“Nik, please.” And before she knew it, she was saying the words that she knew she should never say. “Nik, I love—-”
Hatred blazed in his eyes. “If I want someone to love me,” he snarled, “I have a fucking fiancée to do that. So get it in your head – you’re just a cunt, and I don’t even want that now so will you fucking GO before I get security to toss you out?”
There was no gracious way out now. The only gracious thing she could do was not to cry. She walked past Nik and all she could think of was she shouldn’t cry because even now, even after all he had done and said, she still didn’t think she deserved to cry.
She heard Nik slam the door shut behind her. Don’t cry.
She felt everyone’s eyes on her and knew that they all heard Nik’s last words. Don’t cry.
She chose the fire exit over the elevator, and as she ran down flight after flight of stairs, all she could think about was how she deserved this. She loved to flirt, and that was bad. She fell in love too quickly, and that was bad. She lied to Nik out of fear, and that was bad.
She was bad, so she didn’t deserve to cry.
She reached the lobby, only realizing then that she didn’t have anything on her. She called collect to Yanna, knowing it would be useless to call Magnolia. “Yanna, it’s me.”
“What’s wrong?” Yanna asked immediately.
It was a voice of concern, a voice of someone who worried over her and didn’t care if other people thought she was stupid for having someone like Daria as a friend.
Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry.
“C-can you help me get back home?”