"You not going to write to him anymore?"

"I can't." My frustration was clear, and Alex sighed, shaking her head. I'd grown pretty close to the nurse now, she wasn't assigned to me anymore but she visited every night after she finished her shift, and we'd gotten as close to friendship as I'd ever had.

"I just… I don't think this is going to end up well."

Why not?"

She raised her eyebrows. "Haven't your read Romeo and Juliet?"

"Have you read Romeo and Juliet, Violet?" His voice was soft and rich, toned just right to start the spark between my thighs, though what he was saying wasn't sexual.

"Yeah. It's bullshit though," I really hated the way people go crazy over that fucked up excuse for a love story. He frowned though, dropping the book to the floor with a thud and crawling towards me. He straddled my thighs, not pressing down hard enough to let me feel his weight, but warming my flesh with his bare legs.

"You don't think it's… romantic?" He rolled his 'll's', drawing my eyes firmly to his full mouth and skilled tongue, which did nothing to help the uncomfortable slickness on my thighs and inside my underwear.

"Tate," I gasped as he lowered himself just enough to wedge a knee between my legs. I couldn't help it, abandoning all sense of dignity I rolled my hips against his thighs.

"I mean, if you died… I'd die too." That woke me up.

"Tate, no. I mean, no. Goddamn Tate," I hissed because he'd spread his teeth against the flesh of my neck and moulded it to the shape of his mouth.

"As if," he kissed the spot he'd marked, "I could live without you?" The raised inflection at the end of his statement made his utterance a question though I knew the point wasn't up for negotiation.

"Well I think it's stupid. If I died I'd want you to carry on, I'd want you to be happy." He sat back, removing his leg from between mine and making me buck forward with a frustrated sigh.

"Violet, Violet, I couldn't live without you, I couldn't be happy knowing you weren't in the world." The sincerity in his voice didn't leave room for questioning. He truly believed himself.

"Well you don't have to worry about that, anyway."

"No?" He raised an eyebrow in a challenge.

"I'm immortal," I stated with a smirk and he giggled, an angel face with dilated pupils as he mashed his mouth onto mine and forced my lips open instantly with his own.

"Can I be immortal, too?" He asked against my mouth and I nipped his bottom lip.

"Sure you can put up with me forever?"

"Violet," he pulled back, slipping a hand around my neck and applying pressure to my windpipe with his thumb. "I couldn't put up with forever without you," he was being honest, and the graceful smile spread across his features confused me because it was becoming harder and harder to breathe.

"Tate… can't," I choked on the words.

"Shhhh its okay baby. We'll talk later. I'm tired." I wanted to point out that he didn't need to knock me unconscious every time he needed to sleep, but I didn't know how that would truly help the situation. He wouldn't understand anyways.

"Tate," I whispered as much as I could manage, but I was fading fast.

"Shhh, Juliet, shhhh."

By the time I'd woken up, everything was normal again and when I'd asked Tate about Romeo and Juliet he'd given me a funny little look, accompanied by a half smile.

"Violet… I've never even read Romeo and Juliet…" his mouth quirked. "You must have dreamed it or something."

I pressed my lips into a tight line, remembering.

"Tate won't kill himself. Jesus, you're morbid." My voice wavered a little, remembering the conversation but not willing to share such a peculiar moment with Alex.

"Maybe so, but I've seen the way that boy writes to you. And I've visited him, remember. You're his reason for living. You can't just… stop talking to him."

"I can. I have to. I have to make the doctors believe I don't love him anymore, or they'll never let me go."

"Alright. Do you want me to smuggle some more of his letters to you for a while?"

"I don't know, I don't think that will make it easier to not reply. He'll probably worry for a while, but I'm hoping he'll come to the conclusion that they're simply withholding my letters, but I'm still writing them. He needs to believe I'm safe, I just can't tell him so." She nodded.

"I could… maybe try to see him again. And just let him know." I bit my lip, because the idea was horribly tempting, but at the same time, terrifying. Alex was pretty, voluptuous, not too many years older than I was. Tate was in prison, and a jealous, insecure part of me was desperate to prevent the two of them talking. The idea of him falling for her… I couldn't let him see any woman but me.

"No, we don't know who can be trusted, you know?"

"Not everything is a conspiracy you know," she sighed, shaking her head a little at my paranoia.

"Well me and Tate haven't had a whole lot of people on our side, okay? There's just us." I snapped, and she stiffened, standing up.

"Alright. I'm sorry I suggested anything at all. I've got to go, okay? I'll see you tomorrow." At least she was coming back. We'd fix things then, I was too drained from this conversation to try to apologise now. She was an hour late the next morning, in her own clothes instead of uniform. By the watery look to her eyes, I knew there was something wrong. I sat up.

"What's happened?" My concern wasn't entirely selfish, I was just as worried that something had happened within her life as I was that something had happened to Tate. Well, maybe not just as worried, but worried all the same.

"Oh god, Violet, I'm so sorry," her voice broke off into sobs and she hugged herself, not approaching me as she usually would.

"What the fuck is going on?" My voice was a snap through the hysteria bubbling up.

"It's… oh god. It's all over the news. Constance is dead." I sat back, feeling a sick sense of relief.

"That's okay. Really. Tate won't care." I didn't care either. I wondered why Alex was in tears.

"No but… her boyfriend… when he heard, oh god," I sat up again, tense, because I had an inkling as to where this was going. Would Larry really continue to take the fall for Tate with Constance gone? I was betting that no, he wouldn't.

"Larry has a watertight alibi, it's just surfaced and it's being considered. There's a chance Tate will go down for the whole thing now."

"No."

"Violet, he's 18 in three weeks."

"No." I didn't even want to think about how she knew that. I didn't want to think that she'd visited him, plotted with him.

"He might be eligible for the death penalty."

"No."

"Violet."

"Can you leave me alone, please. I need to think." She didn't need to be asked twice, she didn't know how to cope with me at the moment, because I wasn't a hysterical mess like she was. She didn't know how to handle any grief other than the kind you see on the silver screen. I was hollowing out, rapidly and ruthlessly, draining the hope from my bones and resigning myself to sit and watch and wait for the moment when my worst fears would be confirmed. I would not hope for a lenient sentence, I would simply wait for the confirmation that Tate was going to be killed. I hadn't switched off my emotions, wouldn't if I could, but had allowed them to become me. I was not going to feel grief for him, I was going to become grief.

It only took three days of waiting and waiting and Alex's shaky reassurances and visits that were becoming shorter and shorter for me to hear the news.

"Larry has been released. I'm so sorry Violet. I'll come back when I know more." That was the confirmation, in the most ambiguous way, that Alex would not be coming back to talk to me without a purpose, because I was no longer worth talking to. I'd forgotten what it was like to talk, or the semblance of teenage bullshit I'd known for a few short weeks when I had a friend and a boyfriend I could write letters to and a whole future to dream about. She was eyeing me in a weary way though, like she was afraid I'd smash through the window and kill myself right here, but I wasn't Juliet. I'd never be Juliet. Tate wanted to be Romeo, or maybe he just wanted me to want him to be Romeo, but neither of us were that tragic. I could, would survive without him, because, suicide is simply too easy a way out. It was my fault Tate had been caught… he came back for me, saved my life. He'd still be in school if I hadn't made it necessary for him to kill Leah. He would graduate, go to college, make something of himself one day. He'd marry a pretty woman and have pretty babies and die old, and loved. But he couldn't do any of that now, because of me.

Maybe he'd have married someone like Alex. Maybe he could still marry someone like Alex, someone simple and pretty with a normal job and a steadfast sense of right and wrong, of normal and abnormal, who could ground him. Maybe he already was. I mean, it's not so implausible, is it? Tate isn't seeing me, isn't seeing anyone but the other boys in the centre, and then he gets visits from a pretty woman who 'cares' about him. It's really not so implausible that he would eventually fall for her, over me. I didn't want to see Alex anymore, though cutting connection with her would not necessarily cut his connection with her, but I had to ask. I didn't want to know but I had to ask.

"Are you seeing him?" I asked, because I had to.

"Not anymore," she looked at the floor, knowing what this would mean to me: Betrayal.

"When did you stop?"

"The day before Constance died. I went back but they won't let me see him now, until the trial is over."

"Why did they let you see him at all?" I had to know.

"I…"

"You what?" I searched her downcast face, knowing the answer from the way it was written in her blush.

"I told them I was his girlfriend."

"Go away." I knew it was childish, and there are a million more biting, eloquent ways I could have hurt her, but I didn't have the energy to. She had betrayed me, she was not my friend, and perhaps he wasn't, either. Was he in love with her, now? Had he stopped writing me letters weeks ago? I hadn't read them for fear of finding his hurt and confusion too painful, but would I have found instead a confession that he had found someone else? Someone better than I could ever be? Tate was better than that, of course, but it didn't make the thoughts go away when his hands and lips and tongue weren't there to dispel my insecurities.

"Violet…"

"I said go away."

"Violet…" she sighed, moving for the door. She stopped before exiting, turning dramatically in that bullshit way they do in sitcoms when they have something to say. "Violet, before I go, you should know something. Can I tell you?" I made no move to acknowledge her. "It's about Tate?" She added, and I turned my head a little, because as cliché as it was and though I knew that of course it would be about Tate, hearing her say his name had piqued my interest.

"I tried to get him to forget you, for both your sakes, he's such an incredible man," I bristled with indignation, feeling her praise like it were slander, but she wasn't finished. "He told me to go away. Screamed it, actually, a lot. And that's when I wasn't allowed to go in and see him anymore. You know what I think?" I shook my head, slowly, trying to process what she was telling me. "I don't think they stopped letting me in when Constance died. I think they stopped letting me in because he refused to see me. It's always you, Violet. I just thought you should know that, even if it doesn't make it any easier on either of you… or me," she added, voice breaking as she dashed from the room.

I almost pitied her, this poor girl, because she'd only succumbed to her natural response. It was impossible to hate Tate. I was unique for loving the monster he could be, but everyone, the whole damn world loved his face and his smile and his rich, honey sweet voice that could charm anyone into anything. She'd suffer forever with the loss and longing of unrequited love, because when you fall in love with the devil he has your soul forever, even when he doesn't particularly want you.

"At least he's mine," I mumbled to myself, smiling though it hurt my cheeks to stretch and burn over the bone. I turned to look out the window, content to relive the memories of my time with Tate, the memories that provided undisputable proof that Tate loved me and was mine as much as I was his, that we were equals but that he was my possession, as he'd confessed to me the weeks that seemed like a lifetime ago in a motel bathroom. His lips had dripped with my blood when he parted them around my name, making me shake with want and love and fear and respect for the man and the monster and the boy that had taken everything and given more in return than I was ever entitled to.

I lost track of days and nights because I didn't sleep and I didn't eat. I did nothing but dream and wonder, wonder if he were already dead, if he was going to die. If he was going to get out and run away with Alex, forgetting all about the hollow shell of a human being he'd moulded out of warped love and discarded. I didn't truly believe he'd discarded me, because I knew we were always more than that, more than the cliché the world presented us with, but the fear was there. I knew he wouldn't run away with Alex, she was nice but not his type, but I hoped he would run away. And that one day he'd crawl in through my window to rescue me and we could live in the woods or the desert or the mountains or anywhere he wanted so long as he was there.

The passage of time has become irrelevant. My eyes show the world in shimmers, shimmers I know are too impossibly bright and white to be anything but an illusion sent by Tate for my amusement. Nothing pleases him so much as my smile, but I cannot make my mouth form a shape so foreign for one with so much sorrow.

'Life's too short for so much sorrow,' his voice is echoed in my skull with words he never said.

'You're wrong' I sighed in my heart, 'it's an eternity'. His smile is sad, the angelic, burning look from the beach so long ago, like he was saying goodbye all over again.

'Don't you die on me, Violet,' he mumbled, but I wasn't really listening. He was so silly, to think I'd live him that way.

'I'd never,' I mumble back, just as solemn and ethereal, shimmery eyes closing to peace I could finally rest with.

"How did it happen?" Tate's voice was hard and gravely, unshed tears washing through his vocal chords like a stream.

"She starved herself, and her body was too weak to recover. We tried to drip feed her, but it was too late. She'd been ill for a very long time."

"Oh."

"I'm sorry, Mr Langdon."

"Me, too."

"You can't be blamed for this, I'll make sure of it. We're not dealing with any new charges, you're untouchable." Tate shifted in his chair, leaning back and flashing the suit across the room a small, sad smile, swallowing thickly before leaning forward and cocking his head to the side.

"I think we both know that's not the case."

"Mr Langdon, I truly believe we have a shot at this case." The lawyer floundered with papers, pen tapping the desk erratically.

"Can I talk to the prosecutor?"

"I… I can't stop you," he closed his eyes, packing his things into his briefcase.

"Goodbye Mr Langdon. It's been… interesting to work with you."

Tate nodded his head in agreement, diverting his attention to his hands.

The door opened a few minutes later, and two men entered, setting the standardised tape recorder on the desk.

"You wanted to see the prosecutors, Mr Langdon?"

"Yeah. I did it. I killed Leah, all by myself." They glanced between one another and then looked at Tate, long and hard, probably trying to figure out what his angle was. Tate sighed. "Look, Violet Harmon is dead." There was no reaction on the faces of the prosecutors, their expressions were guarded, which signalled to Tate that they were already aware of this fact and had probably planned to use it against him in some way.

"We're aware of the… tragedy," the word sat uncomfortable on prosecutor 1's lips and Tate wanted to smash his face in. Violet was so much more than that. She was the start and the end of the world.

"Yes. So…" Tate leaned forward, flashing the pair the most angelic smile he could muster, knowing the effect it could have. "Let's talk about this death penalty, shall we?"

A/N: Well guys, that's it. Tate's Conscience is officially finished. Obviously there won't be a sequel, but I've been working on some new ideas, some one-shots and such, so look out for those. I feel so crappy about this being the end, but I really loved writing and I loved reading all your comments.

RECS: Everything ever written by shootforstella. The Curve of her Lips by ohyellowbird and Scarlettwoman710 is perfect so definitely read that if you haven't already. Twisted Nerve by TateAndViolet- Mad world is great. Lovely Helena is amazing, but I'd especially recommend Darkness is My Name and Race Track Princess. GinHermi's Never Let Me Go is a really interesting concept AU, even if it breaks my heart a little bit sometimes! Captivation is fabulous, especially 100 and 200. OH OH and everything written by gimmedanger, too, because she writes incredible fic after incredible fic and there is no end to the talent. And one last ridiculous rec/ thank you HAS to go out to jandjsalmon for her continued support, advice and comments that make me laugh and squee with happiness because her approval is literally the best thing. Eternal love, therefore to jandjsalmon and shootforstella for their all-round awesomeness.