— scorpio skies.

elliealdenkamp​.

a lithe arm reached out, hand securing the lighter within its grasp. as a delighted smile painted ellie’s lips. she taken a seat across from both darby and miriam, the three forming a sort of circle around the pile of rocks and twigs darby had pulled together. her glittering green gown trailed down her body and onto the ground where it without a doubt was picking up dirt, but the girl didn’t mind. she’d managed to run off deeper into the arboretum with, arguably, two of her greatest friends. getting a little dirty along the way was but a small price to pay for this sort of rare and unique time all together. “how about… tyche, goddess of fate and fortune?” her mesh and stone covered shoulders rose and fell in a shrug, ellie beginning to light the candles. “what do you think, mir? who should it be?” one after another, the wicks went aflame, their light starting to glow across the young women’s faces. in truth, she didn’t mind whoever it was they ended up dedicating the fire too, only that they all had fun with it.

“This feels like the start of the Trojan War,” she commented, eyes glued to the flame as Ellie lit the candles. Sitting with her legs crisscrossed, her flowing dress covering her legs, she contemplated their options. “Athena. She’s the goddess of wisdom, so I think she can tell us our exam answers.” While she didn’t expect it to work, her skin was thrumming with excitement. She was in excellent company and that was the only thing that mattered to her. The moon casting a pale light on the three girls, the glow of the candles flickering across their faces created an ominous atmosphere. It almost seemed like it would work, like they would summon a real goddess – it was the thrill that anything could happen. She grabbed the bottle of wine they brought with them and some crackers they had swept from the bar, holding them out towards the middle of their intimate circle. “How does this work? Do we throw it into the candles as an offering? We don’t have to do a blood oath, do we? I don’t want to get blood on my dress or on my shoes.”

@dcrbyalbright​

                    He came to the bar with another drink in mind, eyes on whoever was tending but was met with a scent that he had only encountered once in his life before. It was faint, but there, just enough for him to question it. In all honesty, it reminded him of the times back home, when his sister would take a flat iron to her hair— faint, but something. He set a hand up on the counter before turning, a brief investigation, and his eyes could not help but land on the girl a few feet over. He didn’t really know her. Not really, though he had definitely noticed her around before. His eyes moved over her profile, and coincidentally, or rather not, she was tending to her hair. The ends were visibly frayed, consuming her attention, and in his buzzed state, he smirked, “… You didn’t set your hair on fire, did you?” He asked, turning to her then, speech naturally slowed and smoothed, a tease, “‘Cause from here it’s lookin’ like you set your hair on fire.”

Waiting for the champagne she had ordered, Darby was busy examining the ends of her hair, blackened and singed, frayed from when she had leaned to close to a candle attempting to put out the small bush fire she had set with Elli and Miriam. She felt like a criminal on the run, just a bit, the fire put out hastily and the girls going their separate ways like the end scene of Ocean’s 11. Luckily her dress was still intact, simmering gold silk hugging her body, almost the same color as the champagne set down in front of her. A southern accent brought her out of her reverie, blonde head whipping up to look at the person questioning her, cheeks growing hot under his gaze. “Just a little accident with a curling iron. Never did get the hang of those things. Nearly burned my eye off with one another time, see?” She lied to him, pointing to a faint circular scar underneath her eyebrow. “Is it bad?” She asked him, holding out her hair for inspection, bonfire-like scent accompanying it. “I’m dressed as Circe. Maybe I can just pretend it happened in a sorcery mishap,” she joked lightly, taking a sip of champagne. “What do you think?”

dcrbyalbright​:

Darby always found emotions fleeting. “I love you,” her mother would coo, pressing kisses to her forehead in a drunken haze, only to lock herself in her room the next day, shouting when Darby tried to enter. Everything felt ephemeral to her. Fading quickly, like a fogged up shower mirror. Not worth it to indulge in anything above the surface level, constantly treading water. But with Holden she had once dove in. Now found herself constantly pulled under his tide, despite her own protests. It felt more right, touching his hand, than it had when someone else’s tongue had been shoved down her throat. It was more intimate, somehow. “Thanks,” she told him, blurting the word out, cheeks growing red at the relief that he would still let her join. Sometimes around him, she still felt like the flustered girl she had once been. Trotting towards the boundaries of the smoking area as he spoke, she hopped the low fence, stepping over, cigarettes perched in her hand precariously. She grinned at his recitation, wondering about his choice of poem. She often took people’s memorized poems as an indication of their innermost self. “Do you know Mary Oliver?” she asked, almost growing bashful as she prepared. her intelligence still managed to embarrass her sometimes, like a long held secret. “You might see an angel anytime and anywhere. Of course you have to open your eyes to a kind of second level, but it’s not really hard. The whole business of what’s reality and what isn’t has never been solved and probably never will be. So I don’t care to be too definite about anything. I have a lot of edges called Perhaps and almost nothing you can call certainty,” she recited to him, stopping in her tracks afterwards, offering him another drag of her cigarette, almost smoked down to the nub. “I’m sorry,” she said suddenly, without warning, thinking of how he had seen her earlier. Kissing someone else. Her eyes searched his, blinking rapidly, flashing a cat eye lined in golden eyeliner rather than black. “I mean, for kind of ditching you. Are we okay?”

“Think so,” Holden told her, nodding as he followed her example and hopped the fence. Though much less gracefully than she did, almost tripping and having to steady himself with a laugh. The name sounded familiar, but then again he couldn’t be sure. His memory oftentimes feeling like only a collection of hazy experiences that were sometimes undecipherable from each other. Static noise drowning out the bad parts. And sometimes the good ones too. Perhaps it was sad to live life that way. Almost numbed, not paying attention and missing things. But he’d always felt it was better that way. It avoided attachment. But maybe he hadn’t done such a good job of that, after all. Darby being the one thing he could never seem to kick. But it was moments like these, watching her recite poetry while everything else seemed to fade around them, that he was reminded of why that was. She would always seem to be a very real thing in what seemed to be a very false world to him. “I like it. Feels very… I don’t know, you.” He shrugged, offering her a small smile as he gladly accepted the cigarette back for one final drag. Not really sure how else to put it, despite feeling like that was an incredibly lame response to such a moment. He meant it, though, sincerely and in a good way. “Sure you didn’t write it and not this Mary chick?” He asked her, scratching the back of his head as he pretended to be skeptical in an attempt to make her smile. Grinning stupidly at his own bad joke as he gazed over at her, the air around them seeming to change with her apology, which he wasn’t expecting and didn’t exactly know what do with. Suddenly feeling the need to be calculated in his response in a way he didn’t inherently possess. “Oh that? No yeah, it’s cool…” The moment seeming to test him as he flicked what remained of the cigarette to the ground and smothered it with the toe of his boot. Almost calculating the odd of what would happen if he showed some kind of hurt or jealousy or anything, but ultimately deciding against it. Like he always did. “Life happens. No need for a guilty conscience. Promise I won’t hold a grudge. Couldn’t keep up with it anyway.” He assured her with a shrug, avoiding her eyes as he began to walk forward again. Then, turning around to face her when he thought of something. “What was the line in that poem, again? I don’t care to be too definite about anything… something about nothing having certainty. Yeah, I liked that part.”

“I hope that’s a good thing,” she retorted, face growing flushed, the night air cold enough that her rosy cheeks could easily been taken as an indicator of the temperated and not of her feeling so exposed. Turning towards him, she took a dramatic bow, dipping her torso with an arm flung out to the side as she walked, sharing a hesitant laugh with him. Her grin was wide, tucking blonde hair behind her ears. The apology, after it was given, sat sourly in her mouth. She found herself regretting it. Apologies were not one of Darby’s strength. she rarely handed them out. To do so she would have to admit being wrong. Her guilt often gnawed away at her like a hungry animal, but she found it easier to numb it, blur its edges like scratching an erasure around the corners of a pencil portrait, than acknowledge it. But the guilt she felt looking at Holden threatened to swallow her whole. “Cool. I owe you a drink. Or something,” sh offered, nudging him in the side with her elbow, finally tossing the spent cigarette onto the ground. The edges of her mouth twitched again as he questioned her. “I have a lot of edges called perhaps and almost nothing you can call certainty,” she repeated, pausing to examine his face. “You ever been certain about anything, Holden?” She asked, before she broke into a self-deprecating laugh. “Jesus, that sounded serious. I just mean, like....” she trailed off, looking up at the night sky, eyes tracing the stars. She thought of him, how certain she was that she still felt for him, but also how certain she was that wanting him would lead nowhere good. “I don’t know. Some things I used to be certain about some things. Seems pretty stupid now. But it’s a good poem, still.”

Leo stood there, suddenly all the more aware of her own body, her own mannerisms, who she turned into when she got angry, who she was currently turning into. Her throat went dry as angry words crawled up like bile, threatening to spill out onto the floor if she didn’t swallow it all back down. How many times had Leo stared at her sister, unsure of what to say, where to begin, how to express herself? It seemed she never knew how to do that; articulate how she truly felt because it would lead to a cracked image of who she was thought to be, an ugly smearing of red paint on a masterpiece that had taken years of just sitting still, doing as she was told, to perfect. But Leo genuinely wasn’t sure she believed Darby. “Seriously?” she asked, and it hardly sounded like a question. “You’re telling me he really had no one else? And that’s why he came out to fucking Vermont?” Bullshit. That was the initial thought that came to Leo’s mind, a thought she realized as dismissive and perhaps cruel, but alas. “I don’t know, Darby,” she muttered, crossing her arms. “Dad would fucking kill you if he knew you were talking to him again, you know that? Like, he’d probably be even more pissed about you doing drugs with him than if you just… did them at all.”

The worst part of being sober was how ready everyone seemed for her to tumble off the cliff again. Like they were waiting as she dangled a foot over the edge, rapt eyes waiting for the moment she would fall over so they could confirm what they thought they knew about her. “Just like her mom. There’s never been any hope for that one,” she had heard an aunt cackle to her husband in a low voice the first Thanksgiving she had gotten out of rehab. She had locked herself in her room the rest of the night, skipping pie to guzzle down wine alone. Leo’s sharp seriously? stung like she had been slapped across the face, eyes stinging. She was never one for crying. Empathy for tears was not passed out in their home. “Jesus. This is why I used to crush up valium for you as a baby,” her mother had sneered out once upon seeing wetness under her daughter’s eyes. “I didn’t ask him to come here,” she insisted quietly, shutting her eyes, opening them back up, any tears forming now pushed inside her. “He said he needed a place to stay, okay? Guess he didn’t have anyone else. I didn’t let him. I fucking swear I didn’t ask him to come here. I didn’t o any drugs with him. I mean, he brought them, but I told him to put them away,” she rushed out, breathless, eager to explain herself like she had been caught coloring on their parent’s imported wallpaper. “I know. I told him to get out but he wouldn’t leave, okay? You don’t know what he’s like.” Her eyes suddenly flew up in a panic. “You’re not going to tell dad, are you?”

DARBY ALBRIGHT AS CIRCE || ENCHANTRESS, DAUGHTER OF HELIOS AND HECATE

Darby was something else. The way she carried herself, the way she spoke never ceased to amaze him, and he was torn between staying far, far away from her and holding onto every word she spoke. Looking at her bloody finger, he winced at the damage and had to look away as his distaste was evident on his face. “Do you want ice? Or a bandage? Tell me you at least poured some alcohol on it to disinfect it.” There was a drink in his hand, but it was completely untouched with Hugo just wanting something to tether him to the party and make him blend in. Sweat had gathered on his forehead, a combination of the crowd and the nervousness of being here. He’d wished he was accustomed to going out by now, but every time it was like jumping into a pool of freezing cold water, a complete shock to his nervous system. “Oh, yeah, sure. Whatever makes you happy.” With wide eyes and red cheeks, he watched her demonstration. “Go for a butterfly. That’s about as cliche as you can get,” he suggested, trying not to look too closely as flashes of the night they spent together echoing through his brain. “Yes, please.” The desperation coated his words as he grabbed her hand in led her outside, not wanting to lose her in the crowd. He leaned against the side of the house once they were out. “You have fun in Italy?” 

Red. That’s the color Leo would have seen had she not just torn herself from a deep sleep, all her grogginess still hindering her vision despite glasses being perched on the bridge of her nose. Instead, she stood behind her sister, a mess of fear and confusion, and the ghostly traces of anger her father had instilled in her by example swirling around her stomach like a dangerous concoction of pills and alcohol her mother would’ve relished. Marco. The name rang in her head like the wails of an ambulance bustling down a busy street, eager for obstacles to get out of the way, having to be patient when patience was the last thing to be. She had seen him only a few times, and his name was one that was seldom – if ever – spoken in the Albright household, and it was one she hadn’t heard in what felt like ages. And what she did know of him and his name, his ratlike face, his recklessness and blatant disregard of her sister’s wellbeing, she loathed. Leo watched in horror as the scene went on, almost unsure if this was a nightmare that just felt a little too close to real life, but no; it was real life that felt a little too close to a nightmare. Her face turned hot as her ears took in his voice uttering the girls’ last name, a name she suddenly felt very protective of, and her nails dug into her palm, anger held in balled fists. And then, just like that, like nothing had happened, Marco was shoved out the door, and Leo was facing Darby head-on. Her sister’s weak explanation saw a cynical scoff coming from Leo, and she crossed her arms, narrowing her eyes as she shook her head. “I thought you – I thought you were done with all that. Aren’t you?” she spat quietly, her brow furrowing. “I mean – what the fuck, Darby? Are you fucking, like, back to all this now? Huh?”

Seeing Marco felt like seeing a ghostly version of herself. Of the person she had once been, still was, if she chose to give in again to drugs. He had once been her only lifeline. Marco was like eating food that poisoned you slowly. It would keep you alive, but at a cost. She wrapped her robe tighter around her body, protectively, crossing her arms, still feeling her hands shaking from the shock to her system. “I... I’m done with all that, I swear. Like, I didn’t know he was coming. I didn’t ask him to. I haven’t been doing that shit with him, I swear,” she blubbered out desperately, sniffing once, voice rising to a higher tone. er appearance probably wasn’t helping her case. She had been up most of the night working, barely sleeping, her hour of slumber interrupted by the rap on her window. Under her eyes was an almost ghastly shade of blue, eyes themselves bloodshot. “No, no I’m not back to all that! Leo, I’m sober. I wouldn’t do that. Fuck -” she exclaimed, rubbing a palm across her face, heart still pounding, wondering if Marco would be back for more. “He just wanted money, I swear. I don’t even know how he got here, why he’s in Vermont,” she rambled out, tripping over her own words, trying to explain the surprise of her situation. She stepped forward, grasping onto Leo’s shoulders. “Please believe me.”

Maybe he should’ve been angry. Shown some kind of emotion at least, because there was something there and he knew it. But what did it matter? In that moment, he just couldn’t bring himself to. It wasn’t like the owned each other, even if he felt like out of anyone Darby did have considerable pull over him. He also knew when it came down to it, he couldn’t exactly expect the same of himself. Had he been the one to get there first, it could’ve easily been him who was kissing someone else. Regardless, the thing about Holden was that he could never seem to be able to express his feelings when it really mattered. Always too afraid of what it meant, of something or someone really meaning something to him. For it was always safer to be lukewarm about things. Even if he knew deep down, that Darby did mean something to him and that she had for a long time. However, thinking it and saying it seemed to be two considerably different things. “Huh?” He asked her, far too distracted by her hand on his that it took him a moment to get the joke. “Oh, right. You can still hear my father’s disappointed cries in the distance.” He laughed, as he waved his hand behind him. Figuring, hypothetically, even that would somehow have become a disappointment to him too. Everything he did seemed to be. His thoughts then drifting to how, as uncomfortable as it might have been, he didn’t want this moment to end. How he didn’t want to walk off without her, didn’t want to be alone. Relief flooding his chest when she suggested coming with. “Yeah, of course. I mean, whatever you want to do.” He told her, shrugging nonchalantly. He had to admit he was a bit taken aback at her words, half-expecting her to want to continue on with the night, but not wanting to show it. Perhaps his way of getting back at her a little. “Does it? Alright, let’s see…” He grinned at the idea as he followed her. Thinking for a moment before coming up with something. He was no expert on poetry, but he had read some in his day. “Some say the world will end in fire, some say in ice. From what I’ve tasted of desire, I hold with those who favor fire… But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate. To say that for destruction ice is also great. And would suffice…” He surprised himself in reciting Robert Frost from memory, knocking his shoulder against hers playfully at the last word. “Your turn.”

Darby always found emotions fleeting. “I love you,” her mother would coo, pressing kisses to her forehead in a drunken haze, only to lock herself in her room the next day, shouting when Darby tried to enter. Everything felt ephemeral to her. Fading quickly, like a fogged up shower mirror. Not worth it to indulge in anything above the surface level, constantly treading water. But with Holden she had once dove in. Now found herself constantly pulled under his tide, despite her own protests. It felt more right, touching his hand, than it had when someone else’s tongue had been shoved down her throat. It was more intimate, somehow. “Thanks,” she told him, blurting the word out, cheeks growing red at the relief that he would still let her join. Sometimes around him, she still felt like the flustered girl she had once been. Trotting towards the boundaries of the smoking area as he spoke, she hopped the low fence, stepping over, cigarettes perched in her hand precariously. She grinned at his recitation, wondering about his choice of poem. She often took people’s memorized poems as an indication of their innermost self. “Do you know Mary Oliver?” she asked, almost growing bashful as she prepared. her intelligence still managed to embarrass her sometimes, like a long held secret. “You might see an angel anytime and anywhere. Of course you have to open your eyes to a kind of second level, but it’s not really hard. The whole business of what’s reality and what isn’t has never been solved and probably never will be. So I don’t care to be too definite about anything. I have a lot of edges called Perhaps and almost nothing you can call certainty,” she recited to him, stopping in her tracks afterwards, offering him another drag of her cigarette, almost smoked down to the nub. “I’m sorry,” she said suddenly, without warning, thinking of how he had seen her earlier. Kissing someone else. Her eyes searched his, blinking rapidly, flashing a cat eye lined in golden eyeliner rather than black. “I mean, for kind of ditching you. Are we okay?”

annie’s brows rose, straightening up where she stood and once again taking the bottle into her grasp. a quick glance around the kitchen revealed a readily available cork screw, undoubtedly left behind by one visiting student or another. swiping it with her free hand, she made her way towards darby, a smile painting her face as the wine inside the bottle sloshed about just a little. for a quick moment her gaze flickered over the albright girl, lashes flitting in a way that could’ve suggested she quickly checked her out or was merely blinking. even if it were obvious, it was always hard to tell with annie whether she was flirting or just being friendly. you know, friendly in the way that some young women were towards other young women they found unquestionably beautiful. a chuckle tumbled from her lips as she neared the chaise, stopping short to set the bottle on a nearby coffee table and beginning to work the screw into the cork. “how dare she,” annie teased, though the space between her brows creased in such a way it appeared as though she were personally offended on darby’s behalf. “—but sure thing, just give me a second…” turning back to the wine, she made quick work of uncorking it, a clean pop echoing throughout the space. “beautiful, not a drop spilled or sprayed. this shit can’t go to waste,” she noted, practically beaming as she walked over to behind the chaise lounge’s back, prompting the other girl to lean her head back. she imagined that it’d be difficult for anyone to so easily turn down or forget the silly request, though it was especially difficult for her to resist. even if darby had been joking, she’d get what she’d asked for, annie was intent on that much. chuckling a bit, she bent over some and began to carefully tilt the bottle just over her mouth, stopping after a small pour. she then stood there for a moment, clearly satisfied. “so,” her voice picked up again, walking back around and taking the offered seat, “how’s it taste, beautiful?” her eyes not-so-subtly moved from darby’s eyes to her lips and back.

Gazing out of the window as she waited for Annie to uncork the wine, her eyes traced across the miles of vineyards, faint smile forming on her lips. Picking up her chin from where it rested on the sill, she looked back just in time to see Annie’s assessing of her, feeling exposed and raw like a painter’s muse, like any second the girl would pick up a brush and splash her likeness across the canvas. It made something like nerves flutter up in her stomach, Darby picturing that any second she would open her mouth and butterflies would spill out instead of words. “Amazing. Dionysus is pleased. Not a drop of his precious liquid wasted,” she complimented, heaving the sentence out in one long breath. She straightened up onto her knees, hands on her thighs like she was about to pray, until she leaned back as instructed, blonde hair spilling over the edge. Shutting her eyes, she opened her mouth for Annie to pour it in, face bare of any makeup except for fire-engine red lipstick. A gulp, and she swallowed, wiping at a dribble of wine that went down her chin, smearing her lipstick slightly, like wiping her hand across a foggy bathroom mirror. A sigh left her lips, eyes flying open, looking up a her. Beautiful. Interesting. Annie always toed the line with her between affectionately friendly and flirting, a combination she found exhilarating and confounding. “Divine,” she enthused, leaning down to the ground where she had left a silver goblet, taking the bottle out of her hands to pour some for the girl. “I feel so special. Like a Roman empress waited on hand and foot. You see any grapes around you could pop into my mouth?” She asked jokingly, kicking her feet up, draping her legs across Annie’s lap. Looking back at the window, she nodded her head towards it. “What do you think of the view? I’m thinking of moving her permanently. Although I could do with a few more grapevines.”

                     if romy had known earlier that darby had gotten them invited on a boat with hot italian men , she likely wouldn’t have popped the molly that harper had managed to get her hands on . all she could really do now as she was dragged along by darby towards the dock was hope she didn’t freak out on the water . she wasn’t too worried , though , smiling and laughing at her friend as the golden retriever of a girl stopped them to ‘ practice ’ her italian before they met the man , massimo , darby had told her . at least she thinks that’s what darby had said , romy had never been one to retain names well . “ ciao ! ” she exclaimed , the only word she could say without a highly thick american accent bastardizing the language . she stepped farther onto the boat , giving a nod in thanks towards lorenzo when he held out a glass of wine for her to take . looking around , she felt underdressed in her bikini top , cut off shorts and open button up , but darby hadn’t complained so she couldn’t bring herself to care much . reaching out for her friend and tugging her close , she tilts the glass of wine to her mouth . “ this shit is amazing , try it , ” she laughs , grinning at her friend . “ so do we know where we’re going ? oh my god can they take us to venice ? i wanna ride a gondola so bad you have no idea . ”

Music still pounded in his ears like a heartbeat, sped up and almost menacing, as Holden finally made his way outside through the sea of bodies all crammed together in the dimly lit club. He’d barely even finished his first drink when he suddenly felt restless and wanting out. A familiar feeling of being out of place washing over him. He pretended to be confused by the feeling, telling himself he didn’t have enough to drink or that the club was shitty or that he just needed some air. But in reality, it was the sight of that fur coat, arms draped around someone else. Kissing someone else. His eyes catching it, catching hers, for a moment before looking away. As if he could blink and the memory would be gone forever. And maybe it was for a second as he was far too distracted by getting out of there, by the girl cursing at him when he failed to apologize for stepping on her foot, by the pack of cigarettes that were seemingly missing from his pockets when he reached for it. His mind wandering off, imagining them laying spilled out in the bottom of his suitcase or worse littered on somewhere on the street. All dirty and crumbled from being stepped on. But it wasn’t long before he was called back, when no one other than Darby appeared. Her hand on his arm a reminder of what had just happened in the club, of what was now a hazy memory of what had happened the other night at the manor. Though he retained his composure, a small smirk apparent on his lips at her joke. “Getting arrested on the school trip? Sounds like me,” Holden laughed before shrugging. “Just needed some fresh air. Place seems smaller than I remember. Or maybe I’m losing touch. Can’t keep up like I used to. Finally growing up. See any gray hairs on my head?” He joked as he accepted the cigarette between shaky fingers, taking a drag before handing it back. Blowing smoke up towards the night sky absent of stars as he avoided her eyes. “It is, isn’t it? Maybe I should invest in some furs.” He laughed, eyebrows knitting as he gestured to her coat. Suddenly aware of the temperature after being lost in thought this whole time. “Well, don’t let me spoil your fun. You should go back inside. I’m gonna go… take a walk or something. Reminisce. Buy some more cigarettes.”

“Think getting you out of an Italian prison sounds complicated. I haven’t been keeping up with my DuoLingo. All I remember how to say is “mangia”,” she joked nervously, his lack of a reaction increasing her anxiety more than if he had greeted her with an expression of disdain. It would have been easy for her to fall back into their routine of quips volleyed back and forth. She wanted to reach her handed out, toy with his hair, cheekily check it for any grays. But she knew he had seen her, the look in her eyes at they caught onto his both embarrassed and regretful. Not that he held any claim over her. but he did more than most, even when they weren’t together. He was like an animal that had burrowed itself deep into the recesses of her mind like it was finding a den. Her thoughts always seemed to come back to him. Briefly, her hand reached forward to steady his shaking one after he had taken a drag of the cigarette, smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. “Shame. You’ll never become a brain surgeon. And here I was about to start calling you McDreamy,” she joked, blue eyes examining his face for any hint of a reaction. Maybe she had kissed someone else because she wanted it. To see him squirm with jealousy, affirmation that he wanted her too. “No, I, um... she started, shaking her head, shutting her eyes as if to clear her vision when she opened them again. “Would you mind if I came? I mean... I don’t know. The crowd here’s kind of sweaty. And you smell nice. Would rather be with you,” she told him, clearing her throat, feeling utterly exposed from her statement. She took the cigarette back from him, barely awaiting an answer as she headed towards the exit, looping her pinky around his index finger as a means of tugging him away. “You know any poetry, Holden?” She asked him suddenly, drawing him away from the crowd, whipping her head back to look at him. “Seems like the perfect kind of night to recite poetry.”