last call. @christenbel !
trouble didn't find her, she always managed to find it, even when she wasn't looking. it was just another bad habit that she needed to kick, but what was the point of trying when the universe had it's own plan? the redhead tossed back whiskey shots like she was celebrating something, and in a way, maybe she was. she'd made it past the big day, the one where her life had been turned upside seven years earlier, the day she'd taken the fall for something that hadn't been her fault. five years from the day she'd left everything behind, and the only woman she'd ever truly wanted a future with.
it wasn't fair, but life wasn't fair. a motto she believed in to the fullest, especially as a familiar scent filled her head. her brows pulled together first, but then came the voice and she knew it wasn't in her head. she'd taken shots, sure, but she'd never gotten drunk enough to feel like christen was within reach.
carefully, she turned and her heart stuttered the moment her eyes met the athlete's gaze. she could've walked out, and she probably should have, but she slipped from her place atop the stool and closed the distance between them like it was hers to take. "in town visiting a friend?" she didn't bother sweeping over the room to see if romi was somewhere around. if she was, she'd pop up eventually. "you look good," she added, but that was always a given. she'd spent give years working on false confidence, but five years worth of practice couldn't have prepared her for such a moment. "seriously, chris. what are you doing here?"
there used to not be many things that had the capacity to render christen silent, but these days, she seemed to live in a chamber where the sound of her blood flowing through her body was amplified. she did not dwell well in silence and now it surrounded her, embraced her, cut off her circulation entirely. first it was a doctor's mouth moving with no sound coming out, then it was an antiseptic smell she couldn't wash out of her hair for weeks, and then it was goodbyes and thank yous that soured her stomach. every time she looked around windsor bay, there was the ache of a phantom limb she still hadn't accustomed to losing.
now it felt like someone had successfully decapitated her, her brain a figment of imagination and her heart aimlessly beating with no set rhythm and a cease in sight. it had been five years. five fucking years to chase ghosts and drown her sorrows in whatever river she could find, the stain of her ring finger's tattoo like a scar from a past life. a love that belonged to someone else, because if bellamy had been hers from the start, wouldn't she have come back by now?
at the time, last call had seemed a safe enough place to lick her wounds in private, trying to dull the entire afternoon's worth of physical therapy from her mind. it was closer to no man's land now, the cells of her body jerking frenetically as they ached to run on a knee that couldn't move without pain. bellamy โ the name almost foreign on her lips, the cracking of an entire life locked away and spilling out everywhere with no chance of stifling the flow. christen's first immediate thought, and unfortunately so: there will never be anyone as beautiful as her.
the shock lingered on her face, words failing to string themselves together coherently. "i..." what was there to say? christen cleared her throat, suddenly strangled by the bombardment of thoughts and vision of bellamy ford in the flesh, right within her fingertips. "i could've sworn you were dead, the way you fell off the face of the earth. what are you..." she trailed off, shaking her head as some of the fragmented things exploding in her mind found their way to her mouth, rolling off the tongue. splintered, shattered, shocked: the newest state of being for christen belmonte, much to her own chagrin. "i live here. windsor bay, not... not the bar. got here about a month ago. is this where you've been hiding out, all this time?"
