[angelicstarkey]

fizzie | twenties. march aries. moon child, star girl. lovebird. drew starkey and rafe cameron mdni

⋆.˚⋆ masterlist notif blog ⋆˚.⋆

⟡ i am a corporate girlie working a 9-5 so fics will come out whenever i’m able to!

⟡ please respect that this is a strictly 18+ page due to the sheer amount of explicit content. I understand that while I am not able to control who consumes my content, I am not responsible either.

[kooksandpearls]

How You Get The Girl ❀ 02

pairing – Petal!Reader x Garrett Graham summary – Garrett Graham has a ten-step plan to get his girl back. warnings – Exhaustion, forgetting to eat, fainting, head injury, mild concussion, medical clinic, academic stress. word count – 12k

navigation – Masterlist | « Chapter One | Chapter Three »

Chapter Two. Stand There Like A Ghost.

The audition is six days away. Six days is nothing. 

Six days is also long enough to ruin every choice she’s made about the scene, rebuild it from scratch, ruin the new choices, and arrive at the audition carrying six incompatible versions of the same woman in her body.

She wakes before her alarm with one cheek stuck to the corner of her audition packet and the yellow highlighter still uncapped beneath her hand. 

Grey morning sits flat against the dorm window. Her neck hurts. The inside of her mouth tastes like the coffee she drank at eleven-thirty and the mint she chewed afterward in a failed attempt to convince herself this counted as dental care.

For several seconds, she stays folded over the desk and watches the circulation return to her fingers. The memory of Garrett’s hand slips in with it. 

His pinky beneath hers on the hockey-house couch. The cautious little curl when she touched him. The way he had stayed completely still while she laced their hands, as though even breathing too differently might turn the moment into something she had not offered.

She straightens before her mind can do anything embarrassing with that.

The audition packet is still open to the second scene. Mara stands alone in her mother’s kitchen, speaking to a half-dead houseplant because everyone else in the house has become too frightening to tell the truth to. 

On paper, it’s funny. It’s supposed to be funny, at least at first. Mara threatens the plant with eviction, accuses it of emotional manipulation, gives it a better childhood than her own through three tablespoons of tap water and an increasingly unstable monologue about sunlight. 

Then the scene turns by degrees until the audience understands she has been talking about herself the whole time.

The production itself belongs to Briar, technically. It will rehearse in the same black-box theatre where someone has been promising to fix the backstage sink since her freshman year, and the department will still use student volunteers to sell programmes and direct confused parents toward the bathrooms. None of that makes the audition small.

Once a year, the department brings in an outside director for the spring industry production, chooses a play that can travel cleanly between theatre and screen, and fills the invited performances with every person whose job title makes undergraduates briefly forget how to breathe. 

Alumni agents. Regional artistic directors. Casting associates from New York and Boston. A manager who had found one of last year’s seniors in the lobby afterward and signed her before graduation. 

The official department email described them as industry guests, which was the sort of neat, bloodless phrase universities used when they didn’t want students throwing up in public.

If she gets the role, and if she is good enough, and if the right person happens to be looking in the right direction at the exact second she becomes impossible to forget, something could happen.

Something was a safer word than Broadway. Safer than television, film, representation, meetings in rooms with bottled water she would be too nervous to open. Something didn’t make her sound like a child standing on her bed with a hairbrush microphone and a belief system built largely from cast albums.

She closes the packet, showers in six minutes, and leaves with wet hair pressed dark against the back of her coat.

Her week begins running before she does. By nine-fifteen, she’s delivered a presentation in Professor Martin’s class while privately trying to release the tension in her jaw. 

At ten, she’s across campus in the movement studio, lying on a floor that smells faintly of dust and other people’s feet. 

At eleven-thirty, she buys a coffee large enough to qualify as an organ and forgets it on the windowsill outside Studio B until the ice melts into a pale, undrinkable soup.

At twelve-oh-seven, her phone buzzes inside her bag.

Garrett: Did you eat?

She stares at the message while standing in the costume shop with three safety pins between her lips and a measuring tape looped around her neck. She removes the pins carefully.

coffee.

His reply comes almost immediately.

Garrett: Not food.

it had milk.

Garrett: Deeply compelling defence.

She smiles before one of the first-years drops an entire box of buttons behind her and the room fills with the sound of several hundred tiny plastic objects escaping toward freedom.

By two, she’s forgotten the exchange. By four, she’s also forgotten the cereal bar in the side pocket of her bag and the fact that she agreed to meet Allie outside the library before rehearsal. 

Allie finds her halfway across the quad, walking while reading the audition scene and nearly colliding with a campus tour.

“You’re going to kill a prospective student,” Allie says, catching the back of her coat and steering her away from a family looking nervous beneath a Briar admissions umbrella.

“She should’ve committed to the bit.”

Allie takes the pages from her hand. “You’re not allowed to read while crossing roads anymore.”

Her phone buzzes again while Allie’s still carrying the packet above her head like confiscated contraband.

Garrett: Drive tonight?

Then, before she can answer. 

Garrett: Twenty minutes. No destination. Minimal chance of murder.

Her chest loosens so quickly it feels almost suspicious. She pictures the Jeep warm and dim, Garrett’s hand loose over the steering wheel, the road passing black beyond the windows while neither of them has to decide what the time means. 

She wants it with a sharpness that briefly makes the rehearsal building ahead of them feel like an obstacle placed there personally.

“What?” Allie asks.

“Nothing.”

Allie reads her face with insulting ease. “Garrett?”

She types before Allie can begin making noises.

i can’t tonight. rehearsal until nine and then i need to work on my audition.

Garrett: I could come read with you after. Garrett: I’ve improved. Promise.

debatable.

Garrett: I can be extremely boring and helpful.

The smile comes again, smaller this time. She can almost see him saying it, eyebrows lifted, committing himself bravely to an evening of being uninteresting. She types, deletes, then types again.

i want to. i just really can’t lose the time.

There’s a pause long enough for Allie to hand back the pages and open the rehearsal-room door.

Garrett: Okay, baby.

Another message follows.

Garrett: Kick its ass.

She reads both twice before locking the screen.

Garrett doesn’t argue. He doesn’t offer to sit silently in the corner or appear outside rehearsal with the confident assumption that she will be happy once he’s already there. 

He doesn’t tell her she needs a break, though he’s clearly begun considering himself an unlicensed medical authority on her sleep schedule and nutritional intake. He says okay and lets the no remain exactly where she put it.

The absence of pressure should make it easier to return her attention to the scene. It doesn’t.

By Wednesday, Garrett has started appearing in the small spaces around her life without physically appearing much at all.

A coffee waits at the events-office desk when she arrives for her shift, the order correct down to the syrup she changes depending on whether the day feels cold enough to justify it. The receipt has her name on it and, beneath that, a note written in the special-instructions box.

ACTUAL FOOD NEXT. THIS IS NOT A LOOPHOLE.

She sends him a photograph of the cup beside a packet of vending-machine crackers.

Garrett: I’m reporting you.

to who?

Garrett: Tucker.

She pauses.

you wouldn’t.

Garrett: Try me.

At rehearsal, there’s a fresh packet of throat lozenges tucked into the front pocket of her bag. She assumes Allie put them there until Allie sees the box and says, “Oh, Jesus. He’s fully courting you.”

“He’s not courting me.”

Allie picks up the box and reads the label. “Honey and lemon. Intimate.”

“Give me those,” she mutters. 

“Do you think he asked the pharmacist for the sexiest flavour?”

She snatches them back, but the laugh gets out before she can prevent it, landing bright and brief in the dim hallway.

Garrett’s busy too. She knows because the group chat never permits mystery when it could provide public harassment instead. Extra skate at six. Film review. Classes. Weights. A captain’s meeting. 

Still, he texts between them.

Garrett: How’d rehearsal go?

Garrett: Logan says plants don’t count as scene partners because they can’t feed you energy. Dean says Logan has never fed anyone energy in his life.

Garrett: I said you’d probably hit both of them.

She answers when she can. Sometimes three hours later. Sometimes after midnight, when the building has gone quiet and the light from her desk is the only one left beneath the dorm-room door.

badly. and tell dean he’s right.

Garrett: Screenshotting this.

do and i’ll deny it.

Garrett: Theatre has taught you nothing about integrity.

By Thursday evening, the humour takes longer to reach her. Her temples have developed a low, persistent ache. 

At the campus café, she asks for the chicken thing and has to gesture helplessly toward a sandwich sitting eighteen inches from her face. During rehearsal, she misses an entrance she hasn’t missed once all semester and stands in the wing for a full second while Allie hisses her name through a fixed stage smile.

Dexter calls a break and finds her near the prop shelves, pressing both thumbs into the muscles beneath her eyebrows.

“You’re thinking too loudly,” he says.

“I’m not thinking at all, actually. I think something has died.”

Dexter considers her face, then softens by one degree. On anyone else, it might not be visible. “Go home after this.”

“I have work.”

“You have an audition.”

“I also have expenses. I have to live.”

“Babe.”

She looks away first, toward the rehearsal room where someone is moving a chair three inches downstage and immediately moving it back. “I’m fine.”

Dexter exhales through his nose. Her phone buzzes in her coat pocket.

Garrett: Let me steal you for half an hour tonight.

She shuts her eyes.

Garrett: Drive. Food. I’ll return you to your audition spiral before anyone notices.

Her body wants to say yes before the rest of her can begin listing reasons. She wants his car, his warmth, the stupid old guitar music he keeps low enough for conversation. She wants him looking over from the driver’s seat with that small, private smile he has started giving her instead of the full campus version. She wants thirty minutes in which nobody asks her to be open, grounded, bookable, emotionally available, or off-book.

She also has a shift until nine, rehearsal notes to rewrite, the scene to run, and a monologue that has begun feeling less true every time she touches it. Her thumb hovers over the keyboard.

i want to.

She watches the words sit there for a second, too naked on their own, then adds:

but i can’t. i’m sorry.

Garrett answers quickly.

Garrett: Don’t be sorry. Garrett: You sure I can’t come by later?

She looks at the packet folded and refolded inside her bag. She types with both thumbs.

no no. i really need to focus tonight.

Garrett: Okay.

That’s all. She locks the screen and returns to rehearsal.

At nine-forty, she leaves the campus events office with a tote bag cutting into one shoulder and the strange, papery feeling of having moved through too many fluorescent rooms without seeing daylight. Her dinner has been half a packet of crackers and three sour candies Allie found beneath the seats in the black box and claimed were probably recent.

The dorm is overheated. Somebody on the second floor has burned microwave popcorn so badly the hallway smells like electrical grief. She drops her bag beside the desk, pulls off her coat, and opens the audition packet before taking off her boots.

For forty minutes, she works. Or she tries to. She reads the first line six times and hears none of them. Marks a beat, erases it, marks it again half an inch farther down as though emotional truth might be hiding in the margin. She records the monologue on her phone, plays it back, and hates the deliberate break in her voice so much she deletes the file before it finishes.

At ten-thirty-two, she checks her messages. Nothing from Garrett.

That’s normal. Garrett’s allowed to possess an evening. He has practice in the morning. He’s already asked twice to see her and been told, with increasing clarity, not to come. The reasonable part of her understands this.

Something lower in her body doesn’t.

The silence sits oddly after several days of him occupying every small pause. No ridiculous update from the hockey house. No photograph of Logan doing something concerning. The phone remains dark beside her elbow while she runs the first page again.

She makes it four lines before looking at the screen. Still nothing.

Her stomach pulls inward, though that may simply be hunger finally becoming articulate. She presses the heel of one hand beneath her ribs and reads the next line aloud.

“I’m not avoiding you,” she tells the imaginary plant on her desk. “I am giving you the dignity of privacy while you die.”

The line lands dead.

“Great,” she mutters. “Good. Broadway’s calling.”

Her phone stays quiet.

Maybe she’s been too careful. Maybe every time Garrett steps toward her, she moves the boundary another inch and calls it caution. Dinner, but not upstairs. His hand, but only in the car. The hockey house, but no conversation about what any of it means. Come for a drive. No. Let me help. No. Can I see you? No, no, I really need to focus.

She had wanted him to listen when she said no. She had needed that from him. She hadn’t considered how quiet the room might become when he did.

The knock at her door makes her jump hard enough that her knee hits the underside of the desk.

“Fuck.” She pushes back from the chair, rubbing the sore spot above her kneecap. Her roommate is spending the night at her girlfriend’s, and nobody sensible visits a dorm room after ten-thirty without first sending a warning.

The knock comes again. Two quick taps. She approaches with all the confidence of a woman carrying a highlighter as her primary defensive weapon and opens the door three inches.

A guy in a red delivery jacket stands in the hallway holding a large brown paper bag. “Uh, delivery?”

She stares at him. He checks the receipt. Says her name.

“That’s me.”

He offers the bag.

“I didn’t order anything.”

The delivery guy looks down at the receipt again with the exhausted patience of someone whose job routinely places him between hungry people and their own memory. “It’s paid for.”

“Oh.” She still does not take it. “Are you sure it’s this room?”

He reads the number aloud.

“That’s this room.”

“Cool.”

“Sorry.” She accepts the bag at last. It’s warm against her forearms, heavier than expected, and the smell reaches her immediately through the folded paper. Garlic, chilli, fried dough, something sweet and sharp underneath. Her stomach contracts so suddenly it’s almost painful.

The delivery guy gives her a nod that suggests his role in this mystery has reached its limit, then walks back toward the stairs. She closes the door with her hip and carries the bag to the desk.

Inside are dumplings from the Thai restaurant near Hastings. The good ones, thin-skinned and crisp at the edges, packed beside the sauce she likes. There’s curry, rice, and the cucumber salad she had stolen most of from Garrett’s plate at dinner despite insisting she didn’t want her own. Enough food for tonight and tomorrow, possibly the entire theatrical department.

She looks for a receipt. Her name is printed across the top. Beneath it, folded once and tucked between the containers, is the receipt and small delivery note.

Her mouth changes before she can stop it. It settles first at one corner, then warms slowly across the rest of her face until she has to press her lips together and look down at the note again.

He had listened. He hadn’t come over. Hadn’t turned food into an excuse to stand in her doorway looking handsome and wounded until she invited him inside. He hadn’t asked for thirty minutes in exchange, or a phone call, or proof that the care had landed where he wanted it to.

He had only fed her.

She sits cross-legged on the rug because the desk is buried beneath pages and there is something too formal about eating this food at a chair. The paper bag stays beside her knee. She opens the dumplings first, steam lifting faintly against her face, and bites into one before locating a fork.

Her whole body seems to recognise food at once. Heat moving down into the empty, sour space in her stomach. Salt and garlic waking her mouth up. The ache beneath her ribs loosening enough to reveal how tightly she’s been carrying herself all evening. She picks up her phone.

thank you.

The message delivers. Three dots appear almost immediately.

Garrett: Eat.

She looks down at the open containers around her.

bossy.

Garrett: You like it.

Her thumb pauses.

sometimes.

Garrett: Oh yeah?

She can see his face too clearly. The way his eyebrows would lift, hope trying to disguise itself behind amusement. She takes another dumpling and lets him wait exactly twelve seconds, because she may be exhausted and emotionally compromised, but she still has standards.

sometimes, graham.

Garrett: I’ll take it.

Her fingers smooth once over the folded delivery note where she’s placed it beside the audition packet.

you ordered too much.

Garrett: I know you.

The answer presses somewhere tender. She looks around the floor at the curry, the rice, the dumplings she has already eaten too quickly, and the cucumber salad she is absolutely going to finish despite its alleged status as tomorrow’s food.

debatable.

Garrett: Eat the dumpling, baby.

She laughs under her breath, picks up another one, and returns to the scene with the warm container balanced over one knee. The next time she reads the opening line, it sounds a little less like an actress trying to prove she understands pain and a little more like a girl making a joke because the truth is still too large to say directly.

Beside her, Garrett’s note rests against the page.

At least eat, baby.

Four days before the audition, her alarm goes off at four in the morning. Vibrating until the sound drags her out of sleep with one cheek pressed into the pillow and her heart already behaving as if she’s missed something.

The dorm room is dark except for the thin green light of the charger beside her bed. Her roommate is still away, leaving the other mattress smooth and undisturbed beneath the window, and for several seconds she lies there beneath the duvet with one hand curled near her face, trying to remember why any person would choose to be conscious at this hour.

Then the audition arrives fully formed in her mind. Four days. The scene. The monologue. The director whose previous production transferred from Boston to New York. The casting associate whose name had appeared on the guest list circulated through the department yesterday afternoon. 

The role waiting somewhere beyond a room she hasn’t entered yet, existing or not existing for her depending on what her body does with twelve minutes under fluorescent lights.

She sits up. Her head feels packed with cotton, her shoulders stiff, but the exhaustion is still young enough to be bullied. She pulls on leggings and a sweatshirt in the dark, twists her hair into something technically off her face, and drinks half a bottle of water while standing beside the desk.

Garrett’s delivery note is tucked against the edge of the mirror.

At least eat, baby.

The containers from last night are stacked neatly in the little dorm fridge. There’s curry left, rice, two dumplings she had protected from herself through an act of restraint she now considers misguided. 

She looks at them while tying one shoe, already calculating whether she can eat cold rice in the gym car park without creating a new low point in the human experience. She will eat after.

The thought arrives cleanly. Reasonably. It has no visible connection to every other after that will replace it before the sun comes up. She leaves with coffee in a travel cup and the audition packet folded into her gym bag.

At four-twenty, the campus fitness centre belongs to insomniacs, athletes, and people conducting private wars against themselves. Most of the overhead lights are still dimmed. The treadmills hum in a row beneath silent televisions playing overnight sports recaps, the closed captions moving over footage of men celebrating goals she’s too tired to identify. 

A cleaner pushes a wide mop across the basketball court. Somewhere near the weight racks, metal strikes metal with the ugly, disciplined clang of someone who’s never once mistaken sleep for a priority.

She starts on the treadmill. The first five minutes are awful. Her calves feel heavy, her lungs insulted by the hour, the coffee moving too warm and acidic in her empty stomach. 

Then her body catches the rhythm. Feet landing. Belt turning. Breath in, breath out. The room narrowing into repetition until there is finally nothing to solve except the next step. She runs Mara’s monologue silently while she moves.

I’m not avoiding you.

Three breaths.

I am giving you the dignity of privacy while you die.

Four breaths.

By five-fifteen, she’s on the floor beside a bench, stretching one hamstring while reading the second page. Sweat cools beneath the back of her sweatshirt. Her phone lights up inside the open gym bag.

Garrett: Why are you awake?

She looks at the time beside his name and almost laughs. Five-sixteen.

why are YOU awake?

Garrett: Practice. Garrett: Your turn.

gym.

The three dots appear immediately.

Garrett: At five in the morning?

technically i got here at four twenty.

Garrett: That’s not better.

She smiles down at the screen while rolling her ankle slowly.

Garrett: Did you eat first?

Her thumb stills.

She considers lying in the loose, automatic way she considers moving a chair onstage when the blocking begins to feel wrong.

coffee.

Garrett: Baby.

it’s early. food feels illegal.

Garrett: Food has no business hours.

She can see him somewhere across campus in the rink corridors, curls still flattened on one side from sleep, gear bag over his shoulder, already frowning at his phone with the full disapproval of a man who had ordered enough Thai food to feed her for two days and expected his logistical work to be honoured.

i’ll eat after.

Garrett: Pinky swear.

She looks at the words for a second.

pinky swear.

The lie feels small enough to forgive when she sends it.

At six-thirty, she’s showered, dressed, and walking into Professor Martin’s lecture with damp hair freezing at the ends beneath her coat. At seven-forty-five, she’s in the library with three articles open across her laptop and no memory of opening the third. At nine, she gives up her seat to a girl waiting nearby, carries her coffee down two flights of stairs, and reaches the bottom before realising the cup is empty.

Breakfast, she thinks. Then her professor stops her outside class to ask whether she’s considered applying for the spring research placement. The conversation lasts eleven minutes. By the end of it, she’s late to movement lab and spends the entire walk eating two mints from the bottom of her bag because they’re the first thing her fingers find.

Her phone buzzes twice during class. She feels it through the canvas of her tote where it rests against the wall, but doesn’t look. They’re doing partner work, and Dexter has already accused her of keeping part of her attention on a little electronic leash, which is rich coming from a man who checked a dating app during notes yesterday and then announced that desire was part of his process.

At eleven-fifteen, she opens the messages while crossing the quad.

Garrett: Practice done. Alive. Garrett: Logan got hit in the throat with a puck and says his voice sounds sexier now. Garrett: It doesn’t.

There’s also a photograph. Logan sits in the locker room with an ice pack held against the front of his neck, middle finger raised toward the camera, his expression deeply offended by both hockey and documentation. Dean’s blurred in the background, laughing hard enough to require assistance from a bench.

Her mouth twitches. She begins typing a reply, then somebody calls her name from the theatre-annex steps. It’s one of the costume assistants asking whether she can cover an extra hour before rehearsal because a zipper has broken, three hems remain unfinished, and the phrase dress emergency has been used with complete sincerity.

She locks the screen. The reply stays unfinished.

At noon, she sits at a sewing machine with the audition packet open beside the presser foot, repeating lines beneath her breath while guiding pale-blue fabric beneath the needle. 

At one, she runs to the events office and spends three hours answering emails, printing lanyards, correcting a room booking, and explaining to a student society president that no, the university cannot provide a live falcon for a medieval-themed fundraiser regardless of how central it is to the vision.

At three-twelve, her phone lights again.

Garrett: How’s your day?

Then, fifteen minutes later:

Garrett: Alive?

At three-fifty:

Garrett: Send proof of life please.

She sees all three while standing beside the printer with forty-eight name tags warming beneath her palm. She means to answer. She even opens the conversation, but her manager asks whether she can stay an extra half-hour, and then the printer jams, and then one of the theatre first-years texts that Dexter has moved the rehearsal call fifteen minutes earlier.

By four-thirty, her phone is back in her bag, unanswered. The first rehearsal lasts just under two hours and feels like six.

Dexter stops the same transition nine times. Allie loses a shoe during a movement sequence and performs the next thirty seconds in one heel out of spite. Someone knocks over the prop lamp. She runs her scene three times and hates a different thing on each pass.

“Stop protecting the end,” Dexter tells her after the third run, standing in the centre aisle with one hand pressed over his mouth. “You know where she ends up, but she doesn’t.”

They run it again.

At six-fifteen, she leaves rehearsal, changes shirts in a bathroom stall, and returns to the events office because somebody has called in sick and the evening supervisor needs help setting up a faculty reception in the alumni hall.

There’s food at the reception. Small sandwiches with the crusts cut off, fruit arranged in geometric little rows, cheese on slate boards with handwritten labels informing guests which region had produced it. She carries three trays from the service corridor into the hall and doesn’t take anything because the guests haven’t arrived yet and eating the display feels criminal.

She will grab something before she leaves. Then someone spills sparkling water over the sign-in table. A lecturer cannot connect his laptop to the projector. The keynote speaker arrives early and wants the chairs rearranged. 

By the time she takes her coat from the staff room, the catering trays have been cleared and the few remaining sandwiches are already sealed inside plastic tubs being carried toward the kitchen.

Her stomach gives one tight, hollow pull as she walks back toward the theatre annex. She mistakes it for nerves.

The second rehearsal begins at seven.

The studio has become too warm during the break. The mirrors are clouded faintly near the bottom, the air carrying that specific rehearsal-room mixture of dust, sweat, old wood, and the artificial citrus of the cleaning spray used badly between classes. 

Bags lie open along one wall. Water bottles cluster near the door. Somebody has left a banana on top of the speaker, growing softer by the minute beneath the heat.

She sits cross-legged on the floor with her script spread across her thighs. Her body feels oddly distant below the neck, legs heavy, fingertips cold despite the warmth of the room.

There’s a faint sourness at the back of her throat that she keeps swallowing against. Every few lines, her eyes lose their place and return half a paragraph higher, forcing her to trace the text with one finger like a child learning to read.

Allie lowers herself onto the floor beside her with a quiet grunt, tugging one knee toward her chest. She studies her face for a second too long.

“Babe.”

She hums without looking up.

“You okay?”

“Mhm.”

Allie doesn’t move. She can feel the stare against the side of her face with the uncomfortable clarity of stage light. “You don’t look great.”

“Thank you,” she murmurs. “That’s exactly the feedback an actress needs four days before an industry audition.”

“I don’t mean ugly.”

“Excellent clarification.”

“You look…” Allie pauses, searching for a word. “Grey.”

She lifts her head. “Grey?”

“Like, pretty grey.”

“That’s not better.”

“It’s a flattering grey.” Allie reaches over and presses the back of two fingers briefly against her cheek. “You’re cold.”

“The room’s cold,” she mumbles.

Allie’s brows draw together, humour losing ground around them. “Did you sleep last night?”

“Some.”

“How much is some?”

She looks down at the script again. The words have started swimming slightly near the edges, though she can still force them still by narrowing her eyes. “Enough.”

“That means no.”

“I slept.”

Allie exhales through her nose. “Have you eaten?”

The question reaches her through several layers. Her finger stops beneath the third line. She tries to remember. The morning has become disconnected little rooms in her head. Gym. Coffee. Lecture. Library. Costume shop. Work. Rehearsal. Work again.

Coffee. The mints. Nothing else arrives.

“Oh,” she says.

Allie goes still. “Oh?”

She looks up slowly. Her stomach seems to recognise the answer at the same time she does, giving another tight, unpleasant twist beneath her ribs. “I think I forgot.”

“You forgot to eat?”

“I was busy.”

“It’s seven o’clock.”

“I know what time it is,” she grumbles.

“You’ve eaten nothing since yesterday?”

“I had coffee.”

Allie’s eyes close. “I’m going to kill you.”

“Get in line.”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I. The department’s very competitive.”

Allie doesn’t laugh. She leans closer, voice lowering while the rest of the cast moves around them, people stretching, laughing, running bits of dialogue beneath their breath. “Do you feel sick?”

She presses her lips together, checking the inside of her body as if it belongs to somebody else and she’s only now been asked to assess the damage. Her head aches behind the eyes. There’s a greasy little wave moving through her stomach. Her skin feels too tight over her face.

“Just…” She rubs one palm over her sternum. “Yuck.”

“Helpful.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re obviously not.”

“No, no. I am.” She shifts the script higher on her knees and forces her eyes back onto the page. “I just need food.”

Allie gives her a long look. “I have a protein bar.”

“Great.”

“In my bag.”

She nods, though the motion makes something inside her skull lag half a second behind. “I’ll get it.”

“I’ll get it.” Allie plants one hand on the floor and pushes herself upright, then pauses when Dexter calls her name from across the studio.

He’s standing beside the lighting lecturer with both arms folded, gesturing toward the taped marks near centre stage.

“One second,” Allie says. She points two fingers at her own eyes, then toward her face. “Do not move.”

She lifts the script in a weak little salute. “Go.”

Allie crosses toward Dexter, already asking what he wants before she reaches him.

For a few seconds, she stays exactly where she is. She breathes through her nose. The room seems too loud now, every separate sound arriving at once – the scrape of a chair leg, a bottle hitting the floor and rolling, Dexter’s voice, the lighting lecturer answering, somebody laughing near the mirrors. Her pulse has become noticeable in her throat.

She looks toward Allie’s bag. It sits near the opposite wall, black canvas, one strap folded beneath it. Not far. Fifteen feet, maybe.

The protein bar will help. Sugar. Something dense and artificial and capable of getting her through another hour.

She places the script on the floor and uncrosses her legs. Pins and needles move down both calves. She puts one hand beside her hip and pushes herself up.

The room changes before she gets fully vertical.

Heat rushes over her face and chest in one hard wave, immediate enough that sweat breaks cold beneath the back of her shirt.

Her vision tightens. Black gathers softly at the edges, the mirrored wall narrowing into a bright strip in front of her.

She catches the floor beneath one foot and cannot seem to locate the other properly.

“Hey, Al,” she says.

Her own voice sounds strange. Too quiet, coming from somewhere several feet behind her. Allie turns.

She reaches one hand vaguely in her direction. “Can I–”

The rest of the question disappears. Every sound in the studio pulls away at once, voices thinning into muffled shapes at the end of a long corridor.

The air feels both freezing and unbearably hot against her skin. Her stomach drops, though she’s standing still. Or believes she is.

Allie says her name. The floor rises fast toward her. Or she goes down. There’s no useful difference by the time everything goes black.

Consciousness returns badly.

First there’s light, white and flat through her eyelids. Then sound: the soft electronic pulse of something nearby, rubber soles moving over vinyl, paper rustling. Then pain arrives behind both, a thick, ugly throb beginning near the back of her skull and pushing forward until it sits behind her eyes.

She groans.

The sound scratches at her throat. Her mouth is dry enough that her tongue feels too large inside it, and when she tries to lift her head, the room tips sharply to one side.

“Oh, no, honey.” A woman’s voice comes close immediately. Warm, brisk, real. A hand settles carefully against her shoulder. “Stay down for me. Don’t sit up yet.”

She opens her eyes.

The ceiling is made of white acoustic tiles, one of them stained faintly yellow near the corner. A fluorescent panel glows directly above her with the specific cruelty of medical lighting.

She turns her face away from it and discovers she’s lying on a narrow exam bed with crinkled paper beneath her, a thin blanket pulled over her legs and a blood-pressure cuff wrapped around one arm.

“Where…” Her voice catches. She swallows and regrets it. “Where am I?”

“Student health clinic.” The nurse comes into view beside the bed, middle-aged with silver threaded through her dark hair and a pair of purple glasses resting low on her nose. Her ID badge swings slightly when she leans closer. “You’re alright. Just take it easy.”

She frowns, trying to force the last thing she remembers into a shape. Rehearsal. The floor. Allie turning toward her. Her head pulses harder.

“Ow,” she whispers, lifting one hand toward the back of it.

The nurse catches her wrist gently before her fingers reach the sore spot. “Careful. You took a nasty fall.”

She lets her hand drop onto the blanket. “I did?”

“You fainted, honey. Smacked your head pretty good on the way down.”

“I passed out?”

“You sure did.”

She stares at her. There’s something almost insulting about having lost an entire section of her own evening. One second she had been asking Allie for food, the next she’s horizontal beneath institutional lighting while a machine squeezes her arm.

She closes her eyes again. “Ouch.”

“I bet.” The nurse releases the pressure cuff with a soft hiss and checks the reading before reaching for the little pulse monitor clipped over her finger. “Any nausea?”

“A little.”

“Blurred vision?”

“When I tried to sit up.”

“Any neck pain?”

She tests it carefully without moving. “Just my head.”

“Mhm.” The nurse picks up a small penlight. “I’m going to check your pupils again. Look at my nose for me.”

The light moves across one eye, then the other. She tries not to flinch and fails.

“Sorry,” the nurse says. “I know it’s unpleasant.”

“That light is evil,” she grumbles.

A small smile pulls at the nurse’s mouth. “That’s a common review.”

She sets the penlight aside, makes a note on the chart, then adjusts the blanket where it has slipped beneath her knee.

There’s a little carton of apple juice on the counter beside a packet of crackers and a plastic cup of water. The sight of them makes her stomach turn and tighten at once.

“Your blood sugar was low when they brought you in,” the nurse says, following her gaze. “Your blood pressure wasn’t too impressive either. Your friend said you hadn’t eaten today.”

She looks toward the opposite wall.

“Coffee isn’t breakfast,” the nurse adds.

“I’m learning that.”

“Bit of a harsh lesson.”

She gives a faint, miserable laugh. It immediately worsens the throbbing in her skull, and she shuts her eyes again.

The nurse rests one hand lightly against the rail of the bed. “Because you lost consciousness and hit your head, you’re not going back to your dorm alone tonight. We need somebody to come collect you and stay with you for a while. Keep an eye on you.”

Her eyes open. “I have an audition in four days.”

The nurse gives her a look over the top of the purple glasses. It’s not unkind, but it’s clearly survived many students attempting to negotiate.

“Your audition can remain in four days while you lie still for the next five minutes.”

“But rehearsal–”

“Is finished for you tonight.”

Her mouth presses thin. The room feels suddenly smaller around the bed, the paper beneath her loud whenever she shifts. “Can Allie take me?”

“She’s here, but she told us she lives in another dorm and has rehearsal again first thing tomorrow.” The nurse glances down at the chart. “We need someone who can take responsibility for you tonight. Preferably your emergency contact.”

She stops moving.

The nurse runs one finger down the page. “Let me see here…”

There is a pause while she adjusts her glasses.

“Garrett Graham,” she reads. Then she looks up. “Is that still right, honey?”

For a second, she only stares at her.

Garrett.

His name is printed there in whatever university system has carried it quietly through the breakup, through the months of not touching and looking away and pretending they had both found other people interesting.

She must have entered him during their first relationship, probably sitting at his kitchen table while he stole whatever snack she had brought and told her to put him down because who else was she going to call if she broke a leg doing theatre.

She had never changed it. She hadn’t even remembered there was something to change.

The thought of him arrives with enough force to make the room soften at the edges for an entirely different reason. Garrett walking into the clinic with damp curls or his Briar jacket half-zipped, face already tight with worry.

Garrett’s hand finding hers before he remembers to ask and then stopping, because now he does remember. Garrett saying baby in that low, steady voice he uses when he’s scared and trying not to make the fear hers.

Her throat pulls tight. She wants him. She wants him here now with an immediacy that leaves no room for pride to make itself useful.

She nods once, carefully because her head punishes even that.

“Yes,” she says, voice small and rough. Then, after a breath, “Please.”

“No worries, honey.” She gives her shoulder one gentle pat and turns toward the door. “I’ll go call him now.”

She nods again and lets her head settle back against the pillow, listening as the nurse’s footsteps cross the room and the door opens into the bright clinic hallway.

The door doesn’t close properly behind her. It catches against the frame and remains open by an inch, enough for the light from the corridor to cut a thin white line across the floor and for every sound from the little office beyond to travel with irritating clarity into the room.

A chair rolls. Paper shifts. The nurse says something to somebody at the front desk, then there’s the hollow click of a receiver being lifted.

Her head throbs in time with her pulse.

Whatever she struck on the way down has left a deep, concentrated ache at the back of her skull, the kind that seems to have roots.

Each beat presses outward beneath the skin, heavy and hot, then moves forward behind her eyes until even keeping them open feels like unnecessary labour.

She closes them.

The nurse’s voice carries through the gap in the door, softened by distance but still recognisable. “Hi, is this Garrett Graham?”

A pause.

“This is the Briar student health clinic. Don’t panic, honey, she’s alright.”

Another pause, longer this time.

“No, no, she’s awake. She fainted during rehearsal and hit her head when she went down.”

The silence on the other end must be doing something impressive, because the nurse’s tone changes immediately, growing firmer beneath the kindness. “Garrett. She’s conscious. She’s speaking. Her observations are stable. I need you to take a breath for me.”

Despite everything, the corner of her mouth shifts faintly. Of course he’s panicking so hard a medical professional has begun coaching him through respiration.

The movement pulls at something behind her eyes. Her smile disappears into a wince.

“She needs somebody to collect her and keep an eye on her tonight,” the nurse continues. “Yes. Student clinic, east building. We’re here until ten.”

A pause.

“No, you do not need to run.” The nurse’s voice becomes more distant as she presumably turns away from the open door. “He hung up.”

Someone near the desk laughs.

She would too, except her skull feels as though it has been fitted with a second, much angrier skull inside it. She exhales through her nose and sinks farther into the thin clinic pillow, the paper beneath her head crackling softly with every tiny adjustment.

She means only to close her eyes until the room stops pressing so brightly against them.

The next thing she hears is Garrett’s voice. “Where is she?”

Too loud. Too close. Frayed at the edges in a way his voice rarely is unless something has gone wrong on the ice or he is trying very hard not to let anger become panic.

“Right through there,” the nurse says. “And lower your voice, Romeo. She’s got a headache.”

His footsteps hit the hallway fast and uneven, the rubber soles of his shoes catching once against the vinyl before he appears in the doorway.

Garrett looks like he’s arrived by force. His jacket is half-zipped over a dark Briar sweatshirt, the hood bunched crookedly beneath the collar. His curls are flattened on one side and pushed wildly backward on the other, as if he has spent the entire drive dragging his hand through them.

His cheeks are pink from the cold, breath still coming too quickly, and there’s something naked in his face when his eyes find her on the exam bed.

“Hi.” The word leaves him almost breathless. He crosses the room in three strides, then slows only when he reaches the bed, as though the sight of her has reminded his body that speed is no longer useful. “Oh– hi, baby.”

He bends over her, one hand reaching carefully toward the side of her face. She frowns and lifts two fingers to his mouth before he can say anything else.

“Shh,” she murmurs. “Too loud.”

Garrett stops immediately. His lips press softly against her fingertips before he draws back half an inch, nodding with exaggerated care.

When he speaks again, his voice has dropped nearly to a whisper. “Course. Yeah. Course, baby. Sorry.”

She lets her hand fall, and Garrett catches it before it reaches the blanket. His fingers close around hers gently, warm enough that she feels the difference through her whole palm.

“You okay?” he asks.

The question is absurd enough that she almost laughs, but she remembers what happened last time and only closes her eyes instead. “Forgot to eat. Fainted.”

Garrett stares at her. “You forgot to eat?”

There’s no judgement in the words yet, only horrified disbelief, but her face tightens anyway.

“Don’t be mean,” she mutters. “I’m concussed.”

His mouth opens, then closes. A breath leaves him through his nose, part sigh and part exhausted prayer.

He lifts their joined hands and presses her knuckles briefly against his forehead. “Jesus Christ.”

“I said don’t be mean.”

“I’m not being mean.” His thumb moves once over the side of her finger, the touch so careful it barely counts as movement. “I’m trying not to have a heart attack.”

“That seems dramatic.”

“You passed out and hit your head.”

She sighs. “I was there.”

“You were unconscious.”

“Then I guess technically I wasn’t.”

Garrett’s eyes close for one second, and when he opens them again, some of the panic has settled beneath the familiar exasperation she recognises.

The nurse returns with a folder tucked beneath one arm. Garrett straightens but doesn’t let go of her hand.

“Is she good to go home?” he asks, voice still low.

The nurse comes to stand near the foot of the bed. “She is, provided somebody stays with her tonight and keeps an eye on her. She’s got a likely mild concussion. No driving, no alcohol, nothing strenuous, and she needs to take it easy. If the headache suddenly gets much worse, she starts vomiting repeatedly, becomes confused, is difficult to wake, has weakness, trouble speaking, anything that worries you, you take her to the emergency room.”

Garrett nods through every instruction with the intense concentration of a man being briefed on how to disarm something explosive. “Okay.”

“And she needs food,” the nurse adds, glancing pointedly toward the bed. “Proper food. Not just coffee.”

“Yeah,” Garrett says. “I can do that.”

She opens one eye. “You sound pleased.”

“I’m pleased someone with medical authority finally told you coffee isn’t a meal.”

The nurse’s mouth twitches. “I like him.”

“Please don’t encourage him,” she murmurs.

Garrett ignores that and takes the discharge folder when it’s offered, opening it immediately and scanning the first page.

“You can read it outside,” she tells him. “The words will remain.”

He glances up. “You’re making jokes. That’s good.”

“I’m deeply brave.”

“Yeah, baby.”

The softness in his answer catches somewhere below her throat.

The nurse removes the pulse monitor from her finger and unwinds the blood-pressure cuff from her arm. “Let’s get you sitting up slowly. No heroics.”

“I don’t do heroics.”

Both Garrett and the nurse look at her.

She frowns. “That felt really mean.”

Garrett slides one hand behind her shoulders while the nurse raises the back of the bed. The change in position sends a dull pulse through her skull, sudden and thick enough that she groans and shuts her eyes.

“Easy,” Garrett murmurs immediately. “I’ve got you.”

Her body folds toward the nearest stable thing before pride can be consulted. Her forehead finds the front of his shoulder, cheek resting against the worn cotton of his sweatshirt while his arm settles carefully around her back.

For several seconds, no one asks her to move. Garrett’s hand stays broad between her shoulder blades, holding her upright while the dizziness passes.

Beneath her ear, his heartbeat is still too fast. She can feel the hard, nervous rhythm through the sweatshirt, every beat giving away how little his lowered voice has to do with actual calm.

“You good?” he whispers.

“No.”

“Okay.”

The answer comes without correction or forced optimism. Only okay, quiet against her hair, as if being unwell is something he can sit beside without needing her to hurry through it.

She keeps her head there until the room stops shifting.

When she finally lifts it, Garrett’s face is close. The panic hasn’t disappeared from his eyes, but it’s been folded down into attention.

He watches every small movement she makes as if her balance is written somewhere around her mouth and he might miss a change if he blinks.

The nurse brings over the plastic cup of water. “Small sip.”

Garrett takes it before she can, holds it while she drinks, then lowers it the second she turns her face away. There’s something humiliatingly easy about letting him help. No instinct to argue. No need to prove she can hold her own cup while the room still feels fractionally detached from the floor.

“Alright,” the nurse says. “Feet over the side.”

Garrett moves first, sliding one arm beneath hers while she shifts toward the edge of the bed. Her shoes have been placed neatly on the floor beneath her. One lace is undone.

She stares at it.

Garrett follows her gaze. “Don’t.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You were about to bend down.”

“I can tie my shoe,” she mutters.

“Not tonight.”

He crouches before she can protest and ties both laces, even the one that is already secured, pulling the loops snug without making them tight. His curls fall forward over his forehead.

The gesture is so ordinary, so quietly intimate, that something inside her chest goes soft in a way that has nothing to do with the faintness.

When he stands, he reaches for her bag from the chair and slings it over his shoulder. The pink strap cuts across the dark front of his sweatshirt. Three months ago, she might have made a joke about it. Tonight, she only watches his fingers adjust the weight.

“Ready?” he asks.

“No.”

“Great.”

Garrett steps close enough that his side presses lightly against hers. He gets one arm beneath her shoulders, then takes her wrist and guides it carefully around the back of his neck.

“Wrap that arm around me, baby. There you go.”

She does. The first step feels uncertain. Her knees hold, but the floor seems slightly softer beneath them than it should. Garrett tightens his arm around her waist immediately, drawing her firmly into his side without making a comment.

“I’m fine,” she whispers.

“I know.”

“You’re holding me like I’m ninety.”

“I’d hold ninety-year-old you exactly like this.”

She turns her face faintly toward him. “You’d still be alive?”

“Out of spite.”

“That tracks.”

The nurse follows them to the doorway with the discharge papers. “Slowly.”

Garrett nods. “We’re going slowly.”

He does. Painfully slowly. He matches every small, cautious step, letting her put as much weight into him as she needs without making it obvious when they pass the front desk.

The clinic feels long on the way out, corridors stretched beneath harsh lights, doors opening into rooms full of paper-covered beds and humming machines.

Allie sits in one of the waiting-room chairs with both hands wrapped around her phone. She stands so fast when they appear that the chair legs scrape behind her.

“Oh my god.”

The volume makes her wince.

Allie’s hands fly to her own mouth. “Sorry. Sorry.” She crosses the room and stops just outside Garrett’s hold, eyes moving over her face with visible guilt. “Are you okay?”

“She’s concussed,” Garrett says.

“Garrett,” she mutters.

“What? You told me.”

Allie’s face crumples around the edges. “I shouldn’t have left you.”

“You walked twelve feet away.”

“I told you not to move.”

“I don’t respect authority.”

“That isn’t funny.”

“It’s a little funny.”

Allie looks toward Garrett as though requesting assistance from the only other person in the room who understands the futility of arguing with her.

“I’ve got her,” he says quietly.

Allie nods. Relief moves through her so visibly that her shoulders drop. She reaches out and squeezes her hand once. “Text me when you’re home.”

“I will.”

“I mean it.”

“I know.”

Allie’s gaze flicks to Garrett again, protective even through the worry. “You’ll stay with her?”

“All night.”

There’s no hesitation in it. He says it like the clinic has given him a job and he’s already built the rest of his evening around doing it properly.

Something warm presses behind her ribs.

The cold outside hits hard after the clinic’s stale heat. Garrett pulls his jacket open wider and angles his body around her as they cross the car park, blocking the wind as much as he can.

The campus is nearly empty, paths shining beneath the streetlamps, theatre buildings dark except for the one studio window where rehearsal has continued without her. She looks toward it.

Garrett notices. “No.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You’re not going back.”

“I know.”

“Do you?”

She presses her face briefly into his shoulder. “You’re annoying.”

“Good.”

The Jeep waits beneath a tree near the edge of the lot. Garrett unlocks it from several feet away, then opens the passenger door and turns her carefully until the backs of her knees meet the seat.

“Head,” he murmurs, one hand flattening over the top of the doorframe.

She ducks beneath it and lowers herself into the passenger seat. The movement makes her vision pulse dimly, and she leans back immediately, eyes closing against the padded headrest.

Garrett gathers the edge of her coat before it catches in the door, sets her bag on the back seat, then reaches for the seatbelt.

“I can do it,” she says automatically.

His hand stills. She opens her eyes and finds him watching her. The belt is three inches from her hand. She could pull it across herself. It might make her head hurt. It might not.

She lets her fingers drop into her lap. “You can.”

“Okay.”

Garrett draws it slowly across her chest. The buckle clicks. He gives the belt one light tug, then pauses with one hand braced near her hip.

“You alright?”

“Mhm.”

“You gonna puke?”

“No.”

“Dizzy?”

She sighs. “A little.”

His mouth tightens. “I’m driving like Tucker.”

“That bad?”

“That safe.”

“Terrifying.”

He closes the door gently and walks around the front of the Jeep.

The inside is cold at first. Garrett starts the engine and turns the heat on low rather than blasting it, deciding that even air can be too loud now. The dashboard glows blue across his face as he pulls out of the car park with both hands on the wheel.

For several minutes, neither of them speaks.

She rests her head carefully against the seat and watches campus slide past the window in dark, familiar pieces. Brick buildings. Bare trees. Pools of light across wet pavement.

Her body feels hollowed out and overfilled at the same time, limbs heavy, stomach aching with hunger, emotions sitting too close beneath her skin after the fear and the fall and waking up alone beneath medical lights.

Garrett glances at her every few seconds.

“You can watch the road,” she murmurs.

“I am.”

“No, you’re watching me.”

“I can do both,” he argues.

“That sounds illegal.”

“It’s a talent.”

His voice remains soft, almost absurdly so. Even the humour is careful around the edges, built not to demand anything from her.

The gentleness does something unexpected. Something worse than panic would have. Her eyes burn.

She turns toward the window before he can see, but Garrett has always been irritatingly good at noticing the small changes in her face when he is actually looking.

“Hey.” His voice shifts. “What’s wrong? Something hurt?”

“No. Nothing.”

“Baby.”

The word slips beneath whatever weak structure she’s built around herself. Her throat tightens. She presses her lips together, but the first tear moves anyway, hot and immediate down the side of her face.

Garrett’s hands tighten once around the wheel. “Is it your head? Are you feeling worse?”

“No.” She wipes the tear away too quickly. “No, I just feel like shit.”

“Okay.”

“And I’m tired.”

“I know.”

“And hungry.”

“I know that too.”

“And I’ve ruined everything.”

His head turns sharply before he catches himself and looks back at the road. “You haven’t ruined anything.”

“My audition is in four days, and I’m concussed because I forgot food exists.”

“Hey. We’ll figure it out.”

“You can’t figure out a concussion,” she sniffles.

“I can feed one.”

A broken little laugh escapes her, immediately caught by another tear.

Garrett reaches across the centre console and turns his hand palm-up between them. He does not take hers. He only leaves it there, open.

She looks down at it. Then she places her hand in his. His fingers close slowly, thumb settling over her knuckles. He keeps one hand on the wheel and the other around hers while the Jeep moves through the dark.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers.

Garrett’s brow creases. “For what?”

“Everything.”

“No.”

She stares down at their hands. His knuckles are scraped from practice, skin dry near one thumb. “Garrett.”

“You don’t have anything to apologise for.”

“We both…” Her voice catches. She swallows against the ache in her throat. “We both fucked up.”

He is quiet for a moment. The Jeep stops at a red light, its glow moving faintly over the windshield.

“Maybe,” he says. “But you still don’t have anything to apologise for tonight.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“It does to me.”

“I hurt you,” she presses.

Garrett’s thumb moves once over her hand. “I hurt you first.”

“It isn’t a competition.”

“I know.”

“You always make things a competition.”

“I know,” he says again, and there’s no defence in it. No grin trying to soften the confession. “I’m trying not to.”

The light changes. He drives on.

She looks at his profile, the firm line of his jaw, the curls still disordered from whatever he did to them after the clinic called. “I was mean sometimes.”

“You were hurt.”

“That doesn’t make it okay.”

“No.” His mouth pulls faintly at one corner, not quite a smile. “But I understand it now.”

“You shouldn’t let me off that easy.”

“I’m not letting you off anything. I just…” Garrett exhales slowly. “I don’t want you lying here with a head injury trying to apologise for breaking up with me when I was the one who made being with me feel shitty.”

“It wasn’t always shitty,” she says.

“I know.”

“Most of it wasn’t.”

“I know that too.”

Her eyes burn again. “I loved you. So much.”

Garrett’s fingers close more firmly around hers.

The words sit between them in the quiet Jeep. Past tense only because grammar has cornered her there, not because either of them believes the feeling has obeyed it.

His voice comes low when he answers. “I know, baby.”

She waits for him to say something else. That he loved her too. That he still does. That he wants her back.

Garrett would once have filled the silence with every possible declaration, stacked them high enough that she had no room to examine what was underneath.

He doesn’t. He holds her hand and drives.

By the time they reach her dorm, the tears have dried tight against her cheeks. Garrett parks near the entrance, shuts off the engine, then turns in his seat.

“Stay there.”

“I wasn’t planning an escape.”

“Good.”

He walks around the Jeep and opens her door. The cold reaches in first, followed by Garrett’s hands, one taking hers and the other settling at her waist as she steps down.

Her knees feel steadier now, though her head still pulses each time her foot meets the pavement. Garrett keeps his arm around her anyway, her bag slung over his opposite shoulder.

At the dorm entrance, she swipes her card while leaning against him. The scanner flashes red.

“Again,” Garrett murmurs.

“I know,” she mumbles.

The second attempt works. The door unlocks with a buzz, and warm air spills over them from the lobby. Garrett walks her through it, then slows near the foot of the stairs.

She feels the hesitation before she sees it. His arm remains secure around her, but something changes in his posture, a subtle holding back.

His eyes move toward the staircase and then to her face. He hasn’t been inside her room since before the breakup. Not since the boundaries between them became something fragile and deliberate.

He could carry her bags to the entrance. Sit in the Jeep until one in the morning. Hold her hand in public. But the dorm room has remained closed.

He doesn’t ask. That, somehow, makes it harder.

She looks at the stairs. Then at Garrett. “Can you stay tonight?”

The question comes out quieter than she intends.

Garrett’s face changes at once. Something warm and stunned moving through his eyes before he gathers it.

“Yeah,” he says. “Course.”

“You don’t have to–”

“I want to.”

Her throat tightens again. “Okay.”

He helps her upstairs one step at a time, his arm strong beneath hers, pausing whenever her breathing changes. By the time they reach the second floor, she’s exhausted enough that the hallway seems twice its usual length.

Her key sticks once in the lock. Garrett takes it only after she lets her hand fall, opens the door, and guides her inside.

The room smells faintly of last night’s curry, her perfume, and the warm dust of the heater beneath the window. Her bed remains unmade, audition pages scattered across the desk and floor, clothes folded badly over the back of the chair. Evidence of every hour she’s tried to fit inside the week.

Garrett looks at it all without comment.

“Bed or food?” he asks.

“Bed.”

“Wrong. Food first.”

She gives him a tired look.

“I know,” he says. “I’m oppressive.”

“Deeply.”

“Sit.”

He guides her to the edge of the mattress and crouches in front of her. His hands come to the laces of her boots, undoing them one at a time before sliding each boot carefully from her foot.

She watches him through heavy eyes. “You’ve become very good at taking my shoes off without getting anything out of it.”

Garrett’s mouth twitches. “I’m growing.”

“Disturbing.”

He sets the boots beside the desk and stands. “You have something comfortable to sleep in?”

She points vaguely toward the second drawer of the dresser. “Shirts. Top drawer.”

Garrett opens it and immediately looks away when he realises it’s her underwear drawer. The speed of it almost makes her smile.

“Second drawer,” she corrects.

“You said top.”

“My brain is injured,” she murmurs, biting back a smile.

“Right. Of course.”

He closes the drawer with exaggerated respect and opens the one below it, retrieving an old Briar shirt and a pair of sleep shorts.

“These?”

She nods. Garrett places them beside her on the bed. Then he turns his back.

She stares at him. “What are you doing?”

“Not looking.”

“I need help.”

His shoulders go still.

“With the buttons,” she adds, because the fitted blouse she wore to work has somehow developed fourteen fastenings since morning. “My head hurts when I look down.”

Garrett turns slowly, eyes fixed firmly on her face. “Okay.” He steps close and lifts his hands toward the first button, pausing before touching it. “Can I?”

She nods.

His fingers work carefully down the front of the blouse. There’s no teasing in him now, no downward glance, no charged pause where the fabric opens over her skin.

Garrett keeps his eyes on the buttons with the concentration of someone performing a complicated repair, knuckles occasionally brushing the thin shirt beneath.

When the last button is free, he steps back and turns away again while she slides the blouse from her shoulders. Changing still makes the room tilt slightly, and she has to sit for a moment with the old shirt gathered in both hands.

Garrett hears the pause. “You okay?”

“Mhm.”

“You sure?”

“No.”

He turns, sees her sitting there half-dressed and exhausted, then takes the shirt from her without letting his gaze move below her face. He gathers it at the hem and holds it open. “Arms up.”

She lifts them slowly. Garrett pulls the shirt down over her head, careful around the sore spot, then eases her arms through the sleeves. The fabric settles loose around her body, carrying the faint smell of laundry detergent and the dorm drawer.

“There,” he murmurs.

He helps with the shorts in the same practical, careful way, kneeling to guide them over her feet and keeping the blanket across her lap whenever he can. There’s nothing sexy in it. That makes it more intimate than if there were.

Once she’s changed, Garrett folds her clothes over the chair instead of leaving them on the floor. “Food,” he says.

“Garrett.”

“Three bites.”

“Two.”

“Four.”

“That isn’t how negotiating works.”

“It does when you have brain damage.”

She stares at him.

“Mild,” he adds quickly. “Mild brain damage.”

“Get out.”

“No.”

He retrieves the leftover curry and rice from the fridge, heating them in the small microwave near the desk while she sits propped against the pillows. The machine turns loudly enough that she winces, and Garrett stops it before the timer finishes, catching the door before it can beep.

“Very stealthy,” she murmurs.

“I’m adaptable.”

He brings the bowl to the bed with a fork and a glass of water, sitting on the edge near her knees. She takes the first bite because arguing requires more energy than chewing.

Warm rice sits heavily but not unpleasantly in her stomach. Garrett watches until she swallows, then looks away with enough false casualness to make it obvious he has been waiting.

“You can stop supervising my mouth.”

“No.”

She takes another bite. “Happy?”

“Getting there.”

By the fifth, the empty ache inside her has begun easing. By the eighth, her eyelids feel too heavy to hold open. Garrett takes the bowl when the fork starts resting too long between her fingers.

“That enough?” she asks.

“For now.”

He places the leftovers on the desk and returns with the water. She drinks several slow mouthfuls, then sinks deeper into the pillows while Garrett reads the discharge instructions beneath the warm pool of the desk lamp.

“No screens,” he says.

She glances toward her audition packet.

“No.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You looked at it.”

“I need to practice.”

“You need to sleep.”

“The audition–”

“Will still be there tomorrow.” Garrett sets the papers aside and pulls the desk chair close to the bed.

She frowns. “What are you doing?”

“Staying.”

She tilts her head. “In the chair?”

“Yeah.”

“That looks uncomfortable.”

“I’ve slept in locker rooms. I’ll be fine.”

She watches him settle into the chair, long legs stretching awkwardly beneath the desk, arms folding over his chest. He looks too large for the small dorm furniture, broad shoulders nearly touching both sides of the chair back, knees forced apart by the narrow space.

The sight presses strangely against her chest. “You can lie down,” she says.

Garrett’s eyes lift.

“On the bed,” she adds. “Not– I mean, just… there’s room.”

He doesn’t move immediately. “You sure?”

She nods once.

“You want me there?”

Another nod. “My head hurts. Don’t make me write you an essay about it.”

Garrett stands. He takes off his jacket and shoes, then lies down on top of the covers beside her, leaving a careful strip of mattress between their bodies.

His hands fold over his stomach. He stares at the ceiling with the rigid posture of a man trying to prove he can occupy a bed without assuming a single additional privilege.

She turns her face toward him. His profile is soft in the low light. Curls still a mess. A faint crease between his brows even now. He has not relaxed since entering the clinic. Maybe not since the phone call.

“You were scared,” she murmurs.

Garrett looks at her.

“On the phone.”

“The nurse told you?”

“I heard her tell you to breathe.”

His mouth presses thin. “She didn’t open with you’re okay.”

“She did, actually.”

“She said student health clinic first.”

“Monster,” she whispers.

“I thought…” He stops. His throat works once. “Doesn’t matter.”

She knows what he thought. The shape of it sits plainly across his face even without the sentence. Her hand moves over the mattress between them.

Garrett looks down when her fingers touch his. He turns his palm over, but still waits. She threads their fingers. His breath leaves slowly.

For a while, they lie there without speaking. The room settles around them, heater clicking beneath the window, distant footsteps moving through the hallway, somebody laughing behind another closed door.

Garrett’s hand stays warm around hers. His thumb moves occasionally over her knuckles, the same small path each time.

She thinks of every boundary he’s honoured. Every invitation he’s allowed her to refuse. The open palm instead of the grab. The food delivered without him. His back turned while she changed. The chair dragged beside the bed before she told him he could lie down.

She had wanted him to prove that he could hear her.

Somewhere along the way, she had become so focused on watching him work for another chance that she hadn’t noticed how tired she was of standing on the opposite side of it.

Not ready to erase what happened. Not ready to pretend that love makes two people safe simply because it’s large. But tired of acting as though every soft thing between them needs to be rationed.

Her fingers tighten around his.

Garrett looks over. “You okay?”

She shifts carefully toward him until her forehead rests against the warm curve of his shoulder. His whole body goes still.

“Yeah,” she whispers.

Garrett waits another second, giving her every possible chance to change her mind, then lifts his free arm and settles it around her waist. The hold is loose at first. Barely there. When she moves closer, he lets it become firmer.

His cheek rests lightly against the top of her head. “Sleep, baby,” he murmurs.

She closes her eyes. The ache remains, dull and deep beneath her skull. The audition is still four days away. Nothing between them has been repaired neatly enough to name.

But Garrett’s hand is warm against her back, his breathing slow beside her, and for the first time in months, letting him close doesn’t feel like surrendering something she will need later.

It feels like stopping a fight neither of them wants to win.

notes from me – AHHHHHHHHH. i hope the wait was worth it, my loves! so so excited to hear your guys thoughts on this one!

i hope you enjoyed, as always tell me all your thoughts and theories and ideas!! xx

to be notified when i post new fics, follow @kooksandpearls-library and turn on notifications! i no longer use a taglist for garrett fics.

[angelicstarkey]

how do you feel about gossiping about drew starkey

bby karma is real and is a bitch and i am a scaredy cat of having my life go to shambles any more than it is rn so i’d rather not

i’m sorry :(

[rafesdaydream]

Western nights (3)

part 3: scriptures

pairing: Criminal!Rafe Cameron x Preacher's!Daughter!Reader

blurb: you are the sweet innocent preacher's daughter. he's the town's most notorious criminal. what happens when he becomes obsessed with you, and you can't help but fall for him?

warnings: mdni, mentions of violence, alcohol, smoking, suggestive themes, abuse, crime, guns, knives, religious themes, religious trauma/guilt, religious language, kissing, hallucinations, slight starvation, masturbation, angst, dark themes.

wc: 7.1k

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You always thought hell would be a wretched place. For wretched people. After all, surely they had committed awful sins and deserved to suffer for eternity. Deserved to think about and repent their actions. Never did it cross your mind that you might find yourself there. If this wasn’t hell, you weren’t sure what was. Did this make you a wretched person? Had you too committed unforgivable sins? Would you ever be forgiven? 

Would you ever see him again? No. Stop thinking about that. He is why you are here. At least that’s what you told yourself, taking a deep breath to focus your thoughts. Your mind had been wandering more often now. Maybe that is what’s meant to happen after you spend every waking second locked in this cage of a room with ample food and water, forced to recite the scriptures surrounding you.

“This isn’t punishment. It’s a cleansing.” Your father’s words floated back to you. “You shall be pure once again, mind rid of all these vile thoughts.”

To say he wasn’t exactly pleased once you returned that night was an understatement. He was furious. Disobeying him twice in such a manner was unacceptable.  You could remember his almost menacing gaze in the dim, flickering light of the hallway. 

“Where were you?” he’d demanded, his voice sending a shiver down your spine.

“At the church, sir.” Your voice had been shaky as you’d tried to even out your breathing.

Your father had just stared for a second, clearly having seen through your weak lie. You’d known that, but it was as though he’d wanted to make you squirm. To make you regret ever lying to him. To accept the inevitable fallout, which was the result of the consequences of your actions.

“So late?” he’d asked, a hint of mockery in his tone. 

Your mother had gotten out of bed now, pale in her nightgown as she stood behind your father. The look in her eyes had been pitiful. Her disappointment was always worse than your father’s rage. “Tell us the truth, sweetheart. It’ll be best.” Her words were grim for a place where truth only led to pain. 

You’d almost thought about it for a second. Telling them everything. You’d always told them everything. Before Rafe. Before you’d seen him for the first time. Before thoughts of him had invaded your mind. Before he’d taken you on his bike. Before you’d went into the back of that gas station with him. Before…

What were you even supposed to tell your parents? That you had been seeing the most wanted criminal in town? That you couldn’t stop thinking about him? That you’d been dreaming about marrying him, having kids-

“Tell me the truth. Now.” Your father’s command snapped you out of your thoughts. You’d looked back up at him, swallowing hard. 

You couldn’t. The words wouldn’t come out. Lying again wasn’t an option, but for reasons unknown, the truth refused to fall from your lips. You’d chosen silence.

“Very well.” Your father hadn’t asked again. He hadn’t forcibly demanded answers from you. It was as if he knew they’d come eventually. “Clear out the storage.” He’d ordered your mother without turning.

Here you were now. 

You’d been in the storage room before to retrieve items your mother asked for. Go through boxes sometimes. But never for this reason. Your father's punishments were often cruel, mostly physical. You’d been subjected to canings, beatings, and all kinds of violence, yet in this moment nothing could compare to this mental agony. 

Your father was calculated, sure however, there was no way he could know the state to which your mind had been plagued with thoughts. Thoughts of him. Thoughts of… You couldn’t think of his name. No. Don’t think of it. You’d gone so long. You can’t. It’ll all come back. The memories. The feelings. Everything.

Every time it came, it pulled you under like a wave. It was almost like you’d go numb. Lose all feeling. Lose all coherent thoughts. Except him. Rafe. The way his calloused fingers felt when he brushed back a strand of your hair. The way his breath was warm against your skin when he called you “sweetheart”. The way his lips would feel when they finally pressed against yours-

You gasped, coming to from your trance at the sound of your mother slipping in your dinner from the slot in the door, one of your two daily meals for the next week in here as per your father’s strict words.

“You will spend the week here,” he’d muttered, gesturing to the storage room, now void of the boxes cleared out by your mother. The wooden door that was previously blocked had now been slightly ajar, revealing a little toilet and sink. The only thing that had remained in the room, on the black and white tiles, was piles of scriptures, stacked neatly in the corner. “Your time is to be occupied reading the words of God. You will return to his side, sanctified.”

Your had mother sighed, her nimble fingers wrapping around the necklace she always wore. A silver chain with a plain cross. “May the Lord be with us…” she’d whispered as though you’d traversed to the dark side. You hadn’t. It wasn’t like that, right? No… You were still good. You were the preacher’s daughter. 

You’d wanted to scream it. To beg your father. To sob at your mother’s knees. But you couldn’t give them what they wanted. The truth. So you’d walked in, crossing the threshold of the door with a quiet step. 

“Do you understand, child?” 

“Yes, sir…”

Those were the last words you’d heard from your father, three days ago, before he slammed the door shut. Your stomach had twisted when you heard the click of the lock. Just like it twisted now, seeing the cold meal placed in front of you. Warmth didn’t belong in penance. And penance was eating you alive.

You looked disheveled at best. Your hair matted from sleeping, curled up on the freezing tiles, your thin church dress useless against the bite of the cold. Your lips cracked from the bitter taste of the tasteless bread you’d shoved down for every excuse of a meal, given with a simple glass of water. Your mind fighting to claw its way out of these four walls. To him. Always to him. You were his. Why wasn’t he coming for you? 

You couldn’t do it anymore. It was becoming unbearable. After you’d been alone for the first few minutes, you’d convinced yourself you could get through this. How hard could it be to stay in a room for seven days? Besides, you had an endless supply of readings to get through. Then the lights flicked off outside, and your parents went to sleep. You were truly alone.

The sobs tore their way out of you, the sounds that came with them ugly. You’d cried until you couldn’t breathe, left gasping for air that only fueled the pain. If your parents heard, they’d think it was because of this. You cried for everything but that. You cried for how you got here. For how you’d let your wandering mind taint everything you’d built for years. For the version of yourself forever lost. The girl who was free from these sinful thoughts of him.

You stared at the scriptures that layed in front of you now, pages crinkled from the tightness of your desperate grip. You’d tried your best to believe that you could be cleansed. That your mind could once again be pure. Spent the first morning reading every word, trying to clear your mind and absorb every scrap of meaning. 

Your finger trembled slightly now as you traced the line with complete focus. “Purge me, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.”

“I shall be clean…” Your voice was shaky as you repeated the words as if that would engrave them into you. The first line was always the easiest. Keep going. You have to. Don’t think about him.

“Bring the broken vessel to the altar, for the righteous shall pray.” 

“The righteous shall pray,” you whispered out, throat dry. 

Pray. You couldn’t help but concentrate on the word. The letters on the page. How they were printed out so evenly, the lines of black ink a stark contrast to the yellowed state of the paper. 

Prey.

No. That wasn’t right. 

You were to pray… but… You were the prey. 

No, no, no- It was here again- Your knuckles went white as you grasped the page, trying to claw onto anything tangible as your mind reeled again. Just like it always did. Like it wanted to scour into the darkest depths rather than stay within the bounds of the pages in front of it. 

You were his prey. Rafe’s prey. You’d fallen for a facade that was a fantasy. And now he was going to hunt you down. And he’d enjoy it. He wasn’t a good guy.

But would that be so bad? He’d save you. Save you from this room. Save you from your parents. Save you from these words. You’d move from town to town, pressed up against him on the back of his bike. You’d be pretty and distract the guards while he broke into the vaults. And maybe he’d buy you a ring and a white dress with that stolen money. Forge some fake papers. It would be you and him. 

You… Him… Forever…

And he’d kiss you. And touch you. And-

You sucked in a breath of air as you came to your senses, on your knees now, leaning back against the chipping wall. This had to stop. It was getting worse. The page that had been in front of you had been crumpled, your nails still digging in. You ripped it out with a grunt, tossing it into the corner where a pile of rolled-up paper balls laid. 

“Please, R-rafe…” you begged, half sobbing out of sheer desperation now, as if he were your God. As if he’d hear it somehow and stop tormenting your mind. As if he had any control over this. 

As if you weren’t consuming his thoughts too.

Rafe couldn’t stop himself from pacing from one end of his bedroom to the other. His breathing was ragged. His desk a larger mess than his mind, scattered with blueprints of the bank’s layout that he’d managed to obtain from another acquaintance. After he dropped you off that day. 

Rafe had tried his best to busy himself these past three days. Mapping out plans of how to successfully carry out this heist. Going to every single bar in town, drinking till he could barely stand anymore. Fucking any girl there to distract his mind. And yet it wasn’t working.

What the fuck had you done to him? There was something wrong with him. No matter what he did, you kept invading his mind. “Stop it,” he muttered to himself. “Think, think, think-”

Rafe cut himself off with another sharp inhale, closing his eyes for a second, trying to narrow his focus to the plan. This was it. The biggest bank in town. He could not screw this up. It was simple. He’d pulled off more complicated heists, right? Why was he second-guessing himself? No. Pull yourself together. 

Wait until the guard switch at 11.55pm. Get through the back entrance. Open the vault. Grab the money. And leave town. Rafe went through the steps over and over in his mind as if that would help. Help get the image of you out. How tempting you looked in that little church dress. How tightly you held onto him on his bike. The awe on your face at the sight of the sunset. How you trusted him. 

The dread that ran through you when he led you into the back of that gas station. The look on your face when he told you he enjoyed it. How he felt you staring at him once he drove off. 

It was better this way. That’s what Rafe told himself every single waking second. Because he could not stop thinking of you every single waking second. He needed to rob this last bank and leave town. He could never see you again. Rafe knew if he did, he wouldn’t be able to hold himself back this time. Wouldn’t be able to stop himself from dragging you into the nearest empty space and fucking you until all you could blabber out was his name. He wanted to take up every fucking thought in your mind. Wanted to make you his forever. 

Hell, he was contemplating it now. Driving to your house and scaling up to your bedroom window. How he’d just watch you sleeping for a second. Admire how peaceful you looked. Then he’d climb in and toss you over his shoulder. If you stirred or woke up, he’d make sure you couldn’t scream. 

He’d take such good care of you in his own twisted way. Maybe you’d fight him at first, but eventually you’d understand, right? Rafe was so much better than any other man your parents could ever find for you. No. He’d never let another man have you. If he couldn’t have you, then no one could. He’d hunt down every single one and would find pleasure in their suffering. They shouldn’t have touched you.

Fuck, he was hard just from the thought of thinking about you. No one else ever had this effect on him. But that was the thing. You weren’t just anyone else. You’d become the focal point of his mind. The one thing he craved to have under him. You were the prey he wanted to capture.

Rafe glanced at the clock on the wall. 11:27pm. He had time. Just one more time. That’s what he told himself. One more high before he committed one last crime and left this town forever. Before he left you behind forever. 

Rafe unbuttoned his jeans roughly, pulling down his boxers in a hurry. This was better than the alternative. If he couldn’t have you, then at least he had the thoughts of you. Those belonged to him. Just like you would too- Stop.

He groaned slightly as his dick sprang up against his stomach, now free and painfully hard. “Shit…” Rafe muttered, slowly starting to stroke up and down his shaft as he let the thoughts come to him. He could almost imagine if you were here instead. If it were your soft touch jerking him off instead. How it would feel to have your hand wrapped around his cock. The thought spurred him on. 

Rafe’s motions sped up as he envisioned how nervous you’d be, hand trembling while trying to please him, your movements careful, unlike his. There would be no way you’d seen a man up close. And how glad Rafe would be as the first one to corrupt your innocence. 

“That’s it… go faster…” he’d growl, savouring your every stroke.

You’d do exactly as he said, of course, your eyes taking in everything. “L-like this?” you’d whisper, uncertain. 

“Fuck yes, sweetheart. Just like that. Doing so good for me.” 

Rafe can just imagine how you’d melt under his little praises. How your face would light up a little. How you’d bite your lip, brows furrowed in concentration. God, the look on your face when he came all over your hand-

The thought is what sends him over the edge now. “Fuck,” Rafe groans as he releases into his own hand, thick spurts of his cum staining the sheets. He sighs, cleaning himself up quickly before stuffing his duffel bag with the tools he got from the gas station last time. The same tools that made you see him for what he is. 

He knew what a sick fuck he was for getting off at the thought of you, especially now that you despised him. Rafe didn’t exactly care. He had nothing else left to lose now after he’d already lost any shot he had with you. There was never a chance to begin with. 

Rafe is a criminal. He’d make you remember it. Remember him one last time. Before he was out of your life forever. He shoved the gnawing feeling that came with the thought, pulling on his mask. He needed this high.

The town was flooded with sirens and police cars the next morning. Just like it always was after a robbery. Especially one at the biggest bank in the area. You stirred awake at the shrilling echoes, groaning softly. Your body ached from sleeping on the hard tiled floor, muscles sore. It’s okay. Only a few more nights until you were granted the comfort of your bed again. Just a few more days of this “penance”. 

The morning light was faint, falling in strips across the walls and over the scattered scriptures. There was no way to tell time here, but assuming you hadn’t been served breakfast yet, you assumed it was around 7am. You winced as you sat up, the dull throb in your head shifting to a dizzying feeling. Why wasn’t the ringing stopping? You rubbed your eyes desperately, pinching the bridge of your nose. The last few days hadn’t been ideal, but you’d never woken up like this. 

The sound was muffled. Distant. You focused on the rhythm, hoping that would make it go away. It almost sounded like… sirens? Why were sirens this early in the morning? The station shouldn’t even be open. You couldn’t figure out why you cared that much about them, but your mind refused to stay in one place. Why aren’t they stopping? Why- No… There was no way. He must have already left town after dropping you off that day. But then why did he get those tools from the back of the gas station? 

You dropped your head into your hands, squeezing your eyes shut. Whether to focus or shut out the thoughts? You couldn’t tell. The memories from then came crawling back, gripping onto the edges of your mind.

“Why do you do this?” You’d asked, so naive.

“Do what?” His voice was so… detached. 

“Rob banks. Commit crimes. Live a life on the run.” You’d wished he would tell you a good reason. “Don’t you want something… more?”

“This is who I am, sweetheart. I told you before. You hadn’t seen the worst yet.” 

“No,” you whimpered, trying to tether yourself to reality. Trying to escape the thoughts that lingered in your mind. His voice didn’t leave.

“This is what I do. I am selfish and corrupt, and that will not change.”

Stop thinking about him. There was no way. Those sirens could be for anyone. There were more criminals in town than just him. Your hands fisted in the thin fabric of your dress. What if they were looking for him? You almost laughed at yourself. Of course they’re looking for him. They’ve been looking for him for the past month. Even if he committed some crime and those sirens were for him, this had happened before. And everything had been fine.

You took a deep breath, trying to convince yourself that. He was fine, right? He was okay? You groaned, this time in frustration. Why did you care? He didn’t care about you. He’d told you that himself. 

"What, you really thought I was a good guy, huh, princess?” Rafe’s words came back to you again. “I told you what I am, and now you can fucking see it, can’t you?"

“S-stop,” you whispered brokenly, begging him. Like Rafe was here now and had some form of control over this. He had control over you. That’s why he wouldn’t leave, right? He wanted to make you suffer- What if they caught him? Is that why the sirens are louder this time? Why there is so much commotion outside? 

Why did it matter? Rafe was a criminal. He should be caught. He’d robbed banks. He’d done terrible things- You’d never see him again. It was not like you’d had much of a chance before, but now he’d be locked up for life. But he was supposed to come save you. Take you away from all this. You were his. 

“No!” you gasped, coming to from the grasp of the conflicting voices in your mind. Your mother was standing there. The door was open. Why was she standing there? She was supposed to give you meals through the slot in the door, but… she isn’t holding a meal.

Your mind was overcome with more thoughts, your head pounding harder. Had it been seven days already? Has your mind truly been so polluted that you couldn’t keep track of the days anymore? You’d barely read any of the scriptures. Your father was going to be furious-

“Hurry up. Do not make me repeat myself.” Your mother’s voice was harsher than usual. Did she say something? You could’ve sworn you didn’t hear. The sirens were still screaming outside. You tilted your head, a little confused about what she wanted. 

“Mama-” you started, but she cut you off with a sigh.

“Your father wants to see you,” she repeated. “Fix yourself.”

With that, she turned and walked down the hall. You watched her fading figure, attempting to straighten up. Your hands clung to the wall for support as you slowly stood, one of the few times in the past three days. Had it even been three days or seven? You had so many questions but didn’t want to risk upsetting your parents more. 

Your legs ached with every step as you shuffled down the hall towards your father’s study. He was sitting there, face stern as always, Bible in hand. You suddenly felt self-conscious as his gaze landed on you. You brushed your hands through your hair and over your dress in a weak attempt to make yourself a little more presentable, but it was obvious. You were a mess. 

“Sit,” your father commanded, voice chilling. 

You did as he told, taking a seat in the chair opposite him, your hands arranging themselves in your lap. Maybe he was feeling generous. Maybe he believed you’d been cleansed within three days. Maybe-

“Tell me what you know,” he asked firmly, eyes trained on you. 

“W-what?” you stuttered out under his gaze, not sure what to make of that question.

“You are seeing him.” There was not a hint of doubt in his voice.

Your blood ran cold. There was no way. Your father couldn’t know. How would he know? “S-seing w-who, sir?” you whispered, trying to stay calm. Your breathing was already shaky. 

“You think I don’t know?” he chuckled, the sound wrong. You’d learn over the years to keep silent. To show nothing. Let your father tell you rather than assume. But the thought of him knowing about Rafe made your stomach churn. You managed to stay silent, looking down at your lap.

Your father sighed as if you were being difficult. “Another bank has been broken into as of this morning.” No, no, no… It was Rafe. You tried to keep your expression neutral as he took a sip of his usual morning coffee before continuing, “The Dunwich one. The police say over ten thousand dollars were taken. Largest sum of any of the recent robberies.”

Your breath hitched. That was the biggest bank in town. Every police station within a radius of ten miles will be looking for Rafe. There would be a bounty on his head. A target on his back. You couldn’t stop a shaky gasp from escaping you as the dark thoughts clung to you. Again. No… You couldn’t do this now. Not in front of your father- What if they found him? He’d be shot dead. 

Rafe could be dead at any moment. What if he already was- 

Your father’s cold tone pulled you back to the present. “Do you understand now? He is a wanted man. You will tell me everything now.”

You bit your lip, understanding now what your father wanted. He wanted information about Rafe. Enough for the police to recognise him. Find him. Arrest him or worse. All so, your father could once again get the recognition and praise he so desperately craves. 

“I do not know anything about him, father. I’m- I’m sure he is a terrible man.” The lies felt bitter slipping from your lips. He was a terrible man. You were the preacher’s daughter. Why were you protecting him? You were supposed to be the town’s good girl. Helping your father. Helping the authorities. But you couldn’t. Rafe was going to save you from here, right? You couldn’t turn him in. How were you meant to keep your mind occupied with thoughts of him, knowing you were the reason he was arrested? Or dead. 

Oh God. Why was your mind wandering to such dark places? Maybe you deserved to be in “cleansing”. Your mind had clearly succumbed to the dark side, and you needed to break free into the bounds of holiness again-

“Look at you. Lying to me now,” your father’s jaw clenched as he stood, towering over you now. “He’s corrupted your mind, but I will make you pure again. Tell me about him. Now.” Your father demanded this time, his patience wearing thin. 

You looked up at him, inhaling another shaky breath. You couldn’t. How could you forgo the best escape you had? “Father, I don’t-”

Your head snapped to the side as your father’s hand cracked against your cheek. The slap pulled out a gasp from you, your skin stinging under his palm. “You pathetic little bitch-” he growled. You winced as his hand landed again. Harder this time. Silent tears were streaming down your cheeks now, but you knew better than to resist. Than to fight. 

Your father stopped then, as if waiting for you to speak. What were you even meant to say? You barely knew anything about Rafe. He’d existed in your mind longer than you’d ever spoken with him in person. You had no clue as to how he committed his crimes, where he stayed, or where he was now? All you knew really was his name. 

You thought about telling your father. Rafe. How would he say it? With disdain? With anger? How would the police say it? The town?

But his name was yours. It was the only thing you really had from him. You weren’t ready to share that with everyone. You couldn’t. It was yours.

You met your father’s gaze, lips sealed, bracing for more punishment. A caning? More time in that room? Forced to read scriptures to purify your mind? Instead, your father just stood there, assessing you. “You think I’m harsh, hm? Think you’re so tough?” Your father laughed, the sound mocking. “You will talk. The police will come. They’re already making rounds.”

His hand fisted in the knots of your hair, tilting your face up towards him. “And they won’t stop until they have an answer out of your wretched little mouth.” He held you there for a second, his eyes boring into yours before he dropped you back in the chair. “Lock her in her room,” he ordered your mother before storming out. You let out a sob once he left, taking in a desperate gasp of air. Where was he? Was he okay? You knew it was wrong, but you prayed desperately to God. Your fingers held tight to the necklace you wore. It matched your mother's with a similar smaller cross. You hoped he was safe.

He needed to leave. Needed to get out of town right now. Before it was too late. That was the only thing on Rafe’s mind as he sped down the empty road on his bike, the sun starting to set. He’d only taken what was necessary right now, knowing how to play this game with all his experience. The money was well hidden, and he would return for it later, once the heat had died down. It was too risky to smuggle it out now.

Rafe could see the town border in the distance. No police yet. Perfect. He should be content. Happy even. The heist had gone as well as it could and what he considered successful. He was ten thousand dollars richer. He was about to leave without any problems. Then why did he feel a pit in his stomach? 

Fucking hell. Of course, you were still lingering in his mind. He couldn’t even deny it. All he could see yesterday night while breaking open that vault was the look you’d have on your face if you saw him committing these crimes. The rush he got from that was more than he’d ever gotten from breaking into any bank. He could picture the fear in your eyes. Your shaky breaths. The way your hands would be playing with the hem of your shirt. 

Rafe scoffed. Of course, his subconscious had your typical mannerisms memorised. It didn’t matter now. He was going to leave. Come back a few months later for the money. He couldn’t see you then. Couldn’t risk it. The police would’ve surely gathered more than enough information about him within that time to have a rough idea of his demeanour. Rafe had been careful at covering his tracks, but one camera unaccounted for or one pair of strayed eyes and he’d be fucking compromised. 

Rafe almost didn’t notice as he reached the border, far too caught up in unimportant thoughts. It finally occurred to him then. He’d never see you again. Or perhaps if he, by chance, caught a glimpse, you would’ve moved on. It was better that way. That’s what he told you last time. To not wait for him. 

“Won’t be waiting for me now, will you, sweetheart?” Rafe’s tone had been cold. “Don’t.” He’d answered his own question, it being the last thing he said to you.

Rafe should be glad you were moving on. If not for your sake than for his. If he didn’t cross your mind, it was safer. Less of a liability. Then the images came. Rafe skidded the bike to a stop even though there was no one there. His jaw clenched as he pictured you. With a husband. Your father was certainly already eager to marry you off. Rafe knew men like him well. He imagined you, holding the arm of your newlywed husband, looking like the perfect wife. Smiling beside him. Laughing at his stupid jokes. You belonging to some other fucking man. 

He didn’t understand why he gave a shit. It wasn’t like you ever belonged to him. There was never anything between you two. So why couldn’t he go over the border? Rafe needed to go soon. But he just couldn’t. His body wasn’t cooperating. 

Just one last time. He took a deep breath, trying to steel himself. Rafe just needed to see you one last time. Needed to take in the high that came with it. That’s it. It wasn’t because he needed you. He just… needed the rush. At least that’s what Rafe told himself as he revved the engine and took a turn, speeding down the highway. In the other direction this time. Towards your house. Just once more before he left.

You were trapped. This time in your room. Your father had come back to drag you upstairs, tossing you past the threshold before looking at the door. It had been just around an hour, the sun beginning to dip past the horizon. You stared out the window, partly terrified, as you watched the police make their way down the street, officers knocking meticulously at each and every house. Taking their time to talk to every resident. This investigation was bigger than you’d anticipated. 

“Better to tell them the truth when they come.” Your mother’s voice, calm and steady, reached you. 

You turned to find her standing there. She looked as she always did, wearing a pale blue dress with white lace trims, hair pulled back in a neat bun. Put together despite everything that had gone on in the past few days. As if she didn’t have a care in the slightest about you, her daughter. 

“Mama, I didn’t lie,” you whispered quietly, not meeting her eyes.

It was clear she didn’t believe you either. “Whatever it is you know, confess it. If not to me, then to the police. Perhaps Christ will have mercy and forgive you.” 

You could see in your peripheral vision as she took a step closer. “I don’t know anything,” you breathed.

The next thing you felt was your mother’s icy hand tilting your chin up. “I did not raise you like this. You shall not behave like this.” She never sounded upset. Always just disappointed. “Your father was right. Once this is all over, you are in need of a proper cleansing. To rid your mind of whatever darkness it has congregated.”

With that, she spun on her heel and left, locking your door once again. No. You couldn’t go through that again. Three days had been grueling enough, but the thought of going through it again for a longer period was suffocating. You wouldn’t survive it this time. 

Your heart lept into your throat as you heard the voices of the police. Only one house down now. You needed to go. Escape. But the door was locked. You spun towards the voices again, eyes landing on the window. Your mind ran through every question. Every possibility. All at once. 

You could climb down, right? But where would you go even if you made it out? Maybe you could run away. Oh god. Your mother was right. You had lost your mind to these dark notions. You should just tell the police whatever you can. Purify yourself again through the cleansing.

What if you went to see Rafe? The idea jumped out at you for a second before you laughed at the absurdity of the thought. You had no clue where he was. The search was still going, so he was still free, but Rafe had almost certainly left town by now. He could be anywhere. Doing anything. Without you. He didn’t care about you. Why was that so hard for you to accept?

You layed back on your bed as the thoughts came. Hope. What if you somehow saw Rafe? Then everything would be fine, right? If you saw him, got some final closure that he never cared and that you both could never be together, maybe your mind would finally accept it. You’d believe it if it came from his lips. You’d get to see Rafe one last time, memorise every inch of him before he was gone. Then thoughts of him wouldn’t linger in your mind anymore. 

You imagined the better half of that scenario, something that was surely a daydream, but after the amount of sinful thoughts you’d had, you could let yourself indulge in a few more before the cleansing. 

Rafe deciding to take you with him. What if you could convince him? That you’d let him do whatever he wanted if he just saved you. That you’d do whatever he said. Rafe would agree, right? If you promised you’d be good, he’d agree. And he’d take you on the back of his bike to somewhere far away-

The light from the oranging sun came into focus again. You were running out of time to decide. The police would be here any moment, and it would be dark soon. In the high chance this didn’t work, you still had to come back. Even the thought of your father’s future wrath was painstaking. But if you didn’t go, you’d regret it. You knew that. Being trapped in your coordinated life, knowing you didn’t even try, was worse. What was he doing to you? You’d never think like this a week ago.

You stood, legs shaky, as you went to open your window as quietly as possible, trying to map out your course of action. There was a patch of grass below just before the hard concrete of the road and driveway. If you managed to somehow land on that you’d make it with some scapes at worst. Just as you were about to take a step onto the roof, the chilly air hit you like a wave. You turned back to your closet, opening it to look for something warm. That’s when your fingers brushed against it. 

Rafe’s leather jacket. The one he gave you after the night of the bar fight. You’d kept it neatly folded behind a box of scriptures. Back when you were still “pure”. Before you could think too much about it, you pulled it on over your dress. If you did see Rafe, you guessed you should return it. After all, it was his. God, it still smelled like him. Like cigarettes and his cheap whiskey.

You lost track of time once the sun set, barely a few minutes later, and the world plummeted into darkness. You’d managed to scale down the house and leave the neighbourhood without being seen. Your parents were most definitely aware of your absence by now. Maybe they were talking to the police right now. 

You whimpered, trying to slow down your running mind and focus on your shaky steps instead. The pounding had come back and the ache in your legs was worse than before. The lack of food and sleep was certainly getting to you, your vision blurring occasionally. Everything hurt. 

There wasn’t much ahead of you except a dark, empty road, tall grass surrounding its edges. It almost looked like the road where Rafe had taken you on that ride. You remembered every second. How it felt to be pressed against him. The wind in your hair. The golden sun sinking.

You tried to shun the memories that came after as another gust of wind blew, causing you to hug Rafe’s jacket tighter around you. You didn’t even know where you were or what you were doing. All you knew was you couldn’t keep walking for much longer. Exhausted was the only way to describe your state right now. Like there were chains holding you down, shackling you to the ground. Everything was heavy. 

You almost lost your balance on the next step, but managed to keep yourself upright. You had to keep going. You would find Rafe. You had to. He would come for you, right? He’d save you. 

“Fucking great,” Rafe muttered as he continued speeding down the road, his headlights cutting through the dark. He could see a figure in the distance. It was probably some hitchhiker, desperate to get a ride. The Rafe noticed their stride, as if every step was painful. 

Why the fuck did he care? He had one goal, and that was to see you then disappear- Rafe couldn’t help as his eyes zeroed in on the unmistakable white dress. He laughed to himself. There was no fucking way. How could you even-

Rafe braked hard, pulling the bike over as he realised he wasn’t seeing things. It really was you. Walking down the edge of the highway. 

You winced as his headlights landed on you, bathing you in white. You blinked, tilted your head slightly. You had to be dreaming. Or dead. You watched as a figure got off the bike, walking closer. Your lips curled up in a smile. This had to be heaven. There was no other way. 

“Rafe,” you beamed softly as you stumbled towards him, sure this was a hallucination. 

“What the fuck are you doing out here?” Rafe growled, eyes filled with a mix of confusion, anger, and pure possessiveness as he ripped off his helmet. His chest tightened at that pure, innocent smile of yours. 

“You’re here…” you whispered, smile not fading.

Something was wrong. Rafe could feel it. This wasn’t like you. “Do you have any idea how dangerous it is to-” Rafe didn’t get a chance to finish.

Everything went black. The last thing you felt was Rafe’s arms around you, your face pressed against the fabric of his shirt. 

Rafe lunged forward, just managing to catch you in his arms, pulling you instinctively against him. What the fuck was happening? He shook you slightly, trying to wake you up. “Get up,” he muttered as if he thought this was just a ruse. When you didn’t move, one of his hands flew to your wrist. You still had a pulse. A wave of relief flooded him. 

“Sweetheart? Wake up. Can you hear me?” Rafe called cautiously. “Wake up, damnit!” he cursed, his frustration building up.

You were wearing his jacket. The one he gave you weeks ago. You still had it. Unfamiliar warmth flooded Rafe’s body. You didn’t hate him. Still. Even after the incident at the gas station… You didn’t hate him. He couldn’t understand why. 

The feeling disappeared in a heartbeat as he noticed the bruise on your cheek, now dark and slightly swollen. Your fucking father. He’d hurt you. Rafe’s jaw clenched, rage flooding him as he remembered he’d sworn to kill him. When he saw him lay a hand on you. Rafe had been so caught up in the high he’d almost forgotten. Never again. 

Rafe was going to kill that son of a bitch if it was the last thing he’d do. He hurt what was his. And now Rafe would make him suffer. He slowly brushed back the hair that had fallen over your face with his free hand. He knew he couldn’t leave town now. Not yet. He couldn’t leave you like this. 

“You’re coming with me, princess,” Rafe murmured before lifting you up, one hand on your back, the other under your knees. He considered walking to his place for a second, but that would take too long. Using the bike would be difficult but not impossible. 

Rafe managed to get on after a minute, settling you sideways across the front of his Harley, your legs hanging over one side. He started the engine before wrapping an arm around your waist for support. Hopefully, he could drive well enough with one hand. 

“Hold on tight, sweetheart,” he purred, as if you were still awake. Rafe kicked up the stand before starting down the highway. He’d keep you safe. You were his now.

a/n: its finally hereeeeee!!!!! 🥳 im sorry this actually took so long lol but i hope you guys like it. we see a LOTT of reader's and rafe's thoughts in this one and i enjoyed writing both of their mental breakdowns and obsessions lol 🤭 anyways i love this series so much and as always tysm for all your support and im so excited to keep adding more little pieces to this little universe 💕 always feel free to send in requests and please please please scream and rant to me about this series ✨ i love seeing all your thoughts and my inbox is always open! ‎ꫂ᭪݁

taglist: @rafesgreasycurtainbangs , @rafecameronarchive , @misschillyy , @rafeysfawn , @fleintur , @st4rg1rl2222 @starbuckslover213-blog , @wildflowerwildfire1201 , @isastarset , @cameronsdior , @bonjourjiminie , @shewants7 , @rafessweetheart87 , @flowersarcute , @aceluck , @bookishbelle2312

dividers: @chrisssiren

♡ masterlist ♡

[angelicstarkey]

I love EYS so much!! 🥹 I really liked your other works too, but this one has me completely hooked. Your writing is incredible 💗 This story has me checking for updates every chance I get 😭 Do you have an estimate for when the next chapter will be out? No rush at all. I'm happy to wait! I'm so invested in these two and can't wait to see where their story goes!!

omg wait naur im blushing 🥹🥹🥹 I’m so glad you are enjoying eys as much as i love writing about those two!

chapters come out every monday around 6:30 pm EST so hopefully you can expect to see it then! muah!

[angelicstarkey]

i absolutely loved the new chapter of EYS! just wondering how many chapters you're planning to do? 🤍

( ⸝⸝´ ᵕ `⸝⸝) ahhh thank you!!! i’m aiming for seven, however, seeing how long they’re progressively getting, I’ll prob have to split them but we’ll see!

long story short: seven+ chapters

[angelicstarkey]

What chapter do you think the smut will be for EYS? 👀

in a chapter that’s sooner than you think

[angelicstarkey]

omg hii, i love your theme, it’s so mermaid aesthetic, and i absolutely love your writing it’s so good, you seem so nice, and i would love to be moots 💘💘

omg first moot request kinda nervous rn

ofc we can!! 🫂:D

[angelicstarkey]

yall im not kidding when i say i woke up and initially thought i was in outer banks, then thought an apocalypse happened when i looked outside to see a hazy yellow sky

[angelicstarkey]

DOESSS RAFE AND READER HAVE SEX IN EYS???

now it wouldn’t be from the desk of angelicstarkey if there wasn’t smut in it

[angelicstarkey]

I looove enjoy your stay 💞💞 you're so talented!! 🤩 btw, have you watched the movie QUEER with Drew and Daniel ?

i love you!!!! soso glad you’re enjoying eys 🥹 yes i have!!! how can one not want to see a thumb in drew starkey’s mouth

[angelicstarkey]

https://www.tumblr.com/angelicstarkey/822224728647499776/the-way-part-3-was-so-good-im-chomping-at-the-bit

THIS WAS ME HI

No I’m loving how fun and light it is sometimes I’m actually all good on trauma and violence ALL GOOD

HI wait okay slay im so glad jumping for joy rn

but i totally agree like yes, beat em up rafe but also let’s give those knuckles a break….

[angelicstarkey]

Who do I have to kill around here to get more roommate rafe? Just say the words and I'm on it‼️no but for real I love them, roommate reader is better than me though cause if we're not fucking I gotta avoid you like the plague, you're NOT about to play with me calling me in club on some freak shit and then ending the call talking about some "I'll see you later roommate" KYS (not you✋🏽😬✋🏽 just to be clear not you love u) IM NOT THE ONE! DONT PLAY😒. I appreciate your work on here you always deliver, thank you :) (also I was listening to blur by bella kay while reading and the vibe was unmatched, I mean chefs kiss)

so there’s this person i have a restraining order against if you’re interested IM KIDDING (i do have a restraining order against someone though lol)

roommate!reader just doesn’t wanna ruin the friendship yk? (roommate-ship?) but i agree STAND TF UP BC YOU CALL ME ON THE CELLULAR DEVICE THAT I PAID FOR ON THE PHONE PLAN THAT I PAID FOR AND PULL SOME SHIT LIKE THAT?!!?? boy bye

roommate!Rafe will return in avengers: doomsday

thank YOU for reading my work ohmygod this made my day 🥹

[angelicstarkey]

The way part 3 was so good im chomping at the bit for part 4

AHHH THANK YOU 🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂 this means so much to me im acc blushing bc i did NAWT think it was going to be good (completely off topic but the writing style in this fandom is so diff and serious WHICH IS MORE THAN OKAY I DONT HATE IT NOR ANYONE im ranting but the imposter syndrome is so real) (sorry for trauma dumping)

with the way chap 4 is playing out, im excited for you all to read it 🥹🥹

[angelicstarkey]

hii angel, how are you? ;)

i wanted to say that i am LOVING Enjoy Your Stay! you are very talented and it inspired me these past few days, what advice would you give to someone who wants to start publishing their stories here?

hihi bae!!

🥹🥹 so so overwhelmingly happy that you’re enjoying it! and the fact that it inspired you to start releasing your work means the world to me!!

as for advice:

don’t overthink about what you’re writing and what others will think. i think it helps to remind yourself that you’re doing it bc you’re passionate about it and you’re doing it for yourself!

it is really easy to be upset if your stories aren’t getting a lot of notes/traction at first because ultimately, as humans, we thrive off of validation which is fine!! but again, don’t let it discourage you at all.

if you have a specific scene in mind that you’re excited to write but can’t write the story leading up to it, just write it!!! it’ll be easier to get it out and you’ll be in the flow of writing so then it’s easier to write the parts leading up to it.

if you need inspo, a simple google/reddit search will have a ton of prompt generators which i love to use bc you can just spin off of those ideas

this is completely optional, but find a post format that works for you!! but tbh the more simple and to the point it is, i feel like it’ll be easier for your understand the gist of your piece and capture their attention. maybe im just old but sometimes i feel like i need to know what im signing up for before im reading something

don’t force yourself to write if you can’t bring yourself to, but also just try to get something on a page, even if it’s 100 words so that you’re in the flow

i just realized idk how applicable this is to your question IM SORRY but i hope this helps!! muahmuahmuah

[angelicstarkey]

I absolutely love the Enjoy Your Stay series! It’s so good!!

muah you are so sweet, im so glad you’re enjoying it!! thank you 🥹🥹🥹

[angelicstarkey]

you might be my new favorite person because your writing is AMAZING and i’ve read every single thing you’ve ever written and you like malcolm todd and drew starkey (my husbands!!) you don’t know it but we are the same person and i love you!! :)

twin where have you been all this time? what’s your fave off the new album?

also, every single thing? girl i love YOU more wtf you have no idea how much i appreciate that :’)