post-breakup
He arrives with a bouquet of sunflowers and all the best goodies a nearby bodega had to offer, idly wondering if he should have embraced cliches and grabbed the ice cream he wasn't sure would last five blocks.

Eli isn't sure what he's about to walk into, just which version of Maris will be behind her apartment door because this is uncharted territory. Halfway between the gas station and a diner Maris warned him never to go to, he realized his best friend had never really broken up with someone before.

Okay, she'd left girls before. Maris always left a bit of a mess in her wake, but this...this was serious, different because Rory had been. Maris had been a different, better person (the sweet, kind, loyal one she rarely let anyone see) when she was with her.

He was fuzzy on the details. Maris wasn't exactly forthright on the phone a sort of oh yeah, we broke up tossed in as an aside to be swept under the rug after he asked about Rory during their weekly phone call the night before.

It's fine.

But he knew she wasn't.

He hears a snort the moment her door opens. "Flowers?" She raises an eyebrow. "Really, Eli? Nobody died."

Even he isn't used to seeing her dressed so casually. A faded Talking Heads tee shirt skims her knees. Even her hair is wrong, not messy, exactly but there are a few strands out of place, something he knows she would never allow otherwise.

"Are you gonna let me in?"

"Are you gonna let me put some pants on?" she shoots back. But she steps aside and takes the bag, dumping it and her flowers unceremoniously on the kitchen table.

"You don't need to check up on me," she snaps.

"Maybe I want to." He wrinkles his nose as he looks around the room, unsurprising by an open pack of Lucky Strikes on the coffee table, even though Maris had quit five years before. "Jesus, it smells like an ashtray in here."

She smirks, nodding toward his uniform. "And you're going to lecture me? As a medical health professional?"

Maybe he does know this version of Maris after all. This cruel, haughty version with an air of smug superiority is one he doesn't like.

He tries to a different tactic. "It's Monday," he reminds her gently. "Shouldn't you be at work?"

"I got a sub," she says, narrowing her eyes at him. "Shouldn't you be at work rescuing orphans from burning buildings or giving old ladies cpr or something? Nobody needs you to play the hero here."

"Okay, you need to fucking stop it," he snaps before muttering under his breath. "God, you can be such a bitch sometimes."

The moment he says it he wants to take it back. Insults are the last thing she needs when she's already feeling so low. Part of him is even scared, amazed that he's called her something he literally saw her deck Ben Cohen for at his brother's bar mitzvah.

He'd mimicked the way she shouted I'll show you a bitch for years.

His stomach sinks even further when he sees it register on her face, realizing she heard him. He braces himself for impact, at the very least expecting a very firm get the hell out, but he can barely hear her when she does speak.

"I am," she says softly. "Fuck, Eli I was so mean to her I..."

She doesn't finish the sentence and he doesn't prod any further. He just crosses the room, pulls her into his arms and let's her cry.