WHO: Evan Rosier & Cecilia Hooke
WHAT: Arguments and make-ups
WHEN: Before the M.A.G.I.C. laws were posted, I imagine. This past weekend?
WHERE: An upper class affair

This night was utterly victorious.

Being the Slytherin she was, Cecilia Hooke might have loved that feeling of accomplishment far more than any other feeling in the world. Not that she had an opponent, per se, but when it came to social arenas and the sport of making your ex-boyfriend completely and absolutely annoyed, she was certain that she had this one in the bag. Why else would she have caught Evan Rosier staring at her all night, despite the lovely date on his arm?

Of course, this wasn't to say that she didn't hold a particular hint of jealousy all on her own at the sight of that slag being all over him as she was, but Cecilia had her rebuttal to that problem quite visibly with a hand on her waist. Antonin Dolohov could come in such use sometimes; it was so good to have friends so eager to piss off your exes right there at your beck and call.

She caught Evan's eye for about the millionth time that night, and moved in closer to Antonin pointedly, putting a continuance on their silent war. Cecilia knew that Evan had to know that there was no way in all of hell that she was serious about the other man, not after the way that the two of them had broken up and the reasons for said event, but she certainly wasn't going to stop this until he threw in the towel. After all, the reason behind everything had been to simply knock a bit of sense into him, snap him right back up---things were just going a bit slower than she would have liked them to.

With a sip of her drink, Cecilia's eyes flitted away just as soon as they had come to him. They both knew she was still watching.

Evan liked to think that he was handling the entire situation quite well. He liked to think that her being there with someone else didn’t bother him at all. But, the truth was that Evan was in denial if he thought that this was true. Just seeing who it was that she was with made him annoyed. Him and Antonin were friendly, and probably close enough to be considered actual friends. He had let him stay at his place when he had no where else to go, but he had a tendency to forget that he had been friends with his ex-girlfriend long before he had started dating her. That didn’t stop him from wanting to throw a hex at him. It was a horrible problem of Evan’s, to be rather possessive. True, she wasn’t technically his anymore, and deep down he knew that nothing was going on between the two of them (or he hoped there wasn’t), but seeing his arm around her made the hair on his neck stand up. He fucking hated it, and he hated that she had that effect on him.

Pulling his own date closer to him, he continued with the conversation he was having with an old family friend, only to have the beautiful Italian woman turn and whisper something into his ear, interrupting his train of thought. He turned to her, and rose a brow, not responding to the suggestion that had been muttered to him in secrecy. Before he said anything, his eyes scanned the room to find Cecilia, noticing that she was just looking away as soon as their eyes locked. He let out a thoughtful hum before he turned to his date, who had been quiet the entire evening since she didn’t understand a word that anyone else was saying (that was sort of the point), and leaned down to whisper something else in her own ear before he escorted her out of the area. He was glad to get out of there, away from her, away from the noise. It was just him and…

Fuck, he didn’t even know her name. He had met her on a business trip, and just asked her to join him for the night. It wasn’t even so much to make Cecilia jealous, or to piss her off, even though that was a bit of a perk. It was just so he didn’t have to go alone, and have more questions thrown at him. It also gave him an excuse to get away for a little while.

She had been watching, of course she had been watching. Even when she wasn't looking exactly at him, Cecilia always had Evan and that---woman in her peripheral vision, keeping a close eye on anything that they did. When the woman leaned in to make an exchange with him, it took all that she could not to fully turn her head to stare, but when they began to move, began to leave the room, then she could no longer help it. Cecilia's head whipped around lightly, taking her complete attention away from the conversation she was having for the first time. As she watched them leave, all snug together in that way that made her want to be sick, Cecilia couldn't have cared less how rude she was being to the young socialiate she had been talking to.

Her face flushed as, unbidden, several very upsetting thoughts as to what they could be leaving for flashed through her head. Very suddenly, she felt her skin warm despite herself, and she tilted the remainder of her drink back at once. She needed to leave, she needed to get out of this room and calm down before she---well, not cried, she was a harder soul than that, but---well, before she lost her composure. Yes, that was a better way to put it.

Leaning in towards Antonin, she gave an unconvincing smile and excused herself. Cecilia didn't wait for a response before she quickly moved out of his hold, slipping out one of the ballroom's side doors. Her feet moved seemingly by themselves as she made her way down a long hallway, until she determined that she was far enough away from the action to be safe. Swiftly, she pushed into the first room she found and closed the door behind her, pushing her back up against the wall.

Cecilia breathed in deeply and put a hand to her forehead, closing her eyes. How had this all gone so wrong so quickly?

It had to be a good couple of minutes since he had left the room with his date. But, even after everything, he didn’t go back to the ballroom right away. No, instead he decided to take a bit of a detour. Maybe kill some more time before he headed back, and was dragged into another boring conversation with one of his Father’s colleagues. Kalista wasn’t even doing a good job of saving him, seeing how she was basically making herself as scarce as possible, clinging onto who ever she had brought that night, often times hiding behind him to avoid Antonin. It was really quite pathetic, how the Rosier’s were hiding from the same couple, both for the same reasons.

His hand ran through his hair, pushing it back, even though his pale blonde strands fell forward almost immediately. He was walking with his head down, focusing in on the cuffs of his jacket, adjusting the buttons. After that was taken care of, he tugged down at the bottom to straighten it out, and then looked ahead, stopping in his tracks as he saw someone very familiar bolt into a room that was in close sight. She didn’t seem to be paying attention, so there was a good chance that she didn’t see him.

Actually, he was certain that she didn’t, because if she had he was sure she would have turned and gone in the other direction.

He remained where he was, and waited, seeing if she would emerge anytime soon. But why should he care? They weren’t dating anymore, she broke up with him, and he should just walk by. And that’s exactly what he had planned on doing, and was in the process of actually doing so, when he stopped walking again. Sighing heavily, he turned and looked over his shoulder at the door. He wasn’t going to be a child about this. He wasn’t going to hide from her, and he wasn’t going to let her hide from him.

Making his way towards the door, he twisted the knob and let it swing open before he moved forward, leaning his back against the doorframe, taking in her profile. He was far too casual about the whole thing.

“Headache?” He asked with slightly raised brows, making sure he was the first to get in the first word. The first to show that he wasn’t going to play the silent game, and the first to show that he had…moved on.

Hm.

Cecilia must have jumped a good two feet into the air at the sound of that smooth, familiar voice. Alright so, maybe she had just jolted and thrown her eyes open, but the sudden appearance of her ex-boyfriend, the one person that she didn't want to look at right then, certainly did nothing to calm her either; in fact, her heart was rather suddenly worked up to an alarming pace. "Christ, Evan!" she exclaimed, her hand sliding from her forehead to her chest. Cecilia threw her eyes away from the man that had very suddenly appeared in front of her, just then realizing that this was going to be very awkward.

She had retreated to the side room for a moment of solitude, and then all of a sudden he had to be there, like he had known or something. Why was he there, anyway? Although she said nothing else, Cecilia frowned down at the ornate designs decorating the carpeting of the room, and tried her best to wish him away. As the images of what he and that other woman must have been doing just minutes ago continued to assault her mind, she knew she was going to need a moment before she could look at him again.

Her chest moved just slightly with a handful of desperately calming breaths, and Cecilia moved a hand back through the curls of her hair, adjusting idly the diamond pin that held the half of them in place. She just needed this moment, just these precious seconds, and then---then she finally rose her head again to meet his eyes. Alright, this was... manageable. It would need to be.

"Yes," she said. The question had to have been asked a good thirty seconds ago. "And what brings you away from your lovely foreign arm candy, Mister Rosier?" Cecilia was proud of the way that she clipped her words---strictly formal.

He didn’t seem to even flinch due to her reaction. Oddly enough, he was used to getting that sort of reaction…but most of the time he had planned on sneaking up on the person. It was kind of a big part of being a Death Eater, being quiet so no one knew you were there until you wanted them to. Years of practice made it easy for Evan to create the illusion that he had just appeared out of nowhere, when he may have been standing there for a couple of seconds, if not minutes.

Sliding his hands underneath his jacket, into his pockets, he continued to lean back against the door frame. “That’s a shame.” The words were spoken with an extreme lack of actual concern, as though he were just saying them to state a fact. When she asked about his date however, he wasn’t so quick to respond. His eyes stayed focused on hers, tilting his head slightly as he spoke. “Mister Rosier?” He rose a brow and smirked very slightly. “So is that how things are going to be now, Cecilia?” He chose to ignore her question for as long as possible, not wanting to give her any sort of answer. He didn’t want to talk about his date, and he sure as fuck didn’t want to talk about hers. He didn’t even know what he did want to talk about, or if he did at all, but yet he was still there. He was still there because of her.

"Apparently so," Cecilia answered, her voice waning in and out of confidence. It was all completely dependent upon her thoughts, which were throwing her back and forth on whether she wanted to add the next thing that she had to say. 'Evan' is a name I reserve for the man I love. I haven't seen him around recently, have you?

No, as much as she enjoyed aiming below the belt, she wasn't certain that even she could make herself say that. Evan had not pissed her off enough tonight to incite any biting remarks; he'd only worked to upset her like no one else could.

Cecilia crossed her arms lightly over her chest, the silvery silk material of her gown as cold on her arms as the atmosphere in the room. She still watched him, watched as he smirked just barely and so obviously evaded her question about the woman who had accompanied him there that night. Honestly, after his exit that he knew she had witnessed, he should have been rubbing the beautiful woman in her face--especially with Antonin so obviously abandoned back in the ballroom.

"So, what's her name anyway?" She knew that she shouldn't be helping him along, but it was always good to know a bit about your competition. And then, what else but this horrid topic was there to speak of? Evan was obviously still very against speaking what he knew she wanted to hear, and Cecilia was truly interested in nothing else.

“Right then…” He gave her a single nod to show that he understood, even though the change in her voice was noticeable. There was no point in trying to make more out of it. She obviously didn’t want to be on a first name basis with him at the moment, and he wasn’t about to make things even more uncomfortable between them both.

His eyes traveled down from her eyes when she shifted positions, for the first time taking what she was wearing. It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen her before, but he hadn’t gotten a chance to actually look at her until now. The dress looked perfect on her, accentuating every curve of her body. It was hard to tear his eyes away to look back to her own, but he managed. It was actually her voice that brought him back to reality.

Her constant questions about his date caused him to sigh lightly, crossing his own arms over his chest as he tried to get himself to relax a bit more. “Is her name really that important to you?”

"Is it Alexa? She looks like she could be an Alexa." Cecilia looked off as if in thought, although really she was just looking away from him to hopefully help her suppress the bitter edge to her voice. "Or maybe a Jacqueline. Definitely not an English girl, is she? European, no doubt, but not from around here. Looks Austrian, maybe Italian---oh, that makes sense, Italian, of course, and you must have met her at work, mustn't you?"

She pushed herself off of the wall and walked slowly over to the far window as she mused, stopping there and then turning back around to look at him. Being too close to Evan at any point in time was dangerous, and at this moment she could really not afford to be grabbing and snogging him as she wanted to. It was so difficult, and yet she was still partially certain that breaking up with him had been the best thing for them. Even if he was prancing around the party with some foreign floozy that she may or may not have been the very least bit jealous of after seeing. Didn't that ridiculous slag know that he was hers?

"Come now, Mister Rosier, do tell me all the details. It's hardly fair for you to know so much about my own date when I know so little about yours. I'd count it rude, even."

His eyes didn’t move from her, not even for a second. He could tell that she wasn’t just asking out of curiosity, because of that tone she had laced between her words. There was nothing for him to say as she rattled off the suggestions of what the woman’s name could have been, and where she was from. There was so much he was trying to figure out, as he stood there, watching her torture herself with all of these questions. Wouldn’t it just be better if she didn’t know anything about her? Even if he thought that made more sense, she seemed determined. For as long as he had known her, she was set on getting what she wanted, and wouldn’t stop until she got it.

For the first time in a while, he stared down at the floor, biting at the inside of his cheek, raising his hand to rub at the back of his neck. “You make this sound like some sort of competition, Cecilia.” The fact that he wasn’t saying ‘Miss Hooke’ was done on purpose. He had no reason to not call her by her first name. She could call him whatever she wanted, but it was her decision to end things. It was her choice. She didn’t want to wait for him anymore. It was…understandable, but he wasn’t going to admit to that.

“Natalia.” He finally mentioned the woman’s name after a few moments of silence, now looking up to her as he dropped his hand back down. The only reason he knew what it was now, was because she had reminded him just before. “She’s from Venice, Italy. I met her on business, yes. Would you like to know more? Her favorite color, perhaps? What she enjoys to do when she has some free time?” The words were spoken with dry sarcasm. He didn’t have any answers for either of those questions, since he knew practically nothing about the woman. He didn’t care. He didn’t care at all.

"Competition?" Cecilia arched a brow at him in innocence. "Hardly a competition. I'm just interested in knowing my replacement. She really must be something, for you to have bounced back so quickly."

If there was one thing she had not accounted for, it was the small stab of pain her own words elicited. Usually when she was antagonizing someone, being the snarky bitch that she knew so well how to be, things like that didn't hurt. This did. This hurt, to admit out loud that she knew that he had replaced her with someone already. And then when he finally said her name--Natalia... Well, didn't that just sound like the name of a right perfect lady. It sounded like exactly the type of woman that Evan would chase, like the type of woman that Evan probably would have spent the last year of his life with had she not been in control of his time.

In a brief moment of weakness, Cecilia wondered if he would have told Natalia he loved her.

No, this was no time to lose confidence now. Mentally, she shook her head and put those sort of thoughts from her mind. She intended to win him back, not think about what would happen if she didn't. "And no, I don't care to know quite that much about her. She won't last long enough to make it worthwhile getting to know such trivial things." Cecilia smirked then, and as she did a slight wave of relief washed over her; she had her confidence back. She could deal with this, with him.

He did all he could to not make the momentary narrowing of his eyes noticeable. His stomach turned, knowing now that she believe he had moved on. True, he had been trying to give that impression, but he didn’t really think she’d believe that he had gotten over her so quickly. Not unless she really believe he cared so little about her, just because he hadn’t said those words. Those fucking words… They really ruined everything. When he said them, and then when he didn’t. There really wasn’t a way for him to win.

“Is that really what you think? That she’s a replacement? That she’s your replacement?” Now it was his turn to raise a brow, pushing away from the doorframe to take a few steps towards her. He was still in her way, if she wanted to leave for some reason, but he didn’t think she would be running off any time soon. “Is that what Antonin is supposed to be? Was he really the best you could do?” The fact that he had been asking her questions for as long as he had been in the same room was bothering her. Then again, they both seemed to be asking things neither one of them wanted to answer.

"Well, isn't she?" Cecilia challenged. Her hands tightened in on themselves without her even noticing. "Have you given me any reason to think she isn't, Evan? Have you given me any reason to think that that you couldn't just move on once I'd taken myself out of the picture?" She scoffed and felt color rush into her cheeks, although it was a blush of anger rather than embarrassment. The more and more she talked, the angrier she got at this whole situation and the more frustrated she got with him. "If you'll recall, that's why I left you in the first place."

She couldn't look at him as she said that, and turned her head away to take her eyes off of his face. Her confidence hadn't left her yet, but that didn't mean that having this conversation didn't still hurt like hell. Rejection was one of her least favorite things to deal with, after all, and Evan had delivered her the biggest rejection of her life.

Taking a deep breath, she continued to look at the floor, but tried to calm her rapidly rising temper. "Antonin is nothing. You already knew that."

Evan felt his jaw clench, swallowing roughly, as though this would help ease his own frustrations. The way she was talking was getting to him. The fact that she could say everything and actually mean it, made him want to just…

He didn’t even know what he wanted to do. This was the first time he had ever been in this sort of situation, and it was all so new to him. “You make it sound like you were some sort of inconvenience to me.” His words were spoken with an edge not even bothering to filter his annoyance, now getting even closer to her. “If you can look at me and tell me that you think you did me some sort of fucking favor by leaving, than maybe you did. If you think that I could just move on so quickly, that I could just ignore any feelings I have for you in such a short amount of time, you’re horribly mistaken.”

The fact that he hadn’t used the word ‘had’ to describe what he felt towards her, should have been enough to prove that they were still there. She really didn’t know how far from moving on he was. She didn’t know how much he still cared about her. There was only one way of proving it that, he figured, and it was what had gotten them into this whole mess in the first place.

Cecilia's eyes returned to Evan's face as she noticed that he continued to advance upon her position, getting just about as frustrated as she was--more, if that was possible. She listened to what he said, and now maybe the pink tint to her cheeks had something more than anger to it, but she couldn't tell and it wouldn't have mattered. Her attention was fully on what he was saying, his present tense causing the rate of her heart to pick up despite that none of his sentiments were the three words that they both knew she was looking for. It didn't really matter what Evan said, because him saying words like that would always have that same effect on her; it just wasn't enough of a sentiment for her to take him back for.

She knew he had feelings for her. They just weren't deep enough.

"What are you doing then, Evan?" She didn't even notice that she had dropped the formality--or that she had taken a step towards him, for that matter--until she had already done it. "Maybe you should try just a little harder to get over me. I know you know I'm not coming back because we both know you won't give me what I want." Cecilia shook her head and laughed bitterly; she wondered if he could fathom how painful this was. "I'm not going to stand here and tell you that I did you a favor--this favor was for me. Do you know how fucking unbearable it is to love someone so bloody much and know that they don't feel the same way?"

She shook her head. "Of course you don't. That's why we're standing here right now, isn't it?"

The suggestion that he should try harder felt like a hot blade being stabbed into his stomach. The sudden and sharp pain that would only hurt more the longer he let them sink in. God damn it, he wasn’t used to any of this. He didn’t want to be so hung up on her, to let her be able to make him feel like shit because he cared too much. He hated her for a brief moment, for her complete ignorance towards how much he really did want to give her what he wanted. But, what had he done to prove that? She was right, and he hated her for that as well. That she couldn’t just…know. Wasn’t she supposed to know?

“I won’t do that.”

The words were spoken in reaction to only one part of what she had said to him. It was a response to the first words that had cut into him, since every other words were just additional wounds that were cutting deep into him. He couldn’t try harder. He couldn’t just go around with other women, and pretend like he cared about them even a fraction as much as he cared about Cecilia. “I can’t.”

Fuck, he hated this. His chest felt like there was a horrible weight pressed down against it, and it would be lifted until he did something about it. It was his own fault it was there, and it was up to him to either try to ignore it, and have it get heavier over time, or try and fix everything by doing the one thing that was probably harder for him to do than anything else. He wasn’t…good at this, at expressing his feelings, at telling people how he felt about them. It never felt right, it always felt forced and unnatural. That was one reason why he waited. He waited so long until he could just let the words roll off of his tongue at the right moment, at the right time. That time never seemed to come, though. He waited too long, and unless he acted fast, it never would.

"Then I guess you're shit out of luck, aren't you?"

Her tone had dropped its anger and bitterness for once. Instead, her voice was laced with sadness and regret, slightly sympathetic even though she knew that he was the last person that she should be sympathizing with on this topic. It was his fault, she told herself. He had let her leave him, even though now he admitted that he couldn't move on. He had brought this upon himself all the way.

And still, Cecilia could not attain the slightest joy from the tight, pained way that his words came out. Even though she knew he deserved it, she just bloody couldn't feel pleased that it hurt him to realize.

Bloody man, she cursed him inwardly. Bloody fucking man.

She shook her head and loosened her arms from around her chest for the first time since they had begun talking, running her hands back through her hair. Silence fell upon them for a few long moments as she decided what to say. She didn't know what else to say. He already knew everything that she felt. After all, she wasn't the one who had the communication problem.

Finally, Cecilia broke the silence with a deep breath. The stress of this all was evident even in the sound of the air as she exhaled. "I don't know what you want me to do. I can't---I can't do a relationship with you just to be disappointed again."

His mouth seemed to go completely dry for a moment right after she gave her reply. His eyes flicked away from hers, feeling his heart pound hard against his chest as he looked at the floor, and then back to her. That weight kept pushing, and pushing, almost making him sick. He felt so tense, so…uncomfortable. Not just because of the conversation, but because he felt like he wasn’t in his own body. Evan Rosier kept everything on the inside. It was a problem of his, but at times it did come in handy. This wasn’t one of those times. Everything wanted to come bursting out, but because he was so stubborn, he wouldn’t let it. Not yet.

He stood there for a moment, before he took a couple of steps forward, stopping when he was right in front of her. His hands twitched for a moment at his sides, doing his best not to reach out for her like he so desperately wanted to. God this girl made him fucking crazy, in more ways than one.

“You wouldn’t be.”

The words were spoken quietly, but they weren’t soft enough to be considered a whisper. He just knew that he had to say something, that he had to give her some sort of hint that his feelings ran deeper than she thought they did.

It was uncomfortable to have Evan so close and to know that she could never allow herself to touch him. That's all she wanted to do, to reach out and crush herself against his chest and say that she hadn't meant it, that it was fine and that she didn't care and that she just wanted this to be over. But there was no way she could do that, and Cecilia knew that it would be a very bad decision on her part to fall victim to her own love now. She had to ball her hands into fists at her sides to stop herself before she made a huge mistake and let this rest as it was.

"You don't know that," she whispered. They were so close that she could speak so quietly and still expect him to hear her, and that came as no comfort to her at all. Fuck, she wanted him so bad it hurt, and to not be able to have him now was going to kill her. "You don't know anything, or else you would have had the words to reassure me before it got this far. You still don't have the words to reassure me--or else you're too much of a damn coward to say them."

She didn't know where that last comment had come from, but very suddenly Cecilia heard her voice coming out in a hiss of anger and she knew that she had meant it. She didn't open her mouth to take it back.

Once again, he felt like there was a wad of cotton building up on his tongue. Fuck, he didn’t want her words to cut so deep, but they did. They were still cutting into him, and there didn’t seem to be anything he could do about it. He was defenseless. There wasn’t even a barrier he could put up against everything she was saying, because he knew that they were true. He didn’t like it, but it was the reality of the situation, and he couldn’t deny it.

After what seemed like an eternity of silence, he finally managed to swallow, his jaw clenching as he took a deep, silent breath through his nose, exhaling it through his words, which locked together to form sentences he never thought he’d say. “You’re right…” There was more, but it would take him a while to push through. To break down the wall he himself had built up around him, that she had wanted access to for such a long time. “I was a coward. I didn’t say what you wanted to hear…but I don’t regret not saying it then. I don’t regret not saying them, just so you would be satisfied. I didn’t keep my mouth shut knowing how much it hurt you not to hear those words. I didn’t keep those words to myself out of spite. You asked so many times for me to just tell you, to confirm my feelings for you, but that just made things harder. It wouldn’t have been right if I had. If I had just said it, because you had asked me to.” His words weren’t spoken with any hint of anger or annoyance, but just very calm. Very quiet, an factual. “I wanted to wait. I wanted to wait until things were right…until I could say those words to you, without feeling like I had to, without feeling like it was just something random, something casual. But that time never came. Every time I saw you was just…it was another day. Maybe it should have been easier. Maybe it should have come up on one of those random days, because I should have felt it no matter what we were doing, no matter where we were. But I did. I felt it.”

There was silence again, and he swallowed once more before continuing on. “I loved you.” Another break of silence. “I loved you whenever I saw you. I loved you when I wasn’t even near you. I loved you when I thought about you. When I touched you, when I kissed you, when I heard you talk. I loved you when you made me so fucking mad that I didn’t think I could love you. And right now. Right now, standing here in this room, I love you, Cecilia.” The past tense was completely removed, and he felt his heart pound hard against his chest. “Whether or not that makes any bit of difference now, I don’t know. If it doesn't…? Than I guess I really am shit out of luck.”

Cecilia was so still during Evan's speech that she nearly forgot to breathe. There was so much going through her head as she dissected his words that there was no room for any stray thoughts, no room to think about the millions of emotions that had clenched around her heart like a fist.

The look on her face was undefinable but by absolute shock. She had known it all along, she knew she had known it and yet he had been so against telling her that she thought she'd never hear it. And now that she was, she almost couldn't believe it. He was right in front of her, pouring his heart out---Evan Rosier pouring his heart out! Had she been able to speak, she would have laughed at how amazing that was, but as it were, astonishment had clenched her lips shut tight. It was... he was admitting that he had felt it all along, and---oh bloody hell, this was too much, she was going to--faint or--or something.

Or maybe cry instead. The first sound to bubble up from her throat was a choked sob, a whole long moment before she realized that there was wetness trailing down her cheeks and messing up her makeup; oy, but that didn't matter, what could she care about makeup now when he was saying things like this?

The two of them stood in silence for a long moment, nothing breaking through the air but the sound of her breathing and quiet tears. She looked like a mess, she was certain, and he probably didn't want to kiss someone who looked so ridiculous and messed up, but Cecilia figured that Evan was just going to have to deal with it. A split second later, she had closed the short distance in between them and taken his face between her hands, crushing herself to him in a scalding kiss that had been nearly a month in the making. Her arms fell to wrap around his shoulders and she kissed him for what must have been a good three minutes before she pulled back--but not before moving in to kiss him quickly, once--twice--three times more.

"God damn it, Evan, you've always---you've just got to be so---dramatic." She mumbled, pressing her forehead against his.

The sight of her crying was something he always hated to see…especially when he knew that he was the cause of it. True, this particular situation was different than any he had been in before, and her tears weren’t falling because she was necessarily sad but just…overwhelmed, he supposed. For someone who kept his feelings to himself for the most part, that was a hell of a lot to handle at one time. Even he was still rather shell shocked because of the words that he had spoken, but before he could process anything, she was kissing him.

It felt like it had been much longer than a month since his lips had been against her own, his hands going to her waist, gripping firmly at her tiny frame that he hadn’t been able to hold onto in so long. He felt the silk fabric of her gown beneath his fingertips, also feeling the moisture that lingered on her lips due to her tears. Cecilia’s makeup running down her cheeks didn’t go unnoticed, but it was just unimportant. He was holding her like he had wanted to do since he had first seen her in the ball room, he was kissing her like he had wanted to do since that day when things fell apart.

It wasn’t until she pulled away, allowing his hand to raise to tangle his fingers into the hair that was falling over her shoulders near her neck, did he notice that the weight on his chest was gone. He actually felt lightheaded now that he was relieved of everything. Now that everything was out in the open. “…always.”

The word was spoken quietly, his hands coming up to her cheeks now, carefully moving his thumbs to try and get some of her makeup cleared away.