A/N: Hi guys! I haven't given up on CBOAZ or TBB, but I wanted to write something short about Nastasia. So if you have time, please let me know what you think. :)

Words: 269

If only I could have, y'know, been that girl... Things would have been different…

She stumbles over her words. How could she be so stupid? How would she make it different?

She would have run away with him from the beginning.

She cannot be replaced. You cannot hope to do so, Nastasia.

And like that, she is scorched by her own flame of desire. She seems to shrink beneath the man's eyes, ashamed to have even suggested that.

But hope was all she had left.

Yeah, um, I'm very sorry. That just slipped out.

Her voice is an octave higher than usual and guilt floods her veins, sending small tremors through her body.

She tilts her head down in shame. Her eyes are closed tightly behind her glasses, too horrified at her own words to see her boss's face. When she finally opens them, she sees that the count had lowered the brim of his hat over his eyes and monocle.

Why couldn't she say "I love you?"

To be sure... She is gone... Gone from all worlds, never to return…

He disappears into the air leaving her only with her own feelings of inferiority for company. She falls to her knees, defeated and lets out shaky breaths. Her savior had just stabbed her heart, and all she could do was feel the pain devour all her thoughts.

She pushes the palms of her hands on the ground to steady herself. She slowly rises to her feet and sighs, allowing a tear from each eye to flow down her cheeks.

Timpani may be gone, but she is still here.