Sincerely

“Missed me? Did they hurt me that bad? I feel fine,” I replied quietly.

“We had to get you a new body, they destroyed the old one,” Greyson explains gently.

I notice healing scratches on Elias’ wrists.

“Who hurt you?” I asked.

“Drover, for not showing up, of course. I was right, he could find me,” Elias murmured.

“Bastard,” I hissed, turning in the direction of the nearest door, I wanted to give him a piece of my mind.

Elias grabbed my hand quickly.

“He’s not important right now,” Elias stated quickly. “Who hurt you?” he asked in return, “We believe they could want to come after you again or other androids and humans.”

I looked at him.

“They are part of a group who’s hurt you, killed a human and threaten to hurt others,” he explains further.

“They were Drover’s men,” I replied quietly, even more angered.

Going after me wasn’t enough, they also had to go after Elias.

“Who?” Greyson asked.

“The Drover family, we both used to work for them, I sold drugs for him and Alessio was their bodyguard, that was how we met,” Elias explained.

“We’ll get warrants,” Greyson replies touching Elias’ shoulder before slipping away with the other man, leaving us alone.

Elias hugged me tightly once they were gone, throwing me back into the memories of us.

I remember after taking him to the club, we went back home and spent the next two days hiding out until our first shift, Elias ended up bartending while I was manning the front door. After the shift, Elias had a few shots before leaving the club.

“You can’t drive, you had shots,” I stated when Elias pulled his keys from his pocket as we neared his truck.

“It won’t hit me for a bit,” he replied, ignoring me.

I swiped the keys from him and held them out of reach.

“Hey,” he exclaimed.

“Do you really want to risk it?” I counter.

He let me have the keys eventually. We went over to the truck and I got in the driver’s seat and him in the passenger seat. Elias seemed nervous about letting me drive, so I was careful, I didn’t speed or run any lights and we arrived at his place safely. I parked and returned his keys to him. He glanced at me before getting out of the truck. I followed him to the door and we went inside. He went into the kitchen and started making himself some food despite the late hour, I watched him carefully making sure he wasn’t going to burn or cut himself because of the alcohol he had ingested. He seemed pretty steady though despite the shots.

He ate the food before he went to bed, for the next few nights, the routine was pretty much the same, until Monday night, we both had the next day off and Elias decided to get hammered before we went home. We were at the bar until almost three in the morning that night. I had to help him to the car and into the house.

I sat him on the bed, expecting him to want to go and sleep it off. I turned to leave but he got up and grabbed me, pulling me back into the bed. Not expecting it, I practically ended up on top of him. He pulled me down and kissed me. I froze before I realized what was happening and pulled myself away, not wanting him to go too far and regret it in the morning, if it was a drunken mistake.

As much as I wanted him to touch me and be in bed with him. It was a weird thing to want, but he was the first one to care about me. I had a place to call home because of him.

Early the next morning, he was up puking. I went into the bathroom, he was shirtless and I could see his tattoos again.

“You okay?” I asked.

He paused with his head still over the toilet, he was flushed red from nausea and sickness. He was trying to catch his breath still when he glanced at me. He got up and went to the sink and washed his face before turning around to face me. He wouldn’t look at me though.

I wondered if he remembered kissing me. I didn’t want to anger him, so I didn’t bring it up.

“Do you want some Tylenol?” I asked gently.

He glanced at me finally.

“Please, if you don’t mind,” he replied quietly.

I went off in search of it, I found it in one of the cupboards in his kitchen as well as a glass for him to fill with water, I brought both back to him. He was leaning against the sink, close to the door when I came back. He took the pill and glass from me, filled the glass and downed the pill quickly.

“Sorry about last night,” he replied setting the glass on the counter near the sink.

“Don’t mention it,” I comment.

He looked up at me, and I thought maybe I had said the wrong thing, I thought he was apologizing for getting drunk, but maybe he was apologizing for kissing me. I didn’t want him to regret that.

I hesitated to mention it again, not wanting to anger him, but I wanted to know if he remembered.

“Do you remember kissing me?” I asked.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have, I know,” he exclaimed quickly.

“Was it the alcohol or did you want to?” I asked.

He looked back at me as if I was testing him and he hesitated.

“Does it matter? You’re an android, it’s not like we’re legally allowed to be together,” he comments quietly.

“You didn’t care about legalities when you were working for Drover,” I commented taking a cautious step closer to him, and looking over his tattoos closer.

He met my eyes before reaching out and putting a hand on my neck and pulling me closer. I embraced the kiss this time. My hands ended up running up and down his arms, over his tattoos.

“Alessio,” I heard Elias calling my name and I came back to reality.

“I love you,” he whispers leaning close to my ear.

I smiled. “I love you, too,” I reply, pulling him closer to me and kissing him in return.

“I’m never going to let you walk home alone again either, you clearly can’t handle yourself,” he commented pulling back.

“There were five of them and one of me, plus I wasn’t expecting them to beat me to a pulp. If anything, I expected them to threaten me into coming back either by threatening my new job or threatening you,” I replied.

“You’re lucky they didn’t destroy you, I don’t know what I would have done without you,” he added.

“Eli,” I whispered touching his cheek. “You’re strong, you would—” I started but he silenced me by putting a finger to my lips.

“I’m not that strong,” he murmurs.

I smiled sadly.

“When do we get to go home?” I asked.

“Home?” he asked.

“Your apartment. If I was gone long enough for you to miss me that much, I want to spend some time with you. Do you not like me calling your apartment my home?” I replied.

“No, it’s fine. I haven’t been home in a while myself,” he replied quietly. “I kind of miss it myself. After you disappeared and turned up, I tried to stay away from the apartment in case whoever hurt you turned up there, they still ended up turning up to where I was hiding,” he commented. “I’ll ask Greyson, it might not be safe for us until they bring Drover in.”

His eyes roamed over me, landing on my temple. I reached up, self-conscious and felt the indicator.

“I’ll remove it later,” I murmured, worried it was bothering him.

“You don’t have to, being an android is part of you. I only did it to protect you before,” he replied quietly, still watching it, spin and change colours probably. “I love you, sincerely, either way. I promise.”

I glanced away and down thinking about it.

“I’ll think about it, I guess,” I add after.

He nods to the door, “Let’s go find Greyson and see about going home,” he comments.