It's 1986 and Willow is studying to be a vet, but she can barely make ends meet with her crappy job. When her streak of bad luck peaks and she gets fired, a night of drinking her problems away at a bar puts someone quite unexpected on her path - som...
Willow fully intended on keeping last night a sweet memory - something she could think of on a crappy day, something to bring an inevitable smile to her face, but it seemed she was rather failing.
Trying to clean her place, she found herself sitting on the floor, wrapped in Morten's jacket instead. A pile of bills on a small table by the doors suddenly dropped far down on her list of priorities - along with eating and other normally crucial needs. A wall clock kept ticking the time away and she had no idea how to survive today without giving in and going to his concert, even if just to see him from afar, nothing else.
"Face it, bitch," she snarled at her reflection in the hallway mirror. She hadn't even taken a bath after getting home; in fact, she barely slept, utter chaos in her head. Her face was a mess, so was her hair and she guessed she stank a little, but keeping things that way prevented her from bursting out through the front doors and running, if she had to, all the way to the club.
"Face it, goddamit," she repeated, pointing a finger at her puffy visage.
Willow supposed there was no sense in denying the obvious and the imminent. It just wasn't worth the fight.
She was utterly, hopelessly in love.
And she couldn't recall the last time she would fall so hard; it felt like all that madness she somehow didn't experience even as a hormone-buzzed teen overcame her in one crashing wave. She almost wanted to laugh, thinking about the pitiful bastards she had dated in her life and had cried over here and there. They seemed like a joke now, mockup experiences, some ridiculous life rehearsal.
"What do you know," she muttered, trying to figure out how to start moving on this very minute. "They say it's men losing their shit over what they see, and look at me, having hots for a dude I barely know."
But it wasn't just how he looked - although his absurdly radiant smile and a godlike jaw didn't hurt, not to mention that wild mane which just gave him boyish charm; no, it was the way he kept the eye contact, the way he listened and really, truly heard everything she said, the way he carried about, confident, but a bit goofy, as if he wasn't entirely sure if she wanted his attention or not.
What was it that he wanted, though? Just what they had, a friendly time and an hours-long conversation about everything? But if so, why did he keep asking her to come and see him again? And what was that fucking forehead kiss? Why did he get all tense?
Willow slid her palms over her face up and down. So many questions she most probably won't have answered, ever. It was doubtlessly time to get herself back to looking relatively human, pick up some newspapers and start circling job ads to call on Monday. That was what a woman closer than further to thirty would do - everything else running through her mind belonged in high school.
She took a bath, giving up on her book after a few minutes of idly re-reading the same paragraph, pulled on sweats, grabbed her wallet and started on an agonizingly mundane walk to her closest convenience store. She nodded to the never-speaking clerk, chose a few titles from the local press, stared at the donut shelf for much longer than she wished to, fighting to keep her mind steady, and ended up walking out of the shop with one of them.
"I'll just grow fat over the thing that reminds me of him," she said to herself, never-minding a scolding glance from an elderly couple she passed, and sat on a bench, determined to fulfill her plan of at least browsing the job section. She bit on her donut, spread the first newspaper open, and almost choked on a gasp that tried to escape her mouth as she chewed.
Morten was staring straight at her.
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The concert announcement, accompanied by a whole-page band photo. Obviously. She barely noticed the other two guys, focused on Morten's smug expression, so similar to the hilarious faces he would make at her last night. His hair impeccable, his cheeks shaved smooth, his gorgeous eyes glimmering, and suddenly it became too much. She crumpled the page, then crumpled the cardboard box after the donut, then the donut itself; she bolted up, hands covered in sugary frosting, and trembled with what she pretended was nothing but rage.
"That's it, motherfucker. That. Is. It."
Leaving a scenic mess of newspapers and donut leftovers on the bench, Willow didn't even try to retain any dignity and walk. She sprinted home, in her mind frantically browsing the outfits she sincerely hoped were not in the laundry basket.
