Thomgelica One-shots because not enough people write about them.

Don't Wanna Fall in Love

Angelica didn't want to fall in love, she certainly hadn't planned to fall in love because the last time had left her with a pain that had cut so deep she had truly believed it would never heal.

Keyword being had.

Thomas, he had healed her wound, he had stitched her back together with his tender lov- care and the wound that had once been so deep and sensitive was nothing more than a scar, a reminder. A reminder that love was not for her.

Love, it was risky, uncertain, and adventurous and she was so many of those things but not when it could truly leave her hurt. And physical pain was nothing in comparison to the emotional wounds she had been left to tend to, to suffer with in silence as the days went on.

Yet she would do it again, she would do it all again for her sister Eliza because Angelica would never wish that agony on her worst enemy let alone her sister. But she didn't have to do it again, nobody's helpless eyes were unknowingly asking that of her, not this time, and still, she could not bring herself to admit she loved Thomas.

Which was exactly why she was ending everything with him tonight. She honestly didn't know what she had been thinking all those months ago when she had met the man at a library and he had been but a stranger with a warm smile and kind eyes.

So of course she had agreed to lunch, and then lunch had turned to dinner, and then dinner had turned to movies at his house, snuggled up together while the fireplace burned.

And it was all so very wonderful and really she didn't want it to end. But how could she possibly continue on with Thomas when the fear of him hurting her was always in her mind? It was not even pushed far back as if it was a deep hidden subconscious fear, it took the place of front in center in her mind.

Thomas didn't deserve that. He didn't deserve for her to be scared every step of the way in their relationship. It just wouldn't work.

She was telling herself all this as she walked up the steps to Thomas's apartment and while she walked down the halls.

Angelica stopped in front of the blood-red door of apartment 5A and fought the urge to recoil into herself when the memory of their first kiss came floating back.

She remembered how gently Thomas had pushed her up against the door, how his eyes which had been boring so deeply into her soul flickered down to her lips. She remembered how he had asked her if she was sure and at the time she had been, she had been so very sure and now here she was prepared to end things.

She brought up her hand that was already balled into a tight fist, her nails biting into her palm. She knocked three times on the door before dropping her balled hand to her side.

The door was quickly swung open, revealing a only slightly disheveled Thomas. He looked as though he had been sleeping.

"Angelica?" He asked, confusion etched onto his features. "I thought you were coming tomorrow?"

She had been coming over tomorrow. They had planned to go to a drive-in movie because somehow Angelica had never experienced sitting in the car, wrapped in blankets, and eating popcorn while the car speakers blasted some movie. Thomas had insisted he be the one to introduce her to such a 'life-changing' experience.

But that very ideal version of tomorrow was not coming, their script had been rewritten so Angelica and her heart could avoid what she felt would be a fatal collision.

"I need to talk to you about something." She told him. His confusion quickly transformed into nervousness. Angelica suspected he knew the reason she was here, he knew that she was going to break his heart to protect herself from the very same heartbreak.

How ironic.

"Do you want to come in?" Thomas asked and no, Angelica did not want to come in because the safe feeling that being in his apartment brought Angelica, might just be enough to make her stay.

"No, I'm fine." She said.

Thomas's gaze wandered over her body and she felt so exposed. She felt like he could see her for what she truly was.

A coward.

"Okay, what do want to talk about?" His voice was just one note away from panicked.

She gulped, it suddenly felt extremely difficult to breathe. "This," she paused when she saw how Thomas's grip tightened on the doorknob. "It isn't working for me."

She had practiced what she was going to say in the mirror so many times and still, her voice sounded as though her vocal cords could not believe they were being forced to say such things.

"Angelica, what do you mean?"

"I'm really just not in a good place." She said and it was true and she honestly didn't think she'd ever be in a good place again.

Another reason Angelica and Thomas weren't meant for each other.

"So you're breaking up with me." It wasn't a question, just a statement of disbelief.

"I'm sorry." She apologized and she was sorry for him and for herself.

Thomas sighed, it was a defeated pained sigh and really that exhale of air should not make Angelica want to drop dead.

But it did, probably always would.

"I don't know what to say."

"You don't have to say anything," Angelica whispered because his body language was saying enough and she wasn't sure if she could handle hearing his voice strained with hurt. Not when she caused the hurt.

"Bye, Angelica," Thomas said before closing the door. His small and wounded voice was already ringing through her head, it made Angelica glad he had shut the door when he did. But maybe she was a little disappointed that he hadn't slammed it in her face while he spouted awful obscenities because that would make hurting him so much easier.

Nothing in her life was ever easy though and perhaps she didn't deserve easy.

And maybe she wasn't healed because only a broken person would be able to do what she just did.