and the best part about it is I'm the only who can do somethin' about it

[bye_felicia]

It hits her out of nowhere. One minute, she's berating a waitress for serving someone else before her, the next she's sitting there, staring open-mouthed at a girl near tears, the words still buzzing around in her head, sitting on her tongue, with surprise the only thing keeping them at bay.

The girl doesn't deserve this, she realizes suddenly. This is just the way that things are.

They're not home anymore. She can't treat people like this.

The girl runs away, escapes, and Victra doesn't see her again until she delivers her plate of food, so hot and fresh it's ready to burn her tongue.

But Victra can't pay any attention to her now. She has more important people in her life that she needs to apologize to. Her phone's already out and she's sending a mass text message with her location to everyone in her neatly cultivated contacts list.

I'm back to normal. Sorry.

And to Lincoln, an added:

Please forgive me.

Comments

[nocost]

"I'm sorry," he says. It doesn't seem fair, that a place can violate someone in this way, especially someone he cares for as much as he does Victra. It seems so wrong, one of the many things about Darrow he can't fix for anyone, no matter how badly he might want to. All he can do is be here in the aftermath, be the man he's supposed to be.

He doesn't know how to prevent it from happening again. It seems like once should be enough, more than enough, she shouldn't have to experience it even that single time, but now he's worried it might happen to her again. Or to someone else.

"I wish there was some way to protect ourselves against these things," he says.