Future

                                    

                                          
For two long years, from 1982 to 1983, the rift between Ben and Y/n widened. 
The once unbreakable bond they shared had faded, leaving only the faintest threads of connection between them.
Ben, who had once been so close to Y/n now seemed like a ghost of the man she had fallen in love with.
He avoided her whenever possibleand chose silence over words, leaving Y/n to fumble in the dark, desperate for any sign that he still cared. 
She tried to reach out to him, to fix what had been broken but every attempt was met with cold indifference or worse, with biting sarcasm .
He would answer her questions with short, dismissive responses, never giving her the satisfaction of a real conversation. 
It was as though he had locked himself away behind a wall and no matter how hard Y/n tried, she couldn’t reach him.
Physically, Ben began to distance himself as well. The nights they used to spend together, once filled with warmth and intimacy had become cold and lonely.
He no longer sought her out, no longer pulled her close in the dark. 
When they did share a bed, it was like lying next to a stranger. 
Even during the day, he kept his distance, avoided her touch and barely even looked at her.
It was as if he was trying to erase the memory of their love from his mind and in doing so, he was erasing her from his life.
Y/n felt herself slipping into a state of despair. She was torturing herself, clinging to the hope that things could go back to the way they were but with each passing day, that hope grew dimmer.
Ben’s anger which she had thought was finally under control began to surface again, a dark boiling rage that he couldn’t...or wouldn’t..contain.
His abusive behavior which had been tempered by their love came back in full force and Y/n found herself walking on eggshells, terrified of setting him off.
She knew that the smallest misstep could ignite his fury and she lived in constant fear of the moment when he would snap.
The other members of the Payback team noticed the shifttoo. Ben’s outbursts were unpredictable and no one was safe from his wrath. The team was on edge, trying to avoid his anger but there was no escaping it. 
Y/n watched as the fear she felt for herself spread to the others and she felt a deep sense of guilt for the role she had played in bringing them all to this point.
But she was too afraid to confront Ben, too scared to push him any further knowing that the consequences could be disastrous.
The emotional and physical distance between Ben and Y/n became a constant source of pain for both of them. They were trapped in a cycle of hurt and anger, each too wounded to reach out to the other yet unable to let go.
Y/n still loved him, despite everything but she was scared...scared of what he had become and scared of what he might do.
Ben for his part was torn between his love for her and the bitterness that had taken root in his heart.
He couldn’t forgive her and he couldn’t forgive himself and so he let the anger consume him, driving them both further apart.
By the end of those two years, they were  shadows of the people they once were, both haunted by the ghosts of their past and the love that had been lost. 
The pain of their separation was a wound that refused to heal. They were together in name only, bound by a twisted and toxic bond that neither could break but that was slowly destroying them both.