Written in the Stars

by Alexandria Bellefleur

  Behind them, the door to the hotel opened, the soft strains of Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” spilling out onto the sidewalk. Of all the stupid songs in the world. “Elle—”

  Elle gave a curt jerk of her head and scrubbed her hand over her face, wiping away her tears and smearing more glitter across her skin. “No, you know, I might be starry-eyed and I might be a little bit of a mess sometimes, and maybe I wear my heart on my sleeve.” Elle took a stuttered breath in through her mouth, gasping softly. “But at least I have a heart, Darcy.”

  Whatever little bit of warmth remained in Darcy’s body extinguished as the world spun to a stop, time slowing to a crawl. This didn’t feel like heartbreak, this was heartbreak. Darcy had miscalculated; she wasn’t falling, she’d fallen. She pressed a hand to her chest as if in doing so she could keep her heart from shattering entirely, but the damage was already done. Too late.

  “Whoa, whoa.”

  Darcy turned, chin trembling and nose running, arms wrapped around her body so tight she could barely suck air in. She would not lose it. Not now, not yet. Not in front of Elle and not in front of Brendon, who’d just stepped onto the sidewalk, footsteps slowing as he approached.

  He glanced between her and Elle, eyes narrowed, lingering on Elle at last. “Elle, that’s not—”

  A frustrated cry slipped from Elle’s lips as she shook her head, walking backward, slipping away. “No offense, Brendon,” she choked out, eyes wet and dull, holding none of the sparkle Darcy loved. “But you have no idea what this is.”

  Elle pivoted on her heel and in that second before she turned, their eyes met. A spark flickered in Darcy’s chest, an echo of heat, of what was, what could’ve been. If only.

  And then Elle was gone, turning and striding down the sidewalk impossibly fast, or it looked like that because Darcy’s vision was blurred and each time she blinked she caught a staggered snapshot of Elle walking away, the distance between them growing larger and larger.

  Brendon placed a hot hand on her shoulder, hissing through his teeth. “Darce, come on, you’re—”

  “She’s right.” The air was so fucking cold and it stung her scratchy throat, burned her nose. But nothing hurt as badly as her heart. Splintered and fractured, with each inhale it felt like fragmented shards scraped against her chest like daggers. Darcy could barely breathe. It was too much to bear. Darcy didn’t want to hurt, didn’t want to feel. “You have—you have no idea, Brendon.”

  “It’ll be okay,” and he sounded so sincere that what was left of her resolve crumbled.

  Spine bowing forward, Darcy curled in on herself and gasped out a sob, startling herself and Brendon. “It’s not. It won’t. It was— Fuck, Brendon, it was fake.”

  Brendon looked confused. “What? Darcy—”

  “Me and Elle, it started out fake.” Once she started, she couldn’t stop. The words tripped off her tongue as salty tears dripped from the tip of her nose, her vision obscuring until Brendon was nothing more than a tall blur beside her. “It wasn’t real. It was so you’d get off my back and quit setting me up on dates because I didn’t want to fall in love, Brendon. I didn’t want to fall in love and this . . . this is why.”

  Darcy scrunched her eyes shut and gave a violent shiver, limbs going cold, colder than she thought was possible. It was Seattle for crying out loud, why was she so cold?

  Arms wrapped around her, pulling her close until her forehead rested against Brendon’s chest. His bow tie dug into her temple but she didn’t care. She lifted her hands and fisted them in the front of his shirt.

  “This doesn’t look fake,” he whispered, one hand stroking down the back of her head over her hair.

  Too choked up to speak, Darcy hiccuped and burrowed deeper into Brendon’s shoulder.

  Something cold and wet landed on her bare back. Again, and again, until Darcy lifted her head and tilted back, glaring up at the black night sky.

  Soft, fat snowflakes fell from the sky, dancing on the wind and landing on Darcy’s arms, her exposed back, irritating her bare skin like tiny pinpricks. She shut her eyes and dropped her forehead back to Brendon’s chest, muffling a sob with a bite of her lip.

  Fucking snow.

  Chapter Twenty

  The front door banged against the wall, followed by the sound of several heavy thuds. Margot’s creative cursing punctuated the ruckus, further interrupting Pat Benatar telling Elle that love was a battlefield and that she was strong.

  “Motherfucking duck fucker,” Margot shouted. “Ben can go fuck himself. Jerry, too. Chunky Monkey for goddamn sure. Christ on a shingle that fucking hurt.” A pause. “Oh, hi, Mrs. Harrison. No, I’m good. No, no, no one’s doing anything unseemly to any ducks. Nope. Monkeys, neither. Sorry. Yep, I’ll get right on that. Wash my mouth out really well.”

  Oh, Margot. Their landlord was going to love getting a call from Mrs. Harrison complaining about them, again.

  Margot stuck her head around the corner, peering into the living room. Elle waved weakly from her spot on the couch and Margot’s face brightened. “Hey. You brushed your hair. Go, Elle.”

  Rude.

  Elle rolled over and assumed the position she’d been in before Margot had loudly interrupted her sulk fest. Face buried in the arm of the sofa, afghan pulled halfway over her head, one eye open so she could watch the television, which was currently on mute. Beside her, her phone was turned screen side down, Bluetooth connected to the speakers on the kitchen bar.

  “Mrs. Harrison sends her love.” Margot stepped farther into the living room, nose wrinkling as she stared at the coffee table.

  There were a few takeout containers. Three. Okay, five. And some tissues. A lot of tissues. Elle was going to clean up after herself as soon as she scraped together the willpower to get off the couch for longer than a trip to the bathroom.

  “What was with all that noise?” Elle mumbled.

  Margot kicked a small pile of crumpled notebook paper with her toe. “You know, casually breaking my foot in the doorway. Speaking of, I’m going to unload the groceries I bought and then we can talk about . . . this.”

  She frowned pointedly at the clutter before leaving.

  Elle pulled the afghan the rest of the way over her head and mouthed the words to “Love Is a Battlefield.”

  Strong was the last thing she felt at the moment. Her chest felt like someone had punched a hole through it, ripping out her heart and shredding it into bleeding bits of confetti before stuffing it back inside her body and duct-taping the hole shut.

  “I have soup,” Margot shouted from the kitchen. “Your favorite. Pho Rau Cai from What the Pho.”

  Elle stuck her nose out from the blanket. “I’m not sick, Margot.”

  “You’re not sick yet.” A cabinet slammed followed by the sound of the freezer opening. “You walked all the way to Starbucks in the snow, Elle.”

  Big deal. “It wasn’t even a mile.”

  “Wearing spaghetti straps in twenty-eight-degree weather. Snow.” Margot huffed loudly.

  She sounded like—

  Elle scrunched her eyes shut as another hot wave of tears flooded her ducts. Fuck.

  “I mean, as far as dramatic exits go, that was a good one,” Margot prattled on, oblivious.

  A dramatic exit hadn’t been Elle’s intention. She hadn’t meant to storm off without cash, her keys, or her phone. She hadn’t meant to walk all the way from the hotel to the twenty-four-hour Starbucks several blocks over, but the need to get as far away from Darcy and her painful inability to speak had carried Elle across town on autopilot, snow and strappy heels be damned.

  At least the baristas on shift had taken mercy on her, letting her use the store’s phone. Then they’d gone above and beyond, embodying the real spirit of the holiday season by pouring free peppermint tea in her until she’d thawed and Margot showed up with her car, Elle thankfully having left her keys and phone in the pocket of the jacket she’d checked at the hotel.

  “I don’t want soup,” El
le mumbled.

  For a moment, Margot was quiet. The song switched from “Love Is a Battlefield” to “I Fall Apart” by Post Malone and Elle’s chin wobbled.

  “All right.” The freezer opened again. “I bought Chunky Monkey, Half Baked, Phish Food and”—there was rustling, followed by the sound of something wet hitting the floor, then more of Margot’s colorful swearing—“we’ve still got half a pint of Chocolate Therapy, but it’s been tucked behind the frozen peas so I think it might be freezer burned.”

  Ah, the frozen peas. Without a doubt freezer burned, then. She and Margot only kept the frozen peas on hand in case of emergencies. They were cheaper than an icepack.

  “Elle? Which do you want?”

  Elle gulped in a breath of stagnant air beneath the blanket. “Both. Both is good.”

  “I gave you four options. Which both?”

  “Yes.”

  Margot sighed and shut the freezer. A minute later, the blanket lifted, and Margot pressed something cold and hard against Elle’s cheek. Elle yelped. A spoon. Margot had pressed a spoon to her hot, puffy face.

  With a flourish of her fingers, Margot gestured to the coffee table where she’d shoved some of the takeout containers aside, making room for the four pints of Ben and Jerry’s she’d lined up. “Ice cream therapy. Dig in.”

  Elle adjusted the blanket around her shoulders like a cape and jabbed her spoon into the pint of Half Baked. Spoon laden with cookie dough goodness, Elle collapsed back against the couch and nibbled. That was enough energy expended.

  “Okay, now that you have ice cream, you want to tell me about this?” Margot gestured to the table and surrounding area.

  “It’s not that bad,” Elle mumbled around her spoon. “I’m gonna clean it up.”

  Margot sighed and dipped her own spoon into the Chunky Monkey. “Elle, it’s a mess.”

  It wasn’t. It was some takeout and some tissues. And paper. A cup. Socks. Elle’s eyes burned.

  “You’re right.” It was a mess. She was a mess. “My mom’s right. Darcy’s right. I’m a mess.”

  Margot’s eyes widened. “What? No. I didn’t say that. Darcy’s not right about anything. Fuck Darcy.” Margot set the ice cream down and crawled her way across the floor, heaving herself onto the couch and wrapping her arms around Elle, squeezing until Elle could barely breathe. “Say it with me. Fuck. Darcy.”

  Elle shook her head. She couldn’t do it. Rendered mute, she sniffed instead.

  “Elle, you’re not—” Margot sighed. “Okay, right now, you’re a little bit of a mess. But it’s temporary. You’ll clean this up and you’ll stop being a mess, yeah? Eat your ice cream.”

  Elle shoved her spoon in her mouth and closed her eyes.

  If only it were that easy. Clean up the mess and be okay. Problems solved. “’m not a Virgo, Mar.”

  Margot leaned back, dropping her arms. “You’re right. It’s— Shit, Elle. Just . . . tell me what you did today. You’ve obviously been busy with”—she reached over the edge of the couch and grabbed a handful of crumpled paper off the floor—“lists! You’ve been making lists. Oh My Stars lists?”

  Elle nodded.

  Focus on work. That’s what she had planned to do after that awful first date with Darcy. Her plan had been waylaid, but she could pick it up now. Who says heartbreak had to ruin her focus?

  Margot stared down at the crinkled paper in her hand. “Asphyxiation, decapitation by elevator, burned alive in a tanning booth . . .” Margot looked up at her with startled eyes. “What the actual fuck, Elle? This is morbid.”

  She pointed her spoon at the television. “Horror movie marathon. How would you die in Final Destination based on your eighth house?”

  “That’s . . . I don’t know what to say.” Margot scrunched the piece of paper back up and threw it across the room. “Moving on. What”—she tilted the paper to the side and furrowed her brow—“I can’t read this. It’s all smeared. What does this say?”

  She shoved the paper in Elle’s face. Once Elle had uncrossed her eyes and pulled the paper back, she grimaced both because of what it said and because the paper was blotted with tears . . . snot, too. “This one’s dumb.”

  “Does it involve death and dismemberment?” Margot grabbed the pint of Chunky Monkey off the table and cradled it in her lap.

  “No,” Elle admitted. Not in the literal sense. “It’s the zodiac signs as breakup songs.”

  Maybe heartbreak was screwing with her focus. But only a little.

  Understanding passed over Margot’s face as she tilted her head and lifted a finger in the air. “Hence the music.”

  Other way around. Bless Spotify. The playlist I Should Be a Sad Bitch had pulled double duty, letting Elle sit in her feels while providing inspiration. Multitasking at its most depressing.

  “Give it back.” Margot snatched the paper and brought it closer to her face, squinting. “This is good. Except . . . Elle.”

  What Breakup Song Should You Listen to Based on Your Zodiac Sign?

  Aries— “Survivor” by Destiny’s Child

  Taurus—“No Scrubs” by TLC

  Gemini—“We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” by Taylor Swift

  Cancer—“Bleeding Love” by Leona Lewis

  Leo—“Irreplaceable” by Beyoncé

  Virgo—“Happier” by Marshmello

  Libra—“Thank U, Next” by Ariana Grande

  Scorpio—“Before He Cheats” by Carrie Underwood

  Sagittarius—“Truth Hurts” by Lizzo

  Capricorn—“I Am a Rock” by Simon and Garfunkel

  Aquarius—“I Will Survive” by Gloria Gaynor

  Pisces—“Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler

  Elle snagged the pint of Half Baked off the coffee table and shoved another bite in her mouth, studiously ignoring Margot’s exasperated stare.

  “‘I Am a Rock’?” Margot demanded. “Elizabeth Marie.”

  “What?” Elle sighed around her spoon. “It’s fitting. It’s— Darcy’s a Capricorn.”

  And clearly, she was a rock, an island who had no need for feelings. At least not any feelings that had anything to do with Elle.

  Elle stabbed at her ice cream. Maybe it wasn’t Darcy. Maybe it was her. Elle was the common denominator in her love life or lack thereof, after all.

  “Here.” Margot grabbed a pen and crossed out the song, scribbling something neatly in its place.

  Elle licked her spoon, then shoved it back in the pint before setting it on the coffee table. She wasn’t hungry. “What did you put?”

  With a nonchalance Elle couldn’t muster if she tried, Margot tossed the pen and paper on the table. “‘Too Good at Goodbyes’ by Sam Smith.”

  The back of Elle’s eyelids burned, her vision blurring with tears. She wasn’t going to cry. She wasn’t. She was going to keep staring at the coffee table until she became dehydrated and her body reabsorbed her tears. They wouldn’t fall. They wouldn’t. She wasn’t—

  A hot tear slid down her face, trailing sideways on the curve of her cheek and catching on the side of her nostril, salt burning her chapped skin. Damn it.

  “Elle.” Margot grabbed her by the shoulders and hauled her across the couch until Elle was halfway lying in Margot’s lap. She petted the back of Elle’s head and that did it.

  Composure completely kaput, Elle buried her nose in Margot’s stomach and clenched her eyes shut. Fat, slippery tears leaked from the corners of her eyes, making her face wet and sticky, her nose beginning to run. She gasped in a broken breath and clenched her fingers in Margot’s sweater. “What’s wrong with me?”

  Gently, Margot brushed back the baby-fine hair from around Elle’s temples. “Nothing. Nothing at all, Elle.”

  “Obviously, something.” There had to be. There must’ve been something about her that made it so easy for Darcy to walk away. Metaphorically. Elle had done the actual walking but Darcy hadn’t stopped her, hadn’t even tried.

  Elle had bared h
er heart for Darcy, her soul. From day one, she’d been clear with Darcy on what she wanted, what she craved. Darcy had given her hope that she could have that, that they could have that together. False hope or no hope, Elle wasn’t sure which was worse. From where she was sitting, both made her ache, made her feel like there was something critical missing inside her. That spark, the little voice that kept her going when everything else was grim and dark and bearing down on her. Hope didn’t spring eternal in Elle after all.

  She couldn’t even sleep in her own room, couldn’t stand the sight of the stars on her ceiling because now all they reminded her of was the night that Darcy had stayed, their night beneath the stars.

  Darcy Lowell had ruined the fucking stars for Elle. Of all the things. Elle had given Darcy everything and now she had nothing.

  “Darcy has fucking problems, okay? And those are on her, not on you. You did nothing wrong. Do you hear me?”

  Elle lifted her head and stared up at Margot through clumpy lashes. She bit the inside of her cheek and had to drop her voice to a whisper to get her question out without choking. “But why doesn’t she want me?”

  That was the question that had kept her up last night, awake and staring at the ceiling of the living room until her puffy eyelids grew too heavy and she eventually drifted off into a fitful sleep plagued by dreams of happier times. Like last week when Darcy had made her pancakes for the second time and had kissed the inside of Elle’s wrist when she’d stopped Elle from stealing one off the plate. Or when they’d been up on the astronomy tower at UW and Darcy had looked at her, ambient light from the stars and the moon turning her hair into spun sunlight, all reds and golds, fire in the night, and Elle had felt seen. Like Darcy had taken a peek at Elle’s soul, had heard the tempo of her heart, and decided she liked it. Liked it enough to stay.

  But only for a little while, apparently. Temporarily. Not long enough.

  “Elle—”

  “Am I not enough?”

  Margot shook her head, eyes fierce, the clench of her jaw vehement. “No. You are absolutely enough.”

  Of the wrong things. Her chin wobbled, a fresh batch of tears sluicing down her cheeks. She didn’t have the energy to try to stop them. “Then am I too much, Margot? Be honest.”