halfmyfault

[halfmyfault]

his heart raced in his ears, his smile turned wider, his cheeks were burning while butterflies flapped in his stomach. he was almost breathless with the way she played with his hair, "i, hm, i, i," noah shut his eyes, just for a second, just so he could think, sometimes it was like she made his brain stop all together. "hmhmm." words were useless, all of them, they were useless. and so he decided against them all together, cupping her cheek in his hands and puling her into a kiss. — an actual kiss for what must have been the first time. all too needy and passionate, almost possessive really.

"nonsense, i got control over everything, my feelings are not about to be the exception." he laughed softly, played it off with a joke, but not even richard knew how serious he was about that one. — though she was wrong about that one, he was sure. it was precisely the having feelings part that made him into a bad guy. — "oh, god, don't tell orion that or he is gonna make us do fire drills once a month." richard laughed, holding her hand in his before giving it a small squeeze, back out the way he came. theodore roosevelt's wing. god, richard could see the damage without even walking into the room. he didn't care much about anything in there, but the guitar— oof. "see, now you should be happy that the elvis guitar is in the summer home otherwise it would have met a very unfortunate end tonight."

"tu me fais ressentir beaucoup de choses, noah, maladroit n'en fait pas partie." pennyshore grinned, cheeks pink and stars in her eyes. "it's very thoughtful of you." pennyshore said with another small giggle, only because she was pretty sure if his face got anymore red, it might stay that way forever. "knights do have a tendency to do things they don't like to protect the ones they love." pennyshore said softly, fingers still playing in noah's hair.

"i don't know what happened back then, richard, and you have no reason to tell me. however, i know that no matter what was going on, whatever rights you did or didn't have to whomever, you don't get to control your feelings. you don't get to be the bad guy just having feelings either, alright?" graceland said, and she wouldn't try to convince him either. even if she got him to agree, something told her that this wasn't a thing that would settle into his bones over night. or ever. "that's terrible planning. i don't care how old this house is, you should really get proper emergency exits, richard." graceland said, brows pulled together but the smile on her face was enough to show her playful intent. she held her hand out for him. "babysitters have to clean up once all the kids have gone to bed, let's go assess the damage."

[halfmyfault]

"ah, yes, well, you know me, i'm just the sweetest. so sweet in fact—" he took another sip, straight from the bottle, "so sweet you might need to be careful sharing the bottle with me. you might get cavities." nate laughed offering it out to her as he shook his head. god, everything was so easy with her. he couldn't but look back at the abandoned hills, a small smile pulling at his lips as he felt something tug at his heart, he didn't know what. "well, i have all the money in the world and i am pretty miserable so—" he shrugged one shoulder, with a small laugh, "i don't think it's boring though, those people are just stuck up, is all. the nouveau riche—" this was in his grandfather's tone, in his voice, a word stole straight from his vocabulary. "are much more fun."

"maybe it's not all just bullshit, then," he laughed softly, unable to pull away, even a little. the rest of the world felt so chaotic and lucien, god, lucien felt like fresh air. "does she know everything about me now? just by knowing i'm a leo? what's her sign?" — don't go. don't go. don't go. nash doubted that lucien knew how much everything he said meant to him, how nash could almost see the words leaving his lips, etching themselves into his chest, a tattoo to never leave. the things he said felt so powerful sometimes it felt like it was fundamentally shaking the very center of his being, and all he had said was don't go. — nash held his hand, nodded, "come on, come here," back out the way they came in that same hallway.

"is it nash? he certainly seems like the type. i mean that with all the love and kindness." dia admitted with a laugh. she could spot them a mile away. "i thought you were the only one." dia said, in that faux voice of honesty she so often used to tease him with as she stood from the couch. she quickly tossed her drink back and put it down on the coffee table. "i thought it was impossible to be happy with all the money in the world. i imagine it would get too boring." she said, lifting the hem of her dress as they walked. somewhere along the line she stopped and kicked the tight heels from her feet, leaving them in their place as she continued alongside nate.

"i don't know how much stock i put in it, but i do know that the general consensus it that leo's and scorpio's make good couples. did you know that? and i know for sure that you are a leo." lucien said, letting his accent slip through as he mocked his youngest sister. "my baby sister, maeve, she's into all of it. she told me to tell you that when i emailed her last." lucien admitted softly. lucien understood the need to ask. the need to be the one that made the choice for nash. the guilt couldn't reach him if lucien stood in the way. "don't go." he said softly, cupping nash's cheek as he pressed a gentle kiss to his forehead. "stay with me. show me somewhere in here that matters to you. forget all the people and just stay with me."

[halfmyfault]

down, down, down, he slowly pushed his feet into the pedal. these cars weren't the type you broke on first use, it was the type you pushed and pushed and it always had more to give. his heart sped up. thundering against his ear. his pulse near the steering wheel. the car hummed as though it could hear him, as though it agreed. up, up, up. the dark nights whistled outside the car, wind rushing in through the open windows. the faster the car went, the more his heart jumped to match it. the more his heart sped up, the faster the car went. "hold on to something." his skin was hot to the touch, his head spinning. xander took his foot off the gas. one, two. he slammed his feet into the brakes. the tires locked, the car pushed forward. they skid forward, fast circles on the empty road. his heart leapt to his throat. a rollercoaster without safety harness. the world spun three times and when the car stopped, spread horizontally across the road, xander was already breathless, "jesus fuck. you wanna try?"

sasha laughed as they made their way out of the garage, up the ramp and outside. sasha felt a giddy kind of insanity in her chest. like her skin was on fire, like her bones were rattling and there was this powerful rumbling in her chest that she couldn't explain. not that she could have explained any of it to anyone to begin with. "i trust you." sasha said, reaching over to hit the 'windows down' button. this was the getaway car right? they had committed crimes on so many different levels, and this was their getaway car that they had stolen. richard's, it had to be. they had trashed his room, trashed that fucking red car and stolen another one for their own getaway car. she tucked the painting beneath the seat before she leaned out of the window ever so slightly. she could fly she was so fucking high from tonight.

[halfmyfault]

a soft smile took over theo's lips. "you like me." he said, in a teasing tone. "you like like me." chuckling as he pulled thaddeus into another kiss, as if thadd should be embarrassed, as if theo didn't feel the same exact way, as if his heart wasn't slowly filling up with the overwhelming need to never let this man go anywhere farther than a few feet away. and when he pulled him back into another kiss, it was a lot more needy and passionate than it really was playful, body melting against thaddeus as he allowed his lips to roam down the man's jaw, his fingers to intertwin with the hair at the back of his neck. "you are fucked, you know that?" theo laughed, looking up at him. "i write songs for famous people. you are gonna be the subject of the next fifteen billboard top 10. you are not gonna be able to turn on the radio without hearing about yourself."

anna's parents had passed when sasha was fifteen. ten months apart. his own father passed the year that sasha was born, his mother following soon a few years after that. there was no need to maintain the lie after that, not financially. they had inherited what was promised to them when they agreed to get married. it was too late though. they had made their mark on the art world and they couldn't give that up, not when they had worked so hard to become the power couple that they had dedicated themselves to be. he never thought anything would matter more than that, and then he met theo. "wherever you want to go, theo, i'll follow." thaddeus grinned, pressing a quick kiss to his lips.

[halfmyfault]

he laughed softly, "that is true, i am not in your head." running a hand through his curls as he leaned back. noah flipped the order in his brain. verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus. he could work with that. "alright, but what is yours? any ideas?" too obvious. he knew what she meant, he talked about feeling, she talked around it. he wrote i don't think i like her anymore, girls are the same all they wanna do is break your heart. she wrote i wait around while you don't call me mine, i'll let you finish your glass of strawberry wine. there were different ways to say the same thing. "do it like, do it in your way, do it in your style. the first verse, since it's yours. don't make it pop-y like me."

honey put the guitar on a stand, pocketed the slide until she got to her notebook, where she took it out, because, that was a quick way to get a shard of glass in her hip. she jot down a few notes, flipped the page to jot down a few things about instruments she didn't have on hand to play. "i think that should be you," she said, completeing a though that was in her head, and not allowed. she paused for a moment before bursting into giggles. "sorry. i forgot you aren't in my head." she closed the book again and stood back up, glancing around for anything else she could play. "the first verse. i think it should be the second verse. and i think it should be yours. you do it well, and i think it's too obvious for the first verse, you know?" she asked, moving the stool back to where she found it. she grabbed a cushion from the little loveseat and moved to sit on the floor, only a few feet away from noah. "you're right though, we need more."

[halfmyfault]

@allcnfetti / for honey / main verse.

his eyes were stuck to hers, a smile pulling at his lips. wavering back and forth, as he held her hand to what was supposed to be a handshake and turned into— were they just holding hands now? — he couldn't quite shake the sense that they had met somewhere before, some time maybe in another universe, "you look like a princess, you know that?" there was a small soft laugh. noah couldn't look away, not really, he couldn't shake the feeling that if he did she might disappear, a mere product of his imagination.

[halfmyfault]

"see, hm—" he tilted his head ever so slightly, laughing softly, "i might have a very surface level understanding of what normal life is like, but i am pretty sure that you don't earn more by charging me more. so that's just plain mean." aaron chuckled, pouring himself another drink before taking a sip. everything was far away now, numb, and fuzzy and oh so nice, now this— this was what he was looking for. the easiness of conversation, the far away feeling. "i don't know, miss rumor. being on top of the world kind of sounds like fun. i am sorry that, like, it doesn't fit your standards for normal." he laughed, "what's your version of normal? what would you do for fun right now?"

"oh, i was always going to charge you for the bottle. it's a hundred thirty dollar bottle." rumor laughed, punching in the code as she rang him up, adding her beer to his tab too. "who the fuck told you that climbing the statue of liberty was fun? the journey to get out there sounds like hell all on its own. do you ever do anything for fun a normal person would do?" she asked, finishing ringing him up before she headed out onto the floor, the first time there wouldn't be a thick slab of bar between them, separating them. she moved to the first table and started her wash down, trying to pretend he wasn't there, not physically at least.

[halfmyfault]

"well," he said it like it was work, like it required energy, like speaking was the sort of thing you need to talk yourself up to do, "their mom did convince a forty something year old to go to a lake in the middle of the night after a few beers for a first date, so," frank tried a small laugh, "i would think there was something wrong if they were calm." and then she was there, in his arms, pulling him close, kissing his shoulders, and he relaxed visibly, clearly. his body almost melting into mattress, losing almost all of its tension. "i'm fine, babe." it was a lie, yes, but it was a fairly innocuous one, right? him not having energy that one morning was far from a problem when her brain was on fire from pregnancy. — he should probably get up. he would try again, if she wasn't in his arms. "just— bed is comfortable, is all." frank shrugged, "you need help with— i'm not sure what you are doing around the house actually...?"

"pregnancy brain on fire i think, it'll pass." suvi sighed, climbing into the bed with him, curling up beside frank as she pulled him into her arms. "not pro boxer today, i think bug has decided that they're a ninja. lots of rolling around, jerking about like they're training to kick ninja ass or something." suvi grumbled, feeling the shift once more. "boxer or ninja, i think bug is going to come out very active. we'll have our hands full." she chuckled softly, pressing a kiss to frank's shoulder as she held him. "how are you doing, frank?" she asked, brows knit together as she looked up at him.

[halfmyfault]

his eyes drifted to the side, staring at nothing. he weighted the words, flipped them around. every memory now reframed with this brand new knowledge. — their breakup, their argument, the gala, the things she hid from him. — just because she didn't act crazy, didn't mean she wasn't crazy, right? maybe she just had better self control. — it took her question to break him out of his self induced trance. "i," liam looked around. "i'm just at a strip mall." he chuckled. it took that statement for him to look around, see all the people, walking by, living their lives, laughing. god the world always did become a blur when it came to her. "i was just trying to buy xander a birthday gift and then the song and thn you, and then the call, and all." he shrugged one shoulder. she couldn't see it. "where are you? do you want me to go there?"

"liam. that is the dumbest thing i have ever heard you say. and i mean that with—" lila started the walk back to her bike. "you do drive me crazy. you drive me insane. break my own heart by going to a big event with you insane. try to hide you from my work, hide my work from you because i would rather die than see you get hurt. but insane enough not to just walk away. you can go through my notes on my phone. it's filled with all the texts i never sent you because i thought i was being kind. just because i was able to stop myself before doing something stupid doesn't mean i wasn't trying my hardest to get around my own safeguards." lila said, spotting her bike finally. how she hadn't lost it entirely was beyond her at this point. "i should have walked away. i told you that i loved you and you pushed my feelings aside. i told you i did awful things for a living. i am crazy. and i am crazy about you. and you won't let yourself see it. you won't ever let yourself see just how monumentally i have fucked up my own life just to keep you in it." lila said, a little wild sounding as she spoke, like she really was on her last thread of sanity. "where the fuck are you, right now? i am pissed that we are having this conversation on the phone."

[halfmyfault]

humberto rolled his eyes dramatically. the sort of thing that was way too clearly made for everyone to see. "whatever." he scoffed. he was fucking done, fucking tired. everyone was so fucking fake. so fucking ready to lie all the time. he hated it. hated them. hated the goddamn country club and every dumb asshole rich enough to pay for it. he hated everything. humberto hated everything and everyone. "you tell arthur i'm done. i'm going home." as he stomped his way out of the room.

cadu was too smooth to let his brother's antics sway him in anyway. "will do, boss." rolling his eyes before he turned back to rhea, taking one sip of his lemony drink with a smile. "sorry. we have tried training him not to bark at strangers, but you know the saying, right? can't teach an old dog new tricks." cadu joke, laughing softly, — he knew his brother. he would get angry at something else, yell at someone else. and the next time they were in the same room, it would be like it never happened in the best way. — humberto had yet to met an emotion that he couldn't twist around inside himself until it felt like anger. "you alright? need something stronger?" cadu smiled, "the trick, i have been told, is that it doesn't feel like drinking at all, so you just sip on them and at some point you are drunk on lemonade."

"except that i have fucking eyes, humberto! so he says it's raining, the sun is out and i can fucking see that!" humberto really thought she was too stupid to do this, didn't he? that was so insulting, she was sure she would cry about it later, but she wasn't going to show weakness now. "oh perhaps they know it's not of their fucking business? why are you trying to be my white knight, huh? what's the fucking goal here, humberto? what are you going to get out of saving me from wasting two years of my life then, huh?" rhea waited for his response, but of course she wouldn't get one, not when cadu walked in. clearly looking to reset the atmosphere. "cadu!" she said, putting her best face forward as she turned to him with a wide smile. "i have not, tragically. thank you, thank you!" she grinned, taking the drink from him with a brilliant smile.

[halfmyfault]

the man approached him, muttered some vague drunk threats, aaron nodded with a level of seriousness and respect that he had not shown yet to rumor, clear that he understood the seriousness of the warning. "don't worry, sir, she is gonna do way more damage to me than i could ever do her." he tried a laugh. and then it was mostly just him and her in the almost bar. god, it was late, he hadn't even realize how late it was, how late it had gotten. "how much do i owe you?" he poured himself some more of— honestly, he didn't even know what he was drinking. — in the now empty glass. "i'll take the bottle way the way. forgetting which way is up and which way is down and all that." aaron chuckled taking a sip. "come on. you are closing. let's do something fun. like, i don't know, trespass and climb up the statue of liberty. i got diplomatic immunity. the police finds out, i'll tell them i kidnapped you." he laughed.

rumor didn't want what he was offering, she used to want to be that kind of person, the kind of person who could fuck around and not get attached, not give a shit, but she had never been able to pull that off, not really. "three for six, huh?" rumor laughed. steven muttered some kind of advice to aaron, though she was pretty sure it was a vague threat framed as advice. not that it wasn't sweet, but rumor was pretty sure mike could take steven at this point, rumor certainly could. the two older men shuffled out of the bar and rumor glanced back at the clock before aaron. "i close in ten minutes. you'll have to pay off your tab too, sir." she said with a look before she grabbed herself a shot of whiskey and a beer, moving to stand in front of aaron still, keeping that distance of the bartop between them.

[halfmyfault]

"i thought—" he thought love was supposed to be a big exploding thing, that it came by and set your life on fire, that when someone did fall in love with him, it would be the sort of thing that he couldn't ignore, the sort of thing that he couldn't forget. — all consuming, paralyzing, the sort to make you stutter again when you thought four years in speech therapy had cured you. — it was how he felt. her love for him always felt like something else entirely, something different. simmering instead of burning. slow, steady, ever present. "i don't think i drive you insane, lila." he didn't mean for his voice to sound so sad when he said it. but it was all he could think about. she might have been his first girlfriend, yes, but liam was smart. he had seen other people fall in love, get in relationships. when xander fell in love it took over his life, when his dad and mom were together, it was like the rest of the world was a blur they had no interest in. he was pretty sure alice had destroyed entire lives. she just— she just liked him. "i'm supposed to drive you crazy, you are supposed to be out and then suddenly love grows plays somewhere and all you can think about is calling me even though you know you probably shouldn't." liam let out a small sad laugh, "you make it impossible for me to act rationally. you, you deserve to be with someone that makes you feel like it's impossible to act rationally." he cleared his throat, rest his head back against the wall he was leaning against, "i, i don't know. honestly, i'm running out of excuses to invite you out without making it obvious that i just want you around."

lila nodded once she had made it back onto the street, as if he could see her, see that she knew he missed her. god, she missed him so much it was depressing. he had set this boundary between them, this place they didn't go to anymore, but he still invited her out. still called her. still wanted her around and she was so sure he was going to kill her, slowly but surly. "i know you—of course—" he paused just for a second, but the words that followed his almost gave her a heart attack. "liam," lila sighed, because it only made sense to say all this in person. so he had to do it on the phone. "you said i wasn't the right person at the wrong time. you said you didn't think i loved you, that i wasn't capable of loving you." lila said, thinking back on their fight months earlier, after they had broken up. "i don't—i just—why couldn't you tell me in person, huh? why did you have to be so far away?" she asked, riffling in her pockets for the keys to her motorcycle.

[halfmyfault]

"honesty is always better than having someone bullshit you, rhea. no matter how hurtful the stupid damn words are, they are just words. you gonna get your head fucked with and you think i`m cruel for being a little too blunt?" humberto shook his head, "you ever heard that shit about the apple and the tree? because my mom is pretty damn nice of a person so how do you think i ended up like this, huh? who do you think i am took after, huh? the difference is that i am fucking honest and he isn't. arthur is gonna be telling you it's raining while the sun is out and you are gonna end up believing him." humberto sighed. "you do whatever the fuck you want. you think i care who my dad dates or doesn't? cadu and madu are out there being nice to you and accepting of this, because dad is fucking happy. because they only care about themselves and about not having him being an ass. they don't give a shit about you. in two years, when it all clicks in place and you realize how fucked everyone in his fucking family is. you are gonna remember this moment and the one person who tried to save you from the heartbreak."

of course, of course he would be yelling at their dad's poor fucking girlfriend. of course, he would make it a whole thing. of course, they couldn't have one nice afternoon with the family in a fucking country club. god wouldn't allow it. jesus christ. he had left his brother alone for what, thirty minutes? so he could dry off after the pool. humberto was a fucking child. that was the one thought cadu had in his mind as he walked into the room with two drinks in hands, one wide smile on his face, "oh, wow! rhea!" he was great at pretending he didn't see the people around him fighting. blame mom and dad for that one great skill. "have you ever tried capirinhas? i made you one. it's peak brazilian culture. you gotta try it."

"i don't know who told you that honesty is a kindness, but they were wrong, humberto. honesty is only a kindness if the outcome is kinder than the cruelty used to displace the truth. that certainly isn't what you are doing to me right now." rhea said, arms crossed over her dress as she stood up to him, the fire in her veins stronger now that he was bringing her career into things. "fuck you, humberto! i tried to be nice, to be understanding and kind, but you really don't know when to fucking quit do you? do you really think you can get me to leave him by bullying me? by going after my career, which, for the record, i built from scratch by myself, without his help? do you really think so lowly of me? was that before or after i started seeing your dad, huh?"

[halfmyfault]

"i`m not mad at you. this is just—" he looked himself up and down, "this is just how i talk. this is how i am." direct, brash, blunt, way too much. he knew it already. been told way too much too many times that very same thing to take it as an insult. "it is that simple though, isn't it, tate? i fucking love you. i, no, i'm saying it wrong. i love you as fuck. i love you so fucking much. i love you pra porra." because he could only make it sound right in portuguese. "and it feels like you love me half way, in parts, that's no way to love someone."

"why are you acting like you are already mad at me humberto?" tate asked, taking a tiny step back. "like you've already accepted that i am going to say no and walk away? is that really how you want—do you really think everything is that simple?"

[halfmyfault]

he was terrible at this. he knew he was terrible at this. he had always been terrible at this. liam never really adimited it to her, but lila was the first girl he ever dated. feelings of any type had always been a muddle mess but with her everything was so much more complicated. "i do, though, i— you gotta know that, right? that i do, i, i, i," he cleared his throat, tried again, you can do better, liam. "i love you, lila, i want you, i always do, i always did, nothing, nothing changes that. nothing can, nothing could." she was all he ever really wanted, no matter what, no matter how much time apart they spent. — and liam was being honest with himself, he thought she knew that. "i'm, i'm, i'm, i'm," he took a deep breath, he thought he was done with the stuttering. it was never really done with him, was it? "i'm sorry, do you want me to hang up?"

"why are you calling me, liam?" lila asked, genuine frustration mixed with an insane desperation and muddled confusion. "i don't care about what happened then—" that wasn't even true, she cared more than anything about what happened that day, she needed to talk about it, needed to know what he was thinking and feeling about her, but right now wasn't the time to explore that, "why are you calling me? if you missed me, but you didn't—you never want—what is the goal here?" lila brought the crystal up to the till, mouthing an apology to the clerk before she slid a twenty onto the counter, held up an apologetic hand and left the store without the fourteen or whatever dollars in change.

[halfmyfault]

"well, so what is it?" it was that simple, there was no thinking required. "are you in or are you out, tate?" because with humberto, to humberto, it was always like that, that simple, that direct. "do you want me or not?"

"i never said i didn't want something serious!" tate cried out. she wasn't the best at communicating, she was the first one to say so, but she couldn't blame him for getting frustrated with her. "i'm not trying to—"

[halfmyfault]

god, that only made him feel worse somehow. there she was, fully pregnant, with his kid, and she was moving around the house, cleaning stuff while he was stuck in bed. frank shifted enough to get to the edge— his courage faltered. he shifted back. "is it a normal brain on fire or a pregnancy brain or fire?" his voice was too low, too mumbled. trying to speak while only moving half his mouth. "or a new secret third thing?" frank tried a laugh. god, frank missed alcohol. he missed drugs. he missed alcohol mixed with drugs. "how is my future, boxing pro? training it out?"

suvi spent most of the morning taking care of the house. she had been packing slowly, no rush for them to leave since they still weren't sure what the house situation was but she still felt like she should be getting ready for it. she didn't bother frank for staying all curled up in bed, she would have if she didn't feel so restless. she was in the hall when she heard his voice call out to her again. "i can't just--- baby is being a nightmare, and i feel like my brain is on fire." suvi hummed, walking back into their bedroom.