Esté didn't call again.

An interrupting text message from her manager telling her to meet him downstairs in the lobby in thirty minutes grabbed her attention, and then her work consumed her all day, and then another painfully forced dinner evening, and then day after day after day, life took over.

Her Saint Laurent show had been another unrivalled success and once again, Estélla owned the headlines. Tony's affair as the papers had labelled it stole the limelight for only the time it took for Esté to finish her Victoria's Secret show, and as soon as she stepped off that runway, the world didn't care about the Iron Man anymore, they only cared about the golden girl.

Esté worked herself into the ground right up until Christmas Day. She'd barely found a spare moment to breathe, let alone be plagued by nightmares about the tales that tore her apart inside, but she liked it that way. She didn't want to have to wallow in the sadness of something that couldn't be changed or waste any more time thinking about a man that was careless enough to lose her, so she gave herself no choice but to drown in business, instead.

By the time December 25th rolled around, Estélla was exhausted. She was spending the holiday with Katy and Alicia at her home in The Hamptons, her parents once again being warmed by the sun down under instead of being bitten by frost on the east coast of America.

Between the girls' busy schedules, they'd managed to all pile into the house at some point during the late afternoon of Christmas Eve, spending the last hours of daylight decorating the home for what was left of the festive season.

They laced a huge fir tree with yellow lights and hung old stockings over the fireplace, hooking a wreath on the door and pinned mistletoe above every arch and doorway they could. Cinnamon candles burned throughout the house and snow started to fall just as the girls put out the fire and headed upstairs to bed, giving them a stunning winter wonderland surprise to wake up to on Christmas morning.

"Wow, it's beautiful."

The three girls were stood by the huge bay windows at the back of the house, coffees in hand while they stared out with glassy eyes at the snowdrops falling from the heavens, coating the sand and melting into a rippling ocean at the end of the garden.

"Happy Christmas, I love you both so much." Katy said, putting her arms around her friends and hugging them tightly.

Alicia scoffed and hugged them back, "No need to be so emotional."

"You're such a Scrooge," Esté laughed and walked over to the kitchen, pouring away her coffee and pulling out a magnum of champagne from the wine fridge, "Mimosa, anyone?"

"Sure, but spare me the orange juice." Alicia replied, sitting on top of the kitchen counter while Katy grabbed some glasses from the cabinet.

The girls spent the rest of the day cooking a feast of a Christmas dinner with all the traditional trimmings, arguing over who won each round of Trivial Pursuit that they played, before finally crashing down on the couch together beneath one huge blanket and binge watching all the Christmas movies they'd not had chance to watch that year.

They didn't change out of their matching pyjamas for the entire day, not even when they dared to run across the freshly fallen snow barefoot while their turkey was cooking in the oven. They drank champagne and danced to old music, gossiped about people they did and didn't like, talked about future plans and reminisced on past ones, too.

It was perhaps one of the most wholesome Christmas Days that Esté had ever had. She didn't find herself feeling confused about her feelings or upset because her father kept disappearing from the dinner table to answer business calls. She was present, and her two best friends were present with her, together taking her mind off anything that had the potential to cast a shadow on her smile.

"Are you crying, Esté? You've seen this movie a thousand times."

"No," Esté quickly shook her head and wiped her eyes dry with the sleeve of her pyjamas, "It's just a really happy ending."

Their laughter was silenced by a phone ringing across the room. Katy quickly pushed the blanket from her body and sprinted over to the mobile, ripping out the charger and answering the call in a matter of seconds before disappearing out of the room.

Esté and Alicia both knew that Katy had been desperately waiting to hear from Steve all day, especially after Bucky had found the time to call Alicia for a couple of minutes first thing that morning.

Esté didn't mind. The topic of Tony hadn't come up at all and both girls chose their words with care, treading meticulously cautiously around certain subjects when they talked to Esté.

On the surface, it seemed like she was fine. Esté had been quick to distract herself with work and a trip to Dubai before her show, spending a few days in London with some other friends after her time in Paris was up, too. Fine might've been an understatement, in fact, it seemed like Esté was thriving without Tony. She was on the cover of every magazine and the headline of every article, and not because of a man's misdemeanours, but because of her own success.

"Did you hear from him at all?" Alicia said quietly, chewing on her lip in hopes that she hadn't crossed a line by asking that question.

Esté swallowed. She hadn't told anybody about the voicemail Tony had left her and wasn't planning on it, nor was she planning to ever listen to it herself again. Though every time she came close to deleting it from her phone, she couldn't hit the button.

"No," she lied, shaking her head once with a small cough.

Alicia smiled sadly and brushed some hair from Esté's face, tilting her head as she noticed a flash of upset pool in her blue eyes. Esté was perhaps the strongest, most determined and resilient person she knew, but it was naïve to think that even the strongest of people didn't have a breaking point.

"I never asked because I didn't think you'd want to talk about it but...are you OK, Esté?"

"Yeah," Esté shrugged her shoulders, "I'm fine, totally fine."

There was a falseness in her voice and the smile she flashed didn't quite reach her eyes. It would've fooled most people, but Alicia knew her friend too well to be blindsided by the act, and the truth that she was about to pull the covers from was devastating.

"Hey," she whispered, taking Esté's hands carefully into her own and giving them a gentle squeeze, "You don't have to lie, it's alright. You're allowed to be upset."

"I'm not lying," she shook her head, laughing unconvincingly with another false smile, "I'm not, I really am fine, I just..."

There was a painfully intense look in Alicia's eyes that told Esté she had been caught out. Truthfully, up until that day, she had been fine. A busy life worked at keeping her mind occupied and slowly but surely, Esté started to believe that maybe she really was healing her broken heart quicker than she ever thought she would.

It wasn't until she returned home, however, and she looked out onto her backyard and saw the snow falling across the lonely treehouse in the near distance, that she felt the tension of the ropes that had been holding her together snap completely.

"Talk to me," Alicia urged with a genuine smile, brushing her thumbs across Esté's hands gently.

"I just..." she repeated, feeling herself struggle to pull in a full breath to her lungs as her eyes glazed over suddenly, a pain burning her chest and a quiver in her lips, "How could he do that to me?"

Alicia watched in silent horror as the strength in Esté's face fell, tears pouring endlessly from her eyes as she broke down into a fit of quiet, choked out sobs that she was sure were ones that had been held in for far too long.

She pulled her friend into her arms, holding her tightly while she cried and attempted to soothe her by racing her fingers through her long hair, squeezing her shoulders and rubbing soft circles on her back, though she knew that there really was no cure for a broken heart.

Alicia wasn't sure she'd ever seen Estélla cry before, at least not sad tears. She'd seen her cry with pride and happiness, excitement and elation, but never because her soul was weeping and her eyes weren't strong enough to hold back the flood any longer.

It took a lot for Esté Goldwyn to fall, but Tony Stark had been the force strong enough to take her down, even if the world didn't see it happen.

"It hurts, Alicia. It hurts so bad I can't breathe," Esté gasped as she clung to Alicia's shoulders, practically laid on her chest while she continued to shed her pain from her eyes.

"He doesn't deserve you, Esté, he never did. Not if he treats you like that when you gave him everything, you're better off without him."

Esté shook her head, "But I'm not," she cried, "I don't feel it. I feel worse when I'm alone with these thoughts and my life goes quiet, I feel like I'm not really here, like he's taken me with him and I'll never get myself back. I loved him, I still love him, even now."

Listening to Estélla fall apart in her arms was one of the most paralysingly awful things Alicia had ever had to deal with. The depth of her cries and the pain in her voice was enough to draw tears into her own eyes, digging a deep pit of sadness in her own gut that twisted and turned with regret and fury over a man that had ripped away her best friend's shine.

The world had carried on turning after Tony did what he did and Esté turned with it, but only on the outside. Inside, she'd stayed exactly where she was when she saw that photograph of him with another girl, the feeling of guttural despair that possessed her staying stitched to her bones ever since.

"Oh, Esté..."

Alicia didn't know what to say. There was nothing she could say. She'd seen first hand the way Estélla looked at Tony and the way he looked at her, noticing the difference in their eyes on the night of his birthday party back in May. It had been obvious then that the way the two childhood best friends felt about each other was something deeper than they felt about anybody else, whether they were aware of it or not.

Alicia remembered watching Tony's eyes follow Estélla around the room, catching him stealing glances at her while she talked to other guys and humoured their advances with a polite smile and nod, all while she too was craning her neck every five minutes to see if Tony was passing by.

It was an attraction that had turned out to be fatal, something longer than their lifetimes had drawn out and although seemed infinite, had been slashed by the knife of a cruel mistake.

"Yeah, yeah she's right here but- oh, hold on."

Katy walked back into the room with her phone still by her ear, a happy expression dropping from her face when she saw the red eyes of Estélla and the tears on both girls' cheeks. Her heart sank at the scene, immediately feeling guilty for taking the call from Steve and hoping that she hadn't been the cause for the upset, preferring to have gone without hearing from her boyfriend rather than upsetting Estélla.

They looked up at her from the couch, waiting for her to speak through the frozen parted lips and wide eyes.

"Esté, um, Steve says Tony's asked if you'll talk to him. Do you want to, uh..."

For a split second, Estélla lived in a reality in which she leapt from the couch and grabbed the phone from Katy's hands, sobbing down the phone as she told Tony that she didn't care anymore, that she just wanted him to come home. And he would apologise, he'd change and he would come right back home, right back to her with a sorry smile on his face and a hand that would never again stray from hers.

She debated it for a moment, her heart longing to hear his voice say her name, to hear him say anything at all. Esté missed him more than she ever thought she would, and it made her furious that the man that had caused her an insufferable amount of pain and left a wound that couldn't be stitched could still hold her heart in the palm of his cold, straying hands.

And so the anger outweighed the desperation on that Christmas Day, "No," she said firmly, "I have nothing to say to him."

an;;
Omg where do we think Esté should go from here??? I would genuinely go to war for her at this point I love her so much
I hope you're enjoying this story, I really love writing it and it's so so lovely to see all your thoughts and opinions in the comments on each chapter!! Thank u so much for all the kind words, I love you guys!! <3