Shattered Glass & Broken Hearts

By the time Ronnie and Emily arrived in Vegas, it was near two in the morning. It would probably have been a much faster drive had there not been a major traffic collision on the 91 Freeway, but Emily didn’t really care about the time. All she cared about was getting to the hospital to see Max – to make sure he was still breathing, if just barely or through tubes. No one had told her how bad off he was, or even what it was that he’d overdosed on.

Her parents knew that she was in town, but their house was already full with a few of their closer relatives that had come because of Max’s trip to the hospital. It was agreed upon that she and Ronnie could share a room at one of the hotels on the Strip – not because she liked those hotels, but because they were closer to the hospital that Max was at and as soon as she could, she would be seeing him the next morning.

“Stay close to me, please,” Ronnie muttered under his breath when he watched as she started walking ahead of him by several feet. “I don’t like these places. Anybody can wander up and down the halls, Em.”

“I just want to get to the room and fucking go to sleep, okay?” She snapped at him. “It’s two thirty already and the sooner I sleep, the sooner—”

“You can see Max, I know. But Em, you’re not gonna get in ‘til at least nine. That’s when visiting hours generally start, and you know Max probably won’t be awake ‘til at least noon. So slow your ass down and stay where you’re safe for now, okay?”

She could have thought of any number of things to say to Ronnie concerning the fact that she did not, in fact, feel very safe around him. Sure, she knew that he’d never lay a finger on her – there was no way Ronnie would ever hurt her, not after what had happened ten years ago. But she did feel a little uneasy around him simply because of her feelings for him.

She grumbled under her breath but did indeed slow her pace down when she heard voices at the other end of the hall. She flinched when Ronnie’s hand barely touched her side when he stopped in front of a door that was clearly their room for the next couple of nights.

After several attempts, the door finally unlocked and Emily was the first to step inside. She flipped on the light switch before she groaned when she saw that it was only a one bed room.

“Call the front desk,” she muttered. “We asked for a two bed room.”

“This will be fine,” he grumbled back. “I’m not switching rooms in the middle of the goddamn night, Emily. If the thought of sharing a mattress with me makes you so damn nervous, I’ll take the floor.”

She bit her bottom lip, watching as he dropped the duffel bags down on the ground before he walked over to the bed, his hand reaching for one of the pillows and the top blanket. She sighed, knowing that she’d snapped at him one too many times tonight.

“It’s fine,” she sighed. “You can have one side of the bed and I can have the other. And then in the morning, we can switch.”

Ronnie nodded, pushing some hair out of his eyes as he nodded towards the bathroom. “You can change in there, and I’ll get ready out here, okay? That way nobody’s privacy is invaded.”

“Thank you,” she told him softly before she grabbed her duffel bag.

In all honesty, she thought to herself, she felt nervous as hell sharing a bed with Ronnie. The last time she’d done that had been ten years before, when she’d accidentally fallen asleep in his bed and he hadn’t the heart to wake her up. She had felt so safe in his arms; so whole. To know that tonight she’d be sleeping just inches away from him, but unable to touch him, would bring so many painful memories to the forefront of her dreams that it almost broke her heart all over again.

She sighed softly and grabbed her pajamas out of the duffel bag, making sure to change quickly before she brushed her teeth and put her hair into a loose braid before making her way back out to the main part of the motel room. She couldn’t help but feel a small smile forming on her lips when she saw that Ronnie was already asleep underneath of the blankets, light snores falling from parted lips, beautiful chocolate eyes closed as he lay there.

He looked so peaceful, she decided in an instant. Like nothing bad had happened between them in the past ten years. His arm was even draped on her side of the mattress, and she sighed as she walked over to the bed, moving his arm out of the way before she turned the light off as she crawled onto the bed beside him.



When Emily woke up the next morning, she felt warm breath on the back of her neck and something warmer than a blanket draped across her hip. She was confused for several moments before she felt her stomach sink with the realization that she was curled up next to Ronnie – that it was his arm draped across her, his fingertips lightly grazing the barely-exposed flesh of her stomach, his breath hot on her skin as he snored behind her.

“Shit,” she whispered, biting down hard on her bottom lip.

She hated how comfortable she felt next to him – hated how perfect her body curled into his, like they were missing puzzle pieces that had always been meant to find one another. She liked the way he held onto her, like nothing had gone wrong. It made her wonder if this is how they’d have slept every night for the past ten years had he not walked out of that hospital room when she needed him most.

That thought was enough to urge her to carefully pull herself away from him. Or at least, it was enough to make her try. Instead of letting her go, however, Ronnie’s arm tightened around her, his legs tangling with hers underneath the blankets.

“Don’t leave,” his voice pleaded softly. At first, she thought he was awake and that he meant to say it, but when a snore followed the words, she realized that he was still sleeping. A sigh fell from her lips, and she once again tried to get herself untangled from his limbs before she stopped when he began sleeptalking.

“Em,” he murmured, voice thick with grog as he slept. “Baby, please. Don’t leave me. So sorry. Please,” he begged in his sleep. She could feel his fingertips twitching as he shivered slightly behind her. She knew that the trembling couldn’t be because he was cold; the blankets covering both of them were more than adequate to provide enough heat.

“Didn’t mean to,” he continued after several moments of silence had passed before he gasped, a strangled sound coming from his lips as he squeezed her tighter. “Don’t…Don’t die,” he whimpered. “Em, please. I’ll do anything. D-Don’t die, baby.”

She frowned. It sounded as though he was having a nightmare; probably one from the night they’d been in the car accident. She tentatively touched her hand to his arm, biting down on her bottom lip as she slowly became more awake.

“I’m here, Ronnie. I didn’t die,” she murmured next to him as she slowly rubbed her hand along his tattooed skin.

She felt him squeeze her tighter before he awoke with a start, his eyes opening wide as he sat up, bringing her with him as he gasped for air suddenly.

“Em?” He asked, his voice hoarse as he looked around. “The…”

“It was a bad dream, Ronnie,” she told him quietly. Her fingertips were still on his upper arm, her teeth nipping her bottom lip. She still felt oddly comfortable with her body this close to him, even though she knew that she shouldn’t. She didn’t want to let go of him, even though she knew it would be the best thing to do.

“I thought you were dead,” he whispered. She could still tell that his dream had rattled him. She felt him pull her closer before she pushed his hair out of his eyes.

“I didn’t die,” she murmured. “Not that night, and not now. I’m okay, Ronnie.”

He nodded, swallowing hard before she felt him hesitantly brush his lips across the back of her neck. Her body froze when she felt him kiss her, but she didn’t pull away. The truth was, after ten years of not feeling this form of tenderness from Ronnie, it was all she really wanted now.