Love At First Text ✔️

Her

Eden wanted her flowers to live forever.

The first time she had ever been bought them, and they were as beautiful as she had always hoped. They were thoughtful, too. She had chosen them herself, because Sebastian had wanted her to have something she deserved. And they were dangerous.

Dangerous, because every time she looked at them, her heart swelled, and she smiled, and she thought of him. Him, and nothing else.

She couldn't afford that. She couldn't afford to fall in love with someone who did not know how, or want, to return it to her. She could not unguard her heart, and lower her defences, and let herself fall for him, because he would not be there to catch her. Yet knowing all of that would not stop it from happening. She could fall in love with Sebastian Walker. She likely would, if he continued to be the man that she had so long yearned for.

Which is why she hadn't gone to dinner with him on Saturday evening. She'd lied about the reason – she felt like she was getting far too comfortable with lying to him – and stayed home. He'd told her not to worry, and to have a good evening with her brother. Noah was likely having a brilliant evening, running his club without the knowledge that Eden had involved him in her fake plans. Sebastian had then said he would speak to her soon.

He'd called her the following day.

They'd talked for a little while, before Eden had to visit her parents, and Sebastian parted ways with the promise to message her. He did. He never lied to her. She wondered if it would make it easier to deny herself his company if he did.

Through the week, they had chatted often. Sporadic texts, two phone calls, an exchange of pictures, and even a rapport of voice notes. Eden enjoyed Sebastian's company, and she liked to think that he enjoyed hers. She liked his laugh, and his awful jokes, and the stories of his friends – she was particularly partial to the tales of Elijah and Charlotte during sixth form – and she felt more heard than ever when he asked about her day.

Six weeks was not long, in the grand scheme of things. Six weeks of daily messages, the occasional call, two face to face meetings, one of which was brief and awkward and a complete mess, was a ridiculously short span of time. Except, in that month and a half, Eden had been slowly failing to hold together the pieces of her crumbling composure, and Sebastian had been there to nurture each shard, reading them as the bore the reflection of who she truly was. And he handled her with care. He made sure she was okay, and had eaten, and asked about her day and plans. He listened first, before he spoke, and he made time for her, even when sometimes it felt as though she didn't even make time for herself.

Six weeks was no time at all, but that had not stopped her. It had not stopped her from liking Sebastian, more than was healthy. More than was good for her. She didn't love him – she knew that feeling, the violent and suffocating and beautiful pain of love – but she knew, without much argument at all, that she could. She would. Which is why she knew that she could not see him again. Why she could not speak to him much longer.

The dawning of that realisation had made her droop and wither. Much like the flowers that he had bought her which still sat in the vase on her windowsill, even as the petals began shed and the leaves started to dry.

"Eden." Zoya nudged her friend with her foot. Eden's body swayed at the motion, and as it returned to its righted position, her wandering mind joined her too.

Eden looked at Zoya blankly. "I haven't been listening to you." She admitted.

Zoya rolled her eyes, focusing her attention back to her phone screen. The pair were sat in Eden's living room. Zoya, laid out on the sofa, head held up at an awkward angle by the sofa armrest, her feet folded on Eden's lap. The latter sat upright, with her legs crossed to fit on a single cushion.