chapter eight #2
Willa didn’t respond. Not directly. But she didn’t look away either.
For a moment, it felt less like enemy territory and more like a detente—like they’d found a quiet patch of middle ground neither of them knew they were looking for.
Then Frankie said, “I meant it, when I said You’re not what I expected either, you know.”
Willa blinked.
Frankie smiled, just barely. “But I think I like being wrong about you.”
And Willa—God help her—didn’t argue.
* * *
Frankie
Willa didn’t argue.
Which, for her, felt suspiciously like surrender.
Frankie took another sip of her drink, letting the bourbon burn slow and deliberate down her throat.
She set the glass down, dragging one ringed finger through the water ring it left behind.
She didn’t know why she’d said that out loud.
About liking being wrong. It wasn’t exactly her style to hand over soft things on a silver platter.
But something about Willa made her want to.
Or maybe she just wanted to see what Willa would do with it.
Across the table, Willa picked up her martini glass, swirling it once before taking another slow sip. Her lips curved—not quite a smile, more like she was considering one.
“So,” Willa said, setting her glass down and leaning back. “Bowie shirt, flannel, sunglasses indoors. Be honest—are you trying to fulfill every chaotic queer stereotype at once?”
Frankie snorted. “It’s called range.”
Willa raised a brow. “It’s called you’re one cuffed sleeve away from a fanfic character.”
“I am a fanfic character,” Frankie said with faux solemnity. “Half the people in the pit last night have probably already written me into a werewolf AU.”
That earned an actual laugh. Soft. Surprised.
God, Frankie liked that sound.
“You’re not wrong,” Willa said. “And now I can’t unsee it.”
Frankie grinned and leaned in, like she was telling a secret. “For the record, I’m the brooding one who denies her feelings until chapter twelve.”
Willa gave her a look. “You are chapter twelve.”
Frankie laughed, sharp and delighted, and dropped her head for a second, hiding behind her curls. When she looked up again, Willa was smiling. Not just considering it this time. Really smiling.
It hit like the second drink—unexpectedly warm.
Frankie nudged her glass with a fingertip. “You always this fun after one martini?”
Willa’s smile curled sly. “Only when my date is tolerable.”
Frankie arched a brow. “So, this is a date?”
Willa blinked, thrown for half a beat. Then recovered, because of course she did. “If it was, I’d have worn nicer boots.”
Frankie glanced under the table. “Those are good boots.”
“They’re practical.”
“Exactly. Nothing sexier than a woman who can survive the apocalypse.”
Willa rolled her eyes. “You’re ridiculous.”
Frankie shrugged. “You’re here.”
That shut her up for a second.
Their food came—small plates, because of course it was a queer hotel restaurant. Frankie poked at something vaguely mushroom-shaped on sourdough and said, “I swear this is what my therapist warned me about. Tiny food and emotional vulnerability.”
Willa smirked. “Sounds like a lesbian dinner to me.”
Frankie almost choked on her drink. “God. That’s going on a shirt.”
They ate. They talked. Not about anything deep—thank God. Just music, weird hotel rooms, the tour bus snack hierarchy. Willa admitted she hated cashews. Frankie judged her for it. Willa threatened to write it into her article. Frankie called her a menace. It was… nice.
Too nice.
Which meant it wouldn’t last.
So, when the plates were cleared and the check came, Frankie didn’t say anything. Just reached for her wallet and said, “I’ve got it.”
Willa didn’t argue. Just watched her with that thoughtful look again. The one that felt like it saw through her armor without asking permission.
Frankie stood, grabbing her glass to finish the last sip.
“Well,” she said, dragging the word out lazily. “Thanks for the company, Archer.”
Willa stood too. “Thanks for the drink. And the existential crisis.”
Frankie grinned. “Anytime.”
They stood there for a second too long.
Close. Still.
Then Willa nodded toward the door. “Night, Monroe.”
“Night.”
Frankie watched her go. The way she walked like she was always thinking three steps ahead.
Then she looked down at the table.
The condensation rings were still there—two overlapping circles.
She smiled. And finally let herself feel it.
That maybe, just maybe, Willa Archer was starting to feel it too.
* * *
Willa
The walk back to her room took ninety seconds.
Which was exactly sixty seconds too long for her to keep pretending she wasn’t smiling like an idiot.
As soon as the door clicked shut behind her, Willa dropped her bag on the chair, kicked off her boots with unnecessary force, and muttered, “Jesus Christ.”
She didn’t know what that dinner was supposed to be—but it hadn’t been neutral. It hadn’t been detached. And it definitely hadn’t been professional.
Frankie Monroe had made her laugh.
Twice.
She crossed to the bed, collapsed dramatically, and stared at the ceiling like it had answers. It did not. Just a slow-moving water stain shaped vaguely like Rhode Island. She pulled her phone out of her jacket pocket and opened her texts.
Willa: remind me to never have dinner with emotionally reckless rockstars ever again…
Lena’s reply came with horrifying speed.
Lena: omg you had dinner?? ALONE????
Willa: it was supposed to be the band. they bailed.
Lena: and you stayed??
Willa: …yes
Lena: babe
Lena: that’s not a press dinner that’s a pre-date with feelings
Willa groaned and buried her face in a pillow.
Willa: stop. talking.
Lena: you’re literally texting me from her hotel bed aren’t you
Willa: MY bed. MY hotel room.
Lena: mmhmm
Willa locked her phone and launched it across the bedspread before she could be tempted to throw it into the sea.
She sat up, reached for her laptop, and opened the draft of her article like it had personally offended her.
Cursor blinking. Screen too bright. The half-paragraph she’d started earlier looked overly poetic and weirdly intimate, like she’d written it in a fever dream or under a spell. Which, maybe, she had.
She reread a line and grimaced.
Frankie Monroe sings like she’s telling you a secret she doesn’t want you to keep.
Gross.
Willa backspaced the whole thing. Tried again.
Onstage, Monroe commands attention without reaching for it. She lets the music lead.
She paused. Chewed the inside of her cheek. Typed another line.
The energy she brings isn’t spectacle—it’s surrender.
She stared at the screen. Then slammed the laptop shut.
“Nope.”
She slid it aside, reached down into her bag, and pulled out her beat-up black notebook—the one with the pages half-full of thoughts she’d never publish and quotes she’d never use. Her brain was too full and too loud, and Frankie Monroe was still in it, echoing like a lyric she couldn’t get rid of.
She uncapped her pen and let it move.
She makes it too easy to see her. Like she wants to be understood. Like she thinks if you just look long enough, you’ll get it. And I—
Willa stopped. Swore under her breath. Then kept going.
I hate that I’m curious. I hate that I want to ask her things I have no right to know. Like what keeps her up at night. Or what she’s trying to hide behind that voice. Or who broke her in the first place.
She turned the page. Wrote smaller this time. Softer.
I think I liked her more when she was an idea. I could control ideas. But this? This is harder. This is messy. This is a girl sitting across from me making bad jokes about werewolf fanfic and watching me like I’m some puzzle she wants to solve.
And the worst part? I think I want to be solved.
Willa stared at the last line, pulse ticking a little too fast in her throat.
She didn’t cross it out.
Just closed the notebook, tucked it beneath the pillow, and turned off the light.
Tomorrow she’d write something usable.
Tonight?
She’d settle for being honest. Even if it was just with herself.
* * *
Frankie
Frankie was curled up on the hotel bed, knees drawn to her chest, one arm flung across a pillow she’d stolen from the other side.
The room was dim—just the soft flicker of the candle she always packed in her essentials bag lighting the space.
Cedar and rose curled through the air, warm and grounding, the scent of backstage routines and nights alone on tour.
She wore pajamas that had seen better days—threadbare, soft in all the right places. The kind that made her feel like herself.
Her guitar sat untouched in the corner. She’d thought about picking it up. Letting the chords do the talking. But tonight, it wasn’t the strings she needed.
It was the page.
She reached for her journal, flipped to a clean sheet, and let her pen hover in the silence. Then, slowly, the words came—like her hand already knew what she wasn’t ready to admit.
I want to know what you sound like
when you’re not guarding every word.
I want to hear your voice
when you’re not trying to sound smart,
or sharp, or right.
Just real.
She stared at the lines.
Her stomach flipped.
It wasn’t about music.
She closed the journal slowly, laid it flat on her chest, and let her head fall back against the pillow.
But her mind wouldn’t settle. Her thoughts kept tracing back to the restaurant. To the candlelight catching in Willa’s glasses. To the bite in her words and the glint behind them. To the way she carried herself like she was five moves ahead—and still somehow sat there, stayed there, chose to stay.
Frankie sat up.
Grabbed her laptop.
Typed: Willa Archer Side B.
The results came fast. Festival reviews. Artist profiles. Longform essays with clicky titles and industry quotes. She scrolled until one headline made her pause.
The Lens We Live In: Queerness as Art, Art as Survival.
She clicked.
It wasn’t what she expected. It wasn’t distant or clinical or barbed with detachment.
It was layered. Personal. Seething and tender all at once.
Willa wrote about queerness as inheritance.
As performance. As resistance. She wrote about the body as art and survival as aesthetic—and somewhere between the second and third paragraph, Frankie forgot she was reading for research.
She was just… reading.
Some lines felt so sharp and familiar that she had to stop. Breathe. Start again.
There was edge, yes. But there was softness underneath. A softness that felt earned.
She read it twice. Then closed the laptop quietly, like anything louder might break the spell.
Her heart thudded slow in her chest. Willa Archer was complicated. And Frankie had always been a little too drawn to complicated. People who flinched at softness. People with walls instead of welcome mats. People who made you work for every inch—and made you want to.
She laid back again, pressing her forearm across her eyes. She should’ve hated her. God, it would’ve been easier. But this didn’t feel like hate.
It felt like something sharp and new and alive in her chest. It felt like the start of a song she wasn’t ready to write.
Not yet. Maybe tomorrow.
* * *