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DARCY'S FACE WAS a little flushed, and her eyes...her usual barriers were gone. She didn't know when that had happened, if it was a product of today or if they had collapsed once she allowed her ice to fall. With her hair half up, half curling down to her shoulders, she seemed softer somehow. And found she didn't mind.
⠀⠀⠀ "Well," he prompted, "tell me."
⠀⠀⠀ I'll tell you everything. A promise she told what felt like a millennia ago. But she'd meant it then, beneath a starry night sky, as much as she'd meant it now.
⠀⠀⠀ She shook herself mentally and looked in the mirror. "You were right Sam," she told him over the line of the phone. "About me and Jude."
⠀⠀⠀ "So what did you do about it?"
⠀⠀⠀ She told him everything. From their stroll through Arcadia, a heart-to-heart in a hole-in-the-wall, driving through backroads and breaking in abandoned buildings. She shared general details of what came after while the most precious ones replayed through her mind; desire swamping her, her hands roaming all over his body as his explored her own, how she let herself get lost in the clash of lips and tongues and teeth.
⠀⠀⠀ The snogging had been even more mind-blowing than she could have even imagined, she recalled and shared this with Usama who'd been patiently attentive to her retelling of the day. She did not explain the entirely unexpected kernel of foreboding that had lodged itself in her stomach, as if such earth-shattering kisses could somehow be a bad thing. She ignored it. Negative feelings had no business making themselves known after kisses like that.
⠀⠀⠀ "Bloody hell," he whistled after a beat.
⠀⠀⠀ Darcy snorted at his reaction and at her own reflection before flicking the lights closed and beelining for her bed. She'd come home, later than intended, to utter quiet. Her mum was out cold, completely dishevelled and passed out before the telly with an empty wineglass in her grip. Emma was sound asleep in their bedroom.
⠀⠀⠀ Darcy was so giddy that she decided to ring Sam on sheer instinct, forgoing their previous awkwardness and hoping he'd do the same. And so he did.
⠀⠀⠀ "I know!" Was all she could say without squealing.
⠀⠀⠀ "Well, I thank you for your candor," Sam quipped. "And for calling. I'm happy for you, mate. Truly."
⠀⠀⠀ "Thanks, Sammy." Darcy couldn't help but notice the lull in their conversation, the weighted silence that begged to be addressed. "So, what's going on with you? How've you been?"
