author's note: hi! i haven't written anything in a while, but i adore abby and townsend. this is a very short one shot for my friend tonya.
He looked the same.
She couldn't help herself; she couldn't stop examining and analyzing his presence, thirty feet away from where she stood in between a table and a potted plant. But he looked the same, his blue eyes carefully scanning the scene before him, a slender champagne flute pressed against his lips, the cultivated air of somebody who was utterly bored yet completely fascinated by their surroundings.
Somehow, she ended up next to him. It wasn't meant to happen, she thought she had been walking towards the balcony doors to get some air, but after meandering through the crowd of impeccably dressed socialites (and a few spies), instead found herself five, four, three feet away. And he wore the same cologne. And his hair parted the same way. And he offered a small smile, the corners of his mouth turning upwards as she slowed to a stop.
"Hi," she greeted.
"Hi," he replied.
There was a ten second pause. They appeared to be on better terms with each other than the last time they'd been together, but she honestly didn't know where they stood. And she felt silly wearing heels. And her hands were sweating like a teenager in love.
"I was just going to get some air," she finally said.
"Oh."
His voice was completely neutral. Amicable, but emotionless. She, on the other hand, was overtly emotional, always had been, stating everything on her mind and getting angry when people disagreed. It was funny, how their sun-and-moon personalities seemed to work so well at first.
"Would you—you wanna come with?" She asked, hoping the prickly blush rising up her cheeks couldn't be seen in the dim light of the ballroom.
"Of course," he answered, and he sounded the same. "After you, Abigail."
They stepped out onto the balcony, and she leaned over the metal railing. "It's nice," she murmured.
"It is," he agreed.
The stars were out, but neither of them were looking.
She wanted to ask how he'd been, where he'd gone, what he'd done, in the year they'd been apart. She wanted to ask if he still hated bananas, or if he'd stopped trying to wear socks with holes in them even if he was perfectly capable of buying new ones. She wanted to ask him what he was thinking.
Instead, she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, two years flashing through her mind in a single second. By the time she'd opened them again, he was half a foot away from her.
"You look the same," he remarks lightly, smirking a bit.
"So do you," she replies.
They had clashed from the start, clawing through each other's skins and forcing homes in each other's lives out of an estranged belief that they belonged there. Their driving force blossomed under the illusion that they could work, and they burned out before either had the chance to realize the effort wasn't worth it because the harder they tried the more the illusion cracked.
"I—"
Her statement, not that it had been important, was cut off then, and Townsend was suddenly very close and very still, and they both stood in the night on the frigid balcony, their lips an inch apart. One hand was resting against his chest, and she willed it to push him away, because she couldn't have him so close, even though she did, and she could feel his warmth through his tuxedo jacket, and he looked like someone she could fall in love with again.
His lips brushed hers momentarily, and the spell was broken. They both knew where this would end, and the fervor of a minute ago was lost. They still stood close, no longer touching, looking in opposite directions as the cars sped by on the streets below them, as stars twinkled in the sky.
"I should go," she whispered, stealing a glance at him. He nodded without smiling.
And he looked the same.
And they don't speak after that.
Because this isn't a love story.