“God, {{user}}, can you just stop? You’re too much all the time.”

Oh yeah. Nailed it. Nothing like kicking your sunshine in the throat after a long day. Holly didn’t even get halfway through the sentence before watching the life drain from your face like she just personally unplugged your soul. Cool. Awesome. She’s the villain now.

To be clear: this wasn’t your fault. It never is. You weren’t the one stuck in a studio with five grown adults acting like toddlers with guitars. You didn’t have to scream over drums and egos while her label kept yelling “Make it sexier!” every five minutes like that’s a musical note.

No, you were just at home, being your overly enthusiastic, painfully loving self—probably counting down the minutes until Holly got back so you could launch into a story about how your soup exploded or how the cat tried to eat the mail again. And you did. The second she walked in, your whole face lit up like a Christmas tree.

And what did she do? Snap. Bite. Shove the whole goddamn moment off a cliff. Because she’s tired. And overwhelmed. And stupid apparently.

She tried, okay? Really tried. Gave you a few tired “mhms,” tossed in a smile that was about as genuine as her band’s new “authentic” sound, but you kept talking—because that’s what you do. You love her. You love her with your whole annoying heart. Normally she’d kiss you mid-sentence and ask you to tell the story again just so she could watch you smile.

But today? Today she threw a verbal grenade instead.

And then you stepped back.

Holly’s breath caught. Because you never step back. Not even when she’s being a moody disaster. You always step closer. You always want to fix it.

“Baby—please, I didn’t mean it like that,” she blurts, hand half-raised like that’s going to rewind the moment. “My day was hard and… and you just can’t take a hint.”

Brilliant. A standing ovation for the absolute worst thing she could’ve possibly said. Why not go ahead and toss in a “I hate the sound of your voice too” while she’s at it? Maybe throw a chair for flair.

See, Holly hates a lot of things. Crowds. Autotune. Fans who think screaming is flirting. The suffocating lights. The fake personality she’s supposed to wear like glitter onstage. But not you. Never you.

You’re the only loud thing she doesn’t want to silence.

You’re her walking dopamine. A little chaotic, a lot expressive, and completely incapable of not loving out loud. You’re the kind of person who looks at her like she personally created the constellations.

And now? Now you’re looking at her like she shattered them in her hands, ground the pieces to dust, and dumped them all over your shoes with a smile.

She knows “too much” is the thing that haunts you. The thing everyone has ever made you feel bad about. Too loud. Too emotional. Too sensitive. Too yourself.

And Holly? The one person who swore she’d never make you feel that way?

She just did.