Strawberries & Cigarettes

Chapter 11

May 03, 2015

Purple and fucked up bruises.

That's all Aurora sees when she looks at Spencer, a black eye, a broken nose, a bruised bottom lip, and an even more bruised jaw.

A fucked up set of injuries.

And she can't take back what Louis did to him.

Aurora wishes she can when she has to stand there and consume his stresses about going back to work and dealing with the reality of his new appearance.

But instead, his mind detaches from his unfortunate situation and controls his sore hands to cook up a brunch meal for the two.

Spencer cooking while his hands are wounded isn't exactly going well for him.

They plan to drink freshly squeezed lemonade with their soon-to-be BLTs and crispy fries, so Aurora adds ice cubes into the blue pitcher filled with the cold beverage.

He works on their BLTs, and the fries are yet to be fully deep fried since she's hesitant if she's going to burn herself or not.

Cooking isn't her specialty.

The television plays a random show in the background, a soft hum of a tune from Aurora combining with the placid noises around them. 

"This shit hangover isn't getting better... Not even with coffee and with this fucking pain I can't do jack shit, oh my God, why was he even there in the first place!"

He's been repeating the same complaints all morning long that she can now memorize them word by word.

It's exhausting her head.

"Coffee isn't the best treatment for a hangover." Aurora purses her lips, glancing over at him. "And he was there because his friends invited him... I may or may not have told Jasmine to invite the group."

Spencer snaps his head at her, wincing when he does. "You what? So you practically invited him too! This... I'm suing you."

A chuckle leaves her lips but she puts her hands up in surrender when he glares at her.

"In my defense, I didn't say all of the group... And because he wasn't that fond of you, I didn't think he would actually come!"

He dramatically groans. "The fact that Jai saw me get beat up to a pulp like what the, that's so embarrassing! I don't know how I'll face him — or anyone after this."

Aurora pouts at his negative words while she finally finishes deep frying the salty golden-toned fries.

No comforting or reassuring advice filters through her mind, so she stays silent.

She wishes she can naturally console him.

Someone knocks on their front door, not too loud but enough to make the pair look at each other with furrowed eyebrows.

"Imagine it's Louis to finish beating me up," Spencer laughs out, wincing once more when his jaw aches from laughing.

Or from even breathing.