Based on Last Kiss. A request for actonh. Sorry it took me a 100 years. I hope it's worth the wait!
The old adage, you never quite know what you have until it's gone is a cliché. It also isn't an idea you'd ever entertained much. You hadn't had too many serious romantic relationships; a few in school here and there, girls to have a good time with. Girls who rejected you, a few casual flings. You'd dated and you thought you might've even been in love once or twice. You'd never had your heart broken. never had been one to do the heartbreaking. Things typically progressed to a natural end.
That was fine. You were there to study when you were at university and afterwards, you wanted to make a name for yourself. Romance took a back seat to that, for years and years. And then one day, after you'd set out to be a professional actor, to master your craft, you saw her for the first time.
Maybe it was the way she carried herself...not stuffy and serious like everyone else. Maybe it was the way that when you moved closer, you could see a hint of mischief in depths of blue. A streak of danger, like she wanted to get away from something and make a mess, to fuck shit up and not look back. You liked that about her...the part you could see that said fuck it. She took off her shoes and danced, her arms wound around your neck, her head buried in your shoulder. Her scent would linger on the jacket of your suit for days.
You took her back to your hotel room and there was no consideration of whether or not it was a wise idea because you were captivated and then you lost yourself...allowed yourself not to give into reason for once in your ordered, precise life. Threw caution to the wind and drowned in everything she was, how alive she felt under the palms of your hands.
That was it, that was the easy part. You were completely under her spell. It didn't occur to you to be overly impressed or intimidated (and you knew just who she was, you didn't live under a rock) and that was mostly because she had no real pretension. She didn't put on any false airs and that was another thing you liked. You hung onto that she was witty and smart, that she enjoyed what you had to say and the conversations you had.
The night turned into another and another and still, you felt something holding you back. You couldn't really put your finger on what it was. You knew she wanted a relationship, she'd hinted at it, more or less. It made you nervous...maybe it was the press finding out, maybe it was just your own insecurities so you resisted putting a label on it, told her you thought it might be best to keep things between the two of you for now.
Perhaps it wasn't fair, you realized. You were slowly developing strong feelings for her, the more you spent time with her and perhaps she deserved the validation of what you were to one another. It was clearly important to her.
So, it came with stipulations. You had to place some. It was to protect her as much as it was to protect yourself. You couldn't let your private life collide with your career...or hers, for that matter. They would have to be separate. If she was alright with that, you thought you would be able to have something real.
As it turned out, privacy wasn't an issue. Everything in her world abruptly went to shit and she turned to you to pick up the pieces. The last thing she wanted was to be in public, to show her face and you settled into the role of her protector quite naturally. She wanted to shield what this was from everyone, to keep it sacred, both of you on the same exact page.
And for a good while, you were happy. Even as she began to emerge from that time of her life, she was adamant about keeping your relationship out of the spotlight, not just at your insistence, but because it was what worked.
You didn't notice the cracks. Not until it was too late.
You loved her...more than anything, loved being with her. That much hadn't changed or altered. But something had and by the time quarantine rolled around, you both felt it. Grasped the shift and there wasn't much you could do to stop it.
