WHEN TIME FRACTURES || HOPE MIKAELSON x RYAN CLARKE

Chapter Nine

This February night of 1934 was chillier than she expected, and although she hated the cliché it brought, she'd gladly accepted Ryan's jacket.

Although she made it a point to stare ahead, there was something in the way that he held himself that reminded her of her late uncle Elijah. This small detail wasn't nearly enough to make her stare, but she couldn't help but peer at him from the corner of her eye from time to time.
A mere fraction of seconds passed before she did it again. And again.

He was walking quietly by her side, his hands carefully tucked in his trousers pockets and, thankfully, not pushing for any kind of conversation.

''This is nice,'' she finally said as she glanced around, tired of the eerily companionable silence between them.

Memories of a dark and endless oblivion flashed behind her eyes but she made it a point to push them as far away as she could. At last, they stumbled into a chest that snapped shut after them, trapping Malivore and Agent Clarke under lock and key in the twists and turns of her mind.

She turned her attention to the path ahead, although there was a conflicting thought in the back of her mind. There, right next to the sealed cedar chest, was a nagging tug, a bad feeling that kept her paranoia alive.
It was telling her to run as far away from here as possible -to run as if the devil himself was on her trail, but most of all, to run from him.

She jolted with the chest when something from within banged once on the hard wood. It banged, starting a restless pace that sounded like a death knell. She winced and closed her eyes, picturing the sturdy brass latches the only way they should be, still.

She breathed deeply and felt him shift beside her. Once her lungs were full, she opened her eyes and forced herself to be in the moment.

There was no one in their way, this far into the night, but surprisingly, the further they walked, the more she found herself enjoying the quiet.
Aside from the eternal loneliness she'd experienced in Malivore, she'd always preferred silence over any sound, over any kind of talks.

For a long time, whenever she hadn't been surrounded by quiet, she had only been drowned in the dullest apologies and the dearest of sympathies that had carefully been thrown and tossed into her ears until they had clogged into a knot.
She had never been fond of condolences.
It had been a problem then, and it was a problem now.

''I come here sometimes when I need to think. Which you obviously do.'' Ryan's answer pulled her from her thoughts and she almost laughed; the irony that he enjoyed silence was almost as comical as the insatiable appetite of his she'd seen first hand.

''You know, you have a habit of laughing to yourself.'' he remarked, his dark eyes never straying from the path they were walking along.
She couldn't, for the love of god, interpret the look in his eyes, but she didn't think she would ever forget it.

''I'm sorry,'' she finally said, ''I promise I'm not mocking you. I'm mocking myself, in a way.''

''Do I want to know more about that?'' he asked, shifting so that he could look at her from the corner of his eyes too. Except for that, his face hadn't changed, but he sounded... amused.

''No, you really don't.'' she snorted.
When she looked up, he was staring intently at the grovels beneath their feet, a hint of a smile gracing his features.

''In that case, are you ready to talk about what happened at Gloria's?''

Hope sighed and came to an abrupt stop.
He stopped when she did and turned to face her.
Shifting on her feet, she wrapped his jacket tighter around herself, and took an abnormally deep breath.