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valeisaslut · 3 months ago

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⭒࿐COLLIDE - c. eight

credits for the fanart: nramvv - edited by me

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐄𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓

𝐈𝐓'𝐒 𝐍𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐑.

← 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑠𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑛 | 𝑚𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 | 𝑒𝑝𝑖𝑙𝑜𝑔𝑢𝑒 𝑝𝑡.𝟷 →

⚢ pairing: Rockstar!Ellie Williams x Popstar!Reader 𖥔 ݁ ˖

⭒ synopsis: Ellie leaves before sunrise, and with her goes every trace of the night you thought might save you both. You try to keep moving, caught in the glittering machinery of your own tour, singing songs that taste like ash. But the cracks spread faster than you can hide them. And in a world that never cared if either of you survived it, this part of your story cuts to the question no one ever wants to face—what do you do when love isn’t enough? 𖥔 ݁ ˖

⭒ word count: 17,6k 𖥔 ݁ ˖

⭒ content: heavy angst, detailed violence, intense arguments, explicit language, sensitive themes, references to cigarettes, alcohol, and drug use, everyone here desperately needs a hug, AFAB!Reader, modern AU setting, multi-part series. MEN AND MINORS DNI. Likes and reblogs are deeply appreciated — thank you for supporting! 𖥔 ݁ ˖

Disclaimer: This chapter contains depictions of heavy drug use, addiction, and withdrawal. These are serious and sensitive topics, and while I’ve done my best to approach them with care and respect, I want to prioritize your well-being above all.

If you are sensitive to these themes or if reading about them could be harmful to you in any way, I strongly encourage you to proceed with caution or consider skipping. Please take care of yourself first.

The room was still, steeped in the bleary, gray light of morning—the kind that barely made it past the heavy hotel curtains but managed to cast everything in a soft, ghostly hush.

Nothing moved, yet everything felt like it might break if touched.

It wasn’t peaceful. It was the kind of quiet that comes when something’s been shattered, and the pieces haven’t yet decided where to fall.

The night before clung to the air like thick smoke. It didn’t feel real, more like a fever dream, too sharp and painful to be fiction, and too surreal to trust. Your throat still ached from screaming. Your eyes burned with a kind of tiredness that sleep can’t fix.

And Ellie looked like a version of herself you’d never seen before.

Not healed. Not ruined. Just…stripped down to something rawer. Fragile.

She was crouched beside her suitcase on the floor, hair damp from the shower and darker where it clung to her temples. Around her was the slow, distracted chaos of packing—half-folded shirts, tangled cords, a hairbrush missing its cap, a pair of socks curled beside an open toiletries bag. Her movements were slow, almost mechanical, as if afraid she might shatter if she moved too fast.

As if her body was full of glass and one wrong bend would make her bleed.

You sat on the bed, curled into yourself, knees tucked beneath her oversized shirt. It still smelled faintly of her. Smoke, cologne, something darker threaded underneath. Once, it would’ve been comforting. Now, it clung to you with a sour edge, a bitter aftertaste you couldn’t shake, a reminder that even the things you loved most could break when you held them too tightly.

You hadn’t spoken more than two words since the alarm split the heavy silence wide open. Since reality cut through the fragile hush and reminded you both that her jet to London wasn’t going to wait. Not for grief. Not for guilt. And much less for the slow, aching work of healing that still hung, unfinished, between you.

You cleared your throat, forcing the words out.

"You have to eat real food," you said, voice steady even though your heart was racing. "Not just whatever crap’s on the rider. I want actual meals. Protein. Vegetables. Something warm at least once a day."

Ellie let out a short snort. Dry, empty. Lacking that heat it always had.

"Okay, mom."

You didn’t laugh. Didn’t even flinch. Just stared at her, letting the silence fill the room until it started to press against your ribs.

"I’m serious."

The air shifted. Tightened. Ellie turned her head just enough that you caught the flicker of her jaw tightening, the way she ground her teeth together like she wanted to say something cruel but bit it back.

"Jesus fucking christ. I said okay." she snapped, not loud, but sharp enough to sting.

You didn’t back down. You leaned forward, voice cutting through the stale air.

"I'm doing this because I love you. Because I'm fucking terrified every second you’re not next to me. Because you’ve lost weight and you can’t sleep unless you’re high and you think I don’t notice, but I do."

She froze. Like you’d hit something she couldn’t defend.

For a second, everything was still. Her chest rose, shallow and slow, and then sank again, like the effort of breathing itself had turned into a negotiation. Her fingers twitched, then tightened around the deodorant in her hand until her knuckles went white. You saw the tremor—the way she clenched to hide it, to pretend she was still in control.

You swallowed down the lump in your throat. Pushed forward because if you didn’t say it all now, you never would.

"And you have to call me," you added, quieter. "Every day. Even if it’s just for five minutes. Even if you’ve had the worst day of your fucking life. I don’t care. I don't care if it’s 4 a.m, or if you're half dead from soundcheck or if you’re strung out or if you hate yourself that day—"

You paused, just long enough to breathe around the shaking in your chest.

"You still have to call. I’ll always pick up."

Ellie finally looked at you.

Her eyes were bloodshot, rimmed with red at the edges. And you noticed. She'd cried in the shower. She'd cried before, during it, and after. She looked exhausted. Of the world, of her life, but mostly of herself.

And somehow, seeing that hurt worse than anything she could ever say.

She swallowed hard, jaw flexing, and then her voice came—rough, raw, barely above a whisper.

"Every day?" she said. "Even if I sound like shit?"

"Especially then."

Ellie dragged a hand through her hair, the movement jerky, like she wanted to tear it out by the roots. She stared at the floor for a long moment, her whole body tense, like she was fighting something no one else could see.

And then, finally, she muttered,

"Okay. I will."

You nodded, heart hammering.

"I spoke to Jesse. Dina. Your manager. Your assistant. Everyone’s in the loop now. If something happens–if you start slipping–they’ll tell me. You’re not alone in this, Ellie."

She crouched by her suitcase again, reaching for a boot with a hand that wasn’t quite steady. She turned it over in her palm, staring at the worn sole like it might somehow offer her a way out of this conversation. When she spoke, her voice was low and bitter again.

"So what, y’all made a fuckin' watchlist for me?"

Your heart twisted. "No. We made a net."

She shook her head, a sharp, disbelieving movement. "Feels the same."

"I’m not saying it because I think you’re a problem. I’m saying it because if you fall, I want someone there to catch you. And I need you to understand that. I need you to understand how I feel too."

She shoved the boot into the suitcase with a force that felt almost painful to watch. The thud of it loud in the stillness of the room.

And you saw it—the silent battle flickering behind her eyes. The part of her that wanted to thank you, to reach for you. And the part that wanted to slam the door, scream at you to stop looking at her like she was broken.

"You really think I can make it a month and a half?"

Her voice barely made it across the space between you, trembling and frayed at the edges, but still steady. Just like her.

You shifted forwards instinctively, closer now. Close enough to smell the faint citrus of her shampoo, the salt of dried sweat and something sharper still—something that clung to her like a second skin.

"I think you can make it one day," your voice sure, even if everything inside you trembled. "And then another. And another after that. That’s all I’m asking, Ellie. Just for you to try. Until the tour’s over and you can walk into rehab. Let someone help you. For real this time."

Ellie turned, slowly, until her eyes caught yours—and this time, she didn’t look away. Didn’t blink.

Didn’t hide.

"I’ve been doing this for years," she whispered, and it was a confession pulled from somewhere deep. "Touring high. Playing high. Recording shit I don’t even remember writing. That’s just how this works. It’s how I work."

"It’s how you survive," you corrected, your voice soft but unflinching. "But it doesn’t have to be the way you live."

She let out a breath—shaky, bitter. "I don’t even know who I am without it."

You leaned in closer to her, keeping your voice low and certain, because she needed certainty right now more than anything.

"Then we’ll figure it out. Together."

The words hovered in the air. Fragile. Brave. Naked.

Wordlessly, she shifted onto the bed beside you, the mattress not even making a sound beneath her light weight. Her thigh brushed yours—a ghost of a touch, but it anchored her there. Her hand found yours, and her fingers were freezing. She squeezed, like she was afraid you might pull away if she didn’t hold tight enough.

"...But what if I fuck it up again?" she asked, voice cracking.

You didn’t hesitate.

"Then you try again. And again. And again. Until you don’t."

She looked at you like the world had narrowed down to just this.

You could see it written all over her: the battle between the version of herself that believed she would never be enough and the tiny, desperate part that wanted—just this once—to be wrong about that.

And then, finally, she nodded. Once. And then again.

Her whole body moved with it, like she was learning how to believe it. How to believe you.

You reached up, took her face in your hands with the gentlest touch you could manage, thumbs brushing the sharp lines of her cheekbones. You leaned in until your foreheads touched. Careful. Careful. Like you were stepping towards a wounded animal.

"Promise me." you whispered, so quietly it was barely a sound. It was a prayer.

Ellie’s lips parted. You felt her breath catch against your skin. Her eyes shone, but she didn’t cry. She just breathed out, tremulous and trembling and real.

"I promise."

But even as she said it, you could hear it—the doubt coiled inside her voice, the quiet fear that even her best effort wouldn’t be enough to keep her from slipping.

Because she didn’t fully believe it. She was terrified she wouldn’t be able to keep it. But she wanted to. She desperately wanted to.

And for this fragile, this bleeding, desperate, exhausted morning.

You both thought that was enough.

The car ride to the tarmac felt both impossibly fast and excruciatingly slow at the same time—like the universe couldn’t make up its mind whether it wanted to prolong the moment or rip it from your hands.

Outside, the sky was a washed-out slate, the kind that promised rain but never delivered—just hung there heavy, unrelenting. As if It knew the ache in your chest and decided to match it.

Neither of you spoke much. Ellie sat beside you, hood up, fingers fiddling with the drawstrings of her sweatshirt. Every few seconds, your knees would brush, and each time it felt like the last thread tethering you to the night you’d just lived through.

The moment the SUV rolled to a stop beside the stairs of the jet, the weight of everything between you two finally caught up.

The world outside the windows blurred into a smear of flashing lights and eager, desperate voices. The sharp, mechanical clicking of cameras fractured the air, each snap a demand, a hunger that thickened until it was hard to breathe. The very atmosphere vibrated with it—the unspoken, clawing need of the public.

They had to devour her. Strip her down to an image, a headline, a possession they could pass around.

They couldn’t stand that she was still yours.

And now they would take her. Pry her from your hands until nothing was left but a story you wouldn’t recognize.

Ellie tensed beside you, her whole body coiling with something barely contained, barely holding itself together.

But then, in the same way she had done a thousand times before, she reached up and pulled the hood down low over her face, concealing herself just enough to give her some relief, even if it was just for a few seconds. But it didn’t stop the tremor in her hands as she pulled on her sunglasses, the lenses opaque enough to hide her eyes but not enough to hide the exhaustion in her bones.

It always amazed you—wrecked you, really—how quickly she could shift. How fast she could pull the armor back on.

One breath, she was yours. The one you knew, who rambled about her interests and kissed the hollow of your throat like it was sacred. The one who laughed so hard she cried, who pressed lyrics into your skin at four in the morning, who loved you so deeply it left fingerprints on your soul.

And in the next breath, she was Ellie Williams.

The untouchable. The myth. The most famous rockstar in the world.

The fire the world couldn't help but chase.

The version of her they all thought they knew—the one they could consume, distort, devour—and never once come close enough to touch.

The door cracked open, and the world outside poured in: flashing, ravenous, deafening. The roar of the cameras flooded the car, a tidal wave of need and greed and hunger that rattled the windows, the floor, the breath in your lungs. She just sat there, frozen, the silence between you tightening until it strangled. Like if she stayed still enough, maybe she wouldn't have to go. Maybe she wouldn't have to leave you.

But when she finally reached for the door, her fingers betrayed her again—trembling, small, broken.

“No, no—wait,” you whispered, the words slipping out without thinking, your hand darting forward, closing around her wrist.

Ellie turned. Through the hood pulled low, through the sunglasses that hid everything from everyone else but never from you—you saw it. The naked devastation swimming just beneath the surface of her mask when she caught your expression.

The shattered pleading of two people who didn't know how to let go without being destroyed.

You reached for your own sunglasses, shielding your eyes not from the flash, but from the truth of it—that no matter how tightly you held her wrist, you couldn't stop this from happening.

You couldn't save her from this life.

You couldn't even save yourself from this life.

Without a word, you climbed out of the car with her. It wasn’t a plan. It wasn’t a decision. It was instinct—the desperate ache to stay close, to pretend you could still protect her, somehow.

You walked beside her, step for step.

The distance between you wasn’t measured in inches. It was measured in all the things you couldn’t say. In the way she moved—slow, heavy—dragging the invisible weight that had been building for years.

Not just her fame. Not just her addiction. But the burden of being wanted by everyone but truly known by no one. And somehow, even now, even with you by her side, she still carried it alone.

Even with your hand brushing hers, even with your heart breaking open for her with every breath, she keeps carrying it alone.

At the foot of the stairs, Ellie paused.

You stepped closer, drawn to her like gravity itself had shifted. Close enough to feel the heat radiating off her skin, the frayed edges of her panic, the battle waging in her chest. She leaned her forehead against yours, her breath brushing over your lips, shallow.

And for a single breath, a single heartbeat, the rest of the world melted away—the flashbulbs, the shouts, the crushing weight of expectation.

There was only her. Only you.

"...I don't know how to be away from you right now."

She said, barely audible over the wind slicing through the tarmac. Her voice trembled between you both, suspended in the frozen air.

You closed your eyes, feeling it all—her fear, her need, her love—so big it barely fit inside her anymore. Your hands rose, cupping her face gently, your thumbs brushing the corners of her lips.

"Then don't be," you whispered, your words falling between you like a vow. "Call me. Text me. Think about me so much it hurts. I'll feel it. I’ll do the same. I swear."

She let out a shaky sound that wasn’t quite a laugh, but wasn’t quite a sob. Something caught halfway in her throat.

"You always know what to say..." she murmured, her hands fisting the hem of your shirt, pulling you closer.

You shook your head, your forehead still pressed to hers.

"It's not about knowing," you whispered back. "It's because it's true. Every word."

Her fingers trembled where they gripped you. She sucked in a ragged breath like she was swallowing something too big to say, then finally choked it out.

"It scares the shit out of me," she admitted, voice cracking down the middle. "How much I love you."

Your chest seized. The words hit you in the softest, most breakable part of yourself, the part only she had ever touched.

"Good," you said, voice barely holding. "Then we’re even."

She kissed you then—hard, uncoordinated, desperate. There was no neatness to it, no sweet slow burn. It was a kiss that bruised, that begged, that tried to brand the memory of your mouth into hers.

She kissed you like she was trying to build a shelter out of you. Somewhere she could crawl into when the world outside turned too brutal to survive.

You kissed her back with everything you didn’t have words for. The panic. The ache. The bottomless, helpless love.

You tasted salt between your teeth and didn't know if it was her tears or yours.

When she finally pulled away, her breath hitched in shallow gasps. You could feel the shudder racing through her body, all the way down to her fingertips still twisted in your shirt.

"I love you," she whispered again, so quietly it almost didn’t make it past her lips. "God, I love you. I didn’t even know it was possible to love someone like this."

You pressed your palms flat against her chest, right over her pounding heart, willing her to feel it—I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. You're not alone.

"I love you too," you said, voice breaking wide open. "More than I know how to survive."

There was nothing else to say. No words could bridge the space that was about to open between you. No promises could stitch up the future fast enough.

So you didn’t say anything else. You just stood there, forehead to forehead, breathing the same shaky air, feeling her heart hammering against her ribs like it was trying to break out. Like it knew exactly where it belonged. In your hands.

Then she kissed you again—softer this time, sadder—and stepped back with a kind of reluctance you could feel in your flesh.

And you let her go because you had to.

But it didn't feel brave. It didn’t feel right.

She climbed the stairs, and with every step, it felt like she was taking a piece of you with her. At the top, she paused, just long enough to pull down her sunglasses. Just long enough for you to see her eyes, glassy and red, lashes clumped with tears she hadn’t wiped away. And in that one fleeting, aching look, she said everything. I’m sorry. Please wait for me. I love you.

And as it happened, an intrusive, cruel thought reminded you of the flashing lights from the paparazzi cameras still pulsating, snapping like the breath of a beast that had just caught it's perfect prey.

"The Most Famous Couple Of Music’s Sad Goodbye: Y/N and Ellie Williams Part After Madison Square Garden Triumph"

"Ellie Williams and Y/N: Love, Success, and One Last Kiss Before Parting Ways"

"From the Stage to the Skies: Y/N and Ellie’s Madison Square Garden Love Story Ends With a Goodbye"

"Pop’s and Rock’s Royalty Say Goodbye After a Night That Defined a Generation"

"One Last Kiss: Ellie Williams and Y/N's Break the Internet"

They didn’t know. They couldn’t know. They saw what they wanted to see—Ellie, the biggest rockstar on the planet, saying goodbye after making a surprise appearance at your sold-out concert, her presence at the top of your game fueling their fantasies of the perfect, untouchable love.

And as Ellie disappeared into the plane, as the door shut behind her and the frenzy around you raged on, you were left standing in the void—the chaos of the world still swirling around you, and you, too exhausted to even run from it.

Interviews blurred into interviews. Red carpets bled into flashing lights. And through it all, you both played your roles to perfection. The perfect couple. The fairytale. The love story that the world clung to with white-knuckled hands.

Smiling for cameras, brushing hands in the hallways, whispering promises into microphones meant for millions. She'd call you her muse. You'd call her the love of your life. And the headlines would lap it up—devoted, inseparable, the greatest love story in the music industry.

But the thing was—it was real. The love was real. Fierce, burning, gut-wrenching real.

Not curated for headlines. Not staged for camera flashes or chart positions. Not fake. Not anymore. It stopped being fake a long, long time ago, because somewhere along the way it became the only real thing you had left.

You loved her in a way that hollowed you out, made room for nothing else. She loved you in a way that made her think that, maybe, she could survive herself.

But love wasn't the whole story. And that was your curse.

There were still people behind the names. People who bled, people who broke, people who crumbled under the weight of everything they were supposed to be.

You sat on talk show couches and laughed when you were supposed to laugh, batted your eyelashes when you were supposed to blush. You said all the right things. You wore all the right outfits. You played the part so well that sometimes, for a moment, you almost believed it too—that if you smiled hard enough, no one would see the fractures spider webbing underneath.

Ellie squeezed your waist in photos, tugged you closer for the cameras. Not because she didn’t love you. Because she needed to remind herself you were still there. That there was still something solid in a world that spun faster than she could hold on to.

You kissed under spotlights. You whispered I love you at afterparties with whiskey on your breaths. You collapsed into hotel beds at four a.m., so tangled up in each other you couldn’t tell where she ended and you began.

But beneath the sequins and the designer suits and the perfectly lit portraits, the truth still breathed.

You were bone-tired. She was frayed at the edges.

You were both still human.

Aching, breaking, pieced together by hope and tape humans.

Far too human for the versions of yourselves they kept trying to capture through a camera lens.

They wanted the myth, the storybook ending. But what stood there, clinging to each other beneath a gray, unraveling sky, wasn't perfect.

It was just two humans clinging to something fragile, and praying the world wouldn’t crush it before it had the chance to heal.

The world would never see—maybe never wanted to—the cracks running beneath perfection.

They would never understand the way it hurt to live like this: a life built for spectacle, a love carrying more weight than either of you knew how to hold.

They would never catch a glimpse how it hollowed you out, loving each other in a way that was everything and nothing at once.

And you both knew it. Knew it even as you smiled for the next flash, even as you leaned closer, pretending—for just a little longer—that love alone could save you.

The crowd thinned. The cameras turned away.

But you didn’t move. Couldn’t. The wind tugged at your clothes, at your hair, trying to remind you that the world was still spinning, that time hadn’t stopped just because she’d left.

But for you, it had.

Because that goodbye hadn’t felt like just a goodbye. It felt like a cliff edge.

A moment suspended between who Ellie was now, and who she might become if the fall swallowed her whole.

Your phone buzzed in your back pocket.

You almost didn’t check it. You weren’t sure you could take it. But your hand moved anyway—blind, desperate—fumbling until the screen lit up.

Ells <3

i keep staring at the door like you’re about to walk through it

i don’t know how to do this without you

but i’m gonna try

i swear to god i’m gonna try

i love you. i love you. i love you.

please say it back

im scared im gonna forget what it feels like

Your hands trembled so badly you nearly dropped the phone.

You typed blindly, your breath catching, the world narrowing down to the glow of the screen and the ache inside your chest.

You:

i love you. i love you. i love you.

i don’t think ive ever loved anything the way i love you ellie

please don’t disappear on me

please come back to me sober

im begging you

please

try

and if cant do it for yourself, do it for me

for us

You hit send, every time feeling like tearing open a new wound.

The pause after was unbearable. Long enough you thought she might not answer. But then,

i swear i will

and i’m always gonna find my way back to you

always.

You didn’t cry. Not again. Not there. Not with the handlers and the cameras still prowling at the edge of the runway. Not with the world still watching.

But your hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

You stared up at the sky long after the jet had disappeared into the clouds, willing yourself to believe in something you couldn’t see, something you could only beg for.

Please be okay.

Please make it to the end of the tour.

Please keep your promise.

Please at least try to be sober.

Please come back to me.

Please.

Don’t break my heart.

For an entire month, the tour kept moving, but you didn’t.

City after city unfolded outside tinted windows, skyscrapers dissolving into farmland, farmland swallowed by freeways. You watched it all pass by in a haze of exhaustion so complete it felt cellular. Most of the time, you weren’t even sure if you were awake or dreaming. The applause each night rang through your skull like a memory you couldn’t place.

People screamed your name, held up glittering signs and screamed along to every word, but it was as though you were watching it all from underwater—muted, slow, unreal. Drowned.

You performed anyway. You always did. You had to.

But that tightness in your throat never left, a dull burn just beneath your voice, a phantom hand closing around your windpipe. It made every breath feel borrowed.

The crew never asked if you were okay. They praised your stamina, your professionalism. You looked flawless in photos. You hit every mark. You sold out every venue. But deep down, they knew the truth.

You were surviving, not living. Your body moved through life on autopilot, while your heart existed elsewhere entirely.

You barely even spoke anymore. Just to Rachel, when something needed handling. Just in your weekly family call, your mom saying she misses you in that voice that made you feel twelve again, your dad asking if you were sleeping because you looked even more worn down than last week. Just to say you were fine. Promising to send them something nice and way too expensive, like money could patch over the void. The rest was just interviews—fake smiles, rehearsed lines, saying just enough to keep the silence from swallowing you whole.

There was one interview—a glossy magazine spread, cameras flashing, stylist fussing with the sharp line of your dress—when the subject of Ellie came up.

“She’s on tour,” you said, and your voice came out thin, barely audible. “We’ve both been kind of… everywhere.”

The interviewer smiled, leaned forward like she knew the shape of your silence.

“I have to ask,” she said, tilting her head. “That photo—on the tarmac. Right before her jet took off. You two looked… intense.”

“Oh,” you said, then paused. The lights were too hot. Your dress itched. There was still eyelash glue clinging to the corner of your eye. “That moment…”

The words caught, then fell.

You saw it again, that second stretched into forever—the kiss she left on your lips like a bruise. The way she held your face and whispered I love you like a prayer, like something she hadn’t said out loud until that exact moment.

And the way you said it back. Like it was the only thing anchoring you to the world.

You looked back at the interviewer and smiled, soft and practiced.

“It was a hard goodbye. That’s all.”

She seemed satisfied. Moved on.

But your throat burned.

Because if you spoke even a word more, your vocal cords would give out. And who were you without your voice?

Just a ghost in sequins. A glittering silhouette. A thing built to be looked at, not heard.

Nobody.

And later, in the backseat of the car, you pressed your fingers to your lips and tried to remember exactly how she’d kissed you—afraid you were already starting to forget.

The exhaustion was a weight that pressed down on your bones, dragging you further and further into the ground, until it felt like you were standing on the edge of something far deeper than just a tour.

You were tired of being watched, criticized, picked apart like a product on display. Tired of the constant measuring—of never quite being enough or being too much.

And most of all, you were tired of looking in the mirror and not recognizing the person staring back.

Because not recognizing yourself is even worse than hating what you see.

It felt like all of it was on your shoulders—the pressure, the expectations, the unspoken demands. Like you were holding up something that was never meant to be this heavy. And doing it all in silence, with no one to lean on since you were a teenager.

The weight of being seen, always. Of loving someone who couldn’t stay near without the world sinking its teeth into her. Of carrying an image sculpted by strangers who never cared what it costs to keep the show going on.

You were the brightest star in the sky.

But even stars burn out. Especially the ones that shine too hard for too long.

Stil, she called every night.

No matter where you were—Milan, Toronto, Denver—there she was. Sitting on a bus bench with her hair tucked under a hoodie, or lying sideways on a hotel bed with her guitar resting against her ribs. Sometimes the signal cut out. Sometimes the lighting was too dark to see more than the outline of her face.

But she always called. And you always picked up.

She looked different lately. Not worse. Not better. Different. Tired in a way that didn’t show up under stage lights but crept in when her shoulders slouched between words, or when she forgot to smile after a joke. You couldn’t quite put your finger on it.

But in the beginning, the calls helped. You’d stumble into your dressing room after a show, breathless and dripping glitter, and there she’d be, propped up on the screen of your phone. Her voice would hit you like cold water—bracing and alive.

“Still the hottest person alive, even with mascara halfway to your collarbone,” she’d say, grinning.

And you’d laugh so hard you’d forget how much your body hurt.

But slowly, things changed. The calls became routine. Still necessary, but heavier. Less playful. Like something you owed each other. Like checking in for duty.

You found yourself asking the same questions every night: Did you eat today? How much sleep did you get? Was the crowd good? Are you still taking the magnesium stuff I gave you?

And even though Ellie always answered—sometimes with an eye-roll, sometimes with a sarcastic “Yes, Mom,”—you could feel the mood dimming. The bright, beautiful intimacy you’d built together was still there, but thinner now. Like the connection was stretched too tight over distance and fatigue and things neither of you wanted to say out loud.

She tried, though. God, she tried.

She always wanted to make you laugh. To keep things light. But even when you laughed, it felt off. Like you were both acting out a memory of how things used to be, hoping muscle memory would carry the rest.

And every night, when the call connected, you swore her face lit up a little slower.

You didn’t take it personally. You told yourself she was tired. Touring was brutal. You knew that better than anyone.

And tonight, you picked up on the first ring.

Your stage costume was still clinging to you like a second skin—sweat sticky under the sequins, eyeliner flaking at your temples, boots kicked off somewhere you wouldn’t remember until morning. You collapsed onto the couch in your dressing room, legs stretched out, hair wild, pulse jittery from the encore. You didn’t even had time to say hi before Ellie’s face filled the screen.

She was sprawled on her stomach, half off the hotel bed like she’d melted there, legs dangling like a bored teenager. A beat-up guitar rested across her back, threatening to slip off with every lazy breath. A cigarette clung to her bottom lip, the ember glowing as she exhaled a slow, spiraling stream of smoke that drifted up past her lashes. She had more than enough money to ignore the no-smoking fee taped to the nightstand—and the hotel knew better than to argue. Her shirt was wrinkled, probably from the floor, and the boxer briefs she had on? Definitely Jesse’s.

“Hey there, love,” she said immediately, voice low and hoarse from too many cigarettes or too little sleep. “You look like a disco ball that got mugged outside a rave.”

You snorted, dragging a hand through your tangled hair. “That’s rich coming from someone who looks like a raccoon that learned how to play guitar.”

Ellie smirked around the cigarette. “Yeah, but like…a hot raccoon.”

“Debatable.”

She grinned wider. It didn’t quite reach her eyes. But it tried to.

You tilted your head, watching the smoke curl toward the ceiling.

“Are you smoking more?”

Ellie hesitated, just for a beat. “…Well, yes, but not thaaat much.”

You raised an eyebrow.

She exhaled slowly and turned her face toward the camera, taking the cigarette out with two fingers. “I got a pack, 'cause, ya’ know. Tour stress.”

“Mmhmm.”

She gave you that look—brows raised, that said drop it—and you did. For now.

“Where even are you guys?” you asked, reaching blindly for a makeup wipe and dragging it across your cheekbone.

“Phoenix. Technically. We had to pull over somewhere near a cactus farm last night because the bus smelled like melting plastic.”

Your eyes widened. “Wait, what? What the hell happened?”

“Jesse thinks it was Dina’s straightener. Dina says Jesse farted. I personally think it’s both.”

You wiped the last of your makeup off and leaned back against the couch, balancing your phone on your chest. “Are they with you?”

Ellie shifted on the bed. Looked away from you.

“...They got their own rooms tonight.”

“What? Again?” you asked, frowning.

“Said they just needed a little space. Being around each other every day gets… exhausting, I guess.”

You nodded slowly, staring at the ceiling. “Yeah. I get that.”

There was a pause. You could hear Ellie exhale, the sound scratchy through the phone mic.

“I really miss you,” she said, voice stripped of all the usual sarcasm.

You closed your eyes, the ache settling in behind your ribs. “I miss you too. So much.”

“I think about you all day," she flipped onto her back, the guitar now resting on her stomach, and tapped the ash from her cigarette into an empty coffee cup. "Wanna hear what I was working on?”

“Obviously.”

Ellie didn’t even glance at you. Just gave a small, tired smile, and started to play.

It was nothing showy—no solo, no bravado. Just a simple, slow melody that felt like the end of something. You recognized a few chords from something she’d hummed under her breath months ago, but this version had changed. It was moodier now. Melancholy. Like it was trying to tell you something it couldn’t say out loud.

You watched her carefully. She wasn’t performing. Not this time. Her brow furrowed just a little, her fingers moved almost absentmindedly, like they were remembering the shape of something that used to mean more. The shape of something lost.

When she finished, she didn’t say anything. Just let her hand rest on the frets and stared up at the ceiling, breathing through her nose.

You didn’t want to ruin the silence.

But still you asked, “…Does it have a name?”

“Yeah,” she said after a moment. “Through the Valley.”

You nodded slowly, though something tightened in your chest.

“Are you... okay?” you asked softly. “You’re kinda quiet.”

There was a pause. You could almost hear her jaw clench. She hated being read that easily.

“I’m just tired,” she said, but it came with a grimace, like it hurt to admit. “Don’t worry about it, babe.”

You didn’t push, but the silence lingered—long enough to feel heavy.

Then, as she brought the cigarette back to her lips, you noticed it—the smallest tremor. Her fingers, just barely. Holding it too tightly. Like she was trying to will them into stillness.

You narrowed your eyes. “Hey… what’s up with your hand?”

Ellie froze for a fraction of a second. Just long enough to notice.

Then, reluctantly, she lifted her hand and held it up to the camera. “Nothing. Just a little shake. No big deal.”

You leaned forward. It was subtle, but there. A twitch.

“How long’s it been like that?”

She dropped her hand fast. “Not long. It’s—whatever. Stress.”

You didn’t say anything. Just waited.

She sighed and rubbed a hand over her face, crushing out the cigarette. “It’s just been a weird couple days. Shit schedule. No food. No rest.”

You tilted your head. “Did you actually eat today?"

“Yeah,” she said, too casually. “A burger. And Jesse’s superfood sludge smoothie. He's in his gut health era. Again.”

You narrowed your eyes. “What kind of smoothie?”

“Kale. Banana. Depression. Maybe grass clippings. Can’t confirm.”

You gave a tired laugh, sinking deeper into the couch. “That sounds fucking disgusting.”

“It was. I drank half and poured the rest into a succulent. Pretty sure it’s dead now.”

You smiled, but your chest still felt tight.

She was curled into herself, elbows tucked in too close, shoulders hunched like they didn’t know how to relax.

Her fingers kept fidgeting even after the guitar was set aside. Restless. Anxious. She wasn’t telling you everything. But she was trying.

She always tried.

Ellie yawned then, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hand like a kid. She was so cute when she wasn’t trying to look hot in front of you—though, to be fair, even her exhausted gremlin mode was unfairly attractive.

“Let's stop talking about me” she murmured, voice gone quieter, “Are you okay?”

You nodded too quickly. “Yeah. Just post-show crash. You know how it is.”

She hummed, but didn’t look away from you.

“You sure?” she asked. “You look kinda… I dunno. Tired. Haunted. Like someone insulted your shoes and you haven’t recovered.”

You gave a breathy laugh, trying to lighten it. “My shoes were perfect, thank you very much.”

“I didn’t say they weren’t. I said someone insulted them. Big difference.”

You smiled, but didn’t meet her gaze.

Then she added, softer now, “You can tell me if it’s something else.”

It’s you. I’m scared for you. You haven’t eaten. Your hands are shaking. You won’t talk to me and I’m a thousand miles away. I'm trying my best but it's not enough. I don’t know how to help you. I don’t even know how to help myself.

“It’s nothing, love. I’m okay. I swear.”

Ellie didn’t buy it. You could see it in the way her jaw shifted, how she picked at the fraying hem of her boxers like she needed something to do with her hands.

She looked back up, eyes narrowing just a little. “Are you eating?”

You blinked. “What?”

“Like… properly. Not just a granola bar and a prayer. Real food.”

“Yeah. I mean—I had, like, toast today. And some gummy bears.”

Ellie gave you a look. “Babe. That’s not food.”

“It was all I could stomach.”

There was a pause. Her voice dropped low, serious. “You gotta take care of yourself, alright? Stop worrying about me so much and focus on you.”

You stared at her. “I could say the same to you.”

She sighed, tugged her knees up and rested her chin on them, like a kid folding in on herself. “Yeah. I know.”

You both sat there in silence for a second, just watching each other—tired eyes, cracked voices, too much distance.

Neither of you said what you were really thinking.

But the silence didn’t feel empty. It felt like a warning.

Then, suddenly, she looked up and down at you and smirked faintly.

“Your tits are, like, really distracting me right now, by the way.”

“Ellie.”

“I’m just saying,” she shrugged, “it’s very hard to be hot and mysterious when your boobs are doing that.”

You burst out laughing, covering your face. “Jesus Christ.”

She looked pleased with herself. “You’re the one who answered facetime in a skin-tight corset.”

“It’s my stage fit!”

“Uh-huh. Sure. For the stage. Not for the little FaceTime with your rockstar girlfriend.”

You rolled your eyes, but your heart felt lighter for a second. “You’re such an idiot.”

“Only for you.”

But even as she smiled, it faltered at the edges. She didn’t move from her spot. Her body hadn’t changed positions the whole time you’d been talking.

You told her about your afterparty plans, about the confetti cannon that misfired during your ballad and nearly took out your backup singer. Ellie laughed—really laughed—and for one bright minute, everything felt normal again. Easy.

But when the call ended and the screen went dark, you didn’t move. You didn’t peel off the stage armor or wipe off the remnants of the night.

You just sat there—still in the clothes the world expected to see you in, the fabric sticking to your skin, heavy with sweat and spotlight. Heart full with the kind of ache that doesn't scream, just settles deep and wounds.

The night you first noticed her silence, you were backstage in Chicago, your team swirling around you with clipboards and curling irons and half-shouted cues. You thumbed your phone awake, expecting to see her name.

Nothing.

The pit started forming in your stomach then. Not fully, not yet. Just a dull throb beneath the surface, the kind you could ignore.

You sent a message anyway. A casual one. A lifeline disguised as a joke.

You: miss uuuu call me when you can <3

You set your phone down, face-first on the vanity, and pulled your shoulders back. Shoved the dread deep, deep down where it couldn’t reach you.

You smiled sweetly for the meet-and-greet, signing programs and taking pictures, blinking through the flashbulbs until the colors behind your eyelids blurred. You touched shoulders, signed shirts, squeezed strangers' hands until your own went numb.

You hit every note onstage. You spun through every move of the choreo, your body muscle-memorizing its way through the songs you used to love singing. You kept time perfectly, even when your mind wasn’t in the room anymore.

You bowed to a screaming stadium, lights painting your sweat-slick skin gold, and convinced yourself—for just one breath, one heartbeat—that this was still making you happy.

But when you stumbled offstage, heart still rattling from the lights and noise, the first thing you did was flip your phone over with trembling fingers.

Nothing.

You slept badly that night, if you could call it sleep at all. You kept waking up every hour, eyes gritty, fingers reaching for the phone before you could even register why your chest was so tight.

Still nothing.

Day two.

The worry cracked into something uglier. You woke up in another sterile and expensive hotel room, the sun slashing through the blackout curtains like knives, and stared at the blank lockscreen until your vision blurred.

No missed calls. No texts.

Nothing.

You told yourself she was tired. She needed rest. You told yourself you were being crazy, selfish, obsessive. But by lunchtime, you couldn’t pretend anymore.

You texted Jesse.

You: heyyy, everything okay? havent heard from ellie

No answer.

You texted Dina two hours later.

You: d please just tell me she’s okay

No answer.

Hours passed. Interviews blurred together, a carousel of questions you’d answered a hundred times before. Crew members moved around you like surgeons—tugging, pinning, painting, sculpting you into the version they needed you to be.

At one point, your stylist measured your waist and frowned, quietly murmuring to someone else that you’d lost weight. No one asked if you were eating. Just noted it and moved on.

You convinced yourself that maybe if you kept smiling hard enough, singing loud enough, moving fast enough, no one would notice how hollow you felt inside.

How everything that mattered was slipping away, and you had no hands left free to catch it.

By night, your chest felt caved in. You canceled soundcheck with some excuse about a sore throat.

You locked yourself in your hotel suite, blackout curtains pulled tight, the television a muted hum in the background as you sat cross-legged on the carpet, phone in your hand, heart battering against your ribs.

You called her. Straight to voicemail.

You called again.

Straight to voicemail.

You stared at the screen, willing it to change, willing something—anything—to happen that would tether you back to her.

You sat there until your legs went numb. Until your throat ached from swallowing back everything you couldn’t say.

Day three.

The pit inside you turned cavernous. You still performed. Of course you did.

The machine didn’t stop just because your heart was breaking.

You hit your marks. You posed for cameras. You answered questions about your "unwavering dedication to your fans" with a hollow smile stitched into your face. You waved to crowds who chanted your name like it could stitch the holes inside you shut.

But afterward, backstage, alone, you cracked open. You checked your phone before you even took your mic off. Still. Nothing.

You sent another message. And another.

i’m scared

please answer

i just need to know you’re okay

im not mad

please

No read receipt. No reply.

You stared at the blinking cursor in the empty chat box, and for the first time in a long time, you felt something unspool inside you so violently that you had to press the heels of your hands into your eyes just to breathe.

And then—At three a.m., with the city outside your window swallowing itself whole—you got three texts. From her.

i’m fine

stop blowing up everyone’s phone

i just needed space, sorry babe

love you

You stared. The words blurred on the screen. Blurred in your mind.

Fine. Space. Love you.

Nothing real. Nothing you could hold onto.

Not when it was typed out so mechanically, so cold, the way someone apologizes for forgetting a dinner reservation, not for abandoning the only person who would have died before letting them go.

You pressed the phone against your chest like that would make it better. Like you could will her voice through the glass, back into your ears, back into your bloodstream where it belonged.

You typed a response. Erased it. Typed again. Erased it.

There were no words strong enough. There was no way to say I’m unraveling without you without sounding pathetic. No way to say I’m terrified the next time you need space, you won’t come back.

You didn’t sleep that night either. You just laid there, arms wrapped around your own body, breathing through the ache.

Day four.

You made it through rehearsal by pure muscle memory. You smiled through another radio interview, blinking dumbly while they asked about your "exciting upcoming projects" and "the inspiration behind your latest chart-topper."

You thought about telling them the truth. That the only thing you were writing about lately was grief. That your new songs tasted like blood and static. That every word you sang onstage felt like a lie you couldn't stop telling.

Instead, you laughed prettily and said something about growth. About love. About strength.

Afterwards, you stumbled into a dressing room, locked the door, and texted her manager. You didn't care about pride anymore. You didn't care about looking desperate. You just needed to know.

please just tell me if she’s okay

that’s all I need

please

The reply came quicker than you expected. Sharp. Impersonal.

she’s fine

You stared at it, rereading it a dozen times, hoping more words would appear. Some context. Some proof. Some small sign that "fine" meant anything close to the truth.

But the truth was, you knew better. You knew "fine" was the lie people told when the truth was too messy, too raw, too ugly to name.

You slid down the dressing room wall, knees folding tight to your chest, forehead pressed into your arms to muffle the broken sound clawing up your throat.

You didn’t cry for the cameras. You didn’t cry for your friends or family. You didn’t cry onstage or backstage or on the thousand fucking magazine covers that said you had it all.

But you cried now. For her. For yourself.

You whispered her name like a prayer into the silence until your voice went hoarse.

But names don't build bridges when someone's already halfway gone.

And prayers don’t reach the people who don't want to hear them.

You stayed there long after your team started knocking. Long after the show director started panicking about your late call time. Long after you stopped believing that love alone could save her.

Rachel found you then, her face pale, phone gripped so tight in her hand you thought the screen might crack. She didn’t say anything at first. Just held the phone out, thumb hovering above the play button.

You were too tired to ask questions. Too tired to brace yourself. You nodded once, a small, jerky thing, and took the phone from her.

The video was grainy, shot from somewhere in the pit at The Fireflies show in Boston the night before. For a moment, all you could see were flashing lights, a blur of stage smoke and screaming fans. Normal. Expected. Your chest ached with relief, for a heartbeat.

And then you saw her.

Ellie stumbled into frame, guitar slung low across her body. Her hair hung limp against her face, matted with sweat. Her skin looked wrong under the stage lights—too pale, too waxy, like all the color had been drained out of her.

She played, but it wasn’t playing the way you remembered. Her fingers moved stiffly, almost mechanically, dragging across the strings like they didn’t belong to her anymore. Her posture sagged, shoulders hunched like she was bearing some invisible, impossible weight. She looked smaller. Diminished.

There was a part of you that kept waiting—for the grin, the snarled joke into the mic, the way she usually teased Jesse mid-song, the way she would throw her head back and laugh with Dina when she missed a chord.

But there was none of that.

Jesse and Dina played almost six feet away from her, eyes trained on their instruments, movements sharp and isolated. They might as well have been in separate bands. There was no chemistry. No laughter. No pulse. No Fireflies.

You realized, with a sick drop of your stomach, that she was high. Not the buzzing, messy high she could hide behinf magic. This was worse. This was a body on autopilot, a body betrayed by whatever she’d taken just to survive the night.

The video blurred a little as the person recording jostled in the crowd. It caught one last, awful image: Ellie leaning against her mic stand, blinking into the lights like she couldn’t remember where she was.

And then it cut off.

You stared down at the black screen, your chest hollowing out, slow and deep and cruel. You felt it rip something from you, clean through, like peeling skin from muscle. Confirmation.

Rachel sat beside you silently, her hand resting on your shoulder in a useless attempt to steady you.

At first, you laughed.

Not because it was funny. God, no.

Because it was too much.

Because if you didn’t laugh, you were going to start screaming, and you didn’t know if you would ever stop.

Rachel watched you carefully, her body coiled, ready to catch you.

You rubbed at your face with your hand, laughing a thin, broken sound that didn’t even sound human. It punched straight from your ribs, helpless and mean.

"Jesus christ," you whispered. "Jesus fucking christ."

The sound of your own voice startled you. You hadn’t really spoken in days. Not about anything that mattered. Only smiled for cameras. Only nodded for interviews. Only sang until your throat dulled.

She didn't say anything. She just waited, as if afraid she might set you off by breathing wrong.

The truth of it—sharp and raw and final—was burning itself into your brain now. You couldn’t lie to yourself anymore.

You'd seen it with your own eyes. The way her body sagged onstage. The way her hands shook. The way Jesse and Dina didn’t even look at her, like they were too afraid to touch the wire she’d become, crackling and burning and ready to snap.

You dropped the phone and let your head fall into your hands, nails digging into your scalp hard enough to hurt.

"I can’t do this," you said, "I can't fucking do this anymore."

Rachel moved slowly, her hand tentative on your back, between your shoulder blades.

"You don’t have to," she said. Her voice was sturdy, a rope thrown across a canyon. "You can go."

You lifted your head, blinking through the tears stinging your eyes. "Go where?"

"To her," she said simply. "Take the jet. Leave tonight. I'll take care of the rest."

For one second, you almost said no. Almost said you couldn’t, that you had responsibilities, that there was a whole empire resting on your exhausted shoulders.

But something inside you—something feral and desperate and so deeply human it terrified you—snarled back.

Fuck the empire.

Fuck the perfect career.

Fuck the shiny love story the world wanted to believe in.

She needed you.

You stood up so fast your vision blurred, your whole body vibrating with adrenaline and terror.

"I need to fucking see her."

Rachel nodded, already pulling her phone out, already murmuring instructions to your security team, already moving faster than your grief could catch up to you.

She wasn’t surprised. She knew you.

Knew that you were the kind of person who would burn down the world for the people you loved.

You shoved a few things into a duffel bag without thinking, your hands shaking too hard to fold anything properly. Your stage makeup was still half-smeared down your face, your hair was still sticky with sweat, but you didn’t care. You couldn’t breathe until you saw her. You couldn’t live inside your own body for another second if you didn’t put your hands on her and make sure she was still real.

The car ride to the private airport was a blur. The city lights slashed past the windows in violent streaks. You sat stiff and silent in the backseat, your hands clasped so tightly in your lap that your knuckles ached. Rachel didn’t try to talk to you. She just sat beside you, solid and quiet, like a lighthouse.

When you boarded the jet, you barely noticed the luxury. You barely noticed anything. You pressed your forehead to the glass as the plane sliced into the sky, your breath fogging the window, your pulse hammering out a prayer that didn’t have words anymore.

Please don’t be too late.

Rachel hadn’t come with you. She'd offered, said she’d fly with you, sit with you, hold your hand if you needed it. But you’d said no.

This wasn’t something anyone could shield you from.

You stared out at the dark, endless stretch of stars, and for the first time since this all began, you realized something brutal.

This wasn’t about saving her anymore. It was about saying goodbye, if you had to. It was about being brave enough to find her wherever she was—whole, broken, or somewhere in between—and tell her, You can still come home.

Even if she didn’t know how to make her way back.

Because some promises are bigger than heartbreak. Some promises are bigger than pride. And loving her had never been about winning.

It had always been about staying.

You arrived at the venue just past midnight, drowning in a hoodie three sizes too big, sunglasses cutting sharp lines across your face despite the darkness.

The staff entrance was a mess—roadies dragging tangled cables across the concrete, stagehands shouting over radios, exhausted techs hunched over broken light boards. The heavy buzz of electricity and urgency pressed against your skin, but you barely noticed. You pulled your hood tighter, shoved your fists into the pocket, and moved through the chaos like you were invisible.

When you reached the checkpoint, a security guard—mid-thirties, arms folded over his chest, exhaustion written across his face—stepped into your path.

"No access, kid," he said, glancing at your shoes, your hoodie, your hunched posture, and deciding you didn’t belong here.

Your hands shook as you pulled your sunglasses off, jaw tightening so hard it hurt. You tilted your face up toward the dim overhead light.

The moment recognition hit, the man nearly stumbled backwards. His face went pale.

"Oh my god—I'm so sorry miss—I didn’t—I mean, you can—shit," he stammered, tripping over his own words, fumbling for the keycard at his belt.

You just nodded, sharp and silent, stepping past him before he could finish apologizing.

You moved faster, heart a dull, painful thud in your ears. Then you turned the corner—and stopped dead.

Voices.

Shouting.

Not the roar of fans. Not the pounding rhythm of drums. Real, furious, broken shouting.

You didn’t think. You walked fast towards it, the sound growing louder with every desperate step.

You rounded the corner and almost slammed into her.

Erin. Ellie’s assistant.

She was standing stiffly near the entrance to the backstage hallway, arms crossed, foot tapping against the floor with a restless, angry force. Her head jerked up when she saw you.

"Where's Ellie?" you demanded, breathless.

Erin looked at you —really looked at you—for a second too long. Then her mouth curled into something sharp and tired, her eyes flashing with something you couldn't name.

"Wouldn’t you like to know,"

You blinked, the words not registering. "What?"

She shrugged, the motion too casual, too dismissive.

"It’s been a shitshow for weeks. You’re just late to the party."

You shook your head, as if that could undo the words, as if that could change the way your stomach was folding in on itself.

"What do you mean?" you rasped.

"I mean they can barely stay in the same room without screaming at each other. I mean this tour’s been falling apart at the seams, and no one wanted to tell you because, what, you’re supposed to be the golden girl? The only one she listens to?"

Your mouth opened, but no sound came out.

Her voice softened, almost pitying now. "And it all started when you left."

Erin just shrugged again, as if she'd already said too much, and walked away.

You were barely breathing as you crept closer to the door. The voices had been muffled at first, just angry shapes of sound—Dina’s sharp, furious tone cutting through like glass.

But now you were close enough to hear everything.

Then it hit—an explosion of glass. Loud, sharp, violent enough to rattle the wall.

“You can’t even fucking STAND right now!” she screamed. “You’re fucking high again, Ellie! Again! You think we’re all so fucking blind?!”

Then came Ellie’s voice. A guttural shout that cracked on its way out of her throat.

“Fuck you, Dina! Fuck you for acting like you’re fucking better than me!”

And you froze.

Because that didn’t sound like her.

It didn’t sound like Ellie.

It wasn’t the gravelly warmth that used to whisper songs against your skin, the dry humor that used to curl through your late-night phone calls, the hushed tremble that told you she loved you like it was a secret too sacred for the world to hear.

No. This voice was slurred and wrecked and wild, shattering under its own weight. Like it had been hollowed out, then filled with something dark and volatile. Something you didn’t recognize.

"I don’t have to be better to see what a fucking mess you are!" Dina roared back, so loud it rattled inside your chest. "You’re gonna blow this show! Twenty thousand people out there and you can’t even fucking walk straight!"

“I didn’t ask for this!” Ellie roared, and you heard something crash again—glass, maybe, or that heavy ashtray she always insisted on bringing. Whatever it was, it shattered loud against the floor. “I didn’t fucking ask to be the poster girl, you stupid fucking cunt!”

“I write the songs, I sing, I play, I am the fucking show!” she shouted again. “There wouldn’t be a fucking Fireflies without me! I bled for this. I sold my fucking soul for this band! And now I’m just some face?”

“Yes, you're the face!” Dina snapped back, her voice shaking, not from fear but fury. “You get the fans. You get the press. You get the fucking spotlight, Ellie. Whether you want it or not!”

Then Jesse tried to cut through, voice cracking under the pressure. "Can we not do this right now? We have a fucking show in thirty minutes—"

"Shut the fuck up, Jesse!" Dina spat, her words hitting like open hands. "You don’t get to lecture anyone when you showed up to rehearsal smelling like a goddamn brewery!"

"I wasn’t partying, you fucking bitch!" Jesse barked back, fury snapping through the walls. "I was blowing off steam because this goddamn shitshow is a death sentence!"

“You were off getting shitfaced!” Dina shrieked, her voice splintering with rage. “While I was the one dragging Ellie off the fucking bathroom floor, you fucking useless dickhead!”

Another crash. A bottle against the wall, the sound of glass exploding. You didn’t know who threw it—Jesse, Dina, Ellie—it didn’t matter. You flinched so hard your chest seized up, like the sound had reached in and bruised you.

“I’m tired of being the only one who shows the fuck up!” Dina spat, breath ragged. “At least when I’m here, I’m present! Not floating through the fucking room with my brain fried from whatever the fuck she’s been snorting!”

For a second, everything went quiet. Then Ellie spoke. Low, shaking with something close to animal anger

“Say that again.”

Dina didn’t hesitate. Didn’t flinch. “You’re a fucking junkie, Ellie.”

“You’re a goddamn drug addict,” she continued, her words cutting like a blade, “and you’re dragging us down with you. And I’m done. I’m fucking done picking up the pieces while you light everything on fire and call it a day!”

Her voice cracked then—not with weakness, but with fury sharpened by heartbreak.

“We have been bending over backwards for you for years, Ellie. YEARS. And all we get is lies and fucking excuses. WE ARE ALL FUCKING EXHAUSTED!”

Ellie growled, deep in her throat.

"Fuck you, Dina! You think you’re a fucking saint? You think your hands are clean?!"

"We don’t use before shows!" she spat so hard you could hear her almost choking on it. "We have the decency to wait! We have respect for the people who came to see us!"

Ellie laughed—a horrible sound, bitter and broken. "Respect? The only thing getting me through your fucking whining is being high enough to forget it!"

“You think that’s a fucking excuse?” Jesse snapped, his voice low but razor sharp. “You think you’re the only one hurting?”

He wasn’t yelling like Dina had been. He didn’t have to. His voice was steady in that terrifying way people get when they’re trying not to fall apart.

“You think you’ve got the monopoly on pain just because you're the one with the spotlight and the mic in your hand?”

There was a pause. A charged, electric silence.

“Ever since she left,” he said—and his voice cracked, just once, like it caught on something sharp on the way out—

“You’ve been fucking lost, Ellie.”

It hit the room like a hammer.

You pressed harder into the door, tears burning behind your eyes.

"Don’t bring her into this."

"You just won't tell her the truth!" Dina shouted. "You can't even talk to her!"

"YOU THINK I DON'T FUCKING KNOW THAT?!" Ellie exploded, the words ragged and shredded.

“Then act like it! Do something! Get help. Go to fucking rehab. Stop making excuses to get clean!”

Dina screamed, her voice cracking under the weight of everything she’d been holding back.

“You said after the tour. You promised. And then you packed the whole goddamn calendar like you were planning your own fucking overdose!”

Behind the door, you lowered yourself slowly, pressing your forehead against it.

That was what Ellie had told you. You had cupped her face like something fragile in that hotel bathroom, like something you could save, and you’d believed her.

Those words had held the broken remains of hope inside of you.

And they were lies.

The sob slipped out before you could stop it—full of something breaking. You covered your mouth with your hand, knuckles pressed hard against your lips, trying to hold it all in.

Inside, Ellie’s voice dropped to a growl, “Why would I? What the fuck do I have left?!”

The air changed. Turned bitter. Charged. Like lightning about to strike. Like something holy unraveling.

And then Dina twisted the knife.

“If you won’t get help for yourself,” she said, voice like ice, “then do it for the people you’re fucking destroying.”

Inside, she stepped forward, eyes locked on Ellie like she couldn’t recognize who she was looking at anymore.

“If you won’t take the blame for us, or for everything we bled to build, or for the fact that you're dragging this band into the fucking ground—”

She paused. Just for a second. Then landed the blow.

“Then at least blame yourself for y/n.”

There was a crash—something metal, slammed to the ground so hard it echoed off the walls like a gunshot.

Then Ellie’s voice exploded through the room—furious, slurred, incoherent.

“Shut the fuck up! Shut the fuck up about her! Shut the fuck up about everything!”

“You can’t even say her name!” Jesse shouted, voice low and bitter. “You love her so much and you can’t even say her name!”

That’s when Ellie snapped.

“Fuck you!” she screamed, voice cracked wide open. “Fuck both of you! You want me sober? You want me clean? Maybe if I wasn’t stuck with two judgmental, self-righteous ungrateful assholes who clearly fucking hate me, I wouldn’t need to be high just to fucking breathe!”

“We don’t hate you,” he said, not even above a whisper, and you barely heard it. “We’re just tired of you.”

And that—somehow—was worse. Worse than all the shouting. Worse than the lies.

“You don’t know what it’s like,” she hissed. “You don’t fucking know. You don’t know what it feels like to be me! You don’t know what it’s like to write a song that saves someone’s life and still not be able to save your own!"

And then, after a long, shaking breath, Dina spoke. Her voice wasn’t angry anymore. It was soft. Sad.

“You’ve got fifteen minutes, Ellie,” she said quietly. “Fifteen minutes to pull yourself together. Or we lose everything. All of it.”

A heavy silence settled like ash.

Then Jesse added, voice hoarse with something like grief.

“There are twenty thousand people out there.”

Another pause.

“And they’re all waiting for you.”

And on the other side of the door—your hands clutched to your mouth, your face soaked with tears—you couldn’t move.

Couldn’t breathe.

You were shaking so violently you didn’t know if you’d ever stop again.

When the door finally burst open, the metal hinges shrieked under the force of it.

You instinctively stepped back, half-hidden in the narrow shadow of the hallway, heart hammering against your ribs.

Jesse came out first. Head down, jaw clenched, one hand raking violently through his hair while the other gripped his drumsticks in a death-hold—so tight his knuckles had gone bone white. His chest was rising and falling fast, like he hadn’t taken a full breath in hours. His face looked harder than you remembered—older, somehow. Sharpened by exhaustion.

Behind him, Dina stormed through the door and slammed it shut, not even glancing up. Her eyes burned holes into the floor, her lips a tight line of fury. Every step she took echoed—uneven, angry, deliberate. She vanished around the corner without a word.

Jesse didn’t see you. Not at first. His momentum carried him fast, like he was still riding the tail end of some internal explosion.

And then—his shoulder slammed into yours. Hard.

You staggered back, catching yourself against the wall.

He froze instantly.

His head whipped toward you, and for a second, he just stared. Like his brain was struggling to piece together the moment—who you were, why you were there, what he'd just done, what you just heard.

You watched it all flicker across his face: the shock, the confusion, then the guilt. Thick. Immediate. Ugly.

“Shit…” he breathed, eyes darting like he didn’t know where to look. His hands twitched, hovering uselessly at his sides like he didn’t know whether to reach for you or just disappear. “I didn’t… fuck, I didn’t see you.”

You straightened, forcing your voice to work.

"Jesse," you rasped, too raw, too desperate. "What’s going on?"

"You really shouldn’t be here," he said, "This is... it’s bad, okay? It’s really fucking bad."

"Then tell me," you responded, your voice breaking somewhere halfway through the sentence. "Why the fuck haven’t you answered me? Why didn’t any of you tell me what was happening?"

He shook his head, grimacing like it physically hurt.

"It’s not because we didn’t want to," he said, almost pleading. "We—fuck, we wanted to. Every time you called, every time you texted, it killed us not to pick up."

You stared at him, the words clawing at your throat.

"Then why?"

He swallowed, hard. You could see the guilt stitching him together and ripping him apart all at once.

"Because Ellie made us promise," he said. "She fucking made us swear not to tell you anything."

You blinked, stunned.

"What?"

"She threatened to fire Erin. Threatened to cut ties with me and Dina," Jesse said, voice shaking now. "Said if we even hinted to you how bad it was getting, if we even breathed about it, she’d be done with us. She said if you found out, it��d ruin everything. Said you deserved better than to be dragged into this fucking shitshow."

He laughed then—a dreadful sound that scraped the walls.

"And the worst part is?" he added, eyes glinting and wet. "She actually fucking believed she was protecting you."

You pressed the heels of your hands into your eyes, trying to breathe around the sudden, crushing weight of betrayal and heartbreak and helpless, brutal understanding.

Because of course she did.

Of course Ellie would burn the whole world down to protect you, even if it was the last thing you wanted. Even if what she was protecting you from was herself.

Jesse was still watching you, something wrecked in his expression, but still, he began to walk away.

"I’m sorry you had to see it like this. I’m sorry we let it get this bad. We really fucking tried."

You dropped your hands from your face, blinking back the blur of tears.

"Is she really..."

You couldn’t even finish the sentence. Your throat closed around it.

Jesse shook his head, his jaw tightening. His voice dropped even lower, just a thread.

"She’s not okay."

The words hung between you, heavy as lead.

"And the truth?" almost whispering now, like it was too dangerous to say any louder, now even more far away from you.

"None of us fucking are."

The hallway around you stretched empty and endless, humming with the echoes of all the things that had been broken in just minutes.

You stood there, frozen. One hand hovering now inches from the doorknob, the other clenched tight at your side like it might keep you grounded. Your breath came shallow. Too loud in the silence she’d left behind.

And then Jesse turned.

“I’m gonna… I’m gonna give you a minute,” he said, running a hand through his hair again like it hurt to stand still. “She’s not listening to us anymore. Maybe she never was.”

He hesitated. Just long enough to let the pain show through the cracks.

“Maybe she’ll listen to you,” he said. “Maybe you’re the last person she might still want to be better for.”

The words sat between you like a goodbye.

And then he stepped back. Shoulders heavy with everything he wasn’t saying.

“I’ll be down the hall,” he added quietly. “Just... scream if you need anything.”

You nodded, though you weren’t sure you could speak.

Whatever had exploded in that room was now burning low, reduced to embers and ash. But the quiet that followed wasn’t peace. It was worse. Heavier. Like the moment before a storm shifts course and takes everything down with it.

You didn’t know what you’d find on the other side of the door.

Part of you didn’t want to know.

It was just you.

Just you, the door, and the girl on the other side who once swore she’d never hurt you.

But the door finally creaked open beneath your trembling hand, and for one long, suspended heartbeat, the world stopped breathing with you.

There she was.

Ellie.

Collapsed on the battered greenroom couch, folded inward like something destroyed beyond repair. Her sleeve was shoved carelessly past her right elbow, revealing tattooed pale skin washed ghostly white beneath the sickly, flickering yellow light. A disposable lighter jittered weakly between her trembling fingers. The coffee table in front of her was a war zone, and at its center, balanced on the edge of ruin, a single spoon.

Scorched. Charred black at its base.

The air was dense and stifling with the smell of burning metal, acrid vinegar, and something sickly-sweet, chemical, poisoned—something that made bile rise and burn at the back of your throat.

But none of it mattered. None of it struck you like it should’ve.

Because Ellie’s other hand held something worse.

Something undeniable. Something that sliced reality open with ruthless, devastating clarity.

A syringe.

Full. Loaded. Shaking.

The plunger trembled beneath the pad of her thumb; the needle glittered cruelly in the dim light, cold and sharp, glinting like the blade of a knife.

The realization detonated inside your chest, silent and annihilating, obliterating every fragile lie you'd told yourself about her being fine. Your body moved forward before your brain could catch up, legs weak and useless beneath you, stumbling toward her like something inside you was magnetized to the destruction.

She didn’t see you at first.

She was somewhere else—somewhere unreachable, trapped behind glass, drowning in a nightmare you couldn’t touch. Her head hung low over the pale crook of her elbow, bottom lip caught desperately between her teeth, muscles twitching with tiny spasms she couldn’t control. Her movements were clumsy, fumbling, heartbreakingly vulnerable—like a child lost in the dark, fighting an enemy she couldn’t see.

She was still so young. She was still so breakable. She was still a kid.

You opened your mouth to call her name, but your voice had vanished, robbed by the cruel weight of what you were seeing.

There was nothing—nothing but the panicked, shallow rasp of your own breath as it splintered apart inside your chest.

And then Ellie lifted her head.

The syringe almost slipped through her shaking fingers. Her entire body jerked backward violently, as if the mere sight of you standing in that doorway was a bullet tearing through her heart. Her lips parted, desperately sucking in air that never came, eyes wide and raw and impossibly wounded. Her face twisted into something far more harrowing than fear or surprise or pain.

It was shame. It was guilt.

It was devastation.

Those green eyes—eyes you knew so well, eyes that used to watch you across rooms, across stages, or close enough to catch every color of your irises, alway soft and sharp and warm and full of pure love—were empty now. Hollowed out. Ravaged. She stared at you like you were the last beautiful thing she’d ever touched with her hands, and now, somehow, she’d shattered you too.

Her mouth fumbled helplessly for words, excuses, apologies—frantic, silent pleas for forgiveness she knew she didn’t deserve.

And then finally, a ragged, broken sound escaped her throat, fractured with guilt, grief, and horror.

"What the fuck—what the fuck are you doing here?"

You finally managed to sneak out your trance and sprinted into the room, heart pounding so violently against your ribs it felt like it might shatter you from the inside out. Your vision blurred, your breath came too fast, too loud. You lurched forward, clipped the edge of the coffee table, and sent everything on it crashing to the ground.

“What the fuck am I doing here?!” you screamed, your voice already cracked, already splintering under the weight of it. “What the fuck are you doing, Ellie?!”

She jolted like she’d been shot. Scrambled back, messy, frantic—shoving the syringe behind her like a child caught red-handed, like it wasn’t already too late. Like her hands weren’t already soaked in everything she was trying to hide.

But you were on her in two steps.

You grabbed her wrist. Tight. Desperate. Trembling so hard it felt like your bones might shatter.

She thrashed. Clumsy. Uncoordinated. Weak in all the wrong places. She shoved at your chest, nails scraping, breath ragged, body shaking with too many toxins and not enough strength to fight you off–too light, too thin, too broken.

“Get off me!” she shrieked, “Get the fuck off me!”

“No!” you screamed back, eyes wild, throat raw. “No, no! you don’t get to do this! You don’t get to fucking leave me like this!”

It wasn’t a fight. It was a collapse.

A collision of love and terror and everything you’d both tried to pretend wasn’t happening.

You crashed into each other—limbs tangled, breaths colliding. You didn’t care how hard you hit the floor. You didn’t care that her elbow slammed into your ribs. You didn’t care that she was screaming.

You fought.

You fought for her. For the version of her who used to smile when you said her name. For the girl who promised she’d try. For the person you still believed was buried under the ash.

You fought for her the way she should’ve been fighting for herself.

You clawed. You begged. You cursed her. You loved her.

And in the middle of it all—caught between your hands, between the panic and the heartbreak and the grief—

The syringe broke clean in half, cracked against the edge of the table with a sound so sharp it rang through your chest like a bullet.

Everything stopped.

You stumbled back, breath jagged, heart racing.

Ellie staggered too, eyes wide, then collapsed—as if gravity had finally remembered she was made of bones and flesh. She slid down the wall, hands covering her face, shoulders curling in like she wanted to disappear inside herself.

And you just stood there.

Staring at the broken syringe on the floor. Dark, brown poisoned liquid all around it. It was a mirror. Those shattered pieces mirrored everything she’d promised you, everything she’d thrown away.

You didn’t even realize you were crying until the sob ripped its way out of you—ugly, gasping, human.

“…You’re a fucking liar,” you said, voice shaking so hard it barely made it out. “You lied to me.”

“You made me believe you were trying,” you whispered. “Like I was enough to make you try.”

And then, softer—barely audible through your grief.

“Why wasn’t I enough?”

Ellie lifted her head.

Her eyes were bloodshot, wild, barely hers anymore.

“I was trying!” she spat, voice ripping out of her like it had claws. “You think I wanted you to see this?! You think I wanted you to fucking see me like this?!”

“You treated me like I was a fucking idiot!” you screamed, the betrayal splitting you open. “You act like I wouldn’t notice you disappearing! Like I couldn’t see you falling apart!”

“I didn’t want you to!” she choked out—and then she broke.

The fight drained out of her all at once. Her shoulders collapsed, her spine bowed, like her body had given up the lie. She slumped against the wall, small and ruined, bones unable to bear the weight of the wreckage.

You were shaking. Shaking so hard your teeth clicked in your skull, your fingers curled into fists you couldn’t unclench. Like your own skin might split open and fall away from you.

“I believed you,” you whispered, barely able to hear yourself over the sound of your heart breaking. “I fucking believed you.”

Ellie pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes like she was trying to erase herself.

“I didn’t ask you to believe in me,” she muttered.

“You didn’t have to!”

You shot back, and your voice broke wide open.

“I loved you!”

She flinched like the word hit her in the face. It cracked something in her chest she’d tried to bury.

You stepped closer. Hands trembling. Voice trembling worse.

“Why did you make everyone swear not to tell me? Why didn’t you call? Why didn’t you fucking call, Ellie?!”

She slid lower, curling in on herself until her forehead touched the floor, mumbling something you couldn’t make out—just noise, just static.

You dropped to your knees in front of her. Grabbed her shoulders. Shook her.

“Answer me!”

She just let you shake her like she deserved every punishment you wanted to give her.

“I don’t know,”

She whispered. And it wasn’t an excuse. It was a confession. It was the truth, raw and awful and useless.

You shook your head, tears blurring your vision, voice splintering into something sharp.

“You do know.”

She looked away.

“You fucking know.” You swallowed hard. Your voice dropped. “Don’t lie to me, Ellie. Not again.”

Finally, she dragged her hands down her face, slow like every movement hurt. When she looked up, her eyes were swollen, rimmed red, glassy with tears she hadn’t let fall.

And there it was.

That look.

Like she knew she’d killed something precious with her own hands.

“You left,” she said, voice trembling at the seams, barely holding. “You left and I didn’t know what the fuck to do.”

“I didn’t fucking leave you!” you shouted, the words erupting from your chest so violently they felt like they might tear your throat open. “We both had tours! We had contracts! You knew that—we knew what this life was when we chose it. When we chose each other!”

“I know!” she screamed, “But when you left—when you left—everything went fucking quiet. The world just—collapsed, and I didn’t know how to fucking stand in it!”

Her voice shattered halfway through, splitting clean down the middle.

“But you promised me!” you cried, and it didn’t even sound like your voice anymore—just a raw, splintered thing cracking. “You fucking promised you’d try! You said you’d call—you said you’d eat—you said—”

The last word caught in your throat, jagged and cruel.

“You said you wouldn’t disappear on me!”

Ellie dragged a shaking hand through her hair and yanked, like she wanted to rip something out of herself, and you winced at the sound it made—desperate, aching.

“I wanted to try,” she rasped. “I swear to God, I wanted to. But every time I opened my eyes, you were a thousand miles away, and I couldn’t—” Her voice cracked, then collapsed completely. “I couldn’t fucking breathe. Trying wasn’t enough. It was never enough!”

You stared at her.

At the girl who had whispered forever into your mouth. At the girl who once turned your love into songs.

And now she was here. Coming undone in front of you. And somehow, it still didn’t feel enough.

“…But you promised,” you said again, voice hollow now. Smaller. Fragile, as if saying it any louder it might crush you.

She looked at you—and the devastation in her eyes was the kind of thing you don’t walk away from.

Your chest was heaving. Your hands were fists so tight your nails cut into your skin. You didn’t even notice the sting.

Tears blurred the room, blurred her, blurred the syringe glittering in broken pieces on the floor. That smell—burnt metal and chemicals and pain—was in your mouth, in your lungs, pressed into your skin like a stain you’d never scrub out.

And she just layed there.

Breathing like every inhale was a damnation.

She didn’t speak. Didn’t move. Just watched you fall apart in front of her like it was the only thing left she knew how to do.

That silence was worse than any scream.

“You told me,” you gasped, voice hoarse and shaking, “You told me you were going to fight—for you, for me, for this—FOR US!”

And something inside you twisted. Curled in on itself. Hardened into something uglier than rage.

“And now you’re here! Using he—!”

You couldn’t finish. You physically couldn’t make your mouth shape the word.

So you folded. Bent at the waist, hands gripping your knees like you might fly apart without the pressure holding you down.

You didn’t want to scream. You wanted to vomit. You wanted to disappear.

You lifted your head, wild and desperate, and saw it—saw the way her face had crumpled in on itself, the way her shoulders hunched like she was trying to become smaller, disappear into the floor.

And then she whispered it.

So soft you almost didn’t hear it.

“...I didn’t want you to hate me.”

You shook your head before she even finished the sentence. Violently. Desperately. The tears flooded, hot and heavy and merciless, sliding down your cheeks in broken silence.

“I could never hate you,”

You choked, voice wrecked beyond recognition.

“Not for a fucking second. Not even when I want to. Not even when I tried. Not even for what you’re doing to yourself.”

You were sobbing now, hands trembling at your sides, fists curled like you were trying to hold in the pieces of yourself she hadn’t already broken.

“Not even for the way you’re breaking my heart right now.”

Your tears blurred your vision, but her silhouette stayed focused. Slid down the wall, slow, heavy, her legs folding like paper under her. Collapsing inward.

She looked unrecognizable. Not the rockstar. Not the legend. Not the girl the world screamed for. Just a broken kid in an old shirt on a dirty greenroom floor.

“But I hate myself,” she whispered.

And you felt it. Like a crack splitting down the center of the room. Down the center of yourself.

“I hate myself,” she said again, louder this time. Just flesh and guilt.

You moved towards her on instinct, like your body couldn’t bear the distance anymore. But she flinched—hard—like your love was fire and she was already burning.

Her breath hitched. Her throat worked around the words like they were made of glass.

“That’s why I didn’t call,” she rasped. “That’s why I—”

Her hands curled into fists against the floor, trembling with the force of holding it in.

“That’s why we shouldn’t be near each other.”

It landed like a death sentence.

You stared at her. Stared at the girl who once swore she’d never let go of you.

“What?”

You whispered, but the word was so broken, so small, it barely reached her.

The word barely had shape.

Because deep down, you already knew.

“I…” She choked on the word. Swallowed hard. Tried again. “I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”

It hit like a fist to the chest—no warning, no air. Just pain. Just the sound of something splitting you open from the inside.

“I’m hurting you, every day. I see it. On your face.”

You shook your head. Hard. Desperate.

“No—you’re not—you’re not—”

“I am,” she cut in, the words cracked and sharp like dry wood splitting down the grain. “I’m killing you. And you keep pretending it’s fine, you keep smiling for the cameras like you're not rotting from the inside out. But it’s not fine. It’s eating you alive.”

You wanted to say she was wrong. You wanted to scream it. But you couldn’t.

Because you knew she wasn’t.

“You fell in love with someone who doesn’t exist,” Ellie whispered, her voice unraveling. Her nails scraped uselessly against the floor, desperate for something to hold. “You fell in love with the version of me that used to be. The one who was still holding it together. Who was still funny and brilliant and—fuck—still salvageable.”

“Please,” you breathed, tears burning your throat. “Please stop—”

But she shook her head like she couldn’t. As if stopping would mean drowning in it.

“You didn’t fall in love with this,” she spat with a bitter, hollow laugh. “Not this. Not a fucking addict who ghosts you for days because she’s too ashamed to even open your messages.”

“That’s not true, I—” you tried, but your voice crumbled halfway through.

“You deserve someone who doesn’t make you wonder every goddamn night if they’re still alive,” Ellie said, and now her voice was spinning out—fast, unfiltered, like she had to say it before she shattered completely. “You deserve someone who can walk beside you. Someone who isn’t dragging you into the dark.”

“Ellie—”

“I see it,” she said, and her voice broke again. “I see it every time you look at me. It’s not just love anymore. It’s pity.”

“No,” you gasped, stumbling forward, reaching— “No, I don’t—”

But she pulled back like your touch scalded her.

“This life is ruining us. I know you. I see it all over you. You’re pale. You’ve lost weight. You don’t sleep. You walk through rooms like you’re halfway gone. And I became another weight on your chest, and you don’t deserve that.”

She pressed her palms into her eyes, hard.

“I hate seeing you like this,” she rasped. “I hate what I’ve done to you. What I’m still doing.”

“You’re not—” you tried to say, but your voice faltered. Because even now, with every cell in your body screaming not to agree, you felt it.

You were tired.

Exhausted.

And she knew. She’d known for a long time.

“You have your career,” Ellie said, softer now. More broken. “You have this brilliant, impossible life that you built from nothing. You were shining before you even met me. And if you stay… I’ll dim that light. I’ll pull you under. And you know I will.”

She said it like a confession.

An apology to a god that never showed up.

“You were always too good to be true,” she whispered. “You taught me how to love when I didn’t think I could. You were the first thing I ever loved that scared me more than myself. And you tried. You tried harder than anyone ever has.”

Your knees gave in completely, collapsing in the ground beside her. You looked at her and barely recognized either of you.

“Then why are you leaving me?” you choked, voice cracked and bleeding.

She swallowed, and it buckled her whole body.

“Because love isn’t enough. It doesn’t fix this.”

It cracked something so deep inside you, you knew it would never heal.

“It doesn’t fix me.”

Your whole body was shaking, your breath coming in sharp, ragged pulls. Tears had soaked through your hoodie. The space between you felt endless—too wide, too broken to ever be stitched shut again.

“...But I need you.”

“I need you even more,” she said softly. “But I already made my decision. I’m doing this for you.”

Neither of you moved. Neither of you breathed.

A loud bang echoed down the hall—someone shouting “One minute to showtime!”—but it barely registered. The real countdown was already ticking inside your chest.

Ellie’s hands rose to your face. Clumsy. Like a kid leaning in for her first kiss. Shaking so bad it made your skin vibrate. She cradled you like something sacred—something already lost.

And then—

Then she kissed you.

Not like a lover. Like a goodbye.

It wasn’t careful. It wasn’t clean. It was everything.

And it wounded.

A kiss filled with sorrow so deep it tasted metallic, like blood in your mouth. A kiss that reeked of grief and devotion and everything she couldn’t find the words to say. A kiss that said I love you and I’m sorry and please remember me—all at once.

You kissed her back like you were drowning. As if you held her close enough, tight enough, the moment wouldn’t end. Your fingers dug into the fabric of her shirt, trying to anchor her, trying to anchor yourself.

But the clock didn’t stop.

The world didn’t wait.

It never had.

It didn’t pause for heartbreak, didn’t soften for grief, didn’t flinch at the sound of something beautiful breaking.

It just kept spinning—indifferent, relentless—dragging you both forwards whether you were ready or not.

There was no mercy in it.

No pity. No grace.

Just the cold, unyielding truth that time moved on.

She pulled back first, breathing hard, her forehead pressed to yours. Her chest heaved like she’d just run for miles. Then, slowly, like she had to force every little muscle and nerve, she pushed herself up.

You watched her walk away.

And when she spoke, her voice was so low you almost didn’t hear it.

“This was the most beautiful thing that ever happened to me,” she whispered. “You were the most beautiful thing I’ve ever called mine.”

Shaky. Careful. Final.

“And I can promise you, with everything I have left—I will love you until the day I die. Always.”

A whimper escaped your throat before you could stop it, a small, wrecked sound of someone being carved hollow.

“But you deserve to be happy,” she said, almost like it hurt to believe it. “And I have to let you go, even if it breaks me more than you’ll ever understand.”

She didn’t look at you again. Left you crying on the floor. Wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand—once, rough, angry—then turned her back before you could see her fall apart.

She crossed the room without a word. Grabbed her guitar from where it leaned against the desk.

But at the door, she paused.

And without turning around, she whispered,

“I’m sorry.”

Last thing you heard was boots pounding down the hallway. The bark of stage crew voices, the static crackle of walkies, someone shouting her name over the roar that was already building. The crowd was screaming for her.

And she chose the crowd.

You lay there—on the floor, knees drawn in, chest heaving—in the hollowed-out center of the wreckage she left behind.

Still. Silent. Utterly alone.

Like you always had been.

You don’t remember how you got out. Not the walk. Not the doors. Not the way the air felt outside the venue, sharp and full of things you didn’t want to breathe. You don’t remember the SUV waiting by the loading dock, or the way you collapsed into the leather seat like your bones had finally given up.

You don’t remember the plane. Or the sky. Or how Los Angeles looked from above—cold, glittering, vast.

A city that didn’t care your heart had just been carved out of your chest and left bleeding on a greenroom floor miles behind you.

You only remember her hands. Your face in her palms. Her mouth on yours, saying goodbye before she ever spoke the word.

And for the first time, you understood that there are some things even love can’t fix.

Some people you can’t save. No matter how much light you pour into them. No matter how tightly you hold on.

Some endings are already written. Etched into bone before the first kiss, folded into every soft I love you like a bruise waiting to bloom.

And you will spend the rest of your life learning how to survive it.

Or die trying.

And Ellie walked onto that stage having just let go of the only person she had ever truly loved.

Watched her fall apart and didn’t run after her. Didn’t fall to her knees and beg. Didn’t change a thing.

She stepped into the spotlight with her mouth still swollen from goodbye and her chest caving in on itself, hollow and echoing with the sound of your voice breaking.

Twenty thousand people waited. Their screams tore through the arena walls. They wanted a show. They wanted fire. They wanted the version of Ellie Williams that didn’t exist anymore.

Her ears rang. Her palms were slick. The guitar strap bit into her shoulder.

The first song started. Her hands moved. Her mouth opened.

But the voice didn’t come.

What came out was broken. Croaked. Barely human. A whisper dragged through a throat scraped raw by grief. The words were all wrong—slurred, cracked, drifting somewhere above her like distant smoke. Her chest burned. Her hands wouldn’t stop shaking. The chords buzzed under her fingers, unfamiliar, unsteady.

She forgot the lyrics halfway through. Forgot what song it was.

Forgot who she was singing to.

When the crowd erupted after the chorus, she nearly collapsed.

She muttered something into the mic—she didn’t even know what. Something about needing a break. Then she turned and walked offstage, her boots heavy, her head down, shoulders caving inward.

She didn’t wait for Dina to yell in her earpiece. Didn’t wait for Jesse to catch her. Didn’t wait for the crowd to notice she wasn’t coming back.

She found the greenroom. Slammed the door. Locked it.

And then she destroyed everything.

The guitar was the first to go. It smashed against the wall, the neck snapping with a brutal crack.

Next came the mirror. Her reflection had been staring at her—dead-eyed, swollen-lipped, useless. Unworthy. So she shattered it. Watched her face break into a hundred pieces.

Then the table. The lamp. A chair. The shelves. Her own fists.

She didn’t stop until she couldn’t feel her hands.

Not when her skin split open. Not when blood dripped down her wrists and soaked into her jeans. Not when the room looked like a warzone and her chest still felt empty.

She crumpled to the floor in the center of it all, arms wrapped around her knees, forehead pressed to the tile. Her breath came in short, sharp bursts. Her whole body convulsed with sobs she couldn’t control. She felt sick. Cold. Dead.

And the worst part.

The world outside kept spinning. Kept demanding.

It didn’t matter that she’d left the love of her life sobbing on the floor. It didn’t matter that she’d torn her own heart out and handed it back in pieces. All anyone wanted was the next song. The next photo. The next headline.

They didn’t care that she was dying in here. They never had.

There were fists pounding on the door. Jesse shouting her name. Dina’s voice cracking wide open. A crew member begging her to just say something, anything. But it was all distant. Muffled. Pointless.

She’d made her choice.

She let you go. The one person who ever looked at her and didn’t see a myth or a front-page scandal. The only one who ever knew her and loved her anyway.

But she didn't let you go because she didn't love you.

She let you go because she did.

And now you were gone.

And she was just a girl in a locked room, surrounded by wreckage, bleeding into silence, with your name like a ghost in her mouth and nothing left worth singing.

The world did not mourn with you. It didn’t stop. It didn’t pause. It didn’t care.

You came back to a city that kept spinning—glittering, soulless, and utterly indifferent to the fact that your heart had been torn out somewhere backstage in a venue you’d never set foot in again. The sun still rose. The freeway still roared. Your name still trended in headlines you couldn’t bear to read. And none of it mattered.

You spent the first day in bed.

Then two.

Then seven.

No light. No sound. Curtains drawn. Phone silenced. You didn’t eat. You didn’t speak. You barely slept—just stared at the ceiling until your body ached from stillness.

Grief didn’t hit all at once. It unfolded, cell by cell, minute by bleeding minute. It wasn’t the kind of pain you could scream about—it was quieter than that. Heavier. It wrapped around your throat and made it hard to swallow. It lived in the base of your spine. In the unwashed dishes. In the unread texts. In the way you caught yourself still turning toward the door, still hoping to see her there, smirking, ruined, beautiful, yours.

You wore her hoodie. Slept in her shirt. Stared at her name on your phone like maybe if you pressed it hard enough, she’d feel it.

And one night—after six hours of lying on the kitchen floor with a glass of wine you hadn’t touched and your face pressed to the cold tile just to feel something—you checked the Fireflies’ tour page.

Not suspended. Not like yours.

Cancelled.

One by one, they were dropping like flies. Festival appearances, residencies, the arena dates she swore she would never reschedule. Scrubbed. Vanished.

You stared at the screen until your eyes blurred.

She was unraveling.

You’d known it when you saw the syringe in her hand. You knew it now.

And you knew—without a single doubt—that she wasn’t going to save herself.

So you did what people do when they’re out of options.

You did the last thing you could.

You went back to the beginning.

You texted Rachel at 2:07 a.m.

get me Joel Miller’s number

It took her three minutes to reply.

ARE YOU OKAY?

You can't just ghost me for a week and then ask me for Ellie's dad number. I called you 412 times.

I banged your door yesterday and you didn't even open it. you just yelled "im alive"

You can’t just keep suspending shows.

Im really worried for you.

You stared at the blinking cursor for a long time. And then:

just get me his number. i'll talk when im ready.

Ten minutes later, it appeared on your screen.

An unfamiliar area code. No name.

Just a number and the last ragged shred of hope.

You stared at it for nearly an hour, fingers hovering, not calling. Because once you made this call—once you said it out loud—it was real. It wasn’t a phase. It wasn’t a rough patch.

It was a life hanging by a thread you couldn’t hold onto anymore.

You pressed the call button with hands that wouldn’t stop shaking. It rang.

Once. Twice. Three times.

“Yeah?”

Came the voice on the other end. Rough. Wary. Hoarse. Old. A little confused.

You couldn’t speak at first. Your lips were moving, but nothing came out.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” you said finally, your voice cracked and trembling. “Is this Joel Miller?”

“Yeah. Who’s this?”

You swallowed hard. Gripped the countertop to stay upright.

“My name is Y/N. I—I know we’ve never met, and I wouldn’t be calling if I wasn’t…”

You paused. Swallowed again.

“…completely out of options.”

There was a shift in his voice then—still guarded, but something alert under the surface.

“Y/N Y/L/N?” he asked. “You’re… Ellie’s girlfriend, right?”

“I—yeah.” You forced the word out. “I was.”

A beat of silence.

“…Are you okay? Is she okay? What’s going on?”

Your throat burned. Your chest hurt. The tears were already sliding down your cheeks again.

You pressed a hand over your mouth and tried not to break in half, before finally, muttering those words.

“She needs help.”

← 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑠𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑛 | 𝑚𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 | 𝑒𝑝𝑖𝑙𝑜𝑔𝑢𝑒 𝑝𝑡.𝟷 →

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࿐♡ ˚.*ೃ Damn… Collide Nation, are yall breathing...? I know this chapter might have felt intense — maybe even shocking or painfully raw. I just want to say I approached it with as much care and respect as I possibly could. I actually spent a lot of time researching the subject to make sure it felt grounded, realistic, and not exploitative in any way. This topic means a lot, and I wanted to do it justice.

And if you’re someone who’s sensitive to these themes: I really hope it didn’t reach you in a hurtful way. My DMs and inbox are always open if you need to talk. ♡

see ya'll soon, stay tuned ;)

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lovemomhatepolice · 4 months ago

Text

as pretty as a flower - f1 drivers multi!

navigation taglist requests

pairing: f1 drivers x fem!reader

warnings slightly suggestive, English is my second language

belonging: f1 drivers multi!

type: fluff, pure fluff

summary: short stories about how you were gifted with a beautiful flower from your boyfriend

more content: formula 1 masterlist, as a boyfriend - lando norris, latest oscar's one-shot, as a boyfriend - oscar piastri, as a boyfriend - max verstappen, as a boyfriend - charles leclerc

carlos sainz - red camellia [symbolizes: love, passion and admiration]

The Monaco sun bathed the restaurant's terrace in golden light as Carlos leaned against the balustrade, with an undoubted gleam in his eyes. Between his fingers he held a single red camellia whose petals were full and velvety, as rich as the fire that burned within him every time he looked at you.

"This flower signifies deep admiration and love," he muttered, twisting the stem of the freshly picked flower.

You raised an eyebrow, taking the flower from his hands, running your fingers over its red petals. "Is that so? And who exactly do you admire, Señor Sainz?"

Carlos smiled, reaching up to slip the camellia behind your ear gently. "Who else?" - he murmured, and you could hear the sincerity in his voice. "How could I have anyone else in mind when you're by my side, no matter how bad my day is. You're always watching over me, like the most beautiful of angels, and you're just here being yourself."

You immediately felt your cheeks heat up. You had always been proud of how you supported him, but hearing it out loud - knowing that he could see it - made your heart speed up.

Carlos embraced your cheek and his thumb brushed your skin too. "Camellia also means passion, and you drive me crazy every day."

You laughed quietly, leaning under his touch. "You're quite the romantic, aren't you?"

He shrugged his shoulders, drawing you close in a warm kiss. "Just for you, cariño."

—————

alex albon - blue forget-me-not [symbolizes: faithful love & remembrance]

It was a quiet evening, one where the world slowed down enough to make room for gentle words and gentle gestures. Alex sat on the couch, holding a small bouquet of delicate, blue forget-me-nots, their tiny petals creating a sea of soft colors.

You tilted your head in amusement as you entered your living room when you heard Alex call out to you. “Forget-me-nots?”

Alex smiled shyly. “Yes, I thought they were fitting. They symbolize faithful love and memory.”

You carefully took the flowers and smiled at him, sitting down next to him on the couch. “And what exactly are you trying to remind me of?”

He exhaled, leaning back into the pillows. “That no matter where I am—whether I’m halfway around the world at a race or right next to you—I always think of you. Always.”

The sincerity in his voice made your heart expand. Just for a while.

"Besides," he added with a crooked smile, "You often forget about a lot of things, so maybe these flowers will work their magic and you'll stop doing that."

You laughed, putting the flowers on the table for a moment to put them in the right vase and leaning against its side.

"You're overreacting," you mumbled, waving your hand. "What am I forgetting?"

"Mm, maybe the cake you put in the oven an hour ago?" Alex asked, raising an eyebrow and nodding towards the oven.

At that moment, a smell reached you, maybe not burning, but definitely tending towards it. You quickly got up from the couch and ran to the kitchen.

"Why didn't you remind me?!" you shouted at him, quickly opening the oven and airing it with a cloth.

"Didn't I tell you you'd need them?" he laughed and put the flowers in a vase in the middle of your kitchen table, looking at you with an amused look.

—————

oscar piastri - bluebell [symbolizes humility, gratitude, and everlasting love]

Oscar wasn't the best with words, but when it came to you, he felt everything so intensely that sometimes it scared him. He loved you—not in a fleeting, random way, but in a way that made his chest tighten every time he looked at you.

And that was why, after returning from a long weekend of racing, the first thing he did was place a bouquet of bluebells on your dressing table in your bedroom.

He didn't do things like that often, but you deserved the reminder. Especially when he was away on long trips and couldn't show you his love on a daily basis.

You walked into the bedroom, setting your bag down before your eyes landed on the bouquet. You blinked, smiling to yourself, and walked over to the dressing table. "Oscar?"

You didn't have to wait long, Oscar had been leaning against the door frame from the very beginning, looking at you with that quiet but loving expression on his face. "Yes?"

You turned one of the flowers over in your hands and looked at it, giggling under your breath. “These from you?”

Oscar looked at the flowers, then at you, and snorted under his breath. “Who else would they be from?”

Then he hesitated for a second, before pushing himself away from the door frame, closing the space between you.

“I missed you.”

You swallowed hard, your breathing quickening. It had been a long time since you had been this close, hadn’t felt how much you missed each other. Standing this close, with his unwavering gaze, you could feel every unspoken word between you.

You smiled, reaching up to cup his cheek. “I know. Me too, every single day"

Oscar leaned into your touch, wrapping his arms around you and pulling you closer to him. You stood in silence because you knew it was worth just as much as the words that had previously fallen from your mouth.

—————

lando norris - sunflower [symbolizes: adoration, loyalty, and positivity]

Lando appeared outside your door with a sunflower almost as tall as he was. "Before you say anything, yes, I did look ridiculous carrying this around."

You stifled a laugh, taking the bright yellow flower from him and letting it fall inside. "Lando, this is huge."

"Just like my love for you," he said dramatically, then smiled. "I'm joking. But not really. No, I'm not joking."

You shook your head, tracing the golden petals of a sunflower. You thought for a long moment about where you could put it, reminding yourself once again how big a flower it was.

Lando quickly came up with a solution, helping you set the sunflower in a vase on the ground so that it wouldn't fall in any direction. Thanks to your efforts, the flower stood still, and Lando confidently and contentedly propped his hips up, looking in your direction.

"They always turn towards the sun, you know? No matter what. A bit like I always look for you - after the races, on the bad days, and even on the good ones."

Instantly, you felt warmth spreading through your chest. "You're soft, Norris."

"Just for you"- He admitted, putting his arm around you and kissing your forehead.

kimi antonelli - daisy [symbolizes innocence, purity, and new beginnings

You rolled over on the blanket on the other side laughing, looking at Kimi, who was forming a delicate bouquet of daisies next to you, trying to put them together in some sort of a bouquet. The two of you were together in the meadow that day, soaking up the last moments before his first season in Formula One.

You raised yourself carefully on your elbows, looking up at him. “Is this for me?”

Kimi, focused on tying the grass around the white little flowers, nodded. “Si”

You took the bouquet from his hand and sniffed them, feeling them gently fill your nostrils. “How lovely.”

Kimi smiled warmly in your direction, brushing back your hair, which fell across your face. “Like you.”

You put the flowers down next to you, moving closer to your boyfriend and stroking his luscious curls, which were particularly unruly today. You saw a blush on his cheeks, which made you burst out laughing quietly, cuddling up to him.

—————

george russell - red tulips [symbolizes true love, passion, and deep commitment]

George always had a knack for making even the simplest of things seem wonderful, so it was no surprise when he showed up with a perfectly arranged bouquet of red tulips before your date. Everything was perfectly coordinated - his suit, his hair, and the flowers that sparkled beautifully in his hand.

You smiled sincerely, accepting the flowers from him as he walked through the door to your apartment. "Red tulips? Let me guess - there's some meaning behind it."

He smirked, ever the gentleman. "Red tulips symbolize a declaration of love. I thought it would be fitting for us." he replied, stepping deeper into your apartment. "You know, a first anniversary is no small feat."

Your heart beat faster as you poured water into the vase, leaving your boyfriend behind. You arranged the flowers nicely on the table and turned to him uncertainly.

"So are you declaring something?"

George took your hand and smiled gallantly, kissing your knuckles. “Haven’t I been declaring that all along?”

You laughed quietly and touched his jaw, stroking it. “Maybe, but I like hearing that.”

George chuckled, pulling you closer. “Then I’ll keep saying it. Every day.”

—————

lewis hamilton - lavender [symbolizes calm, devotion, and protection]

"I'm here!" you shouted, entering your shared apartment after a long day at college.

The last month had overwhelmed you, you spent many long hours there every day, and after returning you had no time for yourself or your boyfriend, who was a rare sight in your home, because he was constantly traveling to races.

The scent of lavender wafted through the air before you saw him. Lewis was standing at the kitchen counter, skillfully arranging a bouquet of delicate purple flowers.

You leaned against the door, looking at him. "Since when did you become a florist?"

He smiled crookedly, not looking up. "Since I realized you needed it."

You took a step forward, snuggling into his warm back.

The scent of lavender filled your nose, and the presence of Lewis, who protected and cared for you, even when you didn't take care of yourself, immediately made you feel like your head was getting lighter.

“I thought it would help you relax.”

Your chest tightened—he was always in tune with you, always knew what you needed before you even asked. “You always take care of me.”

His smile softened as you wrapped yourself even tighter around his back. Lewis touched your hands with his own and gently turned you around, pulling you completely into his arms. He kissed the top of your head and hummed quietly.

“That’s it.”

—————

charles leclerc - lily of the valley [symbolizes sweetness, happiness, and the return of joy]

It was one of those days when you could afford to spend a lot of time in the kitchen, rummaging through the cabinets and cooking whatever came to mind. You hummed to yourself as you set two plates with the rest of the dishes in your dining room. Despite Charles's playful protests that you should sit down and relax, you still stubbornly wanted to do everything yourself.

The man sat on the couch for a long moment, watching you move around your apartment with agility, and then, as if remembering something, he stood up and disappeared into the other room. When he returned, he was holding a bouquet.

You looked up as he approached you with a full smile and beautiful lilies of the valley. You winked, putting down the spoon you were holding in your hand.

"Charles…"

He smiled widely, hugging you to him with one hand and carefully protecting the bouquet with the other. "Surprise."

You gently touched one of the petals, still standing in his embrace. “They’re beautiful.”

“I’m glad,” he murmured, resting his chin on your head. “Maman helped me.”

You shook your head, amusement glinting in your eyes, but there was something softer underneath—something knowing. Charles didn’t buy flowers just to buy them. He especially didn’t ask his mother for help with something so trivial.

You looked at him, your voice quieter. “Tell me.”

Charles exhaled, his eyes flickering between yours before he finally spoke. “Because I love you.” He ran his thumb over your cheek, his expression impossibly sincere. “And because every time I come home to you, I realize more and more that I never want to live a life without you. You helped me get out of the dark place I found myself in. And I feel like I'm not showing you this enough."

And with his words, there was silence between you. But it wasn't unpleasant, you both knew it and appreciated it more and more. Because in that silence, there was love. Pure love.

max verstappen - white carnation [symbolizes pure love, faithfulness, and good luck]

The apartment in Monaco was dimly lit, the soft glow of the streetlights casting shadows on the walls. You entered, dropping your bag by the door, exhausted after a long day. But then you noticed it—white carnations resting on your pillow.

You carefully picked it up, its petals fresh and crisp. As if they had just been picked up from a florist. "Max?"

The man appeared next to you in an instant, smiling to himself. He was tired too, you had just returned home from the race, but he had already made sure to welcome you home nicely.

"You left this for me?"

He nodded, grabbing your hips. "Mhm."

A smile appeared on your lips. "What did I do to deserve this?"

"Do I need a reason?" he asked, stroking your hips as if seeking solace in it.

Your fingers brushed his, and your eyes crossed, causing an invisible spark between you. "No," you mumbled, "but I still like to know."

Max exhaled through his nose, the corner of his mouth twitched, and he laughed sincerely. "You put up with a lot," he admitted. "Mostly me."

You smiled pityingly and kissed him sweetly on the lips, feeling him pull you even closer to him. Your apartment was quiet, very quiet, and the only sound was the cars outside the window and the clock that Max couldn't turn off, even though it irritated you so much.

"Oh, you put up with a lot too," you laughed, pulling away from him for a moment. "And now you'll have to put up with me longer."

"I guess I'll survive," he mumbled against your lips, smiling.

—————

oliver bearman - lily [symbolizes devotion, purity, and a gentle, protective love]

When you woke up after a hard night due to illness, your eyes caught sight of a beautiful bouquet of pink lilies standing in a glass of water on your nightstand. They weren't there last night.

It wasn't long before you also felt the gaze and warmth of someone's body behind you - you knew exactly who it was. So you lazily rolled over to the other side, throwing off the tissues that were your only salvation at night and smiled to yourself.

Ollie was lying on the other side of the bed, staring at the muted TV and just like you, he was snuggled up in the sheets. Even at first glance, you didn't notice that he was in your matching pajamas. His hair was still ruffled from sleep and his facial expression was relaxed.

You cleared your throat slightly, trying to regain your voice and at the same time get the boy's attention. "When did you come?"

Ollie glanced at you and nodded. "Four hours ago?" he asked himself and moved closer to you slightly. "You slept for a long time, it's already after 3pm"

You yawned, still waking up. "Sneaking around again, aren't you?"

Ollie smirked, moving closer. "I'm not sneaking around. I'm just…making sure you wake up to something nice. Especially since you supposedly barely slept the whole night before"

She ran a finger over his face, and warmth blossomed in your chest. "You're too good for me, you know that?"

He shrugged, blushing slightly and showing you one of his most beautiful smiles. "Someone has to be."

The moment of silence between you two was broken by your giggles and you slightly pulled away from the boy, looking into his eyes. "Now I'm sad that I'm sick, because I can't smell at all"

—————

franco colapinto - wild rose [symbolizes love, adventure, and untamed beauty]

Your walks with Franco had become a daily occurrence, whenever you had the chance - especially now, when spring was coming with great strides and all life was waking up. The first flowers were blooming and Franco couldn't pass by the wild rose bush indifferently when you walked by it.

"A beautiful rose for a beautiful lady" he said, handing it to you with a smile.

You took it hesitantly, holding back your laughter. A small, pink rose that smelled wonderful and had apparently only recently appeared there in one piece.

"You just stole it" you snorted under your breath, looking at the boy.

He shrugged. "Borrowed. Nature won't mind".

You carefully put it in your bag so as not to destroy it and grabbed Franco's hand, gently nudging him. "You're impossible".

“And yet,” he mused, wrapping his arm around you, “you’re still here.”

You looked at him, rolling your eyes. You let go of his hand and walked forward, trying to hold back the laughter that was escaping your lips. “For now.”

Franco smiled broadly, shaking his head and following you. “Liar!”

—————

arthur leclerc - daffodil [symbolizes new beginnings, hope, and joy]

The apartment still smelled of fresh paint and new furniture. There were boxes lining the walls, some half-open, others untouched. The space wasn't fully yours yet—not until they had time to settle in—but it already felt different. Like the beginning.

You sighed, stretching your arms and looking around. "This still feels unreal."

Arthur, standing at the kitchen counter, smiled wickedly. "I know, but we'll get used to it," he muttered and pulled something out from behind himself, revealing a small bouquet of bright yellow daffodils.

You winked, smiling sincerely at him. They fit perfectly here. "Flowers?"

"For the apartment," he said, stepping closer. "And for you."

You took them carefully in your hands, brushing your fingers over the soft petals. "Daffodils?"

Arthur nodded, his expression unusually sincere. “The lady at the flower shop advised me. A new place, a new beginning. I thought they were a good fit.”

Your heart warmed, and at the same time, you bit your lip to keep from laughing. “You’re such a sucker.”

He rolled his eyes, but the smile never left his face. “Yeah, yeah. Just put them in water before they die.”

You laughed, standing on your tiptoes to give him a quick kiss on the cheek. “Our first flowers in our first apartment. I love them.”

Arthur’s hand found your waist, pulling you into a hug. “Good. Because there’ll be more.”

—————

daniel ricciardo - marigold [symbolizes warmth, passion, and unwavering affection]

The door to your apartment slammed loudly, practically making you jump from where you were standing in the kitchen. Then, like a torpedo, Daniel marched in, grinning from ear to ear.

You looked at him, but you weren't very surprised. He used to barge into the house like nothing had happened. And then he was surprised that your heart rate was racing.

Daniel raised his hand, holding a marigold, as if he was handing it over as if it were a trophy, grinning from ear to ear. "For you, love."

You accepted it with a smile, looking at your boyfriend. "What's the occasion?"

He leaned against the counter, crossing his arms. "I thought you should have something bright."

You glanced at the golden petals, then back at him, looking at his beautiful wide smile. "You're already doing it for me."

His smile softened and he tilted his head to the side. His Australian accent was more audible than usual. “Yeah, well. Now you have two of us.”

She rolled her eyes, stepping closer. “You’re riddiculous.”

“And you like that.”

You sighed dramatically, placing the flower in the vase where other flowers from Daniel were. “Unfortunately.”

He pulled you closer, brushing his lips against your temple. “Lucky me.”

A/N: please do not copy and translate my works! in case of any issues related to this - I invite you to discuss privately :)

a bit longer chapter, because I didn't want to split it into parts. spring blew in, huh? hope you like it <3 feedback always welcomed!

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