19

                                        

                                              
-🥋-
chapter nineteen



MADDIE



After spending time with Robby and getting changed, twenty minutes later I'm speed walking out of the gym.
Because even after all of that, my eyes still search for the boy with a broken smile in the middle of the crowd leaving the gym. 
Hundreds of people are bunched together to crowd in front of the entrance, making it almost impossible to find him. But when I finally spot his head over the crowd due to his height, I'm shoving my way through groups of people, calling out his name in hopes he'll hear me and come back to me. 
"Axel," I yell as I finally break out of the hoards of people. He's walking quickly away from me in the direction of his hotel. He doesn't glance behind him as I stand there hoping he does. He simply walks away from me alone with his bag slung over his shoulder. 
Running forward, I don't stop until I'm walking beside him. "Axel."
He doesn't look down at me as I say his name. He looks straight ahead with the most numb expression on his face it hurts something inside my chest. I say his name again, sterner this time. The only sign I get that he hears me is a twitch in his jaw muscles. 
"Axel, look at me," I tell him, speed walking forward so I'm standing in front of him. He stops walking as I hold my ground in front of him. "It was an accident, right? You didn't mean to break his leg?" Holding onto what little shred of hope, I look up at him. 
As he looks down, still refusing to make eye contact, I raise my hand, pinching the bridge of my nose. I can feel my insides slowly crumbling at the situation he's placed himself into. "Did he make you?"
The look in his eyes tells me everything I need to know. I look up at him as he still doesn't make eye contact with me. He doesn't look in my direction, but he doesn't need to for me to know he isn't here right now. When he stepped on the mats, he didn't look like himself. And now as he's stepped off them, he's gotten back a tiny sliver of him. 
If I want to help him, I need to bring it out before it can dissolve completely. "Axel, you don't need to follow his every command if you know it's wrong. You did so well today and I'm so proud and whatever he tells you does not define who you are."
His eyes are still directed to the floor, his long eyelashes preventing me from seeing the emotions in his eyes. "Can you look at me?"
His eyes flick upwards slightly, and I grab a small flash of deep blue. His body shakes slightly. If i noticed anything about him, he doesn't cry. His body just shakes instead. 
"Please look at me and listen to me. Don't go back there please. Be with me. You're hurt right now. Really, really hurt and I just want to help you. Only if you let me."
I step forward, gently reaching my hand forward to brush against his. "You can come home with me, and my dog will cuddle up to you and we can walk her along the beach. Like back in Barcelona. You don't need to go back to him. I want to help me. Let me help you."
After a moment of silence, the feeling of Axel's pinky finger wrap around mine makes me almost jump forward. His face remains in the same direction, his eyes anywhere but me. But his finger hooks around mine in a tiny gesture. "Maddie."
"Yeah, it's Maddie, your Maddie," I say, fighting to hide the tremble in my voice. "You know me, you trust me. I know things about you, you know things about me.  You're safe when you're with me. I'm not trying to use you, I'm just trying to look after you."
A shuddering breath leaves his throat as he exhales, closing his eyes for a moment. "Why? Nobody else cares."
"I do," I tell him. "I care about you."
"I don't understand why," he says. Then he finally looks at me and my heart stills. His eyes are like glass. So clear, yet fogged, cracked and almost broken. 
"I care because I know you. And I see everything in you that other may not." With my finger still wrapped around his, I use my other hand to wipe my eyes. "Do you know who you are right now?"
When he doesn't reply, I say, "You're Axel, that's who you are. Your favourite colour is green. Your birthday is the sixteenth of august. You're ten days older than me. You know yourself, and right now, you're not yourself. You're Axel."
He cocks his head slightly, like he wants to say so much more than he does. He's always been the silent type, but I want him to unload everything onto me. All of his fears, all of his regrets and all of his pain. I know I could take it. I can handle it and take some of the pain away from him. Because right now, I truly don't know if he can handle another thing. 
"Maddie, I can't," he finally breathes out, stepping away from me as he runs his hand over his hair. "He'll hurt me. And he'll hurt you more."
With tears growing in my eyes, I feel the sting. "Nothing he can do will ever hurt me. The only thing that hurts me, is when he hurts you. He can't hurt me because I won't allow it. I can take it and I will live through it if it means you don't have to."
"That's who you are," I tell him. "What I told you is what you've told me about yourself. You're not him. Remember who you are." It's a dangerous game, but I ask him with a shallow breath, "Do you remember what I told you about me?"
Axel steps away from me again, his chest rising and falling as he breathes. "I can't—" He quickly raises his hands to run them over his face. 
Despite my chest quite literally ripping open, and my heart falling out and shattering on the pathway, I force a smile on my face as I look at him. "It's okay." God, it hurts so badly. "It's okay."
"Something's gone wrong and I..." Axel trails off, his breathing racing. He runs his hands over his face again, leaving red handprints around his eyes. "I want you but— I can't."
As he picks up his bag from the floor, I watch as he slings it over his shoulder, beginning to walk away. Before he does, he stops walking until he stands right beside me. We're both facing difference directions, but only focusing on one thing. 
"I watched you on TV, by the way," he says. I spin around to face him. Through the thick tears in my eyes, I can make out the look in his eyes. I don't know if he's coming back to me or not. And I've never been so unsure about anything in my life. 
In another life, we'd be Axel and Maddie without everything pushing us apart. Because I'd managed to find the most broken boy in the world, and see something in him that is so beautiful, I can't help but admire it. I vowed to myself I'd help him, and I will loose myself in the process trying. I should have thought it through before I went and fell in love with him, but I'd never been one to do much thinking. My heart makes the rules, and my brain picks up the pieces. 
I went into this tournament as an entitled girl that had everything thrown at her. That girl never lost a single fight, or had never felt the pain of losing. I had lost once, but was tended to instantly. But now I've got a boy that keeps getting pulled away from me. I'll say that the challenge to keep him is the hardest thing I've ever endured in my life, but I'll go through it with a smile if it means he'd give me a heart thumping kiss again. This is the one thing the universe isn't letting me have, but I don't care.
That boy doesn't have any body in the world. Not a soul. If I could be the one person who cared about him, that was fine with me. If he knew I cared about him, I'd be okay with him not wanting me back anymore. 
I'd wait for his love, no matter how long it took. Even if I never received it in a million lifetimes. 

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18.02.2025

i'm so single it's actually sad. 
(how do we like the fact i've been updating daily at the exact same time)