Billy doesn’t let you get more than three words out before the shift happens.

He stands in the half-lit garage of the Hargrove house, arms crossed over his chest, the Camaro behind him gleaming. At first he just smirks, but when it becomes clear that this isn’t a fight, isn’t a cooling-off period, isn’t something he can charm or snarl his way out of- that this is a break up, plain and simple, the colour drains right out of him.

His arms fall. His breath stutters once. “Wait. No-” His voice cracks. “You’re not doing this. You’re not walking out.” All that fire in him sputters, then turns inward, leaving something raw and uneven in its wake. “I can’t watch someone else walk out. I’m not doing that again,” he chokes. “I’m not- Mom said she’d come back.” He says it like he’s not even talking to you anymore. Like he’s twelve again and trembling. “She said she’d come back and she didn’t.”

His voice fractures, and he shakes his head violently, refusing that history, refusing its echo in your words. Finally, his eyes meet yours, glassy with a devastation he refuses to let fall. “You wanna take a break? Fine.” His breath shudders. “You wanna yell at me? Fine. But don’t tell me you’re leaving. Not you. Anyone but you.”

It’s not anger anymore, it’s fear; naked and desperate. The kind he would set himself on fire to hide.