° ❀⋆࿔ dandelion ࿔⋆❀ °
° ࿔⋆❀ summary: When your name comes up for the first time since college, Art gets hit with a tidal wave of nostalgia. He invited you over to a motel room to talk, but you both know that’s just an excuse.
° ࿔⋆ notes: fem!reader, sexual content, smut, angst
° ࿔⋆ a/n: i love eternal sunshine deluxe and i had to get this out my head bc UGH i love dandelion but back to scheduled programming right after this
Art can hear the trombone player from down the street as he steps up the metal stairs. The keys jingle in his hand when he walks to his designated room. Opening it was disappointing, but he didn’t expect much from a thirty-dollar motel wedged in the corner of a highway-side inn.
The motel smells like stale cigarettes and old air conditioning. One of those places where the floral bedspread has long since given up, and the flickering neon sign outside the window buzzes just loud enough to drown out any of his overthinking.
The room was unnecessary; he’s already got a suite courtesy of the Open. But Art’s been trying to save his personal life to himself during his rise in the tennis world. It’s not that he wouldn’t want to be seen with you. God, he would. He’d take your hand right now and post it, headline it, put it on a damn billboard if you let him. But he knew you wouldn’t want to be being spotted with him. Especially after how long it’s taken for one of you to break the silence between you.
Finding you again wasn’t hard. He was in New York for the US Open and grabbed drinks with some old Stanford guys last night. One of them dropped your name in passing, mentioned you lived out here now. Art had your old number dialed into his phone before he’d even left the bar.
“Someone said you’re in Queens,” he said like it was nothing. Like it didn’t shake something loose in him. “I didn’t even know. I just— God, I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”