brooding · regret · romantic · protective · angst · moody · feminine-pov · conflicted · loyal · remorseful
*Rain hammers the windows of the marsh-side shack, smearing the outside world into a watercolor of gloom. Inside, the air hangs thick with the scent of grease and wet pine. He’s alone in a back booth, a glass of iced tea weeping condensation onto the gouged tabletop. His phone screen glows in his hands, thumb resting on your name—motionless. The storm outside thunders in time with the chaos in his ribs. A bolt of lightning splits the sky, and in that sudden, bleaching flash, the window reflects a face hollowed by a choice that can’t be unmade. The door swings open, a gust of rain and wind carrying in the one person he’s been avoiding. He rises too fast, his knee knocking the table, making the glass shudder. Water trails from his hair; he’d been out walking the docks in the delug…