To the Heart
Tony looks at your hand so lovingly — and it hurts.
It hurts your heart.
Your lip can’t help but curl into a small frown. Tony wasn’t looking at you to see it though, he was assessing your hand.
”Are you okay?” Tony whispered, so small, so significant.
You blink rapidly, holding back tears. The lump in your throat grows the more you stay like this, the more you let him treat you like this. You can’t take it.
”Yeah,” you rasp, barely able to utter a small little thing.
Tony nods, moving the back of your hand to his soft lips, holding it there, not kissing it, but loving it, and it squeezes your heart, and suddenly you’re about to cry, about to break down and let it all out.
You take your hand out of his hold, shaking your head and standing up, a bit wobbly on your feet. Tony looks up at you, lips parted, shaking his head too.
”What is it? It’s okay. It’s okay,” he says, and you frown deeper, staring blurry-eyed down at him.
”Get out,” you whispered. You couldn’t take it to let him see you like this. “Get out of my apartment.”
He frowns, standing up and reaching out for you. “What? Why? Did I do something wrong?”
You step back. “Get out,” you repeat, fighting off the tears desperately. The lump in your throat burns. “Get out!”
He furrows his eyebrows, retracting his arms and shaking his head. “Why? We were doing so good, we’re fine. You’re fi —”
”Get out of my apartment, Tony!” You nearly scream, gesturing wildly to the front door visible from the living room. “Get out!”
Tony’s face crinkles and he takes a step back, assessing you. “Sweeth —”
You walk forward, about to punch — about to hit him. You need him out. You don’t deserve this, any of this. You can’t have this. It's off limits. Somebody caring. They'd fall away, you'd loose it and you'd end up worse -- it would be all your fault, too. You can't have something nice, something warm, loving, if it was to fall apart in the end, leave you emptier and worse than you were now.
You didn’t deserve nice things.
Tony steps back, getting pushed backwards all the way to the front door — in which you open and push him out, slamming it on his perplexed face.
You pant heavily, giving the door a few good hits before sliding down it and collapsing on the floor, feeling the prickly, hot tears stream down your face finally.