"Don't go to Florida, nobody lives in Florida, unless you're an orange." Louise stiffly quipped, standing before the sprawled out mess of clothes and comic books that Logan fussed over - hurriedly selecting various articles to be thrown into a faded, aged backpack.
"Well, I'm going to be orange. Orange from tanning on the beach so much." He absent-mindedly responded, focused on the choice of leaving his mustard yellow Bob's Burgers employee t-shirt (a failed ploy by Linda and Gene, who really just wanted everyone to have matching tees) or his beloved concert raglan. Louise failed to see him stuff the sickly yellow top into his bag.
"You know that can give you skin cancer, right?"
"Then I'll wear sunscreen."
"And you know that everybody there is blonde. Not naturally, god no. But you won't be 'special' anymore, Logan. You'll look just like everyone else"
"Hm, well, I was planning on dying my hair blue anyway."
"Blue!?" Louise shrieked, sending a cocky, cruel smile to Logan's face. Assuredly, he placed a hand on her shoulder and, oblivious to the look of desolation in Louise's eyes, said, "Look, dude, it's final. I told the guys I was going, and I've already handed in my resignation to Bob."
Logan caught only a brief glimpse of her pitiful expression before it changed into that of irritated defiance. "Handed in your resignation? What resignation? We're not classy enough to have resignation letters!". Shrugging, Logan only returned to his packing, and, ignorantly amused, asked, "Well, what would you rather have me do then? Flip you all off and slam the door behind me?" Anticipating Louise to agree - saying how maybe it would "liven things up around her" or something - her response, "No! I would rather you stayed." caused Logan to nearly choke.
Stiffly turning away from his bed, he found her to be, unsurprisingly, fuming: jaw tight and hands balled into fists. But, oh god, were those tears stinging her red rimmed eyes - threatening to spill in a sputtering overflow? No. God no. Louise doesn't cry. She's never cried, except for that one time she thought her rabbit ears had been converted to blackened cinders (Even then, that ended in maniacal, deranged laughter). So there was no possible way that Louise was going to cry - especially over somebody like him.
Despite his "certainty" that Louise was not going to weep, Logan's tone changed into that of a soft coo, spine curling to level with her short stature and palms holding stubbornly hunched shoulders - as if he were holding her up from plummeting. She averted her gaze, coffee colored eyes awkwardly - defiantly - looking away. Had Logan ever been so close up to her face? Clearly not, as the tints of cinnamon red and earthy copper within her iris' were never noted until then.
"Louise, there's nothing left for me here. My parents kicked me out. My friends have all gone to college. And you guys…" He trailed off, unsure of how to phrase something so delicate. But, within that pause, it seemed the intensity of Louise's eyes only deepened, becoming the sole focus of Logan's attention. Why was he so drawn - so practically pulled to her? Why were his lips tingling - as if demanding the sensation of contact? Why was he going so numb, so floatless? Louise, his main rival for all this time, couldn't actually be causing this, right?
Entirely disconnected from his thoughts, a response stiffly left Logan - though his entrancement didn't waver in the slightest. "...you guys have each other". However, this response seemed to snap Louise out of her own fascination, and the return to a seething glare seemed to sharply slap Logan awake as well.
"Logan, you have us, okay? Don't pull this whole 'lone ranger' bullshit when you know you've got people willing to bend over backwards for you. Because that's just...that's just selfish."
"Selfish?" Logan repeated, offense trickling off his words. Now, it was his turn to get cross."Me leaving you - saving you the burden of paying me as an employee, and all my phone calls from the police station, and the random confrontations from my mother - is selfish!?"
"Don't screw with me - you're not leaving to be good. God, no - you're leaving because you're bored. Because we're - " Louise's throat seemed to catch. Logan could hear it. The brief choking on words and tears - all sternly stifled down by a resilient stubbornness as she forced herself to look away from him and his gaping expression. And honestly, that was more terrifying than hearing Louise yell or be furious with him. It was the most terrifying thing out there. When she spoke again, her voice trembled, but her scowling persevered. " - Because I'm not good enough for you."
"What? Louise, no-"
"Because I'm not exciting enough, or interesting enough, or sweet enough to convince you to stay. And, fine. Whatever. I don't care. Screw you. Go to fucking Florida. Party on Miami. Dye your hair blue. Become an...orange. I don't care. Because I've got my family - and they'd never leave me for a fucking hot-ass beach."
Before Logan could even speak, Louise was storming away - door slammed behind her, causing the whole house to shake. But it didn't even really matter if she had given him a chance to retort, to disagree with every little thing she had just said - that she utterly believed, to crash his lips into hers. He was void of all speech, even of all thought - besides the harsh realization being repeated in his head: "I fucked up".