Extinguished

~11~ Closing The Door

Ellie's POV

Calling Jake was the last thing I wanted to do, but I don't have a choice. I need help moving out quickly, and I don't want Liam involved with this. Telling him is going to kill me—I can't have Alex helping me either.

I know Taylor, and so I knew that he wasn't going to make a scene at the firehouse. Our apartment will be another story; He isn't going to let me leave easily. If Alex is there, it will make it worse.

Alex hates confrontation—Kinda funny since he's a cop, but it's true. He can hold his own just fine, he just doesn't want to have to. At 6'4, Alex is not only tall, he's strong. We all know that he wouldn't stand a chance against Taylor, though. Taylor is on an entirely different level.

So, Jake is my only option. Jake and I don't get along, but he won't let Taylor guilt me into staying. I'm going to need the support; I'm already missing him.

Jake picks me up from work, and we head to do some of the errands I need to do before I head home—er, my old home. I need to get a storage unit rented, and I need to get boxes.

"Hey," he says, barely even looking at me as I get in the truck.

"Thanks for doing this for me," I say with a forced smile.

"Whatever, I just need to be done by 2."

This is gonna be a fun day.

By the time we get to the apartment, it's 11, so I'm sure Taylor is home by now. The thought of that is making me physically sick.

We get to our apartment and I unlock the door, dropping boxes as I go in.

"Jeeze. You're so damn clumsy," Jake says, rolling his eyes.

Taylor comes out of the bedroom at the exact moment I drop the boxes. He stands there for a minute, trying to decide if he should help me, or let me do it by myself. He decides on the former.

He walks over and picks up a handful, setting them on the kitchen table.

"Can we talk, please?" He begs quietly, staring deep into my soul.

Before I can say anything, Jake steps in.

"Look, I've got a kickboxing class I'm leading at 2:30. I'm not gonna stand around wasting my time with this shit."

"Then leave," Taylor says darkly, starting to step in front of Jake.

"Ooohhh, I forgot you're a tough guy," Jake smiles, antagonizing. Jake loves to fight. In school, he ended up getting expelled because he got in too many. It didn't surprise any of us when he went into the profession he did.

"I don't know about that, but we can find out if ya want," Taylor says, an inch from his face.

I step in between them. With the mood Taylor's in, and the mood Jake's always in, somebody's gonna get really hurt.

"Come on, Jake, please? We'll start in the bedroom," I say as I shove Jake lightly away from Taylor. Jake looks at me for a second with a funny expression on his face.

"Fine," he finally says darkly as he follows me.

I half expected Taylor to come in and try again, but he doesn't. Instead, he just gets something out of the fridge, and then goes to the couch to watch the game.

We get done pretty quickly in my room. I let Taylor keep basically everything. I don't want anything that reminds me of him. I had done our laundry the night before shift, so everything was hanging in our closet, easy to grab and pack. Anything left in the hamper he can just throw away.

Next is Liam's room, and this one is going to take more time. I'm taking everything, because everything is his.

Jake silently helps me. He says nothing as he dumps things into boxes roughly and tapes them up.

"You're going to break those," I say as he shoves Liam's trophies into a box.

He stops for a moment and gives me a death glare. "Or I could leave, and you can clean up your own damn mess."

I roll my eyes as I head for the closet.

It takes us a good couple of hours to get everything done. We start grabbing boxes, and we take them to Jake's truck.

It's our last load, and I'm fully expecting Taylor to say something. He hasn't moved from the couch or taken his eyes off the TV this whole time. He's just sat there, drinking his beer and watching the game. He never even came in to make sure I wasn't stealing any of his stuff. He didn't care about the stuff at all.

As I expected, as soon as we're about to leave, he stands up and grabs my arm.

"Please don't do this; I can make this right. Even if I spend the rest of my life making this up to you, I will. Please. Stay. At least for an hour. Just stay and talk. Please?" He begs, choking back tears.

"What a loser," Jake chuckles.

Taylor spins around and is in his face in a moment.

"Don't think for a second that I didn't hear how you were talking to her in there. The only reason you're not in a coma right now is because I didn't want her to deal with that on top of everything else. But I'll tell you what, you better start being good to her. If I ever see you mistreating her, you and I are gonna dance."

Taylor's voice is so low that he sounds terrifying.

"You're telling ME to be good to her?" Jake asks while inching even closer. "That's funny. Are you confused on the events that have led to this? Little pot and kettle, aren't we?" He scoffs as he shakes his head and picks up the last remaining boxes and leaves.

I glance at Taylor. As soon as he meets my gaze his eyes fill with tears again.

"Just tell me you aren't staying with him," he pleads.

"I'm not. Jake will be back later for Liam's furniture," I say as I turn around to leave, closing the door.

Closing the door on Taylor. On my happiness. On the life I thought I was going to live the rest of my life.