Burgundy || HS

quinze

She drew a butterfly on her wrist with a marker to remind her to stay strong. So he inked a butterfly on his stomach to remind her when the ink washed off. ― A.L.

Jane sat away from Harry, digging at her scalp for an itch that didn't exist while reading Die With Me. Although she couldn't fathom how such a book could become a movie, she decided that she would give the unhighlighted version another chance. She hated Andrew, she'd come to conclude. He was just about as selfish as Harry had been when they first met each other. He didn't care for Olivia in the end, they didn't even fall in love. Jane supposed it was for the better. He was going to inevitably leave her.

And while Jane pondered over the misconceptions of false love, Harry sat in their hotel room at The New York Palace and dragged his fingers across the screen of his phone, playing a word game. Of course. They'd been quiet since their previous conversation loss its flame. Jane had asked, after getting an overnight bag from her apartment to take to the hotel, why Harry already had clothes in his car. First, Harry panicked that she was suspicious of dishonestly, but Jane was truly curious.

"It's for," he stuttered, "yanno, bear attacks."

"Bear attacks?"

"For sure. All guys keep clothes in their cars for bear attacks." He twisted his fingers to take hers, "Say I'm in the woods, right? If there just happens to be this she-bear in the middle of God knows where, she's going to fuck me up before I get the chance to run. Right?" Jane nods. "But, I'm a beastly, grizzly man, so I'm gonna obviously hit the bitch, excuse my language, and run. I get to my car and my clothes are torn, I smell like shit, and no police officer is gonna believe that some homeless-looking man with an expensive ass car and shitty clothes. So, I get arrested for stealing a car."

"That makes no sense, Harry."

"Hush, I'm not done." They continued to hold hands while waiting for the receptionist checked them into a room. "To avoid all that from happening, I could simply go into my car, drive a little, then change my clothes and look a bit presentable. Doesn't that make more sense?" Harry's eyes glittered with amusement while Jane shook her head.

"No, Harry, it doesn't make any sense." He shrugged. They hadn't spoken since that moment. It wasn't because of anger or awkwardness, it was simply because there was nothing to talk about. Jane had a nasty habit. Well, nasty in her opinion. She liked to draw in books a small thing from each chapter. May it be a flower for a first date or a tombstone for a funeral, she drew on each chapter.

So, while she was flipping back to the previous chapter, Harry looked over to her with a pen in her hand. It was the first copy he'd given to her of the book and he didn't wonder where the second copy was. His eyebrows nearly met in the middle with confusion and pure curiosity carefully knit in his expression. "What are you doing?" She answered him with a short reply so she could focus on the drawing. "That's a bit odd, love."

There it was again, that word. Love. Jane found it odd. She knew Harry didn't love her, but the stereotypical British male with the word 'love' in his vocabulary with a meaning other than the real one was interesting. Those men and boys threw around the word like they threw a baseball (or high heels, dildos, no judgement). It didn't bother Jane that Harry used the word because Harry could honestly talk about whatever was on his mind and it would still interest her somehow, whether she'd admit it or not.

Jane disagreed and asked for his respect. He nodded and apologized, telling her that he'd done worse. He had. He was doing worse. Just thinking of it made him cringe and he sat up to look at the back of Jane's head. "Let's go swimming," she suggested while feeling his eyes knotting through her spine, reaching for her heart. Harry tensed and his throat closed, but he agreed to make her happy. Harry would do anything until that day to make Jane happy.