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Jinx is sure her boy wonder was sent from the heavens. That's the only way she can comprehend his patience when she wakes for the fourth night in a row with screams ripped straight from her dreams.
It’s not the pretty cries that come from movies or books where the heroine is to be clutched by her knight in shining armor, with her problems to be whisked away by a true love kiss .
It’s the blood-churning one, where her nails claw ferociously at whatever she can sink them into and her throat is closing in on itself from the sheer magnitude of her voice.
The types of screams Ekko is certain came from years of agony, pain, and death. The kind of screams he wants to lock away indefinitely and shield her from, protect her from their rage, but he can’t. So he holds her instead.
He clutches his arms around her, telling her that it’s okay, that nobody is here for her, that it’s just them. He hugs her still when her talon-like nails are breaking the skin of his back and arms when the blood dribbles down his skin and into their bedsheets.
Even hugs her when she’s lucid and realizes she’s torn his body to shreds.
"I'm sorry- I’m so so sorry!” She would whisper, throat sore from the depths of hell leaving her throat. He cradled her face in his palm and reassured her that it was okay, he was okay, they were okay.
Jinx is sure her boyfriend is an angel sent straight from the mages yet again when she explains her nightmares are from their colorful past; explains how she dreams of the night she accidentally slaughtered her second family. How she can still see Vander’s dead body, the fumes of her brothers burning mixed with the horrible stench of the shimmer.
She’d memorized the look of pure horror on VI’s face the moment she realized Powder was the culprit. Then, in the same instant, that Powder was to blame for their loss of family.
With sobs so heavy it shakes the couch, she told Ekko how kind Silco had been to her. He had been forgiving, loving, and always allowed her to have dessert before dinner. It was rare for him to tell her what time to go to bed, and he bought her whatever trinkets and toys she wanted without hesitation.
Ekko tries to console her plenty of times, by Gods he tries so hard. He by no means was a hero, but for Jinx he would put on the cape, he would rescue the damsel, he would slay the dragon that plagued her mind if it were the last thing he ever did. He’s the most tranquil person she’s ever known. On days where the Shimmer wrecking its way through her system is more evident, he’s especially patient.
She hated that her mind was broken, couldn't comprehend his compassionate tone, and replaced it with one of mockery. She hated that she wanted blood, wanted to cause pain on days like this.
She hates even more that Ekko chooses to stay with her, that he doesn’t listen to her when she begs for him to leave before she hurts him again.
It had taken almost two years for them to find their way back to each other. First as foes.
He and his Firelights captured her, nurtured her back to a fold of her old self, and brought her sanity together, piece by piece. Ekko had fetched her food personally, told her the names of the Firelights she or Silco’s clan had killed, tried to find some remaining sympathy, and finally- finally he had broken through.
It had taken three months of him saying the names, their good deeds, showing their family members or people that had been left behind for her to crack. For her to break. For him to trust her enough to let her out of the cage.
Their next breakthrough was a day in the sanctuary, where she sat with the children playing some sort of matching game. A wide grin on her still scarred face and her legs crossed. He couldn’t shake the familiar sight of Powder inside of Jinx and had an inkling that they remained the same girl he once loved.
The painful hope that she could be back to her old self before all the loss and pain had forged her into something else. Something that was pure destruction and death.
After building puzzles with the kids, she had been cleaning up, nicked her hand, and started bleeding. Ekko offered to patch her up, and she had been hesitant of course.
The days grew colder as the seasons changed, and she became more remorseful of her actions. She tried not to linger too long with anyone she had wronged. Ekko was one of them.
Yet, when it was just the two of them, sitting on the bench of one of the bedrooms, not a word needed to be said. Ekko didn’t forgive her just yet, and she didn’t ask for it.
He understood she was learning how to be human again, how to be Powder again. He didn’t want to be selfish and rush her so he didn’t beg for an apology. He could wait until she was ready, it was the right thing to do.
He did, however, rub the area around her wound with his thumb for a bit longer than needed. Offering such a kind smile Jinx thought she might burst from it alone.
She had broken the moment as soon as she felt the familiar hot swell of tears building in her eyes, for fear of the vulnerability that came with letting them drip.
“Uh thanks,” she had said and then left the room before he could say anything more.
The next development had been after she formally apologized to him and a lot more of the Firelights. Nine months of her staying at his sanctuary. She figured it easier to apologize to people she hadn’t been childhood friends with, saving the most challenging one for last.
The two of them had been standing on the balcony, watching the evening sun lower itself on the horizon and passing soft voices between them with nothing and everything in mind.
He made an offhand comment about always being able to win, which prompts her to mention their fight on the bridge. He went stiff after that: neither had dared bring it up since the day it happened.
There was a long, tense silence. One she knew, without a doubt, had been completely her fault. She had reached a shaky hand to his forearm, bringing his attention up to her tearful gaze.
“Ekko, I'm so sorry. For the bridge, for killing Vivienne, for killing Jaime- for everyone. I’m so sorry for everything I did-“ her words were merely incoherent sobs now, her shoulders hitching with each breath she tried to force.
It didn't matter that there was plenty of air in such an open space, Jinx couldn’t breathe. The guilt grew heavy like water in her lungs, squeezing every breath until she felt she had no choice but to drown in it.
Ekko stood up straighter, clutching her forearms as she continued to sob and speak at the same time. He could no longer make out the words of what she was saying, but he knew she needed him. So, there he was.
His first time comforting her in their adult years was a hug.
She had never cried harder in her entire life than she had that night. Ekko ended up carrying her to his room since her own was up a ladder, and she was too exhausted to climb.
When she woke the next morning to the sight of him in the bed on his stomach next to her, she was sure all had been forgiven.
For Ekko to allow her to see him in such a vulnerable situation as sleeping meant she trusted him, right?
That had been the next step in their journey of reacclimating themselves to each other. Neither had spoken a word of them sharing a bed, neither understood the weight the other had over it.
Ekko wanted to cherish their new step in trust, Jinx not knowing this was the first step in her old crush reigniting like a flame in her chest.
She fondly remembered the night when he had kissed her. He had an arm resting over hers on the banister and gained enough courage to lean in when she asked him how he felt about them sharing a bed.
The flame that sparked in her chest had been enough to tell her she felt it too. That inexplicable intimacy, sleeping so close to one another yet expecting nothing more than safety. The blush in her cheeks told her she was still human, she still had a chance to be normal like him.
Looking at him after he had kissed her for the first time was a bewildering experience. His eyes had still been low on hers, his entire body relaxed and his left hand gently caressed the sharpness of her cheekbone.
“Was that okay?” He had whispered, looking finally up at her shimmer-purple eyes. She could see he wanted to do so much more than kiss her, maybe she would let him. She nodded her head softly, letting a soft hand come to rest behind his own and bringing their bodies closer.
It was more than okay. They had bridged yet another gap that night. Their bodies slotted between the sheets, eyes never leaving each other.
The tension in the room had been thick enough to bite, so she did, she sunk her teeth into his lips. Relishing in the deep moan he delivered in response. Their mouths were heavy and wet where they kissed shoulders and necks, their hands firm when they squeezed and urged for more.
They were choosing to trust, to protect, to love . When he had said it aloud, her already flushed cheeks had grown a darker shade of red.
It felt like so little time had passed but he loved her.
Did he love Powder? Or did he love Jinx? When she seemed to have been staring at him for far too long and far too silently, he said it aloud again.
“Hey… I said I love you. You- you don’t even have to say it back but… I do. I think I have for a while,” the hands that were intertwined above her head gave a gentle squeeze as she nodded.
“I love you too, boy wonder,” she waggles one of her eyebrows playfully at the nickname under the other. He could only laugh softly in return, wanting to keep their moment between them for now.
“You better,” he breathes against her before his hips continue rocking into hers. Her playful expression shifted back softly into one of pleasure. Free hand sliding around his waist and clutching against his skin firmly.
When she reached her peak, it was with his name on her lips, her face buried into his chest, her sounds being drowned out with his lips firmly on hers.
He promised that night to never let anyone hurt her again, to play the hero in her sonnet. He had kept his word, made sure to comfort her whenever she seemed tense or whenever she would wake from her night terrors.
Even so, he couldn’t protect her from how harsh Vi had been with her when they finally met one another again after months of being separated.
Ekko had told Jinx it was a bad idea, that she should wait a bit longer until she was more sure of her self-confidence but she had insisted she could handle it.
She couldn’t. No words of affirmation could erase the harsh names Vi had come up with. Even when Jinx had apologized- profusely, what felt like thousands of times over. Ekko stepped in between them before Vi got the proper chance to dismiss them as sisters because he knew that would shatter Jinx’s already fragile psyche.
Just as he thought, it had backfired. She paced around their bedroom for hours, talking aloud about the hour spent with Vi. Blaming herself, yelling about her to the voices that occupied her mind, motioning to different points of the room to further her point.
Ekko had tried to intervene, to get her to eat, to sleep, but she remained obsessive. She was fixated on this relationship. He couldn’t blame her. Her sister meant everything to her.
“Listen, Pow, I know you wanna make this right, but you can’t do that if you pass out from exhaustion the next time you see her,” he stands up from the bed when she tries to leave their bedroom in favor of the punching bag.
It wasn’t a particularly large space, but everything they could need was there. Their clothes were tucked away in dressers, the bathroom would break off in a different room. The bed, stocked with blankets, was warm enough for them both.
The towel he used to clean them up after they had spent themselves in the most intimate of ways, hung waiting to be discarded in the dirty clothes basket. Even the flower she’s grown fond of pressing her nose against just because the lavender relaxes her to no ends.
The nickname he still called her from their childhood never ceased to make her grow wistful. She wondered what their life could have been if she had stayed put that night if Vander and the boys had been brought to safety.
She wondered if Ekko would have ever told her about his crush.
She wonders about it again when he’s holding her hands like she’s made of the finest fabrics in all of Runeterra. She likes when he holds her like this.
When she’s kissing him hard enough to bruise so she can forget Vi, forget all of her troubles in the familiar rhythm of his hips, she wonders again.
When he asks if he needs to pull out this time, she briefly wonders what their life could have been if not for Silco, coming and shattering wrecking it all to pieces.
Killing her second father, her brothers, locking Vi away, turning her into this irredeemable monster. She wants to say no, she wants to feel the weight of his body as he buried himself in their lust.
But she knows how babies are made. She knows she would be a horrible mother, even with all the patience and breathing, and coping methods Ekko is filling her with. This is the one thing he shouldn’t fill her with.
So she nods her head, yes, trying to keep her expression neutral as he rolls off her and grabs the towel on the dresser. She watched in silent awe when he came with tight muscles and his hips bucking up in favor of her warmth.
“Fuck…” he had panted out, legs trembling softly beside her. When he smiled up at her again, she knew she was done for. This will be where she will spend the rest of her days and that was something she was okay with.
“Would you-” she starts to say, looking down at his sweaty heaving body before she scoots closer and wraps her arm around him. She knew she didn’t need permission for post-orgasm cuddles, but the thing about old habits.
He immediately turned to fully embrace her, knowing she needed it since Vi had likely worked her way back into that brain.
It’s not like Jinx was the sole focus of their relationship, over the following years they made sure to be present for both sides. She had tried to get him to open up more when his nightmares plagued him as well when his training with the punching bag had turned into him pounding his fists into the thick fabric until his knuckles bruised and his body was drenched in sweat.
She had wrapped herself around his racing body and squeezed because that’s what he did for her when her thoughts betrayed her. Then promised him it was okay, just the two of them because those are the words he would coo to her in the safety of their bed.
When he insisted he was fine, that something must be bothering her for her to want to comfort him, that’s when she knew. She knew if they were going to work, he would have to see there were two of them. Equal parts.
“We are not two halves that come together for one whole,” her voice broke the silence of their bedroom later that night, him laying on his back and her picking at the bedsheets thoughtfully.
“What- what do you- how could you say that? I thought we worked. What are you- are you breaking up with me?” He sits up in the darkness, looking at her as she sits up slowly as well.
Her head shook no, which eased his thoughts but her words were lingering in his ears. “We are not two different halves of one person, Ekko. I love you, I love how honest you are, I love how compassionate you are. But that’s not me. That’s not a part of me, not anymore.”
He furrows his brows in the shadow of the night, wondering why she was choosing now to confess her feelings. He doesn’t interrupt, he lets her speak because whatever it is would make far more sense as she continued.
“I’m not a leader or a critical thinker. I’m impulsive and rude and I don’t respect personal space. We’re not two halves. We’re our own people, we just happen to find a rhythm and a moment that works well enough for the both of us.” Jinx lifts a palm to stroke his chin, feeling the stubble there before she moves hands to rest down on his shoulders.
“I don’t want us to be half a person. Not when I’ve got two versions of myself already fighting inside. I don’t want you to try and fit in with that, I never have.”
He nods softly, keeping their proximity while draping his arms over her thighs now. He understood.
“You love me, but not because you need me to feel complete. You love me because you want me to understand what it means to be treated with such empathy and compassion,” she scratched her nails into the shaved portion of his hair, watching as he relished in her touch further." I love you not because I need to, but because of the way you treat me. The way you talk and laugh and hold me like you’re afraid I’m going to break if you let me go.”
She inhales sharply when his palm squeezes more firmly against her to reiterate her statement.
“That’s because you will, won’t you?” She brings their faces closer then, her forehead resting on his, noses brushing when she nods.
“I will… but I’m never letting go so you don’t have to hold on so tightly. You have me Ekko, and I have you,” her voice was a whisper, casting soft breaths on his lips.
He liked it.
"I love you," he promised, having drilled the promise into her broken mind.
“I love you too,” she swore, because she did. He was patient and understanding and he put the glass shards back together. Even when his fingers had been cut to pieces he kept going, kept gluing, kept showing up.
Her boy wonder was perfect.