I'm back, everyone. So I'm dedicating this chapter to MemoirsofaLostCause. To answer your question about Blaise, we aren't going to learn about him till a little bit later in the story. I promise I will reveal how he became who he is now.
Disclaimer: I'm broke.
She was sad eyes, wine lips, and a broken heart in the middle of the night. Her arms were curled on her chest, eyes open wide as she stared at the ceiling while memories drifted through her mind. It'd been eight months. Eight months since they'd met, since they began this whatever-they-were. Eight months till she'd found that she had fallen much too hard for a man like him. Eight months for her to realize that she meant nothing to a man like him. For a girl like her, it was... Well, she didn't really know what it was but it hurt her somewhere inside and she felt the tears threatening to fall.
The arm around her waist tightened as he shifted in his sleep and she wondered who he was dreaming about tonight because she couldn't imagine herself as an inspiration of dreams. The leg curled around her own held her to the bed and she turned her head to gaze at the man beside her. A small, sad smile graced her lips. He'd never see it. She gazed at him, taking in his appearance rather than memorizing the familiar contours of his face. There were no secret kisses, no runs of fingers through his hair or accidental brushes of her fingers on his skin. Not tonight. Not ever.
Gently, softly, she lifted his arm off her body and sat up as it fell to the bed where she had lain, refusing herself another look at his sleeping profile. Slowly, her legs became disentangled from his own and she heard him shift, his body noticing the lack of warmth. A final act of caring, she brought the covers from the end of the bed up over his body, still not looking at his face. From the doorway, she allowed herself a final glance back, still dressed in yesterday's clothes. She whipped her head to face the exit then swiftly shut the door in a quiet click.
In her car, she sat with her back tall and straight. She didn't need him and his bouts with other girls, other women. She didn't need him attempting to subtly change her into his ideal woman, into someone she didn't want to be, instead of accepting whoever she was even though she didn't think she'd ever know who that would be. The woman was telling herself that she didn't need the man four stories above her in the apartment building. She was trying to convince herself that she didn't want him anymore. It didn't take much time, though, for her to believe that she could do better than him.
She finally turned the key in her ignition and drove into the dawn. Her father's ultimatum rang in her head and she bit her lip when she looked in the rearview mirror. Up in the apartment, a fist unconsciously clenched in the sheets.
She kept driving, telling herself that she'd stand as tall as a skyscraper without him.