Page 45 of Marking Micah

When her mind began to clear she realized he was rocking her, humming a quiet tune, occasionally kissing her hair.

Who was this man? This man who could take her to such heights, then sit with her through her worst moments? He was so, so solid. And she knew he would catch her no matter how hard she might fall.

“Arrow?” Her voice sounded rusty and unused in her ears.

“Yes, darlin’? What do you need?”

“Just this. Just… you.”

“I’m right here,” he told her for probably the hundredth time since her accident.

For the hundredth time, she knew it was true.

She breathed him in, let his voice reassure her. Then she said, “I need to tell you some things.”

“Okay.”

“When my accident happened, I remember… seeing Brett’s face. The shock on it. But he was behind you. Like he’d stepped back when I fell.”

“Yeah, honey,” Arrow said quietly.

“I’ve always wondered if it was true. I understand why you’d never tell me. But I knew all along it was you who tried to catch me. You were the one who was there from the moment it happened until… now.”

He didn’t say anything, just stroked her hair, allowing her to think, to remember.

“And I have these fuzzy flashes of the EMT’s, of being in the ambulance, and you were right there the whole time. And even when they took me into surgery for the brain bleed, I felt like you were with me, holding my hand. I mean, I know you weren’t in the operating room, obviously, but… you have no idea…” She had to pause, more tears clogging her throat, but she managed to swallow them down. “You have no idea what that meant to me. You’ve always been my safety. And Chara was with me all those terrible months, too, and I love her for it, but you… youhadme. So completely I’ve never really known what to do with it.” She had to stop for a moment, to find the courage to say what she needed to say, finally.

“Do you remember when we were talking and I told you how pissed I was at Brett?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Well.” She paused, cleared her throat. “I think the thing I’m the maddest about is… I feel like he stole from me the ability to feel like I can ever have… love. Like, what happened with him turned me into this total mess that’s way too much for anyone to deal with. So I’d sort of resigned myself to being alone. I haven’t been able to even think about getting too close to anyone, because… because then they’d see what a wreck of a person I am, and they’d run. And I wouldn’t blame them. Not one bit.”

“Do you see me running?” Arrow demanded, his voice raw with emotion.

She shook her head. “No. Not even for a minute.”

“And you’ve allowed yourself to get close to me,” he said.

“Yes, but we were close before the accident.”

“Not like we have been since then.”

“Because you were always with me, taking care of me,” she protested, not even sure what her argument was.

“And why do you think I’ve been doing that? Do you think I feel like you’re too much of a mess to care about?”

She covered her face with her hands. “I don’t know. You didn’t have to do it. You didn’t have to be there for me the way you were, the way you are, always.”

“I’ve been here all this time because I wanted to be. Because I needed to be.”

She lifted her head to look into his eyes, knowing her face was a mess. But it didn’t seem important right then.

“Arrow? Why? Why do you need to be here with me?”

“You know why,” he said, raw emotion all over his face.

“You’re really going to make me say it?Now?” she asked, almost wanting to laugh.

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