ᵗʰᵉ ˡᵉᵃᵈᵉʳ ?

𝘭𝘦𝘵'𝘴 𝘴𝘱𝘭𝘪𝘵 𝘶𝘱 𝘨𝘢𝘯𝘨 !

everyone tells you about the shift from childhood to adulthood, but no one ever prepares you how much you'll grow between the ages of twenty & thirty. how your priorities change, how you'll care more about what you put in your body, or how the girl who used to get under your skin like it was her job suddenly becomes a woman you're quickly learning you can't live without. the question catches him off guard, sending heat to his cheeks that were rapidly growing red. perhaps he was reading the signs wrong, seeing what he wanted to see versus what was actually going on between them. a partnership built on the ashes of bridges burned, they were two leaders without a team what else was there to do except grow closer. tell me you don't feel it too ... tell me & i'll drop it. for someone so smart, nancy missed signs all but written in bright neon lights ━ signs just short of shouting from rooftops or holding a boombox over his head like they were the main characters in some cheesy eighties romcom.  ❛ . . . i've been trying to anyway. ❜ he admits with an awkward laugh.

in all honesty he was overdue for a cut ... & a shave. too busy chasing ghosts ( his own & other people's ) he hasn't had a moment to slow down. if he had remembered grace was coming today, he would've freshened himself up. a con to . . . dating ? someone as married to the job as he was, was the fact that things like this tend to slip through the cracks. he was lucky he knew what day it was ( thank god for smartphones, right ? ).  ❛ yeah, ❜ he laughs, running his hand over a scruffy cheek.  ❛ things have been busy around here. ❜ business was booming. good for him, good for idle hands that only seemed to shake when he had nothing to do or no one to hold. a sedative to his racing mind, maybe it would calm down for a minute now that they were in the same place for another fleeting moment. here today, gone tomorrow. he was never good with commitment, too afraid to sit still for long as if he'd fall apart like the old chevy van he'd breathed life back into at seventeen.