CHAPTER FORTY-SIX !

[ social media, real life ]

— ❝ MINE ❞ 💌

ʳᵉᵃˡ ˡⁱᶠᵉ !

"are the angsty songs attacking me really necessary?"

"yes. now shut up and finish listening to mr. perfectly fine."

chris sighs, rolling over on the grass. astoria watches him with a smile, readjusting the airpod in her ear. for the past hour, they've been in some random park, lying in the grass listening to all of astoria's favorite songs. she's decided that if she's forced to listen to all of his playlists whenever she's at his house — which she honestly doesn't mind that much since chris has good music taste — then he needs to become accustomed to her favorite artists, too.

the sound of taylor swift's voice fades out and another song begins, and astoria smiles as she recognizes the instrumentals of the first few seconds. chris furrows his eyebrows, not recognizing the song. he sits up, looking at her with a puzzled expression, but astoria is too busy nodding her head along with the song to notice.

"what's this?" he asks.

"shh, just listen," she replies. "you'll like it, i promise." he nods, falling quiet and now fully immersing himself in the song.

pour another bottle to the floor, love
pushin' for it, oh, you know i want some

astoria smiles to herself, listening to the familiar tune of the song. she'd forgotten how much she loved it until she played it the other day and realized how much it reminded her of the boy sitting next to her.

speaking of chris, he's slightly nodding his head to the beat, silently gazing in front of him as he listens intently to the lyrics.

as she's looking at him, astoria thinks about how unbelievably lucky she is to have someone like him. after all those years of her holding a stupid grudge against him, years of treating him like absolute shit out of spite to mask what she actually feels for him — she knows she doesn't deserve him.

astoria does not deserve chris at all, but somehow, he's hers.

'cause everything you do is screaming, "more drugs"
it's kinda sad, but it's awesome

it's still surreal to her how they've managed to look past all of their previous resentment for one another and acknowledge what they should've done a long time ago. and although she's filled with a deep regret for wasting so much time hating him, she's realizing how much it really doesn't matter anymore. nothing matters now that he's hers.

"i like this," chris mumbles quietly, turning to face her. astoria smiles.

"i'm glad," she replies.

"are you finally going to tell me what this song is?" he asks. "i wanna add it to my playlist."

he takes his phone out of the pocket of his sweatpants, ready to type in the song name.

"it's falling by chase atlantic," she tells him, and he nods as he types it in. a moment later, he twists his phone in her direction and she sees that it's been added to his 'everyday' playlist. he looks so pleased with himself that it almost makes her want to laugh, but she doesn't.

oh, we've lost it
screeching off with no names

an instagram notification flashes on her phone, and astoria quickly checks it, only to find that dante has sent her a reel. she decides to not open the chat and answer it later, not wanting to be distracted from the song and chris before her.

though right as she's about to swipe off of her dm's, astoria's eyes catch sight of harper's name still in her recents, and she's reminded of her last conversation with the girl. she told kali she'd tell chris the day after it happened, but it's been a few days since then and she still hasn't done it. she keeps telling herself that she hasn't found the right time, but in reality astoria is just afraid of how he's going to react.

she looks to chris, his peaceful expression only making this all the worse for her. astoria doubts chris would be mad at her for defending herself against his borderline psychotic ex-girlfriend — he's not that type of person — but she's still nervous. what if he's annoyed that she even engaged in the argument, rather than just ignoring harper?

if he gets mad then it's his fucking problem, kali had said. astoria knows she's right, but after so many years of fighting with chris over stupid things, she really doesn't want this to turn into an argument.

she knows she has to tell him now, though, because the longer she leaves it, the more it will escalate when he eventually does find out.

she said "watch this"
with her hands in the rain

"hey, chris?" astoria says quietly, her voice immediately giving away her nervousness. he turns to look at her, expression changed from serene to concerned as he's instantly detected that something is off.

"yeah?" he says, knitting his eyebrows with concern.

"um," she starts, then clears her throat as she figures out how exactly to word this. she's been more vulnerable with chris before than now, but there never used to be this kind of pressure. there's nothing she wants less than to upset him, to make him leave again right after she managed to get the one thing she's ever really loved.

"whatever it is, you don't have to tell me if you don't want to," chris says, moving closer to her. he takes her hand in his own and squeezes it reassuringly.

"no, no, i have to," she replies, before taking a deep breath. "the other day, harper texted me."

chris falls silent, his expression remaining neutral. nothing gives away his distaste for the girl apart from the slight newfound rigidity of his posture, though his grip on her hand is still calm and comforting.

"she tried to get into it with me, calling me out for stealing you away from her, or whatever," astoria says with a shrug, trying not to reveal to him how harper's words actually affected her.

he just sits there wordlessly, but not in an ignorant way. he's quiet because he's listening, waiting for her to finish whatever it is that she needs to say.

"i know i should've just ignored it, but she was making me seem like a terrible person and it really fucking pissed me off," astoria continues.

"no, i get that," he says.

call it conflict, as you should
and you ain't gonna stop this, stop this

"but... i think it annoyed me most that although i defended myself and everything, i kind of feel like she was right," she finishes with a sigh. chris' eyes widen and his eyebrows raise, twisting his body to sit fully opposite her. they make eye contact, and all astoria can see in his eyes is confusion.

"what are you talking about?" he asks. astoria uses her free hand to brush her hair out of her face, doing anything to buy her time to respond. she's not even sure what she should say.

"she complained about how close we were while you guys were dating and although it wasn't like that between us at the time, i can kind of understand where she's coming from. harper's a shitty person but i should've known better than to be around someone's boyfriend so much," she says, unable to bear looking at him any more.

chris sighs, looking around for a moment before his gaze lands on her once more.

"rory, you know why i broke up with harper," he reminds her. "she's just trying to convince herself she wasn't a terrible girlfriend, it had nothing to do with you."

astoria smiles at this, nodding at him.

"so, you're not mad?" she asks.

"only at her," he replies with a smile. the two fall into another silence, listening to the rest of the lyrics once again.

and you keep on falling, baby, figure it out!
just drive slow, straightforward, or i'm walking around

"this song is so good," chris says randomly, changing the subject to a more positive one. astoria thinks that if she smiles any more, her face is going to ache.

he looks so pretty sitting there, the winter sun beaming down on his face and painting him golden. again, astoria can't believe how lucky she is.

without thinking, she leans forward and presses her lips to his. chris closes his eyes, smiling into the kiss and his hand reaches upward to cup her jaw. astoria feels herself — just as the song describes — falling for him all over again. she melts into his touch, getting lost in her indescribable love for this boy.

he pulls away after a moment, leaving her feeling completely lost without his touch. he just grins at her, and she tilts her head to the side in confusion.

"what?" she asks.

"nothing," he hums. "you're just...mine."

"good" she replies, and he smiles as he leans back in to kiss her again.

and your dad keeps calling, tell him, "cut that shit out"
just keep steering, keep steering now

ⁱⁿˢᵗᵃᵍʳᵃᵐ !

storyofstori

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storyofstori boyf

tagged ; rorysboyfriend

user WE WON!!!!!!!!

user his user change i died

user never getting over them 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

minisourgummyworm so THAT's where you guys went
↳ storyofstori hahahahahahaaaaaaa

designateddriverasf i cannot breathe without chris stealing my shit i hate you @rorysboyfriend
↳ rorysboyfriend these are literally all my clothes what the fuck??
↳ designateddriverasf now go take a closer look at those birkenstocks you're wearing buddy...
↳ rorysboyfriend oh haha! 🤗

lilskyes reminiscing when rory posted a photo of only chris at the beach to her spam pretending she didn't have it bad for him
↳ rorysboyfriend LMFAOOOOOO
↳ storyofstori literally no need to out me like that skye 😕✋

user bf chris !!!!

rorysboyfriend who's that cool guy on my screen rn
↳ storyofstori idk like my bf or wtv 🙄🙄
↳ rorysboyfriend awwww gf ❤️
↳ storyofstori stfu
↳ user them

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TITLE DROPPPPPPPP

sorry to those who thought this fic was titled after falling by harry styles

short ass chapter i'm lazy sorry

━ ava ᥫ᭡