[ But she doesn't; she can't. She thinks she knows the type of man he is, that he's a stray, but she has no idea of the blood on his hands. The amount of lives he hadn't been able to save. She'd held him through nightmares that'd flickered their lifeless faces back before him within sleep that was so often unkind, but she hadn't seen him when he'd enjoyed it.

When he was a demon, when he held the mark, when he thrived for that bloodshed like a god damn drug. The least of all women to deserve that was her, but she's looking at this with how she feels, not what's right. Not what's realistic, and that's all that's been engraved in him.

Still, he allows her to lead him away from the bustling coos and chatter of the fairground, down toward the rippling reflection of the lake, streetlights few and far between. He wishes he were able to guide his anger elsewhere, that he could transcend whatever it was tangling within his chest into something else, something more productive, something they could work with; but he's a character of dead ends.

He doesn't want them to be one of them. ]   No, Clara, nothings happened cause I haven't let it. You shouldn't... shouldn't be hung up on some guy that can't even stick around. That bails out every week without a phone call.   [ And rightfully, she could counter in question as to why he couldn't give her that. He just doesn't know how. He doesn't know how to allow something good to linger only to watch it torn from his grasp. ]   So, what? You're gonna keep me around even if its not reciprocated? Give your time to me when you could have someone that fuckin' treats you right?

No. I'm not gonna let that happen. I can't let you make that mistake.