Filed to story: Penny and Navy Brother Asher
I forget to breathe.
I look up at him,
Prally look.
His black hair is messy, falling into his forehead, damp with sweat from whatever run he took before all of
There’s a scar cutting through his left eyebrow, another faint white line just barely visible along the strong column of his throat.
His jaw is sharp, dusted with dark stubble, his mouth set in a grim line of focus.
And his eyes-
God, his eyes.
Sharp. Dark.
But not cruel.
Not right now
?
He’s watching the bruise like it personally offends him. e world with his bare hands to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
Like he’d tear apart the
I realize too late that I’m crying again.
Silent, helpless tears sliding down my cheeks.
He notices.
He stops moving.
For a second, neither of us breathes.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, voice cracking.
The words tumble out, one after another, too fast to stop.
“I know you think I’m entitled, and a princess, and-and maybe I am compared to all the things you’ve been through,” I sob, gripping the sink like it might keep me standing. “But being in control, keeping everything perfect-it’s the only way I know how to keep my life together.”
I shake my head, feeling the shame burn hot under my skin.
“I was so happy today.” I whisper. “More proud of myself than I’ve ever been. And the way it ended- just-I lost it. I acted irrationally.”
I wipe at my face uselessly, feeling smaller and more pathetic by the second.
I got so scared out there,” I whisper. “I didn’t n’t know what to do. I -“
I break off, hiccupping another ugly sob.
He says nothing for a long moment.
I finally dare to lift my head, lookling at him through blurry eyes.
His expression hasn’t changed much,
Still hand. Still sharp.
Put soller, fo
Just enough.
“I shouldn’t have yelled at you,” he says, voler low and graft. “And I don’t know enough about you to call you entitled.”
I let out a broken laugh, wiping at my nose with the back of my hand.
“Oh, sure,” I mutter. “Now you’re taking pity on me. Now that you know my parents ditched me, my boyfriend ditched me, the bus ditched me, even the Uber drivers ditched me.”
He smirks.
Just barely.
The tiniest twitch at the corner of his mouth.
“Something like that,” he s says dryly.
I stare at him for a long second, feeling something loosen painfully in my chest. teps back suddenly, dropping his hands to his sides. he steps
“You gonna be okay alone?” he asks, voice rough again.
The thought makes me shiver, but I force a nod
“Yeah, I le
He nuds once, short and sharp, and turns to go.
I follow him down the hall, the floor creaking under our feet.
At the door, he hesitates, glancing back once.
“Asher,” I call softly.
“Thank you.” I say
For everything.
For showing up.
For not leaving me.
He just nods again, almost awkwardly, and steps out into the night.
I watch him walk down the steps, into the shadows, the dark swallowing him up.
On impulse, I call after hims
“Try not to get stabbed on the way homer i shen
He doesn’t answer.
Pot just before he disappears into the dark, I swear I see him shake his head-
And smile.
The smile barely lasts two blocks. i try- d, I really try-
God,
To hold onto it, to let myself just laugh at the insanity of tonight, at the way she shoved her tiny fists into my chest like it would even move me, at the way she screamed at me with tears on her face and fury in her voice like she thought she could burn me down with nothing but her
This girl.
This fucking girl.
Perfect on the outside, all delicate edges and soft curves and golden hair and a voice like broken glass and honey, but inside-
Inside she’s fire and stubbornness and cracked porcelain held together by sheer will.
Her face flashes in my head again, uninvited, unwelcome.
Her wide green eyes, glassy with tears she wouldn’t let fall until she couldn’t stop them anymore.
Her flushed cheeks, streaked from wiping at them too hard with the back of her sleeve.
Her mouth- trembling into a sad little pout or pressed into a tight line trying to hold the sobs back.
Coming loose, strands falling out if that tight than she always seems to have nailed to the back of her head, fraying around her face like she fought the whole damn world and barely made it out.
Ivrivit.
She’s perfect in a way that pisses me off.
When people draw angels in art class, when they think about perfection and fragility and something ton good for the world-
They’re thinking about girls like her.
And I hate her for it.
Because every time I’ve touched her-and it’s only been three times, but somehow it feels like more-it felt like I might break her.
Like she’s made of blown glass, impossibly beautiful and impossibly easy to destroy.
And it makes me furious.
Because I know better.