like lightning (the dearamna challenge) [[ON HOLD]]

one

one: write a oneshot / short story about two friends that isn't resolved at the end

 

in the end, after months spent hugging each other in the eye of the hurricane, they argued over a still and stiff-starched party he spent alone (and the lie she told to get out of it). she told him later she was scared of his family and he said so was he. she laughed, mocking him and cold.

 “i’m scared of families,” she told him and crossed her arms over her chest like she needed to protect herself.

(she’d once told him how terrified he made her, because he made her vulnerable and sometimes she wanted to run away)

in the end, it was him who left.

he told her soft and closed that he couldn’t deal with her lies any more and he wouldn’t meet her gaze. he stared at the carpet instead, his head swimming with hurt and a small bashed pride with his reins in its fist.

“i knew you wouldn’t keep your promise,” she told him and there was satisfaction in that voice and he tried to call back the image of that brave broken girl who’d clutched his hand hard and real in the streetlights. when he looked up though she was smirking, and she had that face on she kept for strangers and suddenly he was so, so tired of this.

“sorry,” he said (but only because he knew she hated that word).