The Birds & The Bees | S.R.

Ch. 25 | Different Dynamics

Summary: Lila and Bunny meet, and Bunny confronts Spencer.

A/N: We're back! I hope you all enjoy! Thank you again for your patience, and I can't wait to follow along with your comments. Reading your comments is always the highlight of my update 🥰

Also, reminder that any comments about the actress or her ex-husband will be deleted and you will potentially be muted. I don't want to hear about it. Respect my boundaries or leave.

Content Warning: Jealousy, arguing, some yelling, fear of sexual inadequacy, unprotected sex

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"Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, nor Hell a fury like a woman scorned."

William Congreve had no idea how bastardized his words would become when he wrote The Mourning Bride. The cautionary Buddhist tale about stepping back from one's rage had been turned into a justification for women to seek revenge — the same as the jilted woman turned fire serpent whose favorite pastime was boiling men alive in a bell.

Bunny's silence felt something like that.

That wasn't to say that I wasn't deserving of her fury. I wasn't quite clueless enough that I couldn't recognize the dreadful situation I'd forced her into. She had been forced to face what society had deemed the elite, all while knowing that her idiot boyfriend had withheld vital information from her until it was too late for her to bolt.

No one could be expected to keep it together in that situation. But, like the impossible thing that she was, she seemed perfectly content among the crowd of starlets. Of course, they were equally enthralled by her. I wondered if it was one of those strange social sixth senses that I always lacked, or if they just recognized her brilliance the same as I had.

Either way, I knew it couldn't last. The beautiful little birdling fluttering about would tire from the invisible heavy winds, and I suspected that it'd be harder than normal to convince her to perch herself on my hands to rest.

I didn't blame her. The pain she felt rang true in my chest, despite how loudly she laughed or how sweetly she smiled.

Perhaps it was a mistake to interrupt her convincing act. Maybe I should've left her to pretend that nothing odd had happened, and that we were as happily together as we'd ever been before I ruined everything.

It was probably a mistake. But I'd been making a lot of those lately, so what was one more?

As I approached her, I watched her body language shift from poised to precarious. I watched as her smile began to falter and her hands clenched tighter to glass. Despite those signs, though, she was quick to follow me when my hand pressed against the small of her back.

She hadn't hesitated for even a second. I didn't deserve that kind of trust.

Even when I'd backed her into a proverbial corner of an otherwise empty room, she maintained the forced, crooked smile. Her cheeks were trembling from the weight of it, and even if it had been against my best judgment, I reached out to hold her.

To my surprise, she didn't move away. She stayed perfectly still except for lowering her eyelids and releasing a shaky breath. I ghosted my thumbs over cheeks painted with pearlescent powder and I tried to find some small part of me that deserved to even look at her.

"Are you okay?" I asked once I finally worked up the courage.

"I'm fine."

That was all she said. It was a lie, but I wasn't going to provoke her any further. Not when she had put so much effort into keeping her composure for me.