i'd do anything to hold your hand

[DENVER CARLOS HURLEY]

i wish i could feel it all for you
I WISH I COULD BE IT ALL FOR YOU

It was more than obvious now that Denny was just blind and one-sided. He’d just been so stuck on how much Annie had given him, how quickly and how efficiently she’d changed his world that he’d forgotten that perhaps he’d been doing the same along the way. They each held this domino effect between the two of them; one of them would make a move, and the other would follow subsequently and respectively. Sometimes it felt more like Annie would make a move and Denny would have to pick up the pieces, but in that sense he wanted to be the one to stick behind and fix messes, clean up destruction, and make things okay. He’d rather it be himself than anyone else, and by Annie’s words he had no doubt that she felt the same way. But her words also served a purpose grater than just backing up his own affirmation. Annie’s speech held the meaning Denny would lack without her, without those words; they practically held his entire world on a string before him. But that wasn’t the right analogy. Denny didn’t feel like at any moment the string would break and his world would shatter. Rather, he felt like Annie just held all of what he needed to properly function in a stable manner, which was quite the ironical feeling to come along with Annie.

He didn’t really want to denounce any of the praise that Annie was giving him. It wasn’t because he wanted to feel like a jerky asshole and flaunt about how amazing he was, but rather that he just wanted to elongate this feeling of being needed, of being wanted, of being the only person that someone else wanted around. But still, regardless of all of that, he knew that without Annie being Annie, her Denny would be this horrible person that cared about nothing but darkness and flying. Though Annie wasn’t exactly a light person, she shone so bright in Denny’s life that she’d pulled him out of that state that he’d thought he’d never get out of, and quickly he just became this entirely new person that was built around and for Annie. So he smiled, just letting her words sink in and her kisses leave trails on his lips no matter how far or close they were. He let everything settle and be digested into replies in his mind. “Without you, there’s only me.” It was simple but just as serious as Annie’s words had started to become, and still held almost too much of that seemingly undying happiness Denny just couldn’t wash off of his mentality. “To me, you’re thanking me for having you, because without you, there’s nothingness and a hollowness about me that matches bird bones.” Now he was just getting cryptic and a bit creepy, so Denny slowed himself down and just thought.

“You’re thanking me for being me when, without you, there isn’t any me.” He’d said it multiple times before, but this was different, because now Annie was holding him up on the pedestal next to her. She’d put this blanket that was made of pure meaning behind him, but in retrospect she’d done that a long while ago. She’d done that long before Denny had fallen for her, long before he’d somehow managed to get her to feel the same way that he did. So now, all she was doing was reinforcing this cycle that they had between them; without Annie, Denny was just an empty shell of nothing; without Denny, Annie was just that broken girl that let no one in and gave no chances. It wasn’t like now she was the most friendly person or most personable person ever, but she’d let Denny get this far, which was a sure sign of progress if nothing else. And it wasn’t like now Denny was complete – actually, especially on day like this, Denny would beg to differ. He’d get on his hands and knees and preach to a choir that he was completely whole and needed nothing else in his life besides Annie (and maybe some food here and there, because he liked it).

But for now, that wasn’t the first thing on Denny’s mind. The first thing was that Annie was thanking him for just being there, the same thing he wanted to thank her for every day of his life. The second thing was that he hadn’t really properly replied to her thankfulness – he’d just given an oration about how he wouldn’t be this person centered on her without her. He didn’t even take into account that that little bit was pretty natural – you couldn’t live your life with someone as the center of your universe without them anyway. Regardless of that, he had to find a way to tell her that he accepted her words. He would; Denny knew he would. It would take a few seconds considering his mind was suddenly disarrayed, but he’d find something to say. The funny thing was that the right words were quite simple. They didn’t really make Denny sound too humble – at least the words that he was thinking of didn’t – but they were just the right sort of reply that would (hopefully) put Annie’s fears (if she had any) to rest. “But you’re welcome,” was his choice of words, because modest and humble weren’t the same thing; he could preserve one without worrying about the other. But to make up for the lack of humbleness, Denny leaned forward just a fraction of an inch and kissed Annie, holding her in place the way he was so used to – not bored by, but used to in a good way – and just smiled into the kiss. He couldn’t help it; unless he was so passionately upset and knew that a kiss was all that would cure the negative feeling, there weren’t many times where he couldn’t not smile through a kiss.

When he pulled back for air, which was nearly always the excuse, he didn’t move any farther than Annie had previously. “Is it out of place to say that the pleasure is all mine?” He just wanted to ask for fun mostly, not that he needed Annie’s approval to say that. He was still being cheesy-sweet, like he should be on Valentine’s Day. To make that point even more evident, Denny slid one hand from her waste to her back, running his fingers down her spine the way he had the morning after Christmas Eve. Without really thinking about it, Denny just spoke without regret. “I promised you I’d try to fix things. I’ll try until I can’t try anymore, and that day will only come when I can’t breathe anymore. That day will only come when you can’t either.” As long as he could make sure of that, Denny would; he’d fight until the day Annie died, which would be the day he would die, too. Denny was the type of guy that didn’t make promises that he couldn’t attempt to keep, but it seemed like he kept making promises to Annie that were so impossible to keep that he shouldn’t have even begun to thought of those things to begin with. But that wasn’t the case if you asked Denny. To him, he’d promise the moon and the stars because he would try to give them to her, even if that was as illogical as timing deaths to happen at the same time. Only Shakespeare could do that, and even then that didn’t really compare to Denny and Annie. They weren’t doing something against their parents’ greater judgment (or feud for that matter). They were in love, and that was all that mattered to the both of them. That was all that Denny needed to be motivated to promise things he couldn’t logically capture.




1303 -- lyrics to ellie goulding, words to me duh, image from me. -- denny's outfit is described i'm too lazy for polyvore -- seren/annie and that's it :) -- op i like i like good going denny good word choice