maybe if she had been called beautiful before with so much drive, she wouldn't have been so
stuck
on the one drunk boy from the street.
but he had meant it in such a way―
she was doomed right from the start.
༻❁༺
―on a girl with bad days, the first b...
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「 II 」 THIRTEEN.
he was at her first-floor window within the hour.
she hadn't bothered concealing the tear stains on her cheeks, brushing her hair, or changing out of the blue and yellow t-shirt that smelled like distant whiskey.
after all, what reason would she have had to pretend, to Archer, that things were okay?
Marguerite stepped carefully out of the window next to the front door before allowing her feet to carry her into Archer's arms, which wrapped around her easily like they always had. yes, it was easy to fall back into a thing like this.
tears returned to her surface, but she blinked them away and focused on the aching familiarity of Archer's strong arms. it was as if she'd never been without them. the boy who had left her didn't have as much muscle to his arms, so they didn't surround her in such a
soothing
manner. she had overlooked it for him.
she had overlooked so much for him, and none of it had meant any kind of shit.
it all tallied up to zero.
she was right back where she'd started.
it was nearly 2 a.m., Marguerite was more vulnerable than ever, and soon she was in the passenger seat of Archer's car, which was small and pearly white and nothing like the black box she had spent so much time l a u g h i n g in.
they went to the inauthentic diner together, and when they stepped through the doors Marguerite slotted her fingers between Archer's to keep herself from thinking about what she'd shared with the dark-haired boy in the very same place. she wasn't meeting someone. someone had been more than willing to drive her there himself and guide her trembling legs to a table.
"we can sit in the back so you don't feel like people are watching," Archer had said, and she didn't register his words until they had already gotten
to the back table.
she'd met him sober there countless times. she'd leaned across that very table to speak quietly with him so no one else could hear their little nothings. she'd placed her trust in his hands, right there, to soothe the aching of her hollowed-out heart.
the heart that Archer had hollowed out.
oh, how times had changed. how roles had reversed.
it was Archer who sat down first, where Marguerite usually sat, leaving her to sit in the space the boy with the frustratingly straight face tended to occupy. she glared at the scratches in the table, at the presence of the table, at the way the table made her s w a y on her feet.
so Archer reached out to her slowly, cautiously, taking her hand and intertwining their fingers so he could guide her to his side. she sat next to him, filling the space in the booth, and the booth across from them was
empty. void. null. nothing and nobody to fill it.
she buried her face into his shoulder. breathed him in. there was no trace of whiskey or marijuana on his clothes, on his skin. it shouldn't have felt so unfamiliar. this was Archer.
and when he wrapped his arm around her to soothe his fingers through her messy, unwashed hair, she allowed her eyes to shut and her body to relax. the ghost in the booth across the table would never have done this for her.
of course, this wasn't him. this was Archer.
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