devilslvl asked: that's funny, you didn't say that last night.
there’s a flicker — that cruel, split-second where the air leaves her lungs and she forgets how to hide it. last night sits between them like an open wound, the kind that shouldn’t have felt that real if it wasn’t meant to last. she remembers how soft his voice had gone when it was dark, how his hands had steadied her like he meant every word he never said. and now it’s a joke — tossed out with a smirk that cuts deeper than anything he could’ve whispered. it’s almost funny, how easily he turns something sacred into something disposable. how he makes her feel foolish for wanting it to matter. for wanting him to mean it. she forces her spine straight, the kind of defiance that only hurts because she’s still breaking beneath it — because he’ll never know just how much he ruined her by pretending he didn’t. ❝ yeah, well… i didn’t think i’d have to regret it this fast. ❞ she says it softly, but it lands like glass breaking between them. the room feels smaller suddenly — his voice still hanging there, heavy with mockery, as if what happened between them was something to laugh about. she laughs too, though it isn’t real. it’s the kind of laugh you use when the only other option is to cry. ❝ you’re right, i didn’t say that last night. i didn’t say a lot of things. maybe because for once, i thought i didn’t have to. ❞
her eyes find him, steady even as her throat burns. ❝ you looked at me like you actually saw me — not the spotlight, not the name, not the version everyone else gets. just me. and god, i wanted to believe that. i did believe that. ❞ she exhales hard, shaking her head like it’ll undo the memory. ❝ but you know what’s funny? it wasn’t even the words that ruined it. it’s this. it’s how easy it was for you to make it sound like a joke. like last night was just another story to tell when you’re bored. ❞ there’s a pause, the silence between them thick and aching. she steps back, enough to feel the space she’s forcing there. ❝ you don’t get to make me feel stupid for caring. you don’t get to touch me like that and then act like it meant nothing. ❞ and then, quieter — so quiet it almost doesn’t make it out — ❝ don’t do that, max. don’t turn me into a punchline. ❞
she hates that she still looks at him like that — like she’s waiting for something real to flicker behind the smirk, some sign that last night wasn’t just a beautiful mistake. the kind that ruins you slowly, one heartbeat at a time. her pulse still stumbles when she meets his eyes, traitorous and alive in all the wrong ways. she wishes it didn’t. she wishes she could be the kind of woman who walks away untouched, unscarred, unbothered. but she’s never been that girl. not when it comes to him. the silence between them stretches thin, fragile as spun glass. she can feel the words she didn’t say pressing against the back of her teeth — the stay, the don’t do this, the please tell me it meant something to you too. but she swallows them all down because she knows what happens when she gives too much. she’s done it before. she’s been the one left standing in the quiet, pretending her heart doesn’t hurt as badly as it does. she thinks about how his hands had lingered, the way his mouth had softened when he whispered her name. there had been a tenderness there, one that didn’t belong to casual. it had felt like a confession, like the kind of truth you can’t take back once it’s spoken. and maybe that’s why it hurts now — because she thought she heard something honest in him, something that belonged to her, even just for one night. she turns her face away because she knows he’s watching, and she can’t bear to let him see how much she’s unraveling. her jaw sets, shoulders square — armor she’s worn too many times before. it’s the performance of control, and she’s always been good at that. the world sees the unbreakable nikki bella, the woman who laughs too loud, fights too hard, and never lets anyone see the cracks. but here, with him, she feels all of them — hairline fractures splintering wide open beneath her skin. she tells herself it’s fine. that she’ll move on, that she’ll forget the way he made her feel like she could be soft without consequence. but even as she thinks it, the ache stays. deep and stubborn. a pulse that won’t quiet. because the truth is, she wanted it to mean something. and maybe that’s her biggest mistake — believing that something beautiful could come from a man who only knows how to destroy it.
