220 - melancholy - come down to me - defy_n_gravity - leverage/supernatural

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Title: Come Down To Me
Author: defy_n_gravity
Characters: Parker/Bela Talbot
Rating: T
Words: 1085
Disclaimer: I have no claim on Leverage or Supernatural, just using them for fun.
Warning: Set season two for Leverage (no spoilers). Post 3x15: Time Is On My Side for SPN.
Author's Notes: Follows this.
Summary: A year later Parker is still trying to cope.

She knew she didn't belong there, but she didn't care. What she did care about was that it was different. Colder. Darker. Everything was sitting there, waiting. Just like her.

Parker walked through the rooms of the familiar apartment and ran her fingers over everything she could. Sheets covered all of the tables and chairs, and she yanked them away one by one. They didn't belong there, but as she gathered them all up, she started to see that it didn't change anything. The apartment was still so different. She turned on all the lights, but it didn't make it better.

Bela wasn't there anymore. She was the only thing that could make the place feel right.

Parker went to the kitchen and opened a dusty bottle of Bela's favorite wine. She poured a glass and carried it to Bela's bedroom, setting it down by the side of the bed where Bela had always slept. She sat down in the armchair at the end of the room and pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them tightly. She rested her chin to her knees and stared at the empty bed.

How many times did she sneak into the apartment after a job, while Bela was still asleep, and sit there and watch her? Until Bela would shift in her sleep and open an eye to her with a lazy smirk.

”Going to sit there forever, darling?”

And Parker would go curl up in Bela's arms, breathe her in, and close her eyes. A calm feeling would always wash over her. It wasn't something she understood, but it was good and it was warm. It was where she belonged. Bela even told her as much again and again.

Parker got up and went over to the bed. She let her fingers trace the bedspread as she walked the length of it. When she got to Bela's pillow she pulled the blankets back and climbed right into the bed. She hadn't changed her muddy clothes since leaving the team, and she didn't bother taking her shoes off. She curled up under the covers and pushed her face into the pillow Bela had always slept against.

It still didn't feel right.

She breathed, and breathed, and breathed; trying to pick up the girl's scent, but it wasn't there. She couldn't find it anywhere in the apartment, least of all in the bed. She gave up after awhile and turned onto her back to look up at the ceiling.

Bela had been gone for over a year. Parker had moved on and continued her work with Nate and the others, but she hadn't forgotten Bela for a single day. Whenever she could get away from Boston she slipped back to Bela's apartment where she'd break in and try to find something real she could grasp onto. But it was all gone. Bela was gone.

Parker didn't know why the apartment stayed there as it was. All she knew was that roughly a week after Bela died, she broke in and discovered everything had been covered up. Bela's cat was gone. Someone had come and put a chill through the one place Parker could find warmth, and every time she came back everything was covered again, like she had never been there.

She flung the sheets in the air and quickly scooted further down the bed so that when the blankets came down around her she was completely covered. She smirked a bit and turned her head to the side, but all she saw was more blankets. She reached out, but no one was there.

She closed her eyes.

Bela chuckled at Parker's playfulness and watched the sheets come down around them, hiding them completely from the world. She reached over and took Parker's cheek in her hand, then leaned closer to her. “Are you having fun?”

“Yes!” Parker beamed and curled up against Bela. “I always have fun.”

“I know you do.” Bela brushed her lips to Parker's and ran her thumb under Parker's eye. “Remember to always have fun,” she murmured.

“Duh.” And Parker closed the space between them to kiss Bela. One of the rare moments she made the move first-

Parker kicked at the sheets around her and pounded on the mattress under her. She did this until the memories stopped and the sheets were off of her, and she was free again to look up at the ceiling. She stared at it for a long time before wiping her damp eyes and sitting up.

She looked over at Bela's glass of wine. It still sat there, full. There was no lipstick stain on the rim from where Bela's lips should have been. Parker frowned and reached out to slowly trace the rim of the glass, then she picked it up and sipped from it. When she pulled it away the rim was still clean. She didn't wear lipstick. Her lips weren't Bela's lips. She brought the glass to her mouth again and drained it before setting it back down.

She got out of the bed and went to open the closet. It was empty. Whoever kept care of the apartment had moved all of Bela's clothing somewhere else, and Parker wanted to find that person and hurt them. Bela's clothes belonged there. There was where Parker could go stick her face in and maybe, just maybe, still find the scent that she needed so much.

But the closet was empty. As though Bela had never been there.

Parker stepped away from it, her knees shaky, and she slammed the door shut. The same sinking feeling came over her as it always did. She wouldn't find Bela there. Nothing about that apartment was Bela's anymore, because Bela was gone.

And that led to the same thought she always ended at. If that place no longer belonged to Bela, did that mean that she no longer belonged to Bela? With Bela gone, did that mean the thread between them was gone? Could Parker have any hold on something that she wasn't allowed to have anymore?

“Come back,” she whispered. She shook off her shoes with violent kicks and peeled the clothes off her body as fast as she could. She got back into the bed and pulled the blankets tight around herself. “Come back,” she whispered again. She rolled in the blankets until she was trapped in them. Wrapped up, confined, as completely as she had always felt in Bela's arms.

“Please, come back.”