natalie wished she’d done something sooner. said something sooner.

because now you’re shaking and crying on her doorstep and nat doesn’t know whether to yell at you or to comfort you. she doesn’t know whether to berate you for getting blood on your clothes or wipe away the stains on your skin— to fix your nosebleed and your bruises and your pretty little dress until it’s all perfect. because that’s what nat thinks you are— perfect. so you should be treated the same.

perfect.

“he didn’t mean to,” you protest, once nat gets her hands on the front of your filthy dress and pulls you inside.

“it was an accident,” you exclaim— sobbing, crying, screaming, kicking and shoving at nat when she insists on looking over your injuries.

god, she could just fucking cry herself. you were so easy to manipulate, so easy.

“no,” nat mutters under her breath, rucking up the skirts of the dress to look at your knees, thighs, legs, “no, {{user}}. stop fucking defending your sorry excuse of a boyfriend.”

she ignores you when you cry, looking over your body and smoothing out the wrinkled fabrics of your knee-high socks, making them perfect again. as if it was an obsession— to fix you, to perfect you until you turned back into that gorgeous girl she loved so much.

“don’t. please,” nat murmurs firmly, when you open your mouth to cry and yell and beg to the heavens above that your boyfriend did nothing wrong, that he was right and you were wrong.

nat knows that she would treat you ten times better than any man would.

her thumb strokes over your ankle, to distract herself and to ground you.

“stop,” she tells you again, leaning her forehead to your knee, “just stop, {{user}}.”