Troubled Youth

Getting to Africa took quite a long time. Jared boarded a plane early one wednesday morning and flew across the country back to New York. He met Ella in the airport where they both waited on their next flight that was a layover in Toronto that then lead to a layover in Paris France before they made it to Morocco. The trip took over twenty four hours for Jared and just under that for Ella.
By the time they had landed both were stiff and cramped from sitting so long. Jared had a talent for falling asleep on planes that Ella knew about and had expected him to fall asleep on her shoulder like he had before. She wasn’t so good at falling asleep in small spaces but caught a few twenty minute naps here and there.
Jared stood doing stretches while Ella looked out for the car that was supposed to pick them up. Her eyes couldn’t help but get distracted by Jared’s body stretching out, his shirt lifting up exposing parts of his hips and stomach. He was playing Hephaistion, a Macedonian nobleman and general in Alexander the Great’s army. For that he had been lifting weights, tanning, and growing out his hair. She had a hard time keeping her thoughts away from beds and showers.
They were taken to a hotel and their bags were brought up to the room. The serious jet lag had Ella falling asleep on her feet but Jared’s napping -which turned out to be carefully planned- left him feeling right in time with the difference. They had a meeting to go through before they would be allowed to get some rest and Jared didn’t want to be nodding off during that.
Food was an acceptable postponement for sleep and Ella ate quietly while Jared did all the talking he needed to with his director and other cast members. Ella was so tired she hardly noticed anyone else’s faces. Jared had to practically scoop Ella out of the cab that took them back to their hotel and carry her to their room.
Thinking better of crawling into bed with her, Jared set Ella down on one of the beds and went into the bathroom for a shower. Ella got up long enough to take her clothes off, pull the bed sheets down, and climb back into bed. Jared smiled when he saw her lying face down in the bed, the covers had slipped off her shoulder leaving some of her skin exposed.
He shut the light off and looked back over his shoulder at Ella. He turned and kissed her cheek tugging the blankets back up onto her shoulder. Ella curled up tighter and nuzzled her pillow before she ceased moving. Jared pushed some of her hair back and then climbed into his own bed. He laid on his side facing her and smiled wishing they were in the same bed but content that they were in the same room after so long. Being just her friend was going to turn out a lot harder than he thought.
“What have you gotten yourself into?” Jared sighed tapping his cheeks.

Days of filming began at sunrise. Ella and Jared rose from their separate beds and dressed. They went down to the lobby and sometimes ate breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Other times they would not eat until they got to the filming location. Most of the time Ella was on her phone sending emails and making calls. Jared would watch her when he could thinking to himself that they had to at least be friends after two weeks of this.
The two of them were making friends with cast and crew alike. Ella was keeping track of names and numbers to be added to Jared’s virtual address book so that they could get into contact with one of those people should they need it. There were a few numbers Ella took down from female members of the crew she was sure were not wholly intended for business but Jared didn’t see that as being a motive. Ella knew better but still took the names and numbers down. If anyone tried to give her their number for the purpose of non business related recreation she pretended to log it and then avoided that person. She didn’t really want anything to do with dating even after more than a year of solitude. It sounded crazy in her head and she sure as hell wasn’t intending to say it out loud but she was trying to find herself still.
Ella found that after cutting out all her bad habits she was a little confused on the person she should be. She didn’t have anything to distract herself with and as a result the last year plus she had been thinking a lot about herself.
Terry had noticed this, they lived together after all, but he didn’t question her too much on it. He thought what she was doing would turn out well for her. The only thing was he could see she had begun to struggle with herself. Here she was, a thirty one year old woman who felt like she didn’t know the first thing about herself. It was shocking how cold she felt when there was no one to spend the night.
Jared noticed as well that Ella seemed a little different. She was still rude and a bit standoffish if he asked her anything too personal but other than that, the way she treated him on a daily basis, she was different. Maybe she was a little softer, maybe she was a little more careful. He liked it, whatever it was that had changed her.
Ella was branching out a little in addition to her changes in behavior towards Jared. Before she’d pretty much stuck to a small circle of people in her life; Jared, Shannon, Terry, and a few others. Now she was making friends with other people in Morocco. A few times she went out to dinner with people and Jared hadn’t gone. He was glad she was making friends and trying to build something more than what she already had.
Both her and Jared had started a pretty good friendship with the leading actor in the movie. Colin was in the role as Alexander the Great but when he wasn’t working he had an Irish accent Ella loved. She liked making him talk and he knew this so he would try and clam up when she was around. Of course he found that hard with her inexplicable ability to ask him about things he couldn’t resist talking about.
Jared didn’t find he had to watch them too closely. While Ella admitted she found the younger blond man attractive she wouldn’t have dated him. He was twenty eight and had a son. She told Jared flat out that made it impossible for her to date him. She wanted nothing to do with children and when he asked her why she refused to answer. He then asked why she was reassuring him she wasn’t interested in dating Colin and she just shrugged it off like he hadn’t asked.
On Colin’s side he also found Ella attractive but knew he didn’t want anything to do with her intimately. After Ella had told Jared she had no plans of making a move Colin did the same pulling Jared to the side when Ella had gone back to the hotel early. Jared was a little confused and felt like there was something else going on, something he’d missed like he was on a tv show or something.
“I’m not even going to ask why you’re telling me this,” Jared shook his head with a smile, “but I want to ask why you put it like that. You said she was the kind of girl no one should want to date.”
“Well,” Colin paused looking at his friend, “I’m going to first answer what you didn’t ask. I’m telling you because it’s obvious you have interest invested in her. I know you’ve known her a long time, much too long to have not made a move.”
“Oh, I have. Believe me.” Jared mumbled.
“Fine. Not my business. But I put it as no one should want to date her because she’s not built for that. I mean, I know she seems to be this hard working sweet thing but she’s got a bad streak a mile wide. Maybe wider. She’s the kind of girl you date in college so your friends can be jealous of you, the kind of girl that will break your heart. I’ve run into those girls before and it’s not something I want to do again. I’m sure Ella’s a great girl but she’s not a girl for me. And God help you if you ever do catch her. She may be a thing of beauty to look at but she’s going to try her damndest to break your heart.”
“She’s done that already... a few times in fact.” Jared shook his head. “I can’t stop it though.”
“Masochist.” Colin smiled.
“You have no idea.”
“So if she’s hurt you, then why are you sharing a hotel with her? Why bring her out here in the first place?”
“It’s kind of a long story. We have to get back. They’ll be looking for us Alexander.”
“Right you are Hephaistion.” Colin smirked.
Eventually over a few dinners Jared told Colin his and Ella’s story. Colin gave him the same advice everyone gave him or that everyone would have given him had he questioned every person in the world on his relationship with her. Get out. Run away and don’t look back because it’s only going to hurt worse. Colin even suggested that after this they shouldn’t continue to spend time together. Feelings would only get mixed up again and Jared would have just as hard a crash as he did before, possibly and more likely even harder.
Jared always disagreed though. He thought maybe their conclusions weren’t accurate because they didn’t know the changes she’d gone through since he’d seen her last. Of course when he brought them up it didn’t do much to change what they told him. The most popular counter argument was she may have changed a little bit in a year of being away but the other thirteen years she had treated him badly still grossly outweighed the good she had seemingly become. There was always a chance for relapse, especially since she made all these changes while he wasn’t around. The re-addition of himself could easily bring all that back. All her change could amount to nothing.
Eventually Jared stopped asking people their opinions because he never liked what he heard. Even his own brother gave him a negative outlook though deep in Shannon’s heart he wanted them together. Shannon was just being cautious for his little brother’s sake.

One night Jared had climbed into bed and shut out the light. Ella was sitting propped up against the headboard on her pillows looking out the window. Jared’s eyes adjusted to the dim light leaking in through the glass and he could see her profile. Whether because he was tired or it was dark, to him Ella looked sad. This was the first time he’d seen a sad look on her face since they’d been in Africa.
“Ella, why aren’t you sleeping?” He asked quietly, hand moving towards the edge of his bed as if he could pick up hers.
“Not tired.”
“You’re usually asleep before me.” He mumbled clutching a pillow to his chest. “Are you alright?”
“Fine.”
“What are you thinking?”
“That you should go to sleep.”
“I’m not a child.”
“That’s debatable.”
“Hey. Don’t be mean.”
“That sounds so commanding when you’re half asleep.”
“I’m tired. You should be too.”
“Just go to sleep.”
“Fine.”
Jared tucked his face under his arm and closed his eyes. He was asleep in seconds. Ella didn’t move. She was sitting still in her bed looking out the window thinking. Every once in awhile she would chew on her lip but seconds ticked by into hours.
The next time Jared opened his eyes it was five hours later. In an hour and a half they were supposed to be up heading out to their film site where they would actually be camping for the next few days. Ella was still sitting as he’d last seen her. He grunted shifting himself to sit up and groggily climbed over to her bed.
Ella made no move when he picked up her covers and slipped under them. He pushed her towards the middle and got himself comfortable sitting up against the headboard before he pulled her into his chest. She leaned over shifting to put most of her weight against him and on her own hip with an arm across his stomach. He wrapped his arms around her, kissed the top of her head, and ran his hand through the back of her hair for a while.
“I remembered what time of year it is.” He said quietly. “I know why you’re sitting up.”
It was the usual time when Ella would go meet her father. She hugged him a little tighter to tell him he was right but after that she was limp against him. He knew she was awake from her breathing pattern but was content that she rested against him. He fell back asleep feeling warmer and happier than he had in a long time.
By the time the alarm went off Jared didn’t wake up. Ella shut it off too quickly and laid against him for another twenty minutes. When she looked back to see how long they’d spent there she sat up and started running her hand along his jawline. Jared opened his eyes and picked his head up from the leaning position against the headboard to smile at her. They stayed face to face, noses almost touching, for a few tense seconds. Ella bit her bottom lip staring into his eyes and he mirrored the expression. They were both unsure what to do and too scared to move.
“We’re going to be late.” She said quietly.
“Yeah.” Jared moved forward a tiny amount testing the waters.
“We should get out of bed.” Ella pulled away from him and Jared was left feeling confused.
“Did you sleep at all?”
“No.”
“If you get tired the-”
“I’ll have some coffee.” She cut him off. “We’ve got quite a long drive ahead of us.”
Their conversation ended. The two of them dressed, one in the bathroom and the other in the bedroom. Then they were downstairs to grab a very quick breakfast of cereal and orange juice having lost all the time for a hot breakfast. There was a car waiting outside the hotel they were shepherded into and buckled their seatbelts. Almost as soon as the hotel was invisible in the distance Ella was asleep in her seat. Jared watched her for a while wondering what he could do to make her feel better but his mind came up short.
The two hour drive ended up Ella was still asleep. Regretfully Jared woke her up and got her out of the car. They were shown to a tent they were supposed to share for the next six days. It was quite large and all the tents doubled as background for Alexander and his troops. There was a partition down the middle so they could each have some privacy and comfortable bedding. Jared told Ella to take a nap while he went into wardrobe and makeup. She said she was fine but when he came back from makeup and hair she was passed out on what he assumed she had claimed as her bed.
Ella in a tent. Somehow that seemed perfect to Jared. She preferred a bean bag to a bed. Even after sharing a bed with Jared for so long she was back to a bean bag in Terry’s apartment. Now she was in a tent with a bed more the style of a bean bag and content as could be.
He wanted to get into bed with her, the idea was tempting after he’d had a taste of it the night before, but he had to get into wardrobe. Jared was tucking her hair behind her ear when Colin popped his head in looking for the two of them. The look Jared received he was sure to mean he shouldn’t be doing that but he looked back at her one more time before following his friend out.
Halfway through the day Ella got up and started working where she’d left off. She came out of the tent to watch a little bit of what was going on -she had to listen first to see if they were filming, she didn’t want to step out in the middle of a shot not being dressed in period clothing and having a cell phone in her hand. Jared came over to her when he saw she was up and moving around to give her a hug and ask if she felt better. Ella said she was fine and pushed him to go back to work.
Having her phone proved to be kind of useless. They were miles away from a cell tower and she couldn’t do much work. Turned out she would have gotten much more done if she’d just stayed at the hotel for the days they were out there filming. If she wanted to make a call she had to go into one of the trailers where they had a few phones with huge antennas on the outside of the trailer to get reception. If she wanted to get on the internet there were only two computers to use and she didn’t get to them that often.
The first night in the tent was a little difficult to sleep for the both of them. The wind picked up shaking the side of the red woven fabric in turn shaking the whole frame. They had been assured nothing would uproot the tents while they were there, they had been reinforced and were much more stable than tents of that time period. The sound of sand hitting the side and the wind was a little much to get used to. Ella ended up curled into Jared’s chest again and the two of them laid on his side of the tent trying to sleep.
Ella found most of her sleep the next day while Jared had to work. It seemed most of the cast and crew had a hard time sleeping the night before so Jared wasn’t alone in his feeling like he needed a nap by lunch. Ella was up by then and let Jared lean into her side after he had eaten, his eyes closed but he was keeping his mind active so he didn’t fall asleep.
When the end of the day came Jared was so happy to get into his tent. He found Ella there curled up in his bed with a book she had brought along. That decision had turned out to be very wise since she couldn’t get anything else done. He laid down next to her and stretched out.
“If you’re doing that I’m going to my own bed.” She said turning a page.
“Good, who needs you to keep warm.” He mumbled into a pillow.
“Well when you put it like that.” She got up and pushed the fabric partition aside to move into her own space.
“Ella, I was kidding. Come back.” He grabbed a the partition trying to get a look at her.
“Nope. Stop pulling on that, you’ll take it down.”
“Maybe I want to.” He said giving it a tug.
The fabric proved to be anchored into the frame on the ceiling much better than he expected. Jared gave up and let it fall back.
“If we both freeze because of the temperature drop its your fault.”
“There’s a heater on both sides of the tent.”
“I know.” Jared said rolling over to reach for the on button the heater bore.
“Night sleepy head.”
“Night grumpy face.” Jared rolled over.
Two hours later Jared woke up to the wind. He sighed and rolled over spotting light coming from Ella’s side of the tent. He pulled the partition back to see her still sitting up but it wasn’t because she couldn’t sleep, it was because she hadn’t wanted to. She was thinking again and the time didn’t matter to her. Jared pulled himself over towards her side and she only gave him a glance. He gave up when he was half way between sides and laid with his head facing her.
“What?”
“How’s the headspace?” He asked reaching out for her hand. “Something’s bothering you.”
“No.”
“Yes there is. I know your face Ella.”
“Fine, but do you think I’ll tell you?”
“One day you will. I’ll keep asking until you do.”
She thought for a moment about that and then leaned forward. “I don’t know who I am.”
“What do you mean?” He tried to keep the shock from his voice that she’d actually given him something other than a brush off.
“I thought I needed to just get away from everything for a while and I’d be fine but I have no idea who I am.”
“You’re Ella.” He smiled. “The eighteen year old girl I met in college whose mother kicked her out, who needed a friend that wouldn’t leave her.”
“You don’t think I’ve changed since then?”
“Do you?”
“I don’t know. Sometimes I think so, sometimes not.”
“Ella.”
“What?”
“Why did your mother kick you out?”
“Because we disagreed.”
“On what?”
“Moral beliefs.”
“Like?”
“Sex and religion. We’ve been through this.” She shrugged looking away from him.
“Yeah, but take it from my perspective.” He said rolling onto his back, the partition fabric slipped over him blocking his hips and legs from view. “In college that was all I needed to know to believe it. I’m thirty-three now. I know that wasn’t the only thing that happened between you two. I know there had to have been something else because a mother can get over her child deciding to have sex and get over her child’s differing ideals in religion. She’d lived with you until you were a teenager, she knew you weren’t going to be like her. She had to have. There was something else.”
“So?”
“Maybe you need to talk about that.” Jared sighed grabbing her hand, Ella pulled it away. “Maybe if you go back and tell at least one person everything about your past that you hide they can get another perspective and help you figure yourself out.”
“I don’t see how that would work.” She almost laughed.
“Think about it Ella. Kids normally figure themselves out in college. Why? Because they get away from their family but they still tell their friends about that part of them. Those friends then share stories about their families and through that, through the insight of another person or the words of another person, that kid can start to make decisions about themself. You could see what someone else picks up from your stories, things you might miss because you’re so close to the picture, and that might tell you about yourself. You are who you are because of your family, the way you were brought up. That’s why sometimes you feel like you’re stuck at eighteen even though you’re thirty-one.”
“I’m thirty. I’m not thirty-one for another month.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“So you just want to know my past then?”
“I didn’t say you have to tell me, I just said at least one person.”
“But you meant yourself.” She said leaning forward so her face was close to his.
“If you want to tell me I’d be happy to listen.”
“Okay.”
“Okay what?”
“I’ll tell you.” She said lying out so that their heads were close together. “When I was fifteen I lost my virginity. At sixteen I-”
“Whoa, whoa. Slow down a little. Don’t go year by year picking out the biggest thing that happened. What else went on when you were fifteen. Why did you lose your virginity?”
“Jared.”
“Come on. You’re doing good.” He smiled.
“We should go to sleep.”
“No, talk to me.”
“Fine.”
Ella sighed and started again a fifteen. She explained she did it because she was mad for some stupid reason at her mother -so stupid she couldn’t even remember now- and she did the one thing she’d always been told not to, have sex. It wasn’t anything special, just in the back seat of someone’s car during school hours. Ella started painting him a picture of her teen years getting a little quieter as she spoke. He was hanging on her every word listening to how she’d dabbled in a few drugs by the age of sixteen. Jared knew what that was like having a bad streak in himself.
The more she spoke about her family life the more he felt bad for her. He started to see why she was so closed off and tough. He was waiting for her to break down while talking; he could see tears in her eyes but they weren’t spilling over yet. When he took her hand she finally did cry. Jared pulled her into his chest and she cried a little harder.
A few moments later she pushed off his chest laughing. He was confused wondering how her emotions could do that so fast, the words of his brother in the back of his head telling him women were crazy. Jared tried to rationalize it to a release of emotions, a kind of feeling better so she laughed. This didn’t quite make sense.
“GOD! You think I would cry over that bullshit.” Ella laughed. “You are more gullible than I thought. Even when I started making the whole story standard tv show angst bullshit. And that whole part about my best friend sleeping with the guy I liked, that was pulled straight from that stupid tv show you were on. Jesus Christ Jared. That was too easy.”
Jared sat up and shook his head. “How could I have been so stupid to think you’d actually take down a fucking wall or two? But all of them? Fuck I’m an idiot.”
He went under the partition and flopped onto his bed.
“Jared.” Ella pulled the fabric back and looked at him lying face down. “J.”
“Fuck off.” He mumbled into his pillow.
“Hey, I was just joking.” She reached over and shook his shoulder. “Come on.”
“You haven’t changed at all. This was a mistake.” He roughly shook her hand from his shoulder and moved farther away from her.
Ella crawled over to Jared’s side and laid on top of his back.
“I’m sorry.” She said in his ear. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”
“I believed you.”
“I know.” She kissed his cheek. “I’m sorry Jared.”
“Fuck you.” This time he sounded less mad and Ella was sure a smile tugged at his lips.
“If that’s what you want.” She kissed his cheek again. “If that’s what would make it up to you.”
Jared rolled over so she was on top of his chest. She sat up on his hips and smiled down at him before kissing his forehead and apologizing again. He grabbed her wrists and twisted around so she was underneath him with her hands pinned above her head. Her breath caught and he gave her no time to recover pushing his mouth to hers.
Ella didn’t miss a beat wrapping her legs around his hips and pulling him closer. He backed off moving to her neck and letting one hand go. That hand went into his hair giving him a tug he appreciated as he bit down into her skin. Ella moaned having missed this. She found it quite easy to pull his shirt off and he went for hers. Jared slid down kissing along her sternum and onto her stomach as he lifted her shirt up. She pulled it off over her head and let him kiss for a while before bringing him back up to her lips.
Before Jared knew it the two of them were missing all their clothing. She was on top of him and his hands were gripping her hips tighter than she was used to as she worked against him. He closed his eyes grunting when she changed direction bringing him deeper than before. One of his hands snaked up to her chest to knead.
He came much quicker than he would have liked to and the same went for Ella. She got off him and laid on her back staring up at the ceiling of the tent panting. Jared had a sleepy looking smile about his face and she ruffled his hair when he looked at her.
“I hadn’t intended for that to happen.” He said quietly. “I was only going to make you want it and then pull away at the last second so you knew how you’d just made me feel.”
“I know. I was too quick for you.”
“Too fucking quick.” He panted.
“Hey, I wasn’t talking about the sex.”
“I know, but that was too quick too.”
“It’s been a while.”
“It has.” He nodded. “Still just as good.”
“We have room for improvement.”
“There won’t be any.”
“Why not?”
“Because then we’d just be what we were before. You’d go back to being how you were. It... I don’t know. I couldn’t... it’s not....”
“I get it. One time accident.”
“Yeah.” He sounded sad.
“What would change that?”
“Change what?”
“Make you do it again? Utilize the room for improvement.”
“We’d have to be together Ella. For real together.” His face was heartbreakingly honest.
She made a noise.
“I’m sorry Ella.” He rolled on top of her. “You know how I get. It’s not fair for me.”
“It’s not.” She tucked some of his long hair behind his ear. “I know.”
“I love you.” He said kissing her lips. “I do and I can’t sleep with you anymore if we’re not together.”
“I know.”
He kissed her again lingering for a moment to remember the feeling. Her hands were on the side of his chest, nails tickling his ribs so that he had goosebumps. She remembered he liked it when she did that.
He pulled back smiling. “No one’s done that for a long time. Not like that.”
“I remember.” She shrugged.
“Oh God Ella. This isn’t fair already.” He tucked his face into her neck. “I’ve already played my hand.”
She kissed his ear.
“Ella.” He kept repeating her name, his hips resting between her thighs but there was nothing sexual about it.
“I was fifteen when I lost my virginity.” She whispered quietly into his ear. “It was a dare. I don’t back down from dares, you know that.”
His lips curled into a smile. She was starting to tell him something about herself.
“There wasn’t any malice or any harm intended towards my mother when I did it. I just wanted to prove myself good on my word. Didn’t realize the guy already knew I was good on my word and used it against me to get me in his backseat. When my mother found out I was sixteen.” Her nails ran up and down his back as she spoke, he had goosebumps again.
“You’re skipping parts.” He whispered as he kissed her neck.
“I’m explaining my relationship with my mother. The other stuff will come later.”
“Okay.” He kissed her neck again. “Sorry for interrupting.”
“We’d been okay up until then. There was the normal teenage daughter trying to pull away from her mother because it was natural stuff going on. It was never anything serious. Teen angst.” Jared shifted to lie next to her on his side while she spoke, his hand resting on her hip. “She hit the ceiling when she found out. Went ballistic is an understatement. She made it out like no one in the history of ever would even have thought to have sex before they were married. Maybe on her side of the family anyways. I took it as a more personal attack than she meant it to be. I suppose she took my actions as a personal attack as well since there’d been tension between us.”
“How did she find out?” He asked quietly interrupting her.
“She caught me with my boyfriend at the time in bed. I guess it was worse that I was sixteen and he was nineteen. He pretty much ran out of there, it was kind of funny because he didn’t get his pants back on.” Ella and Jared both cracked smiles at the mental image. “I gave her attitude like any sixteen year old on the top of the world would have. We didn’t speak for two weeks. My father was stressed out trying to talk to the both of us and get us in the same room again. He was always more lenient with belief systems and that kind of thing. We started talking again, me and my mother. Didn’t last long. Me being the creature of habit I am, she caught me several more times with someone in my bed. I think what bothered her the most was that there were different guys. She might have been able to handle it or at least look the other way had it been the same one the whole time. I just forgot about how hurt she would be when I was so focused on making myself feel good.”
Ella paused thinking for a moment. Jared’s hand ran up her side and back down to her hip over and over. He’d missed how soft her skin was.
“I stopped going to church with her and my father after...” Ella laughed a little, Jared kissed her nose encouraging her to go on, “Really Mom stopped taking me after I pulled just about the worst thing possible in her mind and had sex in the church. She was not happy. We didn’t speak for a long time again. Hard headed teenager that I was, I told her I didn’t believe God lived in a building that men built. I told her I didn’t believe he was always there or that he ever was there. I challenged her beliefs and I think what bothered her the most was that I had reasons to back myself up. I wasn’t just some person shouting there was no God and we’re all just bags of meat sitting on a rock waiting to die. That scared her. But like you said there was an eventual getting over that hurdle. My mother and I were okay again. She kind of started turning her stiff neck the other way when a guy spent the night and ignored that I wasn’t at church every Sunday.”
“So what happened?” Jared asked when Ella stopped.
“Me.” She laughed.
“I assumed as much.”
“I decided I wasn’t getting enough attention from her. She was kind of okay with the way I chose to behave but that wasn’t alright for me. While I did get into drugs it was nowhere near the sad addiction story I just fed you a little while ago. More like playing than anything. That bothered her for a while but then she got over it because I did too. I had to figure something else out to piss her off. I just had to. Failing in school only made her hire a tutor. I hated the tutor so I started picking my grades back up. I had to think of something worse to do but I couldn’t. Murdering someone was too extreme. Besides, it would have had to be someone we both knew, not a stranger.” Jared laughed at her black sense of humor. “Couldn’t set fire to anything.” He giggled again. “So I ran away. I was gone for six months. Came back when I was seventeen because I was tired and cold all the time. She didn’t want to let me back in because she had thought I was dead. She was so pissed off. My father took me to a doctor and got me checked out.”
Ella paused and closed her eyes for a moment.
“Come on.” He kissed her cheek.
“Turned out I was pregnant.” She sighed, Jared could see this was something she wasn’t proud of and it would only get worse. “I was scared. But it also gave me, in a fucked up way, just about the worst thing I could do to hurt my mother. I got rid of it after I made sure she knew I was pregnant. That’s one of the biggest things in my life I regret and if you ever bring it up again I’ll kick your ass.” There wasn’t a tear in her eye, Jared hadn’t expected there to be. Even though she was opening up she still had some walls in place. Her emotions would never get the best of her.
“That pushed her over the edge. In her mind I had just taken an innocent life. To me at the time it wasn’t alive. It was just this thing that couldn’t funcrion without me. It was a parasite. I wanted it out so I got rid of it. Now I wish I hadn’t. I don’t see the same way. But that’s when she told me to leave. I did. I packed my shit again and I left. My father found me a week later and told me he’d arranged for a safe place. He sent me to Brazil where he knew a couple people. A nice little old man very much like a grandfather took me in at my father’s request and he was a painter. I stayed with him for a year before coming back. My father had arranged for me to get into college and then that’s where I met you.”
“What about when you were younger?” Jared asked stroking her cheek. “Tell me about that.”
“There’s not a whole lot I remember. I was always with my father. That’s why I was more attached to him. I still am even though he’s gone. From what I understand my mother had me and a week later she was back at work. She did the whole breast pump thing so my father could feed me by bottle while she was gone. When I was a little older, like seven maybe, my mother would give me gifts if I was good while she was away. So would my father. I don’t remember many of them anymore. Sometimes they were expensive sometimes they weren’t. One of them was an art kit when I was eight. That’s how I started painting you know. It was kind of a joke to her that I become a painter. She said I wouldn’t make enough to feed a rat and so I decided to prove her wrong. I hope one day she seems my name in a magazine or my art in a gallery somewhere.”
“She will.” Jared promised.
“I know, I’ll make sure of it if she hasn’t already. It’s one of the things I do so that I’m not like her. I won’t run a company and I won’t be a mother because of her. I don’t want to end up treating my child the way she treated me. I don’t want to run a company with someone and make them dependent on me. I can’t do that. I’m as much to blame for this problem between us, maybe even more so, but I’m not apologizing for it. You know why?”
“Hmm?”
“Because it’s what I chose to do. I don’t apologize for it because if I did then it would be like saying I was sorry for being who I am, for getting to where I am today. I’m not ashamed of myself or my past. I just don’t see the need to tell other people about it. I don’t think they need to understand it.”
“If you loved someone, they would need to understand it.”
“Why?”
“So they would know why you didn’t want children. So they would know why they haven’t met your family, any of your family at all. You can’t just leave someone in the dark about all that if you loved them.”
“Do you think that’s why I told you?” She asked reaching out to run a hand through his hair.
“Yes.”
“You’re right.”

Jared and Ella were close again. Holding hands when Jared had a free moment, sleeping in the same bed, and stealing kisses when they could. He wanted to ask her what was going on but something made him too scared to. Something told him this wouldn’t last much longer if he did.
Colin had a few words with Jared telling him he needed to be careful. It was obvious Jared was much more involved than Ella was and he worried about his friend. Jared assured Colin he was alright and knew what could happen at the worst, he’d already been through it after all. This didn’t stop Colin from having a few words with Ella as well. She promised Colin nothing bad was going to come of this but he was still skeptical. Just from what Jared had told him Colin knew this could be a bad idea.
When the block of filming for Alexander wrapped for that section it was a whole bunch of sad goodbyes. They knew they were coming back in a couple weeks to work together again but it was still sad to leave. They had all become used to their routine and the people around them.
Jared didn’t see any reason to go back to the states. At least he didn’t see one because he didn’t want to go back. Something else was going on in Africa and he wanted to keep it that way. Instead of going home Jared and Ella hopped on a plane and landed in Cape Town, South Africa. He wanted to have time to explore the place before he had to work there.
Ella noticed Jared had been writing songs and he informed her that he’d also been lining up recording for the album. She told him he better not be writing songs about her but he laughed and said he’d been doing that since they day they met. Jared didn’t want to waste any time he had to make the album and already planned a few things out. Shannon, Matt, and Tomo were getting their things together to come out for a couple months and work on hammering out an album.
Seeing Shannon and Matt would be so nice for her. She missed them having not seen either for well over a year. Tomo she had never met. He had come into the band’s picture while she was in New York. Solon had left the band and so had Kevin. Tomo auditioned for the guitarist position and had gained it. From what Jared told her, he had taken all the money he had and bought a plane ticket to California unsure as to if he would be able to go back home. He luckily found reason not to and had been crashing with Shannon and Jared in the house until he found himself a roommate and an apartment.
Now a happy little four piece they were ready to make a second album. The first had done reasonably well and their record label was asking for another. With the funds in place to set up a recording studio on set while Jared was working they were hammering out the final details to get the rest of the band to South Africa the following year when Jared was working on his second movie there.
They weren’t coming in blind though. Jared had been recording songs and ideas on his laptop that he emailed back home. Shannon shared these recordings with Tomo and Matt who then started building up the rest of the songs. In return they made Jared recordings of what they came up with and sent the songs back. From what Jared had showed her and told her about it sounded like they pretty much had the album laid out. All it was going to take were a couple months to get it all down and polished up.
As soon as he explained this all to her he asked Ella to forget about it. This was a bit of an odd thing to ask of her. She’d just been brought in on the full scale of what Jared was planning and had just started handling the record company’s calls for Jared when he asked for a week alone. He wanted her to turn off her phone and just be with him.
And she did.
Ella put her phone away in the bottom of a drawer and let Jared have her full attention. They took the days they had to explore the town. The beach was a frequent place for the two of them. Jared loved the water and the sand. He would have spent the entire week camping on the beach if Ella would have let him. She wanted to see a few other things like the city and try the local food.
Their week was fast coming to an end. Ella had wished there was more time between the two movies. She had wanted to visit Seychelles. It was a chain of Islands northeast of Madagascar. She’d seen pictures of it and thought it was one of the most beautiful places in the world. Jared told her one day they would go. He promised her.
“You know. One day I’ll live on the beach somewhere.” Jared smiled at Ella.
“Yeah, which one?”
“There are so many to choose from.” He pulled her against his chest. “But I hope you’ll live there with me.”
“Couldn’t see a reason not to.” She kissed the bottom side of his chin. “Living with you isn’t so bad.”
She watched Jared sigh as his eyes looked out to the horizon line. The South Atlantic Ocean sprawled out in front of them.
“What is it?” She asked sitting up a little so her eyes leveled with his.
“I just don’t know what to make of this.” He looked at her. “I mean, I don’t want to make anything of it because I’m scared to lose it.”
“You won’t lose anything.”
“I’m pretty sure I will.”
“How could you lose something if you never had it at all?”
“My point exactly.”
“You said you were afraid to lose something. That means you already have it.”
“Ella.”
“What? You started it.”
“Just forget it, alright?”
“No. What’s bothering you.” She sat up and turned her body to face him folding her legs in the sand underneath herself.
“You.”
“What have I done?”
“Everything. Since that night in the tent. Since you told me about your mom. Since the first time we slept together after we got here. What is it?”
“What do you want it to be?” She asked leaning in to kiss him but he turned his head so she only made contact with his cheek.
“I don’t know.”
“We should get back to the hotel.”
“Yeah, we should.” Jared agreed starting to get up from the sand.
Ella took the hand he extended towards her and let him pull her up. She dusted off and pulled a shirt on before they walked back towards their hotel. When Ella tried to lace her fingers with Jared’s he pulled his hand away. This bothered her but she let it slip. She knew what he wanted and she knew he wasn’t going to ask for it. He was too scared.
Jared got into the shower when they made it back to their room. Ella chose not to get in with him though he had left the bathroom door open. That was usually an invitation for her to join him but she thought it best for the time being to leave him alone.
“Shower’s free.” He said walking into the bedroom with a towel wrapped around his waist.
Ella regretted not going with him when she looked up but smiled and headed for the bathroom without voicing that thought. She got in wearing her bathing suit so she could rinse it off. To her surprise she felt an extra hand tug the tie in the back before she could reach for it. Jared had decided to get into the shower with her though he’d only just gotten out himself.
Her top fell to the tile floor and he pinned her against the wall. When she asked what he was doing he pushed his lips to hers so she couldn’t speak. His fingers hooked into the sides of her bikini bottom and slid it down. She wiggled her knees so it would fall off and then stepped out to kick it to the side. Jared caught one of her legs behind the thigh and pulled it up to his hip. His other hand slid to her throat as he removed his lips from hers. She smiled with her eyes still closed as his hand tightened. Choking hadn’t come back into the picture yet and the feeling of it finally doing so was more than enough to get Ella going.
He didn’t give Ella much warning or much of a say when he pushed into her. She was kept pinned against the shower wall only able to hold onto him and kiss him back when his mouth covered hers for brief seconds. With one thigh tight against his hip he reached for the other losing his grip on her neck. It was a fair trade off because once both her feet were off the ground and she was only supported by himself and the shower wall it felt better. He got deeper and she was vocal in her appreciation. He felt her going over the edge and she finished before him. He kept her against the wall rocking his hips into her until he got his satisfaction biting down on her neck as he came.
After that Jared stepped out the shower. Ella scratched her head a moment wondering what had come over him and then went to washing off like she had intended to. Jared dried off for a second time and laid down in bed not bothering to pull clothes on, just one of the sheets was pulled to his hips.
Ella wrapped a towel around herself and walked into the bedroom. She hadn’t grabbed anything to change into. Jared was laying on the bed still staring out the window. Instead of pulling clothes on she got onto the bed and crawled over him. His hands lifted from the bed to rest on her hips until she was settled and then they slipped to her backside. He wished she hadn’t left the towel on.
“I want more.” Ella kissed his neck.
“Then take that towel off.” He turned his head to bite her ear lobe.
“No.” Ella put her hand on his cheek and stopped him. “That’s not what I meant.”
Jared looked perplexed. “Then what do you want?”
“I want more from you.”
In that second he knew what she was saying. He knew she was asking him for more than what they’d shared before. His heart stopped faster than it had when they were just playing a game. He forgot how to breathe. She pushed her lips to his.
“I want more from you Jared.”
He found words. “I’m not running from you, I never have.”
“But you should have, you should have a long time ago.”
“I didn’t want to.” He kissed her, hands rubbing her back through the towel. “I couldn’t.”
She smiled down at him.
“Do you really mean this? Do you really want more than just sleeping together? I can’t handle it if you’re playing that sick game again. I really can’t.”
“No, I’m not playing.” She kissed his forehead. “And I don’t deserve you anymore but I want you.”
“You’ve always had me.”
“Now it’s even.” She kissing his nose. “Now I’m yours.”
Jared slipped a hand to the back of her head and pulled her in for a kiss. He wouldn’t let her pull back so she had to gasp for air when his head changed position. His other hand started to look for the tuck in her towel so he could pull it off. Then he stopped and looked up at her, his eyes somewhat afraid.
“What?” She asked brushing some hair from his forehead.
“Can I actually call you my girlfriend now and mean it? Are we really together?” He asked instantly feeling like he was back in college and having a girlfriend meant everything.
“Yes, we’re really together.” She smiled. “As for calling me your girlfriend, that you might want to wait on.”
“Why?” He was suddenly worried.
“So we can play with everyone else of course.” Her smile turned into a smirk.
He wasn’t sure what she meant.
“Make everyone wonder.” She had to try and not laugh as she clued him in.
“Oh, yeah. Right. They’ll be here in a three months.”
“Two.”
“What?”
“Two months. You’re bad at keeping track of dates.”
“That’s why I have you.” Jared grinned. “In more ways than one now.”
“Oh that was cheesy.” She laughed. “Don’t make me regret this with your bad jokes and puns.”
“Sorry.” He half smiled tracing her jawline with his fingertips. “You know I’m terrible with jokes.”
“Even more so when you’re emotional.”
“Your making me sound like a girl.” He protested.
“You are a girl. You’ve been a girl since I met you. Always so emotional.”
“Hey! You liked it enough to stick around.”
“It wasn’t your jokes I stuck around for.” She said sliding her hand under the sheet that covered him to find a grip.
“Hey, don’t go touching that unless you’re going to use it.”
“Have I ever?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, fine.” She kissed him. “But I’m not teasing you now.”
Jared grinned and rolled over so she was underneath him.

The second block of filming started up a few days later. Jared and Ella stayed close as was possible. When people asked Jared couldn’t help but have a teeth baring grin when he told people Ella was his girlfriend. Ella made fun of how ridiculously happy he looked but he would stop her by pushing his mouth to hers. Then she would share the same expression and pull him in for more.
It was difficult for Jared not to say anything to Shannon. Ella thought it would be fun to let the older Leto wonder when he got to South Africa but Jared had a hard time. As compensation she let him tell his mother. Constance could keep a secret at least and then Jared was able to release some pressure.
After a while it wasn’t so hard to keep quiet when he talked to Shannon. Shannon noticed Jared sounded a lot happier but that was it. He just figured it was because he and Ella were friends again. He didn’t know they were much more than that now.