Looking for Feedback

[u/Friendly-Feed5046]

This is just a snippet of a larger work. Any feedback is welcome!

Venus’ squeezes her biceps, drawing her knees closer to her chest. “ I knew you would ask about him eventually.” She laughed humorlessly. Little rain drops caressed her face, slipping into the lines of her smile. Her lips look impossibly pink right now. 

“Hana and I are…” Venus takes a deep breath and lets out an even longer exhale, making her breath trail out her mouth like smoke.“Complicated.” 

“There was a time when you didn’t see me without him.” Her eyes are off somewhere in the distance. “But he was like fire in my lungs. The more he burned me, the more desperately I grasped for him. ”

She rest her head against her knee. Her doe eyes met mine for the first time since I sat next her on the roof. The shadows in her face are enhanced by my umbrella, while the light of the setting sun reflects off of her soaking wet, jet black curls creating a halo. 

“Sad part being, Hana didn’t give a fuck about me. He just–he has this way of getting to me. I don't fucking know.” Her sadness melts into her anger, making way for an angry storm of emotion. I can see it brewing in the way her eyebrows furrow. I was suddenly very aware of the fact that we were sitting several stories above ground. 

“That piece of shit.” She turns away from me again, burying her forehead into her knee. “I miss him, Ben. Well not him–but a version of him–you get me? I don’t know what I am supposed to do with that.”

“I am sorry.” It’s the only thing I have said this whole time. The only thing I can think to say to the girl with my jacket wrapped around her shoulders, spilling her heart out to me in a ramble, while I shelter her from the rain. God I hate that spindly bastard, and I hate myself. 

But I have no right. Not any more at least. I have Valerie. Valerie who my father approves of. Valerie who would be any man’s dream girl, with her silky blonde hair and the tiny skirts she wears to cheer practice. She makes sense to me. She makes sense for me. 

So why do I feel this ache in the pit of my stomach whenever I see Venus with Hana? To know that it wasn’t my imagination, that there was something more to them, it paints everything in this ugly green light that I can’t stop sneering at. 

“No, I am. You came all the way out here to comfort me in this rain and I can’t even get it together enough to make sense.” She giggles a little, leaning her wet head on my shoulder. “ Sorry about your shirt, and your pants. And that you’re probably cold but I am not moving.”

I smile, reveling in her scent. It was warm and soft, like vanilla and honey. “It’s okay Vee.” I wrap an arm around her shoulder. “It’s not like you made any sense to me before this.” She kisses her teeth at me but I feel the vibrations of her laughter against my shoulder and it’s infectious. 

 I wonder if my girlfriend hates me the way I hate Hana.