Pillow Talk

Nobody's Doormat

Elena sat in Cece's shiny new kitchen, a glass of rose in front of her. It'd taken a while to find her an apartment that met all of her demands but when you had money, nothing was impossible and thanks to her, her sister had more than enough.

The last month had been a challenge for both of them. If not for Elena, Cece would have relapsed and caved to their father's demands. At one point, Elena'd told her that she'd been done, if she'd wanted to go back and risk losing her life, it'd been her problem but she'd better change her emergency contact because she wouldn't assist to that shit in any shape or form. That had done it and since then Cece'd occupied herself with trying to find a decent new home, new wardrobe, new shoes, new everything.

"I wish Roman could be here, too," Cece said with a dreamy expression on her face as she sat next to Elena and sipped her wine slowly. Elena's stomach turned into a knot by the mention of the name.

Since the incident she'd moved in after he'd claimed that she'd agreed in her drunk haze. Elena'd had her doubts whether his story was true or not but he'd slowly driven her crazy so she'd agreed in the end. Things had been ideal, as ideal as they could be between her smart mouth and his temper.

Living with Roman Bürki wasn't half as bad as she'd expected and the truth was, he was right, she'd practically lived there already anyway, long before they'd made it official. She could date it back to the day when the heating system had died in the building and it'd been -10 degrees outside and she'd had nowhere to go but him.

Still giving up her own place had been a difficult decision, one that she'd despised and regretted now. She should have never trusted him.

"Why do you have the death glare on your face?" Cece frowned at her and Elena rolled her eyes, drank her wine up before she reached for the bottle and filled her glass to the top. "What have you done, El? Please, tell me you aren't screwing this one up, too. Roman is a..."

"Real catch?" She snorted and drank some more. Why was she even here? Always the same old story, it could only be her god damn fault. Roman Bürki, real catch, she grumbled to herself. Of course, if you wanted to be someone's dirty little secret.

"Well, yes. Why are you mad at me now? I'm just telling the truth." Her sister whined and she turned to her.

"Because Cece, does it ever even cross your mind that some shit is not my fault?" Elena snapped at her. If she could, her sister would blame the god damn global warming on her as well.

"I'm just trying to tell you that he's rich and famous and he cares for you..."

"Money and fame is not everything for me, hell, it means shit to me. I am not you, Cece!" She jumped from the stool and grabbed her jacket from the back of it. She had no patience for her sister today. "And you really shouldn't talk about things that you have no idea about." She glared at her as she slipped into her jacket. "Because let me enlighten you, sweetheart. Your dreamy Roman doesn't exist. There's only one person Roman cares for and that's Roman."

'No, no, there's no one special in my life.' The woman one time caught on picture with him? 'She's a no one, just a waitress who happened to leave the building at the same moment as him.' The quotes from his Christmas interview for GQ popped into her mind.

It shouldn't have stung and yet, it'd felt like a slap in the face. Elena didn't expect him to put a flashlight to the top of the highest building and declare his love. A simple 'I wouldn't like to talk about this.' would have done it. He could have used that god damn line in every previous interview but not now. No, he had to make sure the message was loud and clear. The fact that he'd had the gutts to call her a no one was just the cream on top.

Then today she'd overheard him talking on the phone with Marco, telling him that she was just fun to play with, a good fuck to pass time with, no more. Again, she didn't want him to walk around and tell people she was his girlfriend because she was not, but the level of repeated disrespect boiled her blood. She wasn't going to be treated like this, not by him, not by anyone.

"Are you going to break up with him?" Cece asked with dread and she took another big sip of her wine.

"Can't. We've never been together." She shrugged. They'd never said that whatever was going on between them would be exclusive or that it was a relationship. This could and should be a clean cut. Or at least that was what she kept telling herself.

"But... But you live with him." Elena huffed. As if that meant anything. As if she needed reminder of the biggest mistake of her life. It seemed since Roman had been around all she could do was screw her life up.

"I do but I'm not his doormat," she stated as she started towards the door. One more word from Cece in Roman's defence and she was going to strangle her. Elena could have tried to explain, could have tried to make her sister understand but they'd been through this so many times with the same result each and every time that she couldn't even bother anymore.

"How do you do this?" Cece asked in a small voice and Elena turned back to her with a confused frown.

"What do you mean?" She asked, her hand rested on the knob as she watched her sister playing with her fingers in her lap.

"This... Everything... I just... You're never afraid of anything, El," she whispered, her eyes stuck on her own hands.

"Roman might be a fucker but he isn't Ramons, Cece," she chuckled lightly. The idea that Roman would ever physically hurt her was laughable.

"I don't mean that." Cece shook her head with a sigh.

"What dou you mean then?" Elena let go of the knob, walked back to her and sat down, taking a sip of the wine she'd left there.

"You don't settle with just good enough and you've always been like that," she said as she turned to her, chewing on her bottomlip.

"One thing I can't be accused with is that I'm a comformist." She ran a hand over her hair with a sigh.

"That's the thing. You're standing up for yourself regardless of the price you might pay, regardless of what you might lose. Even as a kid, you always wanted the best of everything and if you couldn't get it, you'd rather had nothing. You simply don't fear the consequences of throwing the table over if there's something you don't like. You don't need anyone because you're just not afraid of anything."

"Believe me, that isn't true," she snorted with a shake of her head. She felt like howling. Not afraid. Damn right, she wasn't afraid because she was petrified.

She was petrified that it was too late with Roman, that she got way too tangled, that she let him way too close. She was terrified that she couldn't find another apartment as cheap as the one she'd given up, that she wouldn't have enough money because there'd be no job where she could step in, and she would end up either on the street, or even worse having to beg her sister to let her stay for a couple of nights until she sorted things out. "I simply don't let people to stomp over me." Elena knew, no matter what, she'd wing it. She'd gotten through worse than that.

"I've always envied that," Cece whispered as an after thought and Elena stared at her sister in shock. Cece envied her for anything? That concept did not exist. Her sister'd been the golden child, the perfect beauty, the smartest, the top of everything. In this world there was no place for envy in Cece's vocabulary when it came to her.

"I think you had one too many sip of that wine, sis." She chuckled.

"I mean it, El. You can't even imagine the amount of times when I wished that I could be at least a little bit like you." A tear rolled down on her face as she looked at Elena.

She frowned at her sister, unable to say anything. There hadn't been many things that could shock her into silence but this certainly was one of those things. Never in her life she'd imagined she'd hear these words from Cece and not in a mocking fashion.

"You're going to be fine, too." She cupped her face into her hands and smiled at her. "You're beautiful, smart, the most determined person I've ever known. You broke my fucking leg, sis. You're capable of anything."

"It was an accident!" Cece exclaimed, her face turned bright red as she pulled away.

"Shut up, Cece!" Elena rolled her eyes with a laugh and pulled her into a hug.