The Darkness Between Us || [C.L.]

// o n e

"Nonni." It was the only hum in an otherwise silent room. "Virginia." Rosalie snapped this time, fed up with the lack of response. Nina's head lifted slowly from the book she had been engaged with for some time, chewing incessantly on the inside of her cheeks, trying not to think of the day ahead. Stormy hues met with the gentle gaze of her best friend.

"Yes?" Nina's voice was as flat as usual. People often took it as disinterest, and majority of the time, they were correct; very few things felt exciting to Nina, and sometimes, even when they were, it was hard to make her voice match the feeling inside. Silence was often easier.

Rosalie's face lit up. Her and Nina were different that way. Rosalie was a burst of light in any place graced by her presence. There was something special in the way her laughter echoed the room, some sort of ecstasy trapped within, infecting even the grumpiest person until they had no choice but to smile along. Her cheeks were forever rosy. Her hair never out of place. She was exactly what most girls longed to be.

Nina was the opposite. Her hair was always anywhere but in the place she had wanted it to be. She was the type of girl other girl's moved out of the way for, and if they didn't, and Nina was in a bad mood, she would push them. It was never intentional, it was just her.

"We need to be there in two and a half hours. Do you not think we should start getting ready?" Rosalie's voice was animated; tonight had been all she could think of for weeks. She had gone and bought face masks and hair masks and spent hours carefully crafting the perfect outfits for the pair. Nina had protested, partially because she wasn't sure it was entirely necessary, partially because she knew if the choice lay with Rosalie alone she would spend all night in a tight satin number paired with some barely there heels. 

Sometimes, on the evenings they pretended to be more successful than they were and sat in expensive bars waiting for boys who were doing the same to buy them drinks, those dresses were okay. But tonight, she was already nervous and needed to seek comfort in any way she could. With a purposely exasperated sigh, Nina dog-eared the page she was on and slammed her book on the coffee table that sat before her. A small smile found its way on to her lips. "Okay, but I'm wearing my suit."

"No. You can't." Rosalie pouted playfully. They both knew there was no use, because if Virginia Shaw was anything, it was stubborn. And in all fairness, it had been a while since that outfit had been out to play.

It was an easy grey number that Nina had found several years back in a dingy Oxfam in the outskirts of London, slung messily over a single hanger in a seemingly abandoned men's section. Without even trying it on, she had rushed over to the counter and shoved the £10 note into the hands of the startled employee, who had just seconds earlier been engaged in conversation with a person Nina could only assume was a regular. She had rushed home as quickly as she could to put it on, and despite Rosalie's protests about the size ("Jesus, Nonni, it's easily a men's extra large. The second you take the belt off it's just going to be around your ankles. And if the trousers unroll you're definitely going to trip over and break something."), the quality ("It must be at least forty years old. I'm pretty sure my dad had the same one in, like, 1978?") and the suit as a whole ("I mean, I get your whole vibe and stuff. But this just isn't it for me. Like, it's cool, you're cool. But couldn't you just wear a nice dress? I have, probably, like, twelve you could borrow!"), it had immediately become Nina's favourite ensemble.

And tonight she certainly needed it. The truth was, she was nearly halfway to thirty, stuck inside a run-down flat with half of a bedroom and a forty minute tube journey into London. It had been almost 4 years since she left university and started trying to take her career more seriously. Unfortunately, her career had decided differently, mocking her as she stagnated in an entry level admin job, spending days on end sat on a dining room chair that did not match the rest of the set, a hardback she spent £30 on and never got around to reading shoved beneath one of the legs that seemed to lose 2 inches in some sort of tragic accident that no one was around to witness.