The Ineffable Ruth Rhodes

27 third mistake

vincent

Vincent's first mistake was ever getting involved with Ruth Rhodes.

It was the perfect plan, he'd thought. Get involved with someone plain and end it by the time the school year was over.

His second was ever treating her like less than she was. As if she was someone who couldn't do any damage.

He was wrong.

Oh, he was so, so wrong.

His third was loving Ruth Rhodes.

And he knew it as soon as she set her eyes on him, and her lips twitched, and his heart felt like it was being pulled in fifteen different directions. When she laughed, he could hear the sadness in her voice and it made him want to cry. And when she looked at him sadly, like she was okay with wallowing in her sadness, and he just wanted to grab her and take her sadness away. He wanted to reach through her bubble of grief and hold her and dry her tears so she never even had to worry about frowning again, he wanted to run up to her and shake her and tell her to be happy, and tell her she deserved to be loved and she was wrong.

He should've known.

The second she looked up at him and smiled and every trace of drunkenness left his body. The second he called her cute, and her face lit up, God he wanted to call her every kind word in the English dictionary to see how many different ways her eyes could shine. It took every fiber of his being not to look at her and kiss her senseless, kiss her lips so hard they were swollen for a week just so every time she looked at her lips she'd remember him.

He was going insane.

He was wrong, hell, he was so wrong he made wrong look right.

He was in love with Ruth Rhodes.

The ineffable Ruth Rhodes.

And he couldn't bring himself to be sorry about it.