Snippet #2532329

And now what?
I allowed myself to imagine convincing her I hated her. A smirk in the face of her pain. A kiss on the lips of Christy. Leaving her alone right now. They would all do it. An easy thing to do, a terrible thing to live with.
Hardly breathing, I brought my numb hand up to cup her face, a thing I imagined doing a hundred times in the last week alone. I brushed my thumb across her cheekbone, revelling in her soft skin, choosing not to remember what had stopped me before. When she did not move, neither to reject nor accept my touch, I closed the distance between us. I slid the fingers of my other hand around her neck, threading them into the locks of her hair. In the silence of the room, I could hear the ticking of the kitchen clock, a quiet reminder life continued while we were frozen in our own world.
Hesitantly, I pulled her face up towards mine. Her eyes were closed. In this proximity, I could see the purple pools under her eyes that no powder could completely conceal. Strangely enough, that bruised, delicate skin made her seem more beautiful. I pressed my lips against her forehead. "I don't want to pretend to hate you anymore."