Written in the Stars

by Alexandria Bellefleur

  Kicking the covers free, Elle reached down and tugged the sheet over them both, cocooning them inside her warm, if not slightly small bed and slid closer, close enough for their knees to knock.

  “Stay?” Elle whispered.

  Darcy pressed her lips together, her eyes flickering over Elle’s face, searchingly. Elle held her breath, hoping that maybe fate and the universe had conspired and decided she had waited long enough. That she could have everything she wanted and then some.

  A dimple appeared in Darcy’s cheek, bracketing Elle’s favorite freckle as her eyes softened. “I can do that.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Whoever gave the sun permission to shine that bright needed to take several seats.

  Elle scrunched her eyes shut against the midmorning sun streaming through the window beside her bed. Even then, a warm orange glow penetrated her lids, forcing her to burrow into the pillow. With an east-facing bedroom, she seriously needed to invest in some blackout curtains. The legit kind, not the ones she’d bought on sale off Amazon from a third-party seller that had one promising review that she was now ninety-nine percent certain had been written by the seller themselves.

  Hadn’t the sun gotten the memo that it was the weekend? That Elle had nowhere she needed to be, nothing she needed to do except laze around in bed and—

  Bed.

  Darcy. Elle had had sex with Darcy. Great sex, too.

  Elle smothered her grin against her pillow.

  Now with an incentive to face the day, Elle flipped over.

  The other half of her bed was empty, the sheets pulled up to the pillow and tucked neatly beneath.

  A quick glance revealed that Darcy’s clothes were no longer lying on the floor, no longer tossed haphazardly across the room. Darcy was gone.

  Pain bloomed between her ribs, jagged and sharp like someone had jabbed a knife into her side and wiggled until the blade found its mark. No good-bye, nothing.

  People liked to say the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. Maybe Elle was crazy for expecting this time to have been different, for Darcy to be different. Maybe she’d lost her mind for assuming something real could come from a fake relationship, but last night had felt real. Standing up on the observatory and baring her soul to Darcy, Elle had felt seen in a way she never had before. Seen like there was something inside her Darcy recognized.

  There was no word that existed in the English language that meant the opposite of lonely. Some came closer than others, but nothing did justice to the feeling of someone looking into your eyes and connecting with you on a soul-deep level.

  A connection was what Elle craved. To see and be seen, then to take that one step further and for someone, for Darcy, to like what they saw enough to want to stick around and see more.

  But Darcy hadn’t stayed. For whatever reason, a reason Elle would probably never know because there was only so much rejection she could handle, so much battering her heart could take before the hope of something better could no longer sustain her. She’d confronted Darcy once before, but that had been before. When there’d been significantly less at stake. Darcy hadn’t known Elle then; the rejection had barely been personal. To confront Darcy now, to demand to know why she’d left, why Elle hadn’t been worth staying for . . . if Elle had to ask, wasn’t it obvious?

  No, she could take a hint.

  Clutching the sheet to her bare chest, Elle bit down hard on the inside of her cheek. Vision blurring, Elle shut her eyes and sniffed hard because she didn’t want to cry. Crying sucked.

  She sniffed again. Someone in the building was cooking pancakes. At least it smelled like pancakes. Buttery, vanilla-sweet heaven. Either that, or her brain was self-soothing similar to how cats purred, manufacturing her favorite smells where there were none. Was that a sign of an impending stroke? A seizure? WebMD would tell her she had a tumor or some fatal one-in-a-million neurological condition.

  Elle sniffed again. No, the smell was unmistakable, stronger each time she took a whiff.

  She threw back the covers and rifled through her mountain of unfolded clothing, plucking a robe out from the bottom of the stack. Tying the sash tight, Elle stepped out into the hall to investigate further.

  Margot was sitting at the breakfast bar and—

  Darcy was in the kitchen, in her kitchen, wearing one of Elle’s shirts, a bright marigold tee with Hufflepuff Puff Pass scrawled above a blunt-smoking badger. And she was cooking. There were pans and bowls and a spatula—since when did they own a spatula—and the whole apartment smelled like pancakes because Darcy Lowell was cooking inside Elle’s apartment.

  Darcy had stayed.

  Because she couldn’t just stand there, Elle cleared her throat, body flushing with warmth at the way Darcy’s smile lit up her whole face when she looked at Elle. “Morning.”

  Darcy wrinkled her nose in that adorable way of hers that Elle loved, before turning and fiddling with one of the knobs on the stove. “Barely. It’s after eleven.”

  They hadn’t made it back to Elle’s apartment until after one, hadn’t fallen asleep until easily after two. Not such an egregious lie-in, all facts considered.

  Margot spun on her stool, eyes widening as she mouthed the words Oh my god.

  Elle tugged on the sleeve of her robe, bare toes curling into the carpet. Oh my god was right.

  Margot shut her laptop and hopped down off the stool. “All right. I’m off. Don’t have too much fun.” She waggled her brows.

  “Where you going? It’s Saturday.”

  “Interestingly enough, I’m going rock-climbing with your”—she turned, pointing finger guns at Darcy—“brother.”

  Darcy’s lips pulled to the side. “Oh?”

  “Settle down. I won’t say anything incriminating.” Margot paused in the doorway. “Speed dating didn’t go the way he planned, apparently, so he’s got it in his head that maybe he needs to join a gym or something. Meet someone out in the wild. I offered to take him rock-climbing. I’ll be back in a few hours.” Margot slipped through the door. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!”

  Knotting her fingers in the sash of her robe, Elle stepped into the kitchen. “You’re cooking?”

  That Darcy hadn’t left was a relief. Pancakes? Those were promising.

  Darcy tucked her hair behind her ear. “It was either that or order in from Postmates and I don’t know what’s good in this neighborhood.”

  Elle stepped into the kitchen and sidled up beside Darcy, peeking into the bowl of batter. “Um, everything? It’s Capitol Hill.” At the sight of a short stack of pancakes sitting on a plate, Elle’s mouth watered. “How are you even making pancakes? We don’t have flour. Or eggs. Or milk. Or . . . whatever else you need for pancakes.”

  Reaching around her, Darcy grabbed a box of pancake mix. The corner was dented and there was a fifty-percent-off sticker slapped across the first half of the brand name. “I found this in the back of your pantry. The best-by date was last month, but I figured it’s probably safe.”

  “I’m not concerned.” Bracing her hands on the edge of the counter, Elle heaved herself onto the tile surface, narrowly avoiding putting her butt in the batter bowl. Once settled, she hooked a foot around the back of Darcy’s knee, drawing her close. “You met Margot.”

  Darcy’s fingers crept up the inside of Elle’s thigh. When she reached the hem of Elle’s robe, she walked her fingers backward, down toward Elle’s knee. Elle blew out the breath she’d been holding. Such a tease. “I met Margot.”

  “And?”

  Darcy tossed her hair over her shoulder and laughed. “And what? She’s nice. A little scary.” Darcy retrieved the spatula and flipped the pancake bubbling away in the pan with an expert flick of her wrist. The underside was the perfect shade of golden brown. “She made me pinky promise not to break your heart.”

  Elle shut her eyes. Damn it, Margot. Way to be the opposite of chill. “She was kidding.”

 
; Darcy turned, glancing over her shoulder. There was a hickey on her neck, a bruise in the shape of Elle’s mouth, the sight of which made Elle flush from head to toe. “She sounded serious to me.”

  “Did she say what she’d do if you did?” Elle tore a piece off her pancake and popped it in her mouth. “Break my heart, I mean.”

  Darcy laughed, the sound light and bright. “I didn’t ask.”

  The simple way Darcy said that, as if that outcome were unlikely, not worth worrying over, put a stupid smile on Elle’s face. Leaning back against the cabinets behind her, Elle swished her feet, limbs weightless, gravity nothing in the face of the buoyant force swelling inside her chest.

  “Anything else I should be aware of? You know, any torrid secrets Margot might’ve let slip?”

  “Do you have any torrid secrets?”

  “Depends on what you consider torrid, I guess,” Elle joked. For the most part, she was an open book. But even the parts of herself she didn’t broadcast she’d revealed to Darcy.

  Darcy reached for the bowl and spooned a perfect pancake’s worth of batter into the pan. Bubbles appeared around its edges. “We had a good conversation, actually. Margot’s funny when she’s not threatening me.”

  “A good conversation about what?” Elle didn’t want to come out and ask if they’d talked about her, but she was dying to know what she’d missed. She could always ask Margot later, but she wanted to hear it from Darcy.

  Facing the stove, her back toward Elle, Darcy shrugged. Her hair reached the top of her waist and Elle wanted to bury her fingers in it. “She was reading when I came in here, so I asked what. We talked about fanfiction.”

  “Fanfiction?” Had she heard that right? “Really?”

  Darcy’s shoulders stiffened. “What’s wrong with that?”

  Elle frowned at Darcy’s defensive tone and brushed the crumbs off her leg. “Nothing. Margot writes it. She’s a huge Potterhead. She even admins a couple Facebook groups.”

  “She told me.” With another flick of her wrist, Darcy added a pancake to the stack, replacing the one Elle had snagged. “Margot made it sound more mainstream than when I—”

  Record scratch. “When you?”

  Darcy glanced over her shoulder, not meeting Elle’s eyes, but peeking in her general direction. “Nothing.”

  Like that would work on her. “When you what? When you—” No fucking way. “Darcy Lowell. Do you read fanfiction? Oh my god, what fandom? Do you write it? Is it smutty? Please tell me it’s smutty. What’s your—”

  Darcy held up a hand. Her entire face was neon, her freckles blending into her flush. “I’m not telling you the name of anything I wrote. Margot already tried that.”

  This was too good to be true. Darcy. Wrote. Fanfiction. Mind blown.

  “Come on. Don’t I get”—girlfriend hovered on the tip of her tongue—“‘I’ve seen you naked’ privileges?”

  Darcy arched a copper brow. “Seeing me naked is a privilege.”

  Elle slipped off the counter and sidled up behind Darcy. Gently, Elle brushed the hair off Darcy’s neck and around her shoulder before leaning in to brush her lips against the knob at the top of Darcy’s spine. When Darcy shivered, Elle grinned. “Lucky me.”

  Darcy reached out and flipped off the heat to the front burner. “Promise not to laugh?”

  Hands drifting and delighting in the way her touch seemed to drive Darcy to distraction, Elle let her fingers dip beneath the hem of Darcy’s borrowed shirt, teasing the skin over her hip bones. “Cross my heart.”

  “I mean it. No laughing or I’ll leave.”

  Elle forced her face into the most earnest expression of sincerity she could muster and waited.

  Darcy nibbled on her lip. “When I was in college, I wrote Days of Our Lives fanfiction.”

  Soap opera fanfiction. Elle beamed. “Darcy.”

  “Ugh.” Darcy scrunched up her nose. “I told you not to laugh!”

  Elle snagged Darcy by the wrist before she could turn away. “I’m not laughing. I swear. I’m smiling because I think it’s cool and if it’s something that makes you happy, well . . .” She shrugged. “It makes me happy for you.”

  Lips pressed together and eyes still averted, Darcy appeared to weigh the veracity of Elle’s words. After a moment, the tension in her body bled away, shoulders dropping from where she’d had them hiked up to her ears. “Margot’s not well versed on the Days’ fandom, but she says there’s this site that does a great job of archiving fics and keeping everything organized. She wanted my email so she can send me an invitation. Archive of Our Own?” Darcy shrugged. “Apparently the filters for searching for fics are unparalleled, but there’s still a bit of a learning curve. She offered to show me the ropes. Give me a tour of the site. In case I want to get back into it. Reading, maybe writing.”

  Without even thinking, Elle brushed her fingers along Darcy’s skin. “You should do it. You should absolutely do it.”

  “Well, I don’t exactly have the luxury of loads of free time at the moment.” Darcy rested a hand on Elle’s arm, just beneath her shoulder. Her thumb made tiny circles against Elle’s skin, tiny circles that summoned goose bumps. “Perhaps after I pass this last exam, I might consider it. If it’s not too weird.”

  Darcy was barking up the wrong tree, seeking reassurances that her hobbies weren’t odd. Or maybe the right tree. Elle wasn’t quite sure. One thing stood out—Darcy didn’t have the luxury of free time and yet she was here. She was here with Elle. That had to mean something, something big and undefined. As of yet, undefined. She smiled and shrugged. “I say you should go for it. Embrace the weird, Darcy.”

  Darcy slid her hands up Elle’s neck, burying them in her hair. Tipping Elle’s head back and leaning in, Darcy smiled and murmured against Elle’s lips, the touch tickling, “Embrace the weird, huh?”

  Before Elle could answer, Darcy covered Elle’s mouth with hers, kissing her quiet.

  Atop the counter, beside the bowl of batter, something buzzed. And kept buzzing. Darcy’s phone.

  Elle drew back and reached for it, wanting it to shut up so they could keep kissing. She’d pass the phone to Darcy so she could—

  Darcy had a fancy calendar widget Elle had never seen before, something that took organization to the next level. The current month and the next were visible from her lock screen. A notification near the top, Finish C.E. Report, wasn’t what caught Elle’s eye as much as the highlighted green text on December thirty-first. EDT.

  Eastern Daylight Time? Eau De Toilette? Estimated Departure Time?

  No, something about that acronym niggled in the back of Elle’s mind. It meant something else.

  Effective Date of Termination.

  Termination Date. The agreed-upon end of their arrangement.

  Elle’s heart sank into her stomach like a lead weight.

  Last night had felt real. This felt real, kissing Darcy and eating pancakes and sharing secrets. But what did Elle know? Not what did she feel, but actual irrefutable facts.

  Nothing. Darcy had said nothing. She’d kissed Elle instead of answering her question last night, about whether Darcy believed in soul mates, whether that had changed. And maybe her not asking Margot what would happen if she broke Elle’s heart had less to do with Darcy being optimistic about their relationship, and more about Darcy not believing they had one.

  “Is everything okay?” Darcy’s eyes darted to her phone clasped loosely inside Elle’s hand.

  Elle wasn’t sure what to say. Elle wasn’t sure of anything.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Darcy’s heart crept inside her throat, making it impossible to swallow.

  Elle had gone pale, her face draining of color, that pretty flush on her cheeks fading as she stared down at Darcy’s phone.

  “Elle,” she repeated, stepping closer and resting a hand on Elle’s bare knee. Elle jerked and lifted her head, eyes going wide.

  “Sorry.” Elle shook her head and all but tossed the phone at Darcy.
She tucked both sides of her peacock-print robe between her thighs, gaze dropping to her covered lap. “You, um, had a calendar notification. Didn’t mean to snoop or . . . whatever.”

  Darcy’s phone synced to her Outlook account; on any given day, she would have at least half a dozen calendar notifications. Meetings, appointments, lunch with Brendon, basic task reminders. Big or small, Darcy liked to be prepared, liked to know in advance exactly what her week looked like down to the hour. None of that was any reason for Elle to have suddenly gotten—

  Darcy’s eyes dipped down to the glaring green text, the only color on her calendar. EDT. No wonder Elle was upset.

  It would be a lie to say the date hadn’t been looming in the periphery of her mind. At first, after getting Elle to agree to go along with her ploy to get Brendon off her back, Darcy had counted down the days until she could drop the act. Until she could ditch Elle and go back to business as usual as intended. But that had been before, before she’d gotten to know Elle. Before Elle had crawled under her skin, burrowed even deeper. Somewhere along the way, when exactly she wasn’t sure, in the back of the cab probably, it had stopped being an act. The attraction had been there since day one, but feelings . . . feelings Darcy hadn’t counted on. Definitely not these feelings, a particular set of emotions Darcy had long ago tried to bury.

  Deleting the reminder was instinctive. She wanted that ostentatious green text gone, wanted to rewind the moment and erase that look off Elle’s face. Go back to how things had been before, before that terrible little notification had burst their bubble and injected reality into the fantasy world Darcy had immersed herself.

  The moment remained fractured. Elle picked at a fraying thread on her robe with unsteady fingers, refusing to make eye contact.

  Darcy needed to say something. She had never considered herself particularly skilled at this, verbalizing her emotions. Not because she struggled with eloquence but because she’d attempt to rationalize her feelings to the point of talking herself out of sharing them. In the past year, Darcy had done everything in her power to disconnect herself from them—most of them—altogether.