like the bullet you never saw coming; beth

[adna]

one touch will make you so nervous you might stop breathing
one touch will make you so reckless you might start feeling
one touch will finally show to me what you can't hide

“Please,” there is something like a plea in her voice, soft and quiet. “Please don’t apologize.”

It cuts her deeper than she could ever explain—the way that it feels like pity wrapped around her throat. The way that it feels like charity, like a mistake, like anything but what she wanted. She hates herself in these moments. She hates herself for the weakness that claws at her, vicious and brutal and biting.

She hates herself for the way he can remain so calm while she just comes apart.

Adna opens her mouth again and then promptly shuts it, gives a sad smile and then just falls quiet.

She has done nothing but make this entire situation worse the more that she talks. She has done nothing but provoke him into rage and then pity; she has done absolutely nothing but ruin his peace and quiet.

So she doesn’t even try to rectify it again.

She can’t bear the thought of pouring out her heart again—telling him how much she has missed him, telling him how much the night meant to her—for his pity. She can’t bear to tell him anything more when it just ruins things further, when it doesn’t do a lick of good, when she’s left aching in the aftermath.

So, for the first time since she saw him this day, she stays silent.

She swallows her pain and lets her gaze drop to the ground and just breathes in slow.

ADNA