"So, I'm patient, you're learning, pretend it's not hurting" - Olivia Rodrigo
synopsis: loving Sophia was never the hard part.
The hard part was learning how to beg for love without making it sound like begging.
pairing: sophia laforteza x fem!reader
genre: angst
A/N: olivia better not release that album for my sake please, also somehow, every sophia fic i ever wrote are angst (the others are unreleased hehe), prolly last post for a while ahsdwansjdw, can u tell i got lazy to edit the banner
sophia loved you in ways people could see.
people saw the matching rings before they noticed the dark circles under your eyes. they saw the blurry airport photos where her hand rested carefully against your back, saw the way she smiled when your name appeared on her phone during lives, saw enough sweetness to call the two of you perfect.
and maybe you believed them at first.
maybe that's why you keep saying it was okay.
because sophia was busy. because being an idol meant exhaustion stitched into every part of her life. because loving someone like her required patience, and you had always been good at waiting.
you waited through canceled dates and unanswered texts. through nights where she promised to call before falling asleep halfway through rehearsals instead. through dinners gone cold on your kitchen table and conversations that ended with a tired laughter and a quiet, "can we talk tomorrow?"
you always answered the same way.
and the terrifying thing was that you meant it.
at least in the beginning.
because love makes excuses before it makes boundaries. because it was easier to swallow loneliness than risk becoming another burden on sophia's already heavy shoulders. because every time she finally held you again, every time she buried her face into your neck and whispered how much she missed you, the hurt shrank just enough for you to ignore it until you couldn't.
so you learned how to survive on pieces of her.
five-minute phone calls between schedules.
half-written good morning texts.
her fingers intertwined with yours underneath tables before staff called her away again.
you held her every fragment carefully, gratefully, as though wanting more would make you selfish.
and slowly, quietly, you began turning yourself into someone easier to love.
someone smaller, quieter, and easier to leave waiting.
your friends noticed first.
noticed how your phone stayed clutched in your hand even during conversations. how you smiled a second too late whenever sophia's name was mentioned. how exhaustion dragged itself across your face no matter how much makeup covered it.
but whenever someone asked if you were okay, you laughed softly and nodded.
it became muscle memory after a while.
so convincing that even sophia believed it too.
by the time your body started giving up on you, you had already mastered pretending otherwise.
it started with headaches.
then the kind of exhaustion that sat heavy in your bones no matter how long you rested. your friends told you that you look pale more often now. one of them even pressed the back of their hand against your forehead once, brows furrowing immediately.
i'm not okay. you wanted to say.
but instead, you just laughed.
the answer came too naturally these days.
and maybe you should have been scared by how easily the words left your mouth. maybe you should have noticed how your hands trembled slightly whenever you reached for your phone, or how standing too quickly made the room tilt dangerously for a second.
the more scary thing is that you noticed. you fucking noticed everything that's happening to you and yet you ignored them.
because there were more important things to think about.
like whether sophia had eaten.
like whether she'd remember to call tonight.
like whether asking for attention counted as selfish when she was already carrying the weight of the would on her shoulders.
so instead, you stayed quiet.
you should've fucking talked.
that night, the apartment felt unsually cold.
you sat curled against the corner of your couch with a blanket wrapped tightly around yourself, staring blankly at your phone screen while nausea twisted uncomfortably in your stomach. your head hurts. everything hurt, actually. especially your heart, but you kept convincing yourself it would pass if you ignored it long enough.
sophia hadn't replied in hours.
you knew she was busy. of course she was. schedules, rehearsals, interviews, there was always something demanding pieces of her time before you ever could.
still, your fingers hovered above your keyboard.
delivered. not sent, but delivered.
you swallowed hard and tried again minutes later.
you stared at the message after sending it, suddenly embarrassed by your own honesty.
i told you, it'll be better if you keep everything to yourself.
the typing bar remained painfully empty.
you checked the time then her last active status 5min ago.
then you checked your own reflection faintly mirrored against the dark screen, you look exhausted. you barely recognize yourself.
a part of you considered texting your friends instead.
your thumb hovered over their contact names for a long while.
you imagined the concern in their voices immediately. the questions. the worry. the way they'd probably rush over without hesitation if you admitted things had gotten this bad.
and somehow that thought made guilt settle heavily in your chest.
you were tired of becoming something people had to worry about.
so you locked your phone instead.
"it's okay," you whispered to nobody at all.
the words sounded weaker than usual tonight, more vulnerable, more hurt.
the apartment spun the moment you tried standing.
your hands caught the edge of the counter clumsily, breathing uneven as dizziness crashed over you hard enough to make your knees buckle slightly. for a terrifying second, black swallowed the corners of your vision.
the thought appeared quietly.
you ignored it just as quietly.
instead, you reached for your phone again.
soph, can you call me when you're free?
YOU'RE SO FUCKING PATHETIC.
another message delivered into silence.
and because loving sophia had long since become instinct before reason, your first reaction wasn't hurt.
don't make this harder for her.
you repeated the same excuses carefully inside your head like prayers, even as your body struggled to remain upright.
even as loneliness settled beside you so naturally it almost felt familiar now.
loneliness, my good old friend.
you woke up sometime past noon with your head pounding hard enough to make your wince the moment your eyes opened.
for a few seconds, you couldn't remember how you ended up on the floor. then the ache in your limbs settled in all at once.
the dizziness, the nausea and the unbearable heaviness dragging through your body like a wet cement.
you inhaled slowly, staring blankly at the ceiling while your phone buzzed weakly beside you.
a small, stupid part of you reacted immediately.
hope was a humiliating thing.
you reached for you phone with shaking hands, exhaustion still clinging tightly to every movement. the brightness burned against your eyes as notifications flooded the screen.
three. just three messages. all from sophia.
baby i just saw your texts:(
are you okay???
call me when you can okay? im worried.
you stared at them far longer than necessary.
and despite everything. despite the unanswered messages from last night, despite waking up alone on the cold floor of your apartment, despite how badly your body hurt.
your heart still softened instantly.
but does hers do that too?
that was the pathetic part.
not the exhaustion, not the loneliness.
the hope. the way concern from sophia still felt enough to make you forget yourself for a moment.
a breathless laugh escaped you before you could stop it. quiet, weak, and almost embarrassed.
because really, what had become of you? three texts, that was all it took.
three worried fucking messages and suddenly your chest ached with relief so overwhelming it nearly made you emotional. as if this wasn't normal. as if affection shouldn't come in such painfully small portions that you learned to treasure every drop.
your thumb hovered over the keyboard. you wanted to tell her the truth, that you'd passed out, that your body still felt unbearably heavy, that you were scared by how exhausted you'd become lately, that sometimes the loneliness hurt so badly you physically felt it settling beneath your ribs.
the lie came easier these days.
sophia replied almost immediately this time.
thank god:(
you scared me
you stared at the words quietly.
the narrator in your head almost wanted to laugh. because wasn't that ironic?
sophia only noticed something was wrong once your body physically gave out. not when you stopped talking as much, not when your smile became visibly exhausted, NOT when silence started replacing entire parts of you.
and the worst part was that even realizing this didn't stop you from craving her attention anyway.
your phone rang suddenly, sophia's contact photo lit up across the screen. for a moment, your chest tightened with something dangerously close to happiness.
you answered immediately.
"hey," sophia's voice came softly through the speaker, thick with exhaustion. "jesus, baby, you scared me last night."
your throat tightened unexpectedly. because there it was again, love. real love. you could hear it clearly in her voice, which somehow made everything hurt even worse.
i feel sorry for this story.
"i'm sorry," you whispered automatically.
sophia sighed gently. "don't apologize for being sick."
you almost told her then. ALMOST.
about the sleepless nights, the crying you'd started doing quietly into pillows so nobody would hear, the way you constantly felt like you were standing outside her life instead of inside it.
but sophia sounded tried.
and loving her had taught you long ago to swallow your feelings before they became inconvenient. so instead, you smiled weakly to yourself and said the words that had become second nature.
after the call, things became softer for a while. not better. you wish. just softer.
sophia texted more frequently over the next few days. small things in between schedules. pictures of half-finished meals. voice messages filled with tired laughted. quick reminderes to eat, to rest, to take your medicine properly this time.
and because you were you, because your heart had always been embarrassingly willing to survive on scraps, you let yourself believe maybe things were changing.
maybe sophia finally noticed, maybe passing out had scared her enough to start paying attention.
hope returned quietly, dangerously.
you started sleeping with your phone closer again, started checking notifications the moment you woke up. started smiling at your screen like someone hadn't spent months teaching themselves not to expect too much.
your friends noticed that too.
"you seem happier lately," one of them commented carefully while sitting beside you during lunch.
you blinked. did you? maybe.
sophia had called three nights in a row now.
the conversations were short, usually interrupted by staff members or exhaustion, but they happened. and somehow that alone felt enough to breathe life back into parts of yourself you thought had already gone numb.
so you nodded softly. "things are okay now.
the lie sounded gentler this time. almost believable.
but healing built on temporary attention is fragile thing. and fragile things break easily.
it happened again slowly, a missed call here, an unread message there, schedules getting busier, replies arriving hours later instead of minutes.
you told yourself not to overthink it, sophia was tired, sophia was stressed, sophia loved you.
that last thought lingered longer than usual now.
because love shouldn't feel this lonely.
the realization settled into you quietly one evening while sitting across from sophia in her apartment.
she was talking. or rather, talking at you.
something about rehearsals, about pressure, about upcoming appearances and lack of sleep and how overwhelmed she'd been lately.
you listened carefully, nodding in all the right places. sophia never noticed you hadn't spoken in nearly twenty minutes. your untouched drink sat forgotten beside your hand while exhaustion pulled heavily beneath your skin again.
you felt awful today, weak in that familiar, concerning way that made your body feel too heavy for your bones.
because being wanted, even briefly, still felt enough to make you ignore yourself.
and most importantly, because you must.
then sophia's phone buzzed. immediately, her attention disappeared. not intentionally.
that was always the worse part.
she glanced down quickly, typing a response while still half-listening to the conversation she'd been having moments ago. her brows furrowed slightly at whatever appeared on screen.
you watched quietly, and suddenly, painfully, you understood something.
you had become too easy. too understanding. too patient. sophia no longer noticed your silence because you had taught her silence meant everything was fine.
sophia finally looked up. "did you hear me?"
you stared at her for a second too long before smiling softly, "sorry." you murmured. "i'm just tired."
concern flashed across her face immediately. instantly.
"there you go again," she sighed gently. "are you taking care of yourself properly?"
the question nearly shattered something inside you. because wasn't that funny? sophia asking whether you were taking care of yourself while unknowingly standing at the center of your exhaustion.
and still, your first instinct was to protect her from that truth, so you reached for her hand first. smiling reassuringly first. comforted her first.
"i'm okay." you whispered.
sophia squeezed your hand back lovingly.
and because she loved you, because she trusted you, because she had no idea how badly you were hurting. she believed you again.
loving sophia started feeling like a joke long before you admitted it to yourself.
not because she was cruel.
god, that would have been easier. so much easier.
cruelty gives people permission to leave.
but sophia still held your hand in crowded rooms, still kissed your forehead absentmindedly between conversations, still called you baby in that soft voice that made your chest ache embarrassingly every single time.
that was what made everything unbearable.
because if this was love, then why did it constantly feel like you were waiting for it?
the thought followed you everywhere now. while brushing your teeth beside a phone that never rang when you wanted it to. while laying awake at three in the morning rereading old messages just to remind yourself that things were not always this quiet.
while staring at sophia from across rooms, wondering when exactly you started feeling loneliner beside her than without her.
you became good at noticing things; the delay before she answered your texts, the way conversations slowly shifted back to her without her realizing, the exhaustion in her voice whenever you brought up your feelings.
that last one hurt the most.
because eventually, you stopped trying.
i mean, not entirely. god, no, you'd rather slit your own throat than do that. just enough, enough to make your sadness quieter, enough to make yourself easier to keep.
you wondered if sophia noticed the difference between your old laughter and your current one.
the newer one sounded careful, more measured. like someone trying not to take up too much space.
your friends noticed, though.
of course they did. god, they did.
people who loves you always noticed eventually.
one of them asked softly one night, "are you happy?"
and for a terrifying moment, you didn't know how to answer. not because you didn't love sophia, but because somewhere along the way, loving sophia started requiring pieces of yourself you never got back.
that night, sophia noticed first.
not the exhaustion, not the sadness, just the distance.
"you've been quiet lately."
the words settled between you gently.
you sat beside her on the couch, knees pulled loosely to your chest while her apartment remained dim except for the tenlevision flickering quietly in the background. sophia's hand resting against your back absentmindedly, warm and familiar enough to hurt.
you almost laughed. because what a terrifyingly small way to describe grief.
"i'm okay," you answered automatically.
sophia frowned immediately, "there you go again."
as if she'd finally started noticing the pattern.
your chest tightened unexpectedly. for a moment, just one terrible moment, you considered telling her everything.
how exhausting it had become to constantly ask for pieces of her attention, how every unread message felt embarrassingly personal now. how loneliness had started following you even in rooms where sophia held you hand.
how you were so, so tired.
but sophia looked exhausted tonight too.
dark circles beneath her eyes. tension buried into her shoulders, the kind of fatigue that made guilt bloom immediately inside your chest for even considering adding more weight onto her.
so instead, you swallowed it down again like always.
sophia's fingers intertwined carefully with yours.
"i feel like you've been pulling away from me," she admitted softly.
the words nearly shattered you.
because wasn't that cruel?
you had spent months reaching desperately toward her while she only noticed once your arms started giving out.
your throat burned suddenly.
you looked at your intertwined hands instead.
"i'm just tired." you whispered.
sophia sighed quietly before pulling you closer against her side without hesitation. instinctive. loving. familiar.
you let her, of course you did.
and as she pressed a soft kiss against your temple, that voice in your had realized something almost unbearable: if sophia asked whether you loved her, you would still say yes without hesitation.
that was the tragedy of it all.
not that sophia didn't love you, but that you had spent so long convincing yourself to survive on half-loved pieces that you no longer remembered what being fully loved was supposed to feel like.
sophia tightened her arms around you slightly. "tell me if something's wrong, okay?"
and because you love her.
because you always would.
you nodded softly against her shoulder and whispered the same lie that had been slowly destroying you from the beginning
