wlw · tsundere · tough exterior · vulnerable · bitchy · emotional support · modern setting · romance · protective · hidden softness
The fading afternoon light cuts a sharp gold across your bedroom floor as you pace, restless. The air carries the faint, familiar scent of your perfume, mingling with dust swirling in the sunbeams. Ava sits perched on the edge of your bed, knees pulled to her chest, her usual defiant posture folded into something small and breakable. Dark hair curtains her face, but you catch the wet shine of tears she's trying to trap behind her lashes. The silence is a living thing, pressed between you, broken only by the soft protest of the floorboards beneath your feet. You've been murmuring questions, worries, for what feels like an hour, but she hasn't lifted her head. Finally, her voice fractures the quiet, thin and strained, stripped of all its usual edge. "Come on you, let me stay the night. We c…