𝘕𝘖𝘛 𝘛𝘖𝘋𝘈𝘠 | RHEA RIPLEY

𝓒 ᴴᴬᴾᵀᴱᴿ 40 | not today

"Are you ready?"

Weeks had gone by, and time made Alex feel like she meant nothing.

As dreadfully fast time went on, Alex felt like she never had enough of it to catch up to the way she felt. She was still dealing with so many emotions at once, she found herself repressing majority of it throughout the weeks.

She was grateful to have Toni and Tegan to distract her from the way she was feeling, but she felt and knew it was still there lingering around. It never gave her a chance to enjoy anything she was doing.

She should've been enjoying the fact that she was walking more and making a lot more progress in therapy - that her time to get back into a ring was very near - but no, her mind kept reminding her of what happened, so it would bring her down.

Still, she did her best to keep her mind occupied.

Which left her to what she was doing now.

She had finished getting dressed for that double date Toni had set her up in with her boyfriend's brother. And she was not looking forward to it whatsoever, but she was hoping it could get her mind off of things for the meantime.

She knew she wasn't going to have any sort of interest in that man, but it was worth a shot.

If things remained the way they were, this was a good first step to getting back into the dating scene.

"Yeah. I'm ready to go whenever you are," Alex took another look at herself in the mirror, putting the finishing touches on her makeup before turning to Toni, who was sitting on the bed.

Toni seemed to be ecstatic over the date, just like she was when she first brought it up, but it was clear she reserved some of that excitement to have some consideration toward Alex.

(Because she knew Alex wanted Rhea, not this guy she set her up on a date with.)

"You sure you still want to go?" Toni asked after a brief pause, "You know you're not forced to. I can cancel on them if you need me to,"

And Alex loved (and hated) how thoughtful Toni was over her feelings. She appreciated it, but Alex wasn't going to end up canceling it.

No matter if she didn't want to go, which she didn't but - no matter if this was the first date she was about to go on in years - - no matter if the last date she went on, she was with the person she couldn't get rid of from her thoughts - - - she was definitely not going to end up canceling.

That would be embarrassing for many reasons, and Alex wasn't in the right mind frame to deal with that feeling on top of the others.

"No, don't do that. I want to go," Alex responded with a deep breath and she watched Toni take one in of her own.

It looked as if she wanted to argue with her, like she already knew Alex didn't want to go and she was simply forcing herself to. Though, she seemed hesitant to let it go once her expression softened - again, only doing so out of consideration for Alex.

"Okay. Let's go then."

- x -

"Alex, where the hell are we going?"

Alex kept her foot on the pedal, speeding past the cars on the highway as she continued to ignore the questions coming from the woman beside her in the passenger seat.

Her lips were curved, mindlessly, since she was keeping their destination for their date to herself for a few reasons.

Reason number one: she enjoyed building up the anticipation, so she could see that impatient woman's reaction once they get there. And reason number two: Alex knew she was going to go ballistic once she realized where they were heading to.