Chapter Text
Abby tells herself she doesn't look for Mel anymore.
Its a habit now, thoughts she shuts down before they can fully form, attention she redirects without thinking. Like muscle memory. Like something trained out of her.
It doesn't always work.
The room is too loud, too full of people trying to act like belong anywhere other than here. Abby sits on the edge of it all, half listening, half existing, letting Nora talk beside her. Something about nothing important. Something that should be easy to focus on.
Abby nods in the right places.
She's good at that too.
Then of course she had to see Mel.
Not even on purpose. Just..there across the room, standing too straight like she’s holding herself together with a single piece of tape and pure force. Talking to someone Abby doesn't care to register. Smiling in that controlled way she always does, like her happiness is calculated.
Abby looks away first, she always does.
Nora says something that should make her laugh. Abby thinks she probably does, quietly, at least. It feels distant, like she's watching herself do it from somewhere else
When she looks back, Mel is already looking at her.
It lasts less than a second.
Enough.
Something in Abby’s chest tightens, familiar in a way she refuses to even acknowledge. She shifts her weight, like that might fix it. Like she can physically move out of whatever was attacking her like this.
Mel looks away first this time.
That shouldn't matter.
It does anyway.
Nora’s fingers brush Abby’s wrist when she leans in closer, grounding, present, real. Abby lets it happen. She should lean into it more. She doesn't.
Across the room, Mel is laughing at something Owen says.
Abby stops paying attention to Mel after that.