WARNING: Sexual content.

He's always there, leaning casually against a street sign, smoking a cigarette because he doesn't give a shit (and neither do you). He's always watching. Waiting.

You've learned to ignore it, for the most part. You have to, even though you know you'll give in after ten or so more years, because it's all too much and he's the only one that can simultaneously give you everything you need and everything you don't want.

He smiles at you, knowing that you've seen him. You turn your head and keep walking.

"I'm not your doll," you said to him the first time, much to his wry, smirking amusement.

"You're not?" he asked innocently, and put out the cigarette in the ashtray, gray specks dancing.

You glared at him and stomped out of the bedroom, his laugh ringing in your ears.

There's an itch that you want to scratch, but you can't because of the invisible eye that watches you knowingly while you sleep.

The blankets feel soft and you're warm wrapped inside of them like a cocoon, but you know that you're not really safe. That you never will be.

When your first husband died, you hadn't expected it.

The bus had come out of nowhere, lights bright and horn blaring, and he hadn't been looking and he was crushed, groceries flying high and apples littered on the road, spinning and spinning.

You tried saving him, but they wouldn't let you close enough and you never got the opportunity. Maybe you hadn't tried as hard as you could have.

It was at the funeral when Adam showed up again, in one of his stupid black suits that looked too good on him, and he rested a hand on your shoulder as you cried and didn't say anything.

Later, the two of you fucked in the back closet and you hated yourself.

"I want you to stay away from me," you say to him for God-knows-how-many-times-it's-been-now. "I can't live like this."

"But you can, Claire," he always says. "That's the problem, isn't it?"

You married again, just to chase away the desperate loneliness. His name was Anthony and he was an investment banker, and he loved you and took care of you and kept you safe. You didn't love him - you liked him, but you didn't love him.

One day you grew tired of endless hours spent in mahogany rooms with leather couches, and you dove out the window and ran. You didn't know what you were running to, but you ran anyway.

You wound up at Peter's house, somehow, and he stroked your hair as you lay on the couch and bit your lip, face buried in a pillow.

It's always the same conversation, only with different nouns and adjectives and slang that's ridiculous but you say it anyway because you're supposed to be a teenager sometimes, then a college student, and then you have to run again.

Adam, the old bastard, will whisper sweet, soothing things in your ear, things about destiny and fate and other stuff that you used to sort of believe in. And you'll succumb, you'll always succumb, because only with him do you feel alive and worth something - even if it's only for a moment.

Then he'll start acting like he owns you, like you're his plaything, a toy, his own personal Barbie doll that he can fondle and dress up and show off. You don't belong to anyone, you tell him, and he'll just smile and say that he disagrees. Then he'll fuck you raw to prove his point and you'll love and hate every second of it.

Then you'll leave the next morning, sure this time that you'll never go back, never again.

But you do. Always.

It gets harder and harder to hide as technology advances and everyone has ID cards that you have to use for every little thing, so you finally leave America and go to a small, insignificant country in South America, where you can speak the language fluently because you've had a lot of time to learn these things.

He won't follow me here, you think as your bare feet crunch the grass. He wouldn't bother.

And he doesn't, surprisingly - or, at least, he never lets you know that he has.

Instead, Peter shows up, and helps you build a new house and keeps you company. He's aging - not as fast as he would if he were still normal, but he is - and it makes you sad to see the small wrinkles in the corners of his eyes.

Because once he's gone, only you and Adam will be left. And you won't have anywhere safe anymore.

Maybe, if you stay with him, he won't age anymore - like the good old days, back when you were a cheerleader at her Homecoming and Peter was the guy in the trench coat staring inside a trophy case, and he depended on being near you to stay alive.

You know you're being selfish, but when he decides that he wants to go to Europe, you say that you're going with him. He doesn't stop you.

Victor is the third husband, after you and Peter have left South America for Germany. He's dark and imposing, with slanted eyebrows and a perpetual scowl. Peter doesn't like him, but you do, and you impulsively marry him one day because why the hell not.

Peter looks surly at the wedding, but he doesn't say anything, and for that you are grateful.

The marriage doesn't last long. Victor gets a mistress and you catch them at it, and you leave without saying goodbye. Peter follows, arm hanging protectively around your shoulders as you fall asleep on the train ride to France.

You're walking out of a boutique when you see him, arm casually propped up against a streetlight, puffing away on his cigarette, and you hate that he looks so sexy doing it.

"Hello, Claire," he says, and you glare at him and tell him to stop bothering you. He doesn't listen and he walks over and gathers you in his arms, and you don't know what you're doing as you drop your bags and hug him back. But you never know what you're doing anyway.

Peter asks where you were when you come back at four in the morning, and you know that he's been waiting up for you and it makes your heart hurt, so you lie and say you got lost before heading upstairs.

Adam comes to get you the morning after next. He's hanging outside of your window, hand extended, patiently waiting for you to grab it.

"I can't," you whisper, thinking of Peter asleep in the next room and how worried he'll be when he wakes up and you're not there, but Adam shushes you and beckons you to come.

"He'll be fine," he tells you, and you don't know how he's always able to manipulate you like this but you grab his hand and you both jump down to the ground and run.

It's like he has a string that he's inserted down your spine that he pulls whenever he wants and you come, always obedient, always ready. You find scissors and you cut the string and flee, but he always gets it back in there and you don't know how the cycle is going to end, or if it ever will, if it'll just keep going on and on like your perpetual lives.

It's the anniversary of your father's death, and you lock yourself in the bathroom and don't let anyone in, especially not him. It's amazing how it still hurts after all this time, worse than when your mother died or your brother or your ex-lovers. You don't cry, you just sit there.

You decide to take a shower and you shed your clothes, the warm water falling like small marbles against your back. You don't bother putting shampoo in your hair, you just stand in the white marble tub and feel the water trail down your bare skin.

You hear someone un-locking the door from the outside and walking into the bathroom. You can see out of the corner of your eye through the curtain the silhouette of someone taking off their clothes. The person steps in the shower.

Of course it's Adam. You hadn't thought it'd be anyone else.

You don't look at his face, but you know he's looking at yours; you can feel his sharp blue eyes scrutinizing you - not in a judgmental way, but merely as though you are something interesting and different.

You look up at him, and he kisses you, slow and soft, running his fingers through your wet hair. You run your hands up his arms that are slick with beads of water.

The kiss ends, and nothing else happens. The two of you just take a shower and that's that.

"Will you marry me?"

He's asked you this over a dozen times now, and you've always told him no, but now you say yes because there's no point in not saying yes anymore.

You almost do it.

Then you see, one day, walking down the street, a little girl hugging a doll. A boy comes up from behind and yanks it away from her and runs off cackling. The girl cries and cries and sits down on the sidewalk and cries, but she doesn't run after the boy and she doesn't try to get her doll back.

That's when you decide to book a flight back to Texas.

A decade or two passes, and you marry a man named Dante in Tucson, Arizona. He has powers also, and you don't need to hide anything from him. He can travel through time and space, just like Hiro Nakamura was able to do, and he takes you anywhere you want to go and any time you want to go to. He's not perfect, but neither are you and the two of you complement each other and fit together well. He stays with you his whole life - all ninety-five years of it. He dies peacefully in his sleep, your hand wrapped around his.

It's the only normal, functional relationship you've ever had.

You run into Peter again when you move back to New York City for the twentieth time (you can never seem to stay away from the place), and he looks ten years older but he seems happy to see you. You hug him and ask him how he's been, and he says fine, but you remember that this was the day his brother (your biological father) died, and you hug him tighter and you both probably look ridiculous but you don't care.

"Do you want to get something to eat?" you ask, and he nods and takes your hand and you both walk down the street.

The American empire collapses, but by then you and Peter are in Japan and it doesn't affect you - not in the physical sense, anyway. You cry a little for the country you once called your home, and Peter pats your back and tells you it's going to be okay. You believe him, sort of, and you rest your head against his shoulder.

"You're my anchor, you know," you tell him, and he smiles crookedly and rubs your arm.

You had been sure Adam would never step foot in Japan - he would never come back here, you thought; he had told you about his history here and from the way he had sounded about it, it didn't seem like he ever wanted to come back.

Apparently, though, you're a special enough case that he's able to make an exception.

You have sex with him, with Peter in just the next room. You're both being too loud and you've probably woken him up, but Adam is inside of you and you can't think about Peter now.

This time, it's Adam that's gone the next morning, and you wake up and feel oddly empty.

Peter won't look at you when you go down for breakfast, and you can't look at yourself either.

You have no idea where this… thing with Adam is going, when it's going to end, when it's going to begin. You wonder if you should just give up and be with him forever like he's been insisting for X amount of years, just to end the agony.

But he's gone now, he hasn't come back since that night, and you feel rejected and used and stupid for falling for his tricks again.

There's a feeling in the air, a feeling of something important, but you don't know what it is or what it means.

Peter left a couple weeks ago - he looks like he's about forty-something now, and he went to India for a reason that he didn't really specify. Things had been different between you two since that one night, that one stupid night, and you're a little relieved to see him go. You both need distance and time to forget.

You're about ready to leave for Italy when Adam seems to pop up out of nowhere.

"You didn't really think I'd stay away, did you?" he asks, smirking, and you can't help yourself as you hug him furiously and leave kisses all over his face.

He laughs - it catches you off guard, because you've never heard him truly laugh before.

"Let's go to Italy then, shall we?" he says, and holds your hand. "It's absolutely gorgeous there this time of year."

You smile, knowing that soon enough you'll be running away from him again, but for now you can just enjoy this, however fleeting it is.