Afraid of the Dark

Banner by Earl of Slander. I looooove it. It's gorgeous and I think it fits the mood of this story perfectly. One of my favorites so far. Thanks so much! :D

That afternoon, I made one last-ditch effort to stay away from Pete. I left Hurley's room and walked right past Pete's room, half-running down the hall to my own suite before my self-restraint collapsed and I went back to Pete's room. But once I was safely inside my huge, empty hotel room, all alone, I still couldn't make myself throw away Pete's note.

I unfolded it and set it down on the coffee table, and then I just sat on the couch staring at it for the longest time. The magazine with Pete's wedding pictures on the cover was still lying on the floor where I had left it earlier this morning. I made a point not to look at it as I bent down and flipped it over so that the lipstick ad on the back, instead of Pete's and Ashlee's smiling faces, was facing up. And I just kept staring at that damn note, without seeing the words, as I wondered what the hell I was supposed to do now.

The best thing to do would be to just wait it out. In two more days, Fall Out Boy and I would go our separate ways and I would most likely never see Pete again. If I could just keep from getting any more involved with him over the next two days, I would get on a plane and fly far away from here--away from him--and then there would be nothing left to do. Problem solved.

But the idea of just pretending that he didn't exist when he was just down the hall from me was almost as painful as the idea that, after just two short days, I would never see him again.

That was the real problem here: that there was no solution. It didn't matter what I did now, because time was running out before we both boarded different planes and never saw each other again. After that...after that...

What would happen to me? Would I miss him? Would I be lonely?

The questions seemed so silly. I had only known him for a few days. How could I miss him?

But it hurt to think about never seeing him, never speaking to him again...

And even if this wasn't the end of our relationship, it could never be a real relationship. He already belonged to someone else--he was married, he had a child. He couldn't just go home and tell Ashlee that he had met some girl in New York that he liked better. He couldn't just pack his bags and move in with me next month. He couldn't just leave.

And even if he could, he wouldn't want to. He loved Ashlee--he had told me so.

And it wasn't as if he was in love with me. He had never even so much as hinted at those kinds of feelings for me. My silly infatuation was completely one-sided.

That was all it was: a silly infatuation. As much as it gnawed at my peace of mind now, I was sure that I would forget him entirely in a matter of weeks, once I left him behind. It was just that he was so new, so different from anyone I had ever known before--I had mistaken the shock of him for something like love, that's all--I was just being silly--none of it even mattered anyway...

No, it didn't even matter.

Well, I could reassure myself that this was just a silly crush all I wanted, but when I answered the door half an hour later only to find Pete standing there with that lopsided grin on his face, I was caught between throwing myself at him and running away.

"What's wrong?" he said, his grin disappearing as he took in the torn look on my face.

I struggled to smile, but only succeeded in not scowling. "Oh--um--nothing..."

He looked even more concerned at my non-answer. "Are you mad at me?"

"No, of course not," I said, half laughing. "Why would I be mad?"

In one fluid motion, Pete shrugged, slipped his hands into his pockets, crossed his ankles, and leaned against the doorway. "Did you get my note?" he murmured.

"Oh. Yeah, I just...I've been working, and uh...I didn't really get a chance to--"

"That's fine," said Pete quickly. "I understand. I mean, you've got a job to do, and um... I get it, I just..." He stood upright again and backed into the hallway, shuffling his feet and not meeting my gaze as he explained with too many hand movements and long pauses. "I just..." He ran his hand over his face and held it there for a few seconds. Then he took a deep breath, looked right at me and said, "I don't even know why I came here. I just--I--nevermind." He laughed nervously, shrugged, and walked off down the hallway.

He watched his feet the whole way back to his room, and there was something so sad about the way he moved that I called after him.

"Pete?"

He stopped, but didn't turn around. "Yeah?"

"It's not that I didn't want to see you. I just--I didn't know if it was a good idea..."

"Why not?"

"I just...I..." How could I possibly explain this to him without sounding like a complete idiot? It was impossible.

"What?" He turned around to face me.

I sighed in defeat, resigning myself to sounding like an idiot. It was inevitable. "I was...I'm scared."

One of the benefits of holding yourself aloof from other people, without getting involved in all their trivial conflicts, is that you can observe them from a distance. I had been observing people all my life, and I felt that I had a pretty good grasp of the human psyche--that was one reason why I was so good at my job.

But Pete was so different from other people. His motives never made sense to me; I couldn't predict what he was going to do or say next. He shook me up, he made me crazy, he scared the shit out of me, and yet, I loved him for it.

I had given up on trying to make sense of him by now. When I told him I was scared, I didn't even bother predicting his reaction; I knew I would be wrong. But I was still surprised when he laughed and told me, smiling, "Of course you're scared, Sarah. You're supposed to be scared."

Another cryptic retort, paired with that familiar knowing smile. I should've known. "Pete..." I shook my head at him, but refrained from rolling my eyes. "What do you mean?"

He shrugged and took another step closer--and suddenly he was right in front of me, when he had been all the way down the hall just a few seconds ago. I just got so distracted around him. I wouldn't notice a nuclear bomb if it hit me square between the eyes, when Pete was around.

"You're a canary," he said. "I'm a coal mine."

"Excuse me?"

"It's a line from one of our songs," said Pete coolly. "Aren't you reporters supposed to research things like that?"

I shook my head. "I don't understand."

"They used to send canaries into coal mines to check for noxious fumes. If the canary never came out--"

"--it was dead, and the mine wasn't safe for the miners. I'm from West Virginia, Pete," I added when he looked impressed. "I know coal mines."

"Well, excuse me then. You said you didn't understand."

"I don't understand!"

"It's a metaphor."

"I know it's a metaphor, I just..."

He let me stand there in the doorway of my extravagant suite, pulling my hair out in frustration for a moment, and then he said, so softly that I could barely hear him, "Don't you think the canary's scared, too?"

...Oh. So that's what he meant.

Pete was leaning against the wall, so I leaned against the doorframe so that we were facing each other at a right angle, our heads separated only by a narrow strip of stylish modernist wallpaper. I tilted my head back a little so I could see the look in his eyes.

"And how does the coal mine feel about all of this?" I asked him.

He looked away, his gaze fixating on the carpet, but his mind's eye was obviously somewhere far away. "The coal mine feels...guilty. Sad. Helpless. I mean, he can't help it if the canary never comes out." Pete's eyes met mine then as he said, "He's a coal mine. He is what he is."

I closed my eyes and listened to the echo of his voice inside my head. Were the words even real?

"Sarah?" Pete whispered.

I opened my eyes again.

"Do you want to go to dinner with me?"

"I don't know..." I licked my lips--nervous, afraid. "I don't know if it's a good idea..."

"Why not?"

It was so hard to deny him when he was right there, his breath mingling with my breath, his eyes on mine. "I just don't want to...you know, get in too deep."

"Why not?" Before I could answer, he added, "Don't be afraid."

And how could I argue with that? After all, the canary has to fly into the coal mine eventually, no matter how afraid of the dark she is, and even if the dark swallows her whole. It's what she was made to do.

-----

It was just before three o'clock in the afternoon as Pete and I walked down street after street in the middle of Manhattan. Traffic was awful and there were people everywhere. Manhattan is always busy.

"Where are we going again?" I asked Pete as we stood on a street corner, waiting for the walk sign to light up so we could cross the street.

"Just this one place I know. Don't worry, you'll like it," he said, distracted. The walk sign lit up and Pete nudged me ahead of him. "Come on, we gotta go."

The group of people that had gathered around us moved forward to cross the street en masse, and we followed. Crossing the street here was scary because even at a red light there were always plenty of cars turning right on red, and none of them seemed to have very much regard for human life when it came to yielding to pedestrians. There was a gap between me and Pete and the rest of the group, and a yellow taxi cab raced to turn right before Pete and I got to the other side. Pete grabbed my shoulder and yanked me back, saving me from being run over, then grabbed my hand and pulled me across the street behind him as the light turned green again.

"It's one more block down," said Pete fervently after we had made it to the other side of the street alive. "We only have to cross one more street, don't worry."

He grabbed my hand again when we crossed that last street, and then he kept holding it until we got to the restaurant. The thing is, I didn't even notice he was still holding my hand until he finally let go. It just felt so easy and natural--touching him was nowhere near as odd to me as not touching him was.

-----

"So you've lived in Chicago all your life?" I asked conversationally as our waiter refilled our glasses of wine. I never drank this early in the day, but Pete had ordered the wine before I could say no--and once it was sitting right there in front of me, on the table between myself and the man I shouldn't have been with, I definitely couldn't say no. For the first time in a long time, getting drunk sounded pretty appealing to me.

Pete must have sensed this earlier, because he ordered the wine without even asking me first. And then when I downed my first glass in three large gulps, he did the same (whether he was as anxious as I was or was just being polite, I'm not sure) and called the waiter over to pour our second glasses.

"Well yeah, until a few years ago, when I moved to L.A. I lived with my parents until I was, like, twenty-seven, actually." He glanced up from the fancy menu to flash me a cheesy grin.

"Oh, wow. There's a sure sign of a keeper."

"I know, right?" he laughed. He drank some of his wine and scanned the menu. "What are you getting?"

"The salmon steak. So why did you move to L.A.?"

He shrugged and said, without looking up from the menu, "It was just easier, with the band and everything. A couple of the guys already had houses there, so I figured I might as well move out there, too. Do you think I should get pasta or a steak?"

"Steak. Pasta is girl food. So then you moved in with Ashlee, right?" I took a sip of wine as I mentioned Ashlee on purpose, so that it would look like I was wincing at the taste of the alcohol rather than at the mention of his wife.

Pathetic, I sneered at myself--then immediately took another big drink of wine. I needed to be drunk, and soon.

"Right," said Pete. His eyes weren't moving back and forth across the menu anymore, I noticed; they were now fixed on one spot, staring so intently that I half expected the menu to start smoking or something.

"And that's where you guys live now--at her place in L.A.?" My eyes were watering, either from the wine I was practically chugging at this point or this torturous line of questioning. Bringing Ashlee into the conversation was so masochistic of me. What was I thinking?

"Right."

"Do you like it there? In L.A.?" He didn't answer right away--he just kept staring at that one spot on his menu--and the questions just kept coming out of my mouth, each more painful than the last. "Are you guys happy together? Do you have any regrets? If you could go back to three years ago, would you still move out to L.A.?"

As if coming out of a trance, Pete looked up at me slowly, the blank expression going out of his eyes to be replaced by some steely emotion--like indignation, but sadder, harder. "So you're getting the salmon, then?" he said as he folded his menu shut and stacked it on top of mine. "I think I'll get the steak."

He leaned forward and folded his arms across the table and stared me down. And I stared back. And all the fight went out of his eyes as the seconds ticked by, until he just sat there staring back at me with the most defeated look on his face.

"Pete?" I asked softly. "Are you happy in L.A.?"

He looked down at the table as he unfolded his arms and then clasped his hands together, as if in prayer. He sat there watching himself twiddle his thumbs for a while, and when he finally looked up, his smirk was sardonically pleasant.

"I'm tired of talking about me," he said.

"That's what we're here for," I pointed out.

"No," he corrected me, "that's what you're here for. I couldn't care less about a fucking interview."

He smiled sweetly at me. I glared.

"So," he went on with a grand sweep of his hand, "enough about me. Lets talk about you."

"Uh-uh. Absolutely not."

"Oh, come on! I answer all your questions. You could at least answer a few for me." And then, goddamn him, he smiled that huge smile and I knew I was a goner.

I groaned and leaned back in my seat, folding my arms across my chest. Now that he had it in his head that I was going to talk about myself, he was going to make me do it. There was no escaping it now. "Fine," I grumbled.

"Yes!" Pete pumped his fist in the air once in a triumphant, very un-Pete-like way, then paused bit his lip thoughtfully. "Uh...so, where are you from?"

"Hurricane, West Virginia."

"You're from a town called Hurricane?" His eyes were sparkling as he looked at me like I was something new and intriguing and lovely and his smile was oddly tender, but underneath all of that was a sort of knowing amusement. "Why does that not surprise me?"

"That," I said, gesturing to him with my glass of wine as I lifted it to my lips, "is exactly why I didn't want to talk about myself--"

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry. So what's Hurricane like?"

I finished off the last of my wine and sighed, fingering the rim of the empty glass longingly. Thinking about my hometown made me want another refill even more. "Small. Dirty. Boring."

"Oh. Kinda like me?"

I looked up and Pete was watching me expectantly with a self-satisfied smirk. I knew it was funny, and I knew he was trying to make me laugh, and I wanted to laugh--but somehow I couldn't find it inside me to laugh, I could only find tension and worry and fear. But I managed to grin back at him, and I said, "No. You're not boring," and I could tell by the way he smiled that it was exactly the right thing to say.

"No, that I'm not," he agreed. He knew I wasn't in the mood for any more jokes; his face was serious as he asked, "So why did you leave Hurricane?"

I sighed heavily at that doozy of a question, and I guess he saw how it weighed me down before could even think of the truest answer, because he called the waiter over to refill our wine glasses again. And while I sat there wringing my hands out over my past, he looked a little worried and asked the waiter to just leave the bottle on the table, please. I hadn't told him anything yet, but he could already tell I was going to need that wine.

It took less than two hours for the two of us to finish off that whole damn bottle together. It hurt a lot at first and I was halfway drunk by the time the check came, but somehow the world made more sense to me than it ever had before. Probably because I told Pete things that I had never told anyone else, and he still didn't think I was crazy.

"Actually," he said, "I think you're amazing."

And as we divided up the last few sips of wine between us, I believed him. The thing is, I have never believed in anything the way I believed in Pete that day. And even though it hurt so bad--the ultimate letdown--at least I know now that I am capable of believing. At least I know now that that strength, that hope, that courage is inside of me somewhere. I must have just lost track of it somehow.