i’ve given up on love before – this is my last time trying / partyscver .
she crinkles her nose, the sun beaming too brightly, boots covered in snow. truly, a winter wonderland. it’s strange being back, strange being around everything she worked so hard to run away from. confrontation is a lesson still needing to be learned on her part. and with each step, her heart drops further into her stomach, thinking about the possibilities of running into him. surely, he’s moved on. he’s ozzy. how could he not? a boy like him was never supposed to end up with someone like her. a boy like him deserves the world, someone who’s not scared.
and astaire? she’s scared. scared to love again, scared to allow herself to be loved. and so she opens her love alarm for the first time in a long time. and with that, the block appears on her screen, taunting her. she sighs, reminded of the time of their break up.
all she needs to do is meet a love alarm executive. all she needs to do is get into the badge club and meet someone. meet someone who’s able to remove it. and it’s so silly how her life has been ruined by this single app, but to everyone else and inevitably her – it’s become a lifeline of sorts. a definitive way of finding true love.
ring! one person within ten metres likes you.
what? she laughs, slightly amused. who could possibly like her, there’s literally no one in her vicinity. she turns to look. and once she does, an instant regret surfaces. out of all days, he’s here. out of all days, so is she. she stares, not knowing what to say – not knowing if she even has the right to say anything to him at all. i miss you – she wants to say, but instead,
⁺ 𝑶 › he hears the treacherous ring and he knows he’s done for. this was the beginning of the end. after swearing he was done with her -- the truth sells him out faster than he can prevent it -- feeling the gentle vibration of his phone in the pocket of his jacket has a curse at the tip of his tongue as he steps into her proximity as if drawn to her ; some magnetic force pulling him to her before he can even follow the direction of his steps.
it shouldn’t have been this way -- after months of regret, anguish, and pain ; why was he still holding on to her? she was no longer a lifeline he could tether himself to. no longer was she obligated to carry him out of the turbulent storm that was his calamitous life. she had no reason being, anymore. ( at least this is what ozzy had told himself ; time and time again )
but truthfully, they were all lies.
if she only said the word -- ozzy knew ( dreaded this truth but accepted it all the same ) that if given the choice, if she opened her heart just once ; he’d let her in all over again. he’d bear all the hurt if only he could get back the sun in his sky and the stars in his night.
because she had been all that and more -- and yet, now ...
all that remained was a solemn greeting and her words, just now, cut like a blade straight to the heart. did all their memories render them as strangers now -- that a mere ‘ hi ’ was all it took to weather conversation between them?
so he takes it ; shoulders the blade and covers the wound with a smile -- the crooked grin he’s donned for years now, one far too familiar for the occassion. “ hi, yourself. you back in town? ” it’s so superficial that ozzy hates the words that leave his lips -- when all his heart wants to scream are the truths his broken heart had cried in the months she’d disappeared. “ or are you going to skip again? ” he shouldn’t have said it -- he knows -- but a part of him, the bitter monster that he was pulls its ugly head into gear. but he laughs, masks what mockery the words could mean with amusement as he glances from her to the ground and back. was it too soon to say it’s nice to see you? ( how many more before he can say ‘ when can i see you again? ’ )