We Die Soon

One

A/N: this'll be non-linear, kinda back and forth, from past to present, sorta just going over leo and olivia's relationship (or lack thereof).
it'll be short, maybe only ten-ish parts. if it was more I wouldn't be able to finish it bc i suck.
*also: for this story to work, ray really has to be an asshole. i don't believe he is, i'm sure he's a nice guy if olivia is dating him, but just assuming only leolivia shippers are reading this: let's let it go.*

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She walked in slightly stumbling. Her expression wasn't quite worried, and not really upset. Maybe a little guilty. Mostly just numb. In her hand, she held her purse, tiny with no strap, probably cost over a thousand dollars. Her high heels were too high for her in her state (tipsy). Her dress was short and tight, and I thought she had never looked skinnier than she did right then. It scared me.

"We need to talk," she said dryly, throwing her clutch down in the chair by the door.

"Yeah," I agreed.

We did. It was true. It had been a while since we'd really talked, and there was a lot to talk about. The obvious thing would be: I was in the hospital. She probably wondered why. It might be why she came to visit.

But that wasn't it. There was more.

In fact, it didn't even start with all the things we missed in those three long months that we ignored each other. It started years ago. Maybe even the very first day we met.

I wouldn't lead the conversation, though. She'd start. I'd follow.

She took a seat at the end of my bed. I sat up straighter, feeling like I needed my eyes to be level with hers or she would just melt me. She had a way of doing that anyway.

"First of all I'm sorry for what I said," she said it quickly, as if she was uncomfortable apologizing. Her words all morphed together, a long slurred sentence.

She wanted to start there, with the "fight". (It wasn't really a fight. I knew fights. I lived for fights, and I knew they were all physical. I knew there was some sort of strategy behind it. My falling out with Olivia was all mental, and there was no time to strategize.) I actually knew she would start there. The most obvious beginning.

I nodded. "Yeah."

"I know that you're mad and you have a right to be mad. Like, I mean, I get it. Like I was a total bitch. Like I shouldn't have said that. Like you were just trying to protect me." She was drawing out some of her words more than others; I wondered where she was that she'd been drinking.

"Yeah."

"Can't you say something?" she begged, placing her hand on my calf and crawling just a little closer to me.

"I can't think of anything," I answered honestly.

I thought I had a lot to say to Olivia, but then, when I was finally in front of her again, nothing came to mind. She messed me up, just naturally, just by being herself, looking the way she did. I got distracted by her amber eyes, because sometimes, just in certain light, they looked red, and her blonde hair, not my thing and I usually liked brunettes, always looked so soft, like if I felt it it'd be like running a hand through water.

Our argument was actually the first time I had been able to see her as anything other than perfect. She didn't look soft, or even beautiful. Just harsh. Just evil. Her hair got blown around by the wind and it looked like a tangled mess. Her eyes were just brown.

"Olivia, I didn't want to tell you this!" I said, following her out of the building full of Disney stars. The night air froze me, but I kept walking after her.

"Then why did you?" She yelled, turning around, looking right at me, anger in her eyes.

"Because I thought you should know? I mean, why wouldn't you wanna know?"

"How about because it's bullshit? It's not true, Leo!"

"You don't believe me? I saw it. I saw him kissing her."

"Ray is a good guy. He wouldn't do that to me."

"I'm not crazy," I defended, but she was making me feel crazy.

"I'm not saying you're crazy. I'm saying you're lying."

"Why would I lie about that?"

"Because you're obviously still upset that I've never felt the same way about you as you do about me."

There it went. The thing it always seemed to come back to. I had grown tired of that boomerang, and that's when it happened. When she just became a person. Not Olivia Holt, not a flawless angelic being. I had gotten angry at her before, but never in that way.

I told her how I felt about her years before then, and she still liked to bring it up, and it came out like a bullet, hit me like a confirmation that she didn't care how I felt or if our friendship lasted or was torn apart.

She just wanted to be friends, but that's a different story.

"You're so full of yourself," I told her, surprised by how hard my voice sounded.

But my solid voice was no match for the ice-cold one that came out when she said, "And you're so pathetic."

I wasn't usually an insecure person, mostly because people usually didn't say things like that to me, but when someone did it was usually Olivia and I would end up repeating it to myself in my mind every day, because for some reason I was the type of person that cared what people thought of me. I didn't like being that person and I always pretended I wasn't.

I also was the type of person to just take whatever insults were thrown at me because I was too nice to tell someone off.

Except that one time, my response was immediate.

"Fuck you."

The last thing I said to her until, 'Yeah,' was, 'Fuck you'. And I never really cussed, especially not in front of her, but something in me completely shifted at that moment. I wanted to say something she would remember. I wanted to hurt her like she hurt me, and I liked to believe those two words did it, because it was probably the first time she had ever heard me say that, at least directed toward her.

She did have a reaction, which I liked, because sometimes she didn't. A lot of cruel words didn't affect her stone heart, but that night I noticed her eyes widen just slightly and I could tell it meant something to her.

All I wanted was to mean something to her.

"Leo?"

Olivia said my name, crawling closer to me on the bed, and suddenly I was back in the present. A hospital room, a somewhat-drunk and irrevocably beautiful girl facing me.

"You were right, by the way," she said. "He cheated on me. A lot."

"I wish I wasn't right."

She shrugged. "Whatever."

It was silent for a moment as Olivia just stared down at her hands, reminding me of a little girl, looking younger than usual. It was just that moment, because when she looked back up at me and spoke again, it was gone, and she looked like a woman.

"My head's still buzzing," she said. "I'm gonna get some coffee. Do you want something?"

"I'm good," I replied.

She smiled sadly before getting up and leaving the room. I wondered if my parents were standing outside, or Jason or Katie. They'd disappeared just minutes before Olivia entered, like they wanted to give me time alone with her. Like they wanted me to die.

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A/N: Let me know if y'all are reading and want me to continue :)