasha leaned in and whispered into her ears, her hand coming up to hold tightly onto the brunette. By the end of the conversation, the rest of the students could see Prof Maximoff's quivering lip.
"Class is dismissed today," she declared lifelessly, the class erupting with joy. Natasha watched her wife’s muted expression as the brunette hastily shoved the clicker and laptop into her shoulder bag and following her wife out of the lecture hall.
___________________
The heavy thumps on the door jolted you from your laptop. You turned to look at the raindrops cutting across the sky and deciphered that it would be impossible for anyone sane to pay a visit in this weather.
The thuds grew heavier with each pound but you calmly took a jumper to cover yourself before walking towards the door. Just by looking at the silhouette across the stained glass door, you already knew who was standing on the other side and you weren't looking forward to this.
With your chin held up high, you looked at the woman who stood at your door, allowing the headlights from Wanda's car to cast a long shadow of tragedy into the cabin.
She says your name but it trembles against her throat. You're unable to decipher if she was shaking from the cold or from shock. Her coat was wrapped tightly around her as she held the umbrella close above her head. The wind was whipping her hair around.
“No,” You said.
“Pleas–”
The door shut right in the brunette's face. The storm sent another loud clap through the sky but even then, she remained still.
Wanda knew you could see her figure outside the door though you were not even close to flinching when rain drops lashed upon her, whipping her skirt around her knees, slapping her clothes wet against her chest. Wanda's silence was her plea. Like the winds, her words died mid air– mid sentences. When you opened the door once again, green into brown, you both remained like this, searching and discerning.
Her eyes looked desperately frantic– glazed over with a sheet of tears so thick, you fought to see what laid underneath.
The car door opened and slammed, causing her to look back.
"Myshka, I told you to stay in the car." Wanda snapped at your little sister as she darted through the heavy raindrops. You were about to hiss back at the woman for using a tone on your sister but she continued, "You're gonna get sick in this weather!"
You found yourself looking over her shoulder at your little sister in disbelief. The little girl was completely drenched in both rain and tears by the time her face plummeted into your chest.
"Lotte… Wanda–"
You watched another sob wreck through your sister and you felt puzzled, trying to comfort her as best as you could. "Lotte, what's wrong?"
"Listen to me," Wanda said, "Nobody could contact you but you were listed as his emergency contact and guardian. We have to go, now."
You couldn't believe your ears. This was what the police had said when they turned up at your house right before you had to go to the hospital to say goodbye to your mother. What was Wanda doing? Was she trying to mock you misery?
"What? No! First you kidnap my sister and now you're trying to trick me to–"
"Please stop." she warned so sternly it stopped you mid accusation.
You glared at her.
"It's your brother," she said again, this time quieter.
Wanda, unable to look you in the eye, turned her gaze into the distance and you imagined her to be recounting the accident as though it was happening right here, right behind you, right now.
It was only a half past four but the sun was setting very fast that particular evening. While the skies were still a purple bruise, twin boys were playing their favorite playground with a new babysitter. One of them was hit by the other and the one hit bolted towards the end of the playground. A driver was in a heated argument with his wife who was in the passenger seat. A teenager was walking home from school with his younger sister. The driver had missed the first traffic light, halting abruptly at the stop line. The teenager ushered his sister across the pedestrian crossing instead of the next one. And one of the twins slipped past his babysitter and onto the busy Manhattan road.
As the teenager reaches the end of the crosswalk, and the lights turn green and the driver accelerates, the teenager catches a little boy dashing across the street.
And it all happened too expeditiously– too hastened for something this bad to occur. “Because it would make it impossible to stop."
Your brother jumped into action, pushing Billy onto the other sidewalk as the distracted driver continued driving forward.
If one thing had just happened differently. If the Tommy hadn't hit Billy. If the driver hadn't been distracted in his argument with his wife. If your brother hadn't chosen to pick your younger sister up. If the new babysitter had kept a closer eye or had better reflexes. If the driver hadn't missed his traffic light. If your brother hadn't crossed this particular street.
If it had been you babysitting the boys instead. None of this would have happened.
But all the circumstances had fallen into one another to create the perfect tragedy. And James was run over; Twice. Once backward, once forward by an oblivious driver who wasn't sure what he had driven over. And the grotesque cracking of a teen’s strong bones, that sounded just like a tree branch breaking off during a heavy storm, impaled the stale evening.
“Oh God," you clasped your free hand over your mouth. You felt yourself queasy with grief but when you wanted to lurch over and pour out your emotions, you had to look at your little sister still weeping harshly against your chest.
In the midst of everything, you attempted to bring yourself down from that cloud of anxiety to calm her but her sobs weren't getting any shallower even with each comforting circle drawn on her back.
Wanda could tell from your faltering hand on your sister's back that you needed space for yourself but that you were trying to be the stronger older sibling, the same way her own brother was to her. So she pulled your little sister from your small frame and allowed the girl to wrap her legs around steady body, carrying the nine year old as she would a toddler. She bounced lightly, up and down, up and down, despite the extra weight, trying to pacify the girl.
Yet, her eyes remained firmly on you as she watched your face contort with sharp agony, as though someone had sent a knife through you. At the relieving loss of your responsibility as a pillar of support, your knees suddenly buckled to give out underneath you. Despite having her hands full with your sister, she still managed to dip herself to catch you.
"We have to go," she whispered to you once again.
And this time, you didn't resist.
____________________
In, out. In, out. In, out.
The ventilator that was helping your brother breathe was chugging at a consistent pace, never letting up. You allowed yourself to breathe in the same intervals– a free therapy tool to keep yourself calm as you were alone now, with your thoughts.
It was just past eleven at night and way past bedtimes for your younger sibling. But they had insisted on staying over together with you. So your sister and brother were on the couch in the hospital, sound asleep.
And you weren't exactly sure where Wanda and Natasha went but there was a vague memory about getting clothes and toiletries for your family.
Your head was buried deep into your hands, and you felt guilty that the first thing that crossed your mind was how you were ever going to afford any of the surgeries, treatments and therapies your brother would eventually need.
You were not in the right state of mind to make any decisions but at that moment, you decided that you wanted to sign him out Against Medical Advice now. Right this instance. You couldn't even think straight. How would you even cope with the ventilator at home? What would happen if he had another medical emergency? He was due for another surgery in the morning but getting everyone back home where it was safe felt like the number one priority right now.
You had poured all these demands out over the nurses counter where the women were trying to conciliate your inner monologue.
Before long, you were screaming at the top of your voice, at the nurses, asking them why this had happened to your family again, screaming at yourself about how you could let this happen.
By the time both Natasha and Wanda returned, your two other siblings' faces were soaked in tears of fear and concerned looking nurses while you flailed around like a mad man.
Natasha gasped before rushing towards you. She looked concerned but you were suddenly scared of her. You took a a few quick steps backwards in quick succession, the sheen of glossiness in your eyes cracking as tears bled down your cheeks. But she was much faster and much stronger than you expected. And her hand hooked onto your back, halting your retreat.
"Hey," she tried again, "Easy, easy."
You looked everywhere but at her.
"Hey."
She tugged you closer so you were half in her arms. "Hey." She said again, firmer this time. This time you pointed your gaze at her but her face was filled with so much tenderness, it made you feel disgusted.
"Fuck you," you shout echoed against the hospital walls.
Her eyes grew wide at the explicative.
You tried again, "Fuck. You."
She opened and closed her mouth several times, seemingly at a loss of what she should say to you. And you felt her grip falter for a split second, only to snake around your back, pulling you into her chest.
“Let go of me you fucking Bitch!” You shook your arm out of Natasha’s form grip with a mighty explicative.
She held onto you and pulled you in but you didn’t freeze like the last time, no. You were going to do everything but that. Because doing that would mean you've accepted this. Whatever this was. So you squirmed, pushed, bit, slapped and hit her.
Your struggle felt like an endless pit suspended in time, at least until she lost her rigid grip on you and you slipped away like sand from a closed fist.
Voices yelled after you but you were long gone, back into the darkness.
____________________
Keys shook with a might as Natasha's shaky hands guided them into the keyhole of your family apartment. They dashed in, searching every crevice until they laid their eyes on the room in the deepest corner of the flat.
"Fuck!" the redhead yelled as her hand turned the knob to your bedroom.
Wanda tried after her wife. It was locked shut.
There's banging on the door. "Let us in. Are you okay? Please open the door now."
Their pleas were only met by your silence.
It had been at least five minutes of pounding on the door. "Please let us in," Wanda's distraught pummel against the door grew quieter with each passing one as she no longer found the will to do so. "Please…"
"Kick it down," Wanda whimpered to her wife with tears streaming down her eyes. Natasha took in a shaky breath as she reared herself the furthest she could in your small living area before charging towards the bedroom door.
Their steps were frantic as they approached you with a haste they didn't know they had in them. It was Wanda who entered first, her breath hitching. She found you in the far end, back slumped against the cold bathroom tiles opposite from where they stood, door wrecked.
At the sight of you, both her hands clasped tightly over her mouth in soundless horror.
"Oh God, oh God. What did you do?" Natasha gasped behind her wife as a metallic scent in the air assaulted her nostrils.
Nothing would have prepared them for your bloodied body. There was a razor blade lying adjacent to your arm, a careful placement that contradicted the messiness of the environment. Even through their blinding tears, they could see that your sleeves were pushed up to the elbows, bare skin bleeding from angry and open slashes that you had reopened with a ferocious might.
Natasha looked over at her wife whose knees hit the ground so hard she was sure that a bruise would be forming right about now. With her brunette partner immobilized by fear, Natasha pushed past her and began rummaging through your medicine cabinet, looking for anything– anything to stop the blood that was leaking like a faulty faucet from your gashes. But even then, she knew that nothing could stop the hemorrhage of your soul.
You sat there for what felt like twenty minutes, Natasha’s hand holding steady pressure on the deeper ones. It was supposed to be comforting, yet you found that the concentric circles of pain just kept widening.
"Can you look at me?” Natasha’s thumb gently lifted your head but you shook your head off her hands.
You winced again, though not out of pain.
“No,” your weak voice was feather-light, “I can’t.”
She pulled the cloth from your arms, observing for any more bleeders before concluding that you were going to be alright.
"Please?" she begged.
You looked up, just for a brief moment, although that was enough to catch the raw state of her face, puffy with emotions and so wounded with pain, your pain.
“I have to clean you up.”
You inspected your arms. You’ve been here just long enough for your body’s clotting mechanism to start working. It was difficult to tell but it looked like none of it was too deep for you to handle.
“I can do it myself. It’s not like I’ve never done this before,” you snapped at her pointedly but felt sorry almost instantly. “Sorry,” you managed under your breath, “I just wish you’d go away. I don’t want you to see me like that”.
“It’s okay,” she breathed, taking a single step back. Curious eyes watched as you cleaned yourself expertly and her heart wrenched when she heard tiny winces escaping you, creases growing on your forehead from the pain.
“Hurts?” Natasha observed aloud.
“Not if I deserve it.”
The redhead was stunned at your casual statement of self directed hate. She turned to look at her wife for help. There was an awkward silence.
“You don’t deserve this, myshka,” Wanda finally spoke.
“You hesitated. You didn’t even mean that,” you shot back at her as you continued running your arm under the cool water. But you saw her hand appear from the side, stretching out towards you. There was a curiosity in your hum as her fingers danced expertly across your slashed skin.
She trembled as she held your arm, and you watched on in curiosity as her fingers dived between each gash, cleaning away any stubborn blood stains. Once the faucet was turned off, she didn't hesitate, setting the gauze into neat rows on your arms, preparing to hide them under a layer of bandage.
“You don’t deserve this," your body seized at her susarate that was spoken into your ear. Wanda took in a deep breath, using her thumb to sweep away at the tears you didn't even realize you were crying. You sat still for a while and allowed her gentleness to comfort you, your chin leaning slightly into her touches.
But then you shook your head, which swatted her hand out of the way, because you knew it was a lie that you didn't deserve this softness.
"Don't lie to me if you don't know anything," you said. Because you knew you only deserved every mistake, every tragedy, ever self-inflicted harm.
You weren't worthy. You had struggled for so long to reconcile between the state of your life and your worth. So when you made the decision to accept your unworthiness, you thought things would hurt less, except they didn't. You only felt nothing from then on, but even then, your decision brought you to this state of mind and you took pride in that. .
"You don't know anything," you echoed your words from earlier with a loud hiss at them, an attempt to remain indignant, angry and self-righteous that you were in control of everything– about the life you were in control of throwing away. And up until now, you were so sure of the inevitability that is– leaving this world.
But here these two mothers were, disrupting your plans and making it harder and harder to let go with each kind word, touch and embrace that they showered you with. Each one making you crave to be worthy once more and more and more. So you hated them. Because you didn't want to struggle again.
You said nothing.
"Please. We want to help," Natasha's pupils were dilated with pain, "We want to help but we can't help if we don't understand." The last of her words came out like a whimper. You had never seen Natasha this vulnerable before.
There would never be enough words that could explain that you were hollow and completely alone. They couldn't understand the dull ache of abandonment and detachment that lingered in your body long after your parents' last touch.
They could never understand the weight of your pain and the desperation to be free.
They would simply never understand a life of being you.
So despite their pleas, you allowed both of their worlds to collapse into one another as they weighed in on your silence, unsure what exactly they would, wanted, or could to do with you. They watched as the transparent beads began to form between the crevices of your eyes for the umpteenth time this evening.
And suddenly, you felt desperate to say more. You wanted to say, please don't leave me. Please, you're the only people I have. Please be here for me. Please hold me. Please. But the rest of your words were drowned in deep guttural choke.
At the sight of your struggle, Wanda took a tentative step forward to you. She looked at you and you tilted your head into your shoulder and tried to give her a coy smile but she saw right through your facade. She pulled you straight into her, her hand tangling through your hair to the back of your head as she inched you towards the crevice of her neck where your trembling chin rested. Where her body made contact with yours, you felt your skin burning up, a flame you didn't know you needed and a powerful sob was released from your chest.
"I'm sorry," you wept bitterly. And you could feel her relax in a shaky exhale that she let out.
"It's okay, we've got you," Natasha said as she stroked your hair from behind and placed a firm kiss on your temple. You nuzzled yourself further into Wanda who held you with all her might. Even in your weakened state, you wanted more. More of their touch, more of their love. You were so hollowed out, so starved, so painfully desperate.
The fierce spirit in you refused to rest and that was what helped you survive all these years. You had been destined an orphan but this– This spirit made you a fighter. Though, you didn't want to fight anymore. Fighting hurts so much. And an ache tightened across your heart, a deep yearning to be saved.
You opened your eyes to look at Natasha and you didn't dare to look away because they looked like they held a promise. For so long, the agonizing little hope that stewed in your heart was what kept you on the threshold of living, where you were neither really living nor really dying. Just searching.
She could see your body shaking against Wanda, a shameful lie was burrowing itself deep into your ribcage. Natasha wanted to stop it. She wanted to stop you from believing lies. She wanted you to know the truths.
"We see you," she whispered, her breath cutting short.
That phrase lit something up in you. It wasn't about making lemonades out of lemons or about things not being the end if they were not okay because that was just utter bullshit and you knew it. Instead, her words stuck like faith to a religious man– A promise to a desperate soul. Your desperate soul. Natasha sees you. Wanda sees you.
Even in hiding, they found you and now, they saw you in the light. And they were never letting you go again.
She sang a Russian lullaby to you, one you could only imagine was from her own childhood. Her singing voice was filled with a silky warmth, like torched milk on a bitter winter's night.
Wanda pulled herself apart from you slightly and dipped her head to catch your sparkling eyes.
"Tomorrow," she promised softly.
"Tomorrow, you will tell us everything."
You didn't realize how much you needed to hear those final sentences. Somehow, the thought of salvation had always been far away, an endeavor too impossible. But alas, Today, you laid here, between the arms of two mothers– Your salvation within the reaches of Tomorrows.