When the World Stops

He stands still. It seems as if the world has come to a stop. He can't move. He can't speak. But he can hear. He can hear her crying. Those heart wrenching sobs. They make his numbness go away. The way her hands clutch at his shirt. He can feel her tears leave a damp trail on the cotton.

He can't see properly. Everything is a blur but as she continues to cry, he feels the mist shift. He looks down to come face to face with her. Her eyes are glossy, her cheeks wet, her lips glistening with tear drops. She looks beautiful but it is her expression which catches him off guard. She looks defeated. He has never seen her like that before and he wants this to be the first and the last time ever. She does not look beautiful with this expression, he realizes. This is just not her.

She, he thinks fondly, is a fierce and stubborn creature. Not an angel, no. Nor a fairy. But then not quite the devil either. She is the one and only made for him and now that he has come to terms with that, he cannot allow a mere disease to take her away from him. No. not again. He would not be able to bear it.

He moves. He finally moves and pulls her in for a hug. Her heart against his. A heart which could stop beating soon, a voice in his mind says. He tries to quieten it but cannot. He feels her stiffen and he realizes her emotional barrier is up again. She does not move away from him but her sobbing ends. She sniffs once, twice. The tremors stop.

'I'm fine,' she mutters.

'We will be fine,' she says. She sounds like she trying to comfort him. And the fact that she is doing that when she - to all extents and purposes - 'hates' him, breaks him.

A tear falls from his eye.

Author's Notes: Something I wrote in ten minutes because I really wanted to write. Barely got time to type and put this up, it's not edited. Hope you like it. Review please.

P.S. Excuse the last minute thought title. I may change it later.