Falling With Style {Chris Evans}

ten (update)

While making breakfast for three the next morning, Mila was lost in her thoughts. She felt blank, like for once there was no proper agenda for the day. She tried not to feel disappointed that she could have been in Boston right now, because Chris Evans had come all this way to see her! She was just craving a road trip of some sort.

Today's lazily planned agenda called for showing Chris around her hometown an hour away, but she felt that it could wait. Something was screaming "go for a hike!"

She smiled at the thought, bringing him an omelette and leaving Ashley's plate next to her on the dresser where she was struggling to wake up. In the living room in front of the tv that was turned off, they both opted for water. They talked about how the second Cars movie was such a failure.

Ashley walked into the kitchen with her plate with an omelette and fruit with a glass of milk. She sat on the recliner diagonal from the couch Mila and Chris were sat on. "You know, I knew this was gonna happen. Chris was gonna get here and try to take my best friend from me!"

"Only with your permission, of course," he winked.

"Well, how do I say no to you? You can have her," she said before stuffing a cheesy chunk of omelette into her mouth. She rubbed her tummy and closed her eyes with joy at the taste of it.

Mila turned to Chris and said, "What did you want to do today?" He pulled out his phone and showed her a list of things he wanted to see while in Georgia, and most of these things were in Atlanta. "We're gonna have to work on your itinerary skills," she shook her head in disappointment. Her itineraries were complete with addresses, store hours, and what time they would be there to what time they needed to move on to the next thing. Besides the point, it looked like they were going to Atlanta today.

Ashley took their plates when Mila said, "I guess we'll have to sneak you out of the dorm during the daylight this time."

"Shouldn't be too hard, everyone is at that party at Vincent's frat," Ashley rolled her eyes and leaned on the recliner instead of actually sitting down again. Mila also rolled her eyes. How could people not get tired of partying every weekend and at the same place with the same people and the same cheap drinks and the same cheap pizza?

"Well, I can't go in this," he looked down. He was still wearing his hoodie and jeans from the plane ride. Mila offered to go get his suitcases and duffel with the help of Ashley so he would have less of a chance getting spotted.

Once they hauled it into the elevator and back in the dorm, Mila said to Chris, "Geez, what the heck did you pack? Your Captain America suit, complete with the shield?" He laughed at that. It was funny because he actually debated on it when he was first packing for shits and giggles but decided to leave it home.

Chris nearly took longer than them getting ready in Mila's room, mostly because he was digging through unorganized suitcases and his duffel looking for a specific outfit he had in his mind. In the bathroom with the door open to her room, she had changed into fitted, high waist khakis with three giant brown buttons going up the middle for a cute added decoration. She paired it with a tucked brown blouse with a v chest like that zipped, depending on how much chest someone wanted to show. She zipped it up more than halfway, modestly. On her neck was a gold chain with a sapphire solitaire, her birthstone and a gift from her older sister.

In her own room, Ashley had opted for a casual red dress, collared and sleeveless that came down to her knees. It had a black belt, just firmly enough around her waist to show off and emphasize her hips. She did light makeup: thin black eyeliner wings, blended with just a dash of smoky eye shadow, and some red lip gloss that tinted her pink lips a few shades darker. She thought the combination emphasized her almond blue eyes, and it had become her staple look.

Ashley and Mila were on the couch talking about how they didn't even want to think about school today, yet the conversation would end up somehow going back to it. When Chris walked in finally, dressed in a thin black sweater that was tight on the biceps, jeans that were somehow a darker shade than the sweater, and brown boots that were under his pant legs, he clapped his hands and rubbed them together. He said, "Who's ready for a road trip?!"

Three hours of Chris and Mila keeping Ashley awake with Disney songs she didn't know the lyrics to. Three hours of Ashley occasionally interrupting to gasp at celebrity drama she was scrolling through on her newsfeed. Three hours of Chris saying, "Oh, I know him, that's just a rumor" or "I knew it" every now and then in response to Ashley calling out all of the rumors and tabloids.

"It must be so exhausting after a while, right?" Mila asked. She had mostly been quiet, keeping her opinion to herself on most of the celebrity drama. All she could really think about is how tiring it all must be for celebrities. Then again, she reminded herself, they probably tended to be too preoccupied with busy schedules to read too much into the gossip they are involved in.

Chris shrugged. He thought about a good answer. The truth was that yes, many celebrities had an on and off switch. It was easy for many of his costars to just refrain and not bat an eye at their name being thrown around. For him, however, it was anything but. He was suffering the consequences of being in stupid movies earlier in his career. Many people just saw him as Captain America, which was fine, but a large portion of his following criticized him, analyzing his every move, his every role, his every upload, his every post. Anxiety from public reaction had almost kept him from even taking on the Captain America role, and many times he wanted to give it all up.

"I guess you get used to it, or really, you realize what is more important," that was his honest answer. He would never get used to being glorified for characters that didn't actually resemble him as a person. He would never get used to crowds of people in love with him without ever actually knowing him. Even the people in his small circle at times felt like they only knew the surface of the depths to his personality. Perhaps that is why he felt so drawn to Mila, who knew he was more than a comic book character and only saw him as a Disney lover, a normal person almost.

Mila pulled into the public parking garage to start their tour of the downtown Atlanta scene. Once she parked, she offered Chris a sympathetic smile. Ashley in the backseat tried to lighten the mood with a scoff as she said, "I know! I hate when my billions of fans come up with some crazy tabloid about my billions of boyfriends!"

Everyone laughed at this before exiting the car. On the check list for today was the aquarium, the National Center for Civil and Human Rights, the World of Coca-Cola, and an evening show at the famous Tabernacle performance venue. Once they were out of the parking garage and downtown Atlanta was in their view, they looked at each other with big eyes and took a deep breath, as if to brace themselves.

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Author's Note
I can't believe it has been a year since I have updated this story :( it is one of my favorites and I'm excited to pick it up again. I did make a little change: for convenience purposes I changed the school Mila attends to Valdosta State University (originally she went to University of Georgia in Athens)!!

I started rereading my chapters and swooned at all the Disney cutesy stuff so if you're still here thank you for 2k reads :)