closed for @dirtyauthority !
continued from here ꨄ︎
elara had spent most of her life mastering the art of appearing untouched. it came with the territory. cameras in her face since she was too young to understand what scrutiny actually meant. strangers building entire versions of her from photographs and interviews and pretty little thirty second clips online. somewhere along the way, she learned how to survive by becoming slippery. hard to hold onto. hard to fully know. she perfected the image before she ever figured out the girl underneath it. beautiful, reckless, unattainable. easy enough for people to desire. impossible for them to keep.
but xander kept getting closer anyway.
that was the terrifying part.
sitting across from him now beneath the glow of the terrace fireplace, elara could physically feel herself unraveling in real time. every confession pouring out of him landed somewhere deep in her chest and stayed there, warm and aching and impossible to ignore. she should’ve been overwhelmed by it. should’ve panicked the second his words crossed into territory that felt dangerously close to love. because wasn’t that what this was starting to resemble? something intimate enough to alter the shape of both their lives? normal people didn’t talk like this unless they were already halfway ruined for each other. and god, maybe they were.
her gaze stayed fixed on him while he talked, legs curled beneath her inside the oversized chair she’d long since melted into. somewhere along the night she’d stopped paying attention to the skyline behind him. stopped noticing the expensive architecture of his penthouse or the glow of the city sprawling endlessly beneath them. all her focus narrowed down to him instead. the roughness in his voice. the lazy drag of his hand over his jaw. the way alcohol loosened his honesty until it spilled freely between them like he physically couldn’t keep it inside anymore.
it echoed through her head so constantly now it was beginning to replace everything else. she hated how badly she liked hearing him admit he needed her.
because elara understood needing people. she understood the ugly hunger attached to it. the desperation. the risk. growing up without anything stable left strange little fractures inside a person. she spent years pretending she didn’t want softness because wanting it and not receiving it hurt too badly. easier to laugh things off. easier to disappear before people could disappoint her. easier to be the girl everybody desired but nobody actually touched deeply enough to wreck.
then xander showed up and started filling spaces inside her she didn’t even realize sat empty.
the scariest part?
he did it naturally.
effortlessly.
he made room for her without asking her to become smaller first.
her chaotic emotions never seemed to exhaust him. her impulsiveness. the mood swings. the occasional selfishness she carried like armor. somehow he looked at all those rough unfinished pieces and still acted like she hung the fucking moon. like she was something precious instead of difficult. and god, nobody had ever really handled her gently before. people liked the pretty parts of elara. they liked the fantasy. but xander liked her. the messy middle of her. the girl who stole his sweatshirts and left makeup wipes all over his bathroom counter and secretly wanted somebody to hold her together when life became too loud.
his words wrapped tighter around her chest with every passing second. i’d do anything for you. elara felt something shift violently inside her after that. because suddenly this didn’t feel so casual anymore.
the realization sat heavy and dizzying in her bloodstream while she stared at him through half drunk eyes, trying to process how quickly he’d become the center of her attention. she thought about him constantly now. in the makeup chair before shoots. during fittings. in the backseat of black cars weaving through the city. even surrounded by noise and people and cameras somehow her brain still circled back toward him every single time. what he’d say. what he’d think. whether he’d eaten. whether he missed her too.
it was insane. she’d never been in love before but this felt dangerously close to whatever people wrote songs about. and maybe that should’ve made her run. instead, it made her want to crawl closer and wrap herself up within him.
his drunken rambling only softened her further somehow. xander, who always carried himself so composed and sure of everything, admitting he didn’t know what the fuck he was doing. admitting she made him stay longer than intended. admitting she’d become important enough to alter his habits. elara’s chest ached so badly over it she thought she might combust right there beside the fire. like she might die if she didn't touch him. because nobody had ever chosen her this loudly before.
her throat tightened quietly while he kept talking and suddenly she became hyper aware of the fact she was wearing his sweatshirt again. sleeves swallowing her hands. the fabric carrying traces of his cologne that she’d secretly grown addicted to. she’d stolen it weeks ago without asking and never returned it because it smelled like him and somehow that comforted her more than she wanted to admit.
home. that’s what xander was beginning to feel like. not in the neat polished way people usually described love either. no. this felt messy and consuming and frighteningly sincere. like finding warmth after years of pretending she didn’t mind the cold.
elara’s pulse stumbled hard against her throat. and suddenly sitting across from him felt impossible.
the distance between them became unbearable all at once. her body moved before her brain could fully catch up, drunk limbs untangling awkwardly from the chair while she pushed herself upright too quickly. immediately the terrace tilted beneath her bare feet. “oh my god,” she burst into laughter halfway through stumbling forward, one hand catching uselessly against the arm of his chair while the other pressed over her mouth. “wait, hold on —” graceful was not the word for whatever the hell this was.
the alcohol hit her all at once in that exact moment, legs wobbling beneath her while xander’s blurred outline doubled for half a second. elara tried correcting herself and only made it worse, a startled squeak leaving her before she practically collapsed directly into his lap in a heap of oversized sleeves, tangled limbs, and drunken laughter. “fuck—” his arms wrapped around her immediately on instinct and the feeling nearly knocked the breath from her lungs. safe. warm. hers.
elara melted against him almost embarrassingly fast after that, forehead dropping against his shoulder while laughter still shook through her chest in soft little bursts. she could feel his heartbeat beneath her cheek. steady and grounding. one of his large hands spread securely against her back while the other anchored around her waist like he thought she might disappear if he loosened his grip too much. god, she wanted to stay here forever.
his voice softened again somewhere above her head, fingers tugging lightly at the collar of the sweatshirt she wore while realization crossed his face. elara only grinned in response, too drunk and too fond to even pretend innocence anymore. because yes, she stole his clothes. yes, she slept in them constantly. yes, she liked surrounding herself with pieces of him when he wasn’t around. when he laughed in disbelief over it, she finally lifted her head from his shoulder just enough to look at him properly again, blonde hair falling messily around her face while her smile turned slow and unapologetic. “what?” the word came lazy beneath her breath, ghosting over his naked neck. “you want me to take it off?” there was no real innocence behind it either. just teasing warmth and that familiar little streak of shamelessness she only ever seemed to fully unleash around him. her fingers curled tighter into the fabric near his chest afterward instead, like she had absolutely no intention of giving the sweatshirt back now that he’d caught her in it.
xander’s reaction to it nearly made her heart stop completely. what’s mine is yours now. you’re with me. the words slid straight through her defenses without resistance. elara went quiet after that. dangerously quiet. because nobody had ever spoken to her like that before. like keeping her was easy. like loving her might be natural. her eyes lifted slowly toward his while his hand settled at the nape of her neck, holding her there gently beneath the flickering firelight and the city stretching endlessly around them. she could physically feel herself softening under his touch. every sharp edge inside her dulling down little by little whenever he looked at her this way.
the kiss left her dizzy in an entirely different way afterward, forehead still hovering close to his while her fingers curled tighter into the fabric of his shirt. for once, elara didn’t rush to cover herself back up with sarcasm or flirtation. she just looked at him. really looked at him. eyes glossy beneath the firelight while something unbearably soft settled across her expression.
“you make me wanna stay too,” she admitted finally, voice quieter now. honest in a way that almost embarrassed her. “that’s… not normal for me.” a tiny laugh slipped from her after that, shaky around the edges while her thumb brushed absently along the line of his jaw. “usually i’m halfway out the door before people even realize i’m gone.”
her gaze drifted over his face slowly like she was trying to memorize every inch. “and i know this is fast,” she whispered, the words catching slightly in her throat now. “i know it probably sounds insane but…” elara swallowed hard, heart thundering violently against her ribs. “i think about you constantly now. it’s actually starting to scare me a little.” another soft laugh left her then, though there was real vulnerability hiding underneath it. “i’ll be doing completely normal things and suddenly it’s just… you. your voice. your face. wondering what you’d say if you were there.”
her fingers slid into the hair at the nape of his neck after that, holding onto him gently like she needed the grounding contact to finish the thought. “and honestly?” her expression softened further, gaze flickering slowly between his eyes and mouth. “i don’t even think ruining each other sounds bad.” the confession came quieter now. thoughtful. almost dazed by the realization of it. “i think everybody secretly wants that kind of love. the kind that changes you a little. the kind that gets under your skin so deep there’s no pulling it back out again.” her lips curved faintly against the corner of his mouth. “people just get scared to admit it.”
she wasn’t scared of him wrecking her anymore. if anything, she thought she might welcome it.
“and nobody’s ever really made me feel safe to be exactly who i am before.” her voice lowered softer still. “like the messy parts don’t ruin it.” tears threatened embarrassingly behind her eyes then, though she laughed again before they could fully form. drunk and emotional and completely gone for him now. “you make me feel…” elara paused, struggling briefly for the right word before her expression softened helplessly. “kept.”
the confession hung there between them warm and terrifying. then she leaned in again, nose brushing lightly against his while the faintest smile tugged at her mouth. “so yeah,” she murmured against his lips. “i think i’m ruining myself for you too.”
