my delilah

06

Elijah was flipping through a bin of records mindlessly, trying to sort things back in order as well as he could. The store had expanded in the past year and with the larger area came more things to keep tabs on – they'd always been a set number of workers coming in here and there, but it quickly became evident that they needed more people as soon as things changed. Delilah and Sophia were probably only the beginning, he realized, and he wasn't sure how to feel about it.

As her name appeared in his head, he let out a heavy sigh – the image of her with Wick just minutes earlier were locked in place, and they disturbed him to no end. It was repulsing, seeing her with someone so crooked; Elijah had a knack for reading people, and he could tell from a miles distance that Wick was bad news, and that Delilah was not – quite frankly, he dared to say that she deserved better, even though he didn't know the first thing about their relationship, or her for that matter. Though Wick seemed to be an open book for him, the girl was not – he knew nothing of what she was, and it was thrilling.

Deep down he knew it was merely his own jealousy speaking, but his consciousness waved that idea away quickly – to be jealous, he'd have to care first. Yes, he could go so far to admit to himself that Delilah intrigued him, but further than that, he refused to go. He thought of Emma, the woman that probably sat in his house, taking pictures of clothing for her web-shop, and he felt nothing.

Truth be told, he'd never wanted anything quite the way he wanted Delilah the moment he laid eyes on her, but he realized the torturous joy she'd granted him would merely be a memory soon. No matter what he felt, it was way past that now, seeing as someone else got there first. He made a mental note of being extra nice to Emma once he got home, purely based on guilt for even thinking the thoughts which stormed through his head.

"Shit," he muttered as he realized the small sliver of focus he'd previously had was completely gone. He let out an exasperated sigh, dropping the pile of records he held up as a frown settled on his face. He looked down to his wrist watch and concluded that his break would start in just five minutes – with a quick look around the almost empty store he shook his head, beginning to walk towards the staff room. He was of no use at that point anyways; hungry and frustrated, and completely unfocused.

He hadn't been able to focus ever since Delilah left. Now, she wasn't necessarily the reason for his lack of focus, but more of the feeling she left him with, along with the man she brought along. He was so different from her; he was harsh, dark and taunting, while Delilah was anything but – she was sweetness, intelligence, joy, and Elijah didn't have to look beyond any surface to know that she held kindness. He had noticed just the couple days she'd been in the store, how people gravitated towards her and her charm, and the only one that seemed to have proven immune to her captivating ways was Azlan, who remained unsure. Elijah wasn't unsure – he was allured, and he almost felt a need to be close, to catch a glimpse of her.

He'd looked after Delilah when he, Wick, asked her to run off and get him a CD, trying his best to avoid any kind of conversation with the man on the other side of the desk, though he could feel his gaze on him.

"She's beautiful, isn't she?" Wick finally muttered, and Elijah had hastily looked over at him to find that he was being observed in the slightest detail. Wick's gaze was unsettling and calculating, and Elijah remembered that he'd wondered if that was what you became once you got children. Elijah had quirked his eyebrow while looking at the man, but soon he stuttered to get a response out.

Wick chuckled at his lack of response. "Ah, come on now. Man to man, I know my girl there is a sight for most men, there's nothing wrong with it."

Elijah thought it was a strange thing for a father to say about his daughter, and that's when he first started wondering if they really were related in that way. Elijah glanced back over at Delilah who stood, running her fingers over a casing for a CD further down in the store, and he couldn't help but to agree – she was beautiful, in its most complex terms as well as the simplest. Honey hair, coffee eyes, sweet freckles speckled her sharp face, which almost seemed to act in symbiosis to create a perfect middle ground of soft and harsh. Delilah was beautiful, and Elijah was sure there was more to her than that as well.