Only Because I Need You

Home Cinema

Caitlin felt her body melt into the leather armchair below her. The room was dark aside from the glaring screen in front of her. The only noise she could hear was the gentle whooshing of her own breath. She scrolled through movies in search for the right one, but none of them really tickled her fancy. The gentle click of her door opening told her that Ethan had finally returned. He had been living with her for a little while, but Caitlin rarely saw him. He was more elusive than her keys when she needed them. She knew he slept on her couch, despite there being a spare room, but that was it. His shadowy form entered the room and he paused as he noticed Caitlin, who had turned to see him. The screen cast a static blue light that highlighted the contours of his face. She hummed a greeting to him, "you know, you don't have to sleep on the couch, I have a spare room for a reason," she tilted her head to him and raised an eyebrow.

It took him a few moments to reply, "Thank you Caitlin," he shifted his weight, it was clear those words were foreign in his mouth.

"No problem," she smiled turning her attention back to the screen, "I was thinking of watching a movie, do you want to join me?" She asked, her sights trained on the screen.

He didn't reply. Unsureness coated his silence. Caitlin wouldn't force him to join her, but she certainly wouldn't mind the company. She heard him suck in a deep breath before beginning to move. He collapsed into the sofa, just a few meters away from her. She struggled to control the smile that threatened to morph her features. She quickly found a decent movie and hurriedly put it on. Her attention focused on the screen, but her ears were always trained on Ethan's shallow breath and the crinkling of his clothing. She had no idea where he disappeared to during the day. He couldn't have travelled far, he didn't have his speed. He also could not have removed his power dampening cuff without the team knowing. Cisco had assured the team that he had programmed so many protocols into the cuff that not even he himself could remove it without an alert being sent to the Lab, along side a location. She knew where he had gone was none of her business, but her natural curiosity was greater than her sense of privacy.

Caitlin glanced over at him, his eyes were trained on the screen, the light reflected eerily from his face. Caitlin couldn't help but notice that he had turned the unscarred side of his face closer to the screen, away from her. She could only guess that it helped him hear better. Yet she had never seen him do such an action before. Theories began to erupt in her mind. The most plausible one was that he was terrified of showing weakness, just in case someone used it against him. It had happened to him before. It made sense. So, if he were doing it with Caitlin in the room, he was either so engrossed in the movie that he didn't notice he was tilting his head, or that he knew that she already had knowledge of his partial deafness and so he thought there was no point in hiding it from her. It could have been either or a mixture of both. His eyes flicked over to meet hers. She immediately looked forwards towards the screen, hoping he had not seen her staring. She was glad the room was dark, because she could feel her face heating up. Caitlin hated it when she was caught staring because more often than not, she didn't mean to.

She decided to focus on the movie, as she should have been from the beginning. In the tranquility of the darkness and soft murder of the television, she found her eyelids growing heavy. Her entire body grew weary, before she knew it, she was shroud in darkness.

Caitlin arose the noise of her nightmares. Her alarm. Slick shivers ran down her spine as she peeled open her eyes and wearily glanced around. She was still on the couch from the night before. All of her muscles groaned in protest to her movement. A small smile crept along her face when she noticed that a blanket had been draped across her body. She located her phone amongst the warm nest that had been created under the blanket and without a second doubt she turned it off. The room was still gloomy and dark, the only real light was from the small cracks between the curtains on her window. She stretched her arm high above her head and peeled the blanket off of her. Ethan was no where to be seen, but Caitlin didn't mind. She stood up and stretched of slightly before meandering back to her room. However, she saw something that made her halt in her tracks. The door to her guest room was slightly ajar, revealing only darkness within. Caitlin crept closer and cracked it open a little more. She could barely make out the lumpy silhouette of someone lying on the bed. Another little smile crossed her features. She closed the door over with a small huff of triumph and made her way back to her own room.

*

Iris stared at the expectant faces of team Flash. They were all staring at her with drawn eyebrows and sour faces. She expected as much. They were gathered in the main cortex. Iris was standing by Barry's side, facing the rest of the clumped group. Her husband looked down at her with furrowed brows. Harry however, looked the least impressed, his arms were crossed firmly over his chest and his chin was jutted out to one side, "So you are telling us, that there is a rumour that people are going missing in some club called Twoot and you want us to spend precious time looking into it because, even though you have no evidence, you believe that Tate Johnning is involved," he kept his expression band and downturned.

Iris nodded her head, "I do have proof," a smug smile crossed her face, "I talked to a few of the regulars at the bar. When I asked who was making the girls disappear, they all just said TJ. Which by the way, could very well stand for Tate Johnning," she tilted her head to the side and plastered a smile on her face. She did not want to deal with Harry's childish behaviour and supremacy issues.

Harry opened his mouth to respond, but Caitlin beat him to the punch, "Iris is right, even though she had no solid proof TJ could stand for Tate Johning, and right now that is the only lead we have so it is worth following up," Iris sent Caitlin a grateful look, she could always rely on her. After all, they were close friends.

"Yeah and if women are being abducted from the club then we need to put a stop to that anyway," Barry added in, leaning closer to his spouse.

"Fine," Harry grumbled, pursing his lips and rocking on his feet. Sometimes Iris really wondered if he was a grown man or a child in the body of a genius. Probably the latter.

"Okay then, sounds like a plan, we better get to work on finding out if T.J. really stands for Tate Johnning," Cisco added, sending a sly smile to Harry, who sneered back at him. Some things in Team Flash would never change, no matter how much Iris wished they would.

A/N - As promised, three days later I am publishing another chapter. Shocking, I know. I am surprised that I have written 47 chapters of this book, and I only have about five-ish more to go. So in around 12 chapters the finale will be published, which should be in 37 days! If I finish the book I might just publish them all in one tbh... anyway, I hope you enjoyed and thank you for reading!

- Potato 🥔