Don't look down

Damon remained silent for a while as he began to change his course towards the lake at the edge of the city. I wanted him to say something, to continue telling me about who the woman was and what he had gone through to make him so afraid of water and heights, but refrained. His nightmare was clearly playing over and over again in his head, as if projected onto the windscreen in front of him, and all I could do was watch as he broke inside, waiting, for him to play it out for me verbally.
And finally, he did, never once stuttering, never once allowing his voice to break.
"... I was ten years old and Lucien and London were both eight. It was the one day my father was not around, he had business with a neighbouring pack. And so, my mother thought it would be a good idea to go to the lake for a picnic. But it was not only the three of us she took with her, but the daughter of our local pack healer, Jade. She was a good friend of London's back then, and perhaps the first girl London had ever developed feelings for.
It was about mid-afternoon when my brother and I decided to explore. We came across a large willow tree. I can still remember how it looked, tall, proud and green with its long, thin leaves cascading down like a green waterfall. It was taunting us, begging us to climb it and so, as the oldest, I decided I'd give it a try first, make sure the branches were safe enough for Lucien. That was where the trouble began. I climbed and climbed and climbed, carried away by that look of excitement in my brother's face. At that point, I was his hero and I chased that feeling until I was at the very top. Then suddenly, I was falling... the water of the lake was moving so quickly towards me and I had no control over anything. The fear was so deep-rooted into me, clutching at me and tearing at my flesh. When I hit the water, I remember wondering if that was how I was going to die. Drowning in a lake, being pulled under, suffocated by water. It was everywhere, snatching at my body and pulling me in deeper until all I could see were the soft rays of light peeking through the water. I couldn't swim... fucking father never thought it was important. His arrogance was drowning me. Slowly, my eyes began to close, and I'd given up on the idea of inhaling fresh air, and eventually all I could see was black. When I awoke, I thought I was dead and it took quite a while for me to realise that I was alright, and that I was safe in my mother's arms. She clutched onto me so tightly I could barely breathe. It was then that I discovered that Jade, who was shivering in a blanket, was the person who'd saved me. That day I walked away from the lake with three things: hydrophobia, acrophobia and a growing sense of infatuation for Jade Robertson. That infatuation died, however, when her family moved out of our pack after they'd discovered that my father beat my mother for my drowning incident. I never saw her again after that."
It was all trauma, all of it, all of this game. Things Damon and I had never ever wanted to face again. This was all too brutal, and I wondered if we'd be able to survive this without too many mental scars.
"Damon, I-"
"Don't apologise. You don't need to. But Lucien does, and he will."
I nodded in agreement, and then began thinking back to the note.
"But... what does the lake have to do with construction?" I asked.
Damon waited a while before he answered, "In the time that you were gone the lake was drained... it's now a construction site."
And there we had it. We had figured out the first stage of the game. Now came the hard part, playing it.
We sat in silence for the rest of the way and it was clear the anxiety in the car was floating around and thickening like some kind of inescapable foul stench. And I could tell, all Damon wanted to do was get there as fast as possible and save Jade, a woman he was once infatuated with. The more I thought about it, the more I couldn't help but feel jealous at the thought. It was petty, I knew that, but still, it was more of a reflex than anything else.
"So... Jade. She was like your first crush, right?" And clearly my mouth shared this reflex.
Damon, who still tapped away on his steering wheel nodded, almost absentmindedly. It was only when I folded my arms and raised a brow at him that he realised exactly what he had done.
"I... well... um... I really don't know how to save myself from this one. But haven't you ever had a crush on anyone? I mean despite you clearly being descended from alpha wolves, you were born and raised human. You had no idea about mates and so you would have had the capability to like more than one person."
I looked down as the dashboard for a second and thought about it. Had I ever, in my life liked someone? I mean, of course I had friends and people I cared about, it was part of being compassionate. But, when it came to deep, intimate feelings... the only person I'd ever felt such a for thing was Damon. And so, I shook my head, no.
"You'd be the first person that I've... cared for in an intimate way."
And still, I could not use the three-letter word. I could say it in my mind, and I knew it in my heart, but when it came to me wanting to say something, the words just could not form in my mouth. It was as if saying 'I love you' were some sort of vulgar phrase. I just could not verbalise it.
Damon gently took my hand in his and gave it a reassuring squeeze.
"Well, if it makes you feel better, you were my first and you will be my last."
I looked at him, half touched, and half in annoyance.
"As if you have a choice."
He chuckled, and I was glad to see it was genuine. I was glad I'd taken his mind off of all of this chaos, even if it was just for a second.

It took us an hour to get to the lake which, now clearly was no longer a lake. The sight of it, a beautiful lake turned into a construction site was perhaps one of the saddest things I had seen. All that beauty reduced to tall steel structures, multiple levels of concrete, drying cement, bricks, bricks and more bricks. There was also something daunting amidst it in the darkness of the night.
"Where do you think she could be?" I asked as we exited the car and began walking through the greyish looking sand which now in the moonlight had a pale glimmer to it and it crunched right below our footsteps.
Damon looked up and around, and then his eyes zeroed in on an extremely tall steal structure next to the semi-complete building structure.
"Up there." He pointed.
"But how do we get up there?" I asked.
He said nothing, instead, he began walking forward, as though lost in thought. The only time he chose to speak was when we reached the semi-constructed structure.
"There are stairs towards the back, do you see? If we take the stairs, we can make it to the top of this structure and then we'll be able to see the top of the steel one next to this one. I think she must be somewhere up there."
I nodded and followed him as we began climbing the concrete steps. Perhaps these were going to be used as emergency stairs, otherwise the people who would be utilising this building would have to have great stamina.
The place still smelled of wet cement with a subtle sandy undertone to it. The smell was so strong it was almost nauseating and the fact that I was beginning to feel nauseated by my lack of eating for the day was not helping much.
"How many more steps?" I asked by the time we'd reached the eleventh flight.
Damon paused and then looked up before panting out, "It looks like there's about five more flights to the top. It's just an estimation though."
It seemed Damon's estimation was spot on and, by the time we'd climbed the next five flights of stairs, we'd made it right to the top of the building, both panting and hunching over.
We then both began walking towards the edge of the building and towards the beginning of the steel construction ahead of us which could be made accessible by climbing through a large break in the wall, clearly left for a door which would lead to the next section of the building. Immediately, when I activated my werewolf sight, my eye caught sight of her body. She was tied onto one of the thick steel beams. She was well hidden, quite well hidden indeed in the far corner, and if I'd been a human, I would not have even been able to make out her body, not even if it were daytime.
I glanced back at Damon and was shocked to find him hyperventilating as he glanced outwards and down towards the ground. His skin was soaked in cold sweat and his heart was racing, pounding and threatening to burst out of his body. Immediately I rushed to his side and gripped the tip of his chin and lifted it so he could look at me. The look of fear and panic all over his face was heart shattering and I clutched him towards my body.
"Don't look down Damon. Don't look down. Just focus on me right now. Focus on my body against yours. Focus on my warmth. Focus on my voice, my scent, my words."
It seemed to calm him down, but not as much as I'd hoped. It was clear, at this stage, that I'd be the one to save Jade. Damon could barely glance at the ground at this point. I couldn't imagine his reaction if he were to walk across those steel beams towards her body.
"Damon, I'm going to let you go now, and then I'm going to try to get Jade, okay?"
But before I could even let go of him, he gripped me tighter and looked up at me. "No, Jasmine. You can't. This is my task to complete, it's my fear to conquer."
"But Damon, you're shaking right now and you're as pale as a ghost. There's no way you can make it across those steel beams towards her."
Damon then pulled away from me and looked towards the steel beams again.
"Jasmine... I can't risk you getting hurt or dying doing something that was meant to be my responsibility. I know you want to protect me, and I know you want to keep me safe, but this time, I need to do this, by myself. This isn't your burden to carry, it's not your mess to clean up. You'll have your fair share of them as well."
I wanted to protest against what he was saying. I couldn't risk losing him. What if he slipped and fell, what if he... died? I couldn't risk losing another person, having another piece of me snatched away. But Damon was already taking off his shoes with his shaky hands and walking towards the steel structure. So instead, I did something almost unthinkable. *Almost*. I gripped him from the back and wrapped my arm around his neck, squeezing it with just the right amount of pressure. He struggled and protested and although he was stronger than me, I had adrenaline and desperation on my side and in a matter of moments, I'd successfully managed to get him unconscious... or so I thought. Because, as soon as I dropped his body and began making my way to the steel, his hand gripped at my ankle and he pulled it forcefully and then let go, sending me skidding on the floor and crashing right onto its hard surface quite a distance away from him.
"I'm sorry Jasmine," he began, "but I have to do this."
And before I could even utter another word, he began stepping onto the nearest steel beam. My heart sank at how much he was shaking, and how much of torment he was clearly going through.
"Damon, don't look down!" I called out, getting myself off of the floor. Admittedly I had quite a few scratches and bruises and my leg was beginning to ache. But I understood why he did what he did, not out of malice, but out of urgency and so I could not find it in myself to be angry with him for hurting me. Not when I tried to do the same. We were just trying to look out for each other.
But I was not done protecting him, and I found myself stepping onto one of the steel beams as well, gulping at the large distance between myself and the ground. I definitely had no trace of acrophobia within myself, but even I had to admit that this was more than terrifying.
Damon seemed to have heard me and glanced at me from across his shoulder with furrowed eyebrows.
"I was not going to let you do this alone. At least now, if you fall, I can catch you... or fall with you." I uttered.
He sighed, clearly having given up on trying to tell me to stay away and continued walking extremely cautiously and not once looking down towards the ground. I made sure to take larger steps in order to catch up with him. I didn't want him too far from me, too out of my reach.
We were about halfway across the steel beams when Damon almost slipped and I immediately gripped him, pulling him towards myself in urgency. We stayed there, frozen and silent, with nothing but our heavy, panicked breathing filling the night air. And that's when it left my mouth, accidentally, unintentionally and irrevocably, driven out by my panic.
"I love you."
---
Hellow everyone! Just a big thank you for all the support you've all given me! We've made it to a significant number on the 'top selling' list which was literally one of my goals when I began to write this novel and as such, I am very, very proud and grateful. I could not have done it without so again, THANK YOU!
Stay safe! Stay healthy! Sending all my love!