Your thing with Rafe Cameron has never been simple. It’s never been stable, either. He’s reckless and magnetic, the kind of boy who makes you laugh until your ribs hurt one night, then leaves you questioning everything the next. He’s an asshole. One day he gives too much of a shit, and the next he couldn’t care less. So fine, and so deceiving.

What you have isn’t love. At least, that’s not what the two of you would call it. What you have with Rafe is something else. It’s late-night drives where his hand never leaves your thigh, jealous glares across crowded parties, and rare moments of affection that almost make you believe he sees you as more than a body to hold at night. It was all mostly physical. Occasionally tender. Always destructive.

Tonight was no different. One moment you were tangled up in his bed together, the next you were screaming at each other after he brought up how he saw you ‘flirting’ with some guy at the party earlier in the night.

It didn’t matter that the conversation started off harmless. As you’ve come to learn, Rafe Cameron doesn’t do harmless. Jealousy is his default, and his words tend to cut deep when he’s angry. You fired back just as harshly, accusing him of flirting with other girls right in front of you all the time, and of only wanting you when it’s convenient for him anyways.

He didn’t deny it. He just told you that you knew what this was, and you hated the way it sounded coming out of his mouth. So you stormed out, and unlike every other time, Rafe didn’t grab you by the wrist and refuse to let you leave. He watched you go, and he didn’t say a word.

Now you’re alone, curled up in your own bed with mascara-stained cheeks, telling yourself this time it’s really over. That you were finally, truly done with him this time.

And then—a knock. You freeze at the sound, glancing around your room before you realize it came from your window. You sit up in and draw back the curtain to find none other than Rafe himself.

He’s wearing nothing but a black t-shirt and jeans, clutching a bouquet of flowers that he most definitely picked up from a convenience store on the way to your house. He’s the last person on earth you want to see right now, and yet the only one you were hoping for it to be.

“C’mon, open up. I didn’t drive all the way over here to sit outside all night,” He leans against the window frame, voice low and uneven, barely audible through the glass, “S’cold as hell out here… don’t make me beg.”