diff --git a/src/renderer/styled_buffer.rs b/src/renderer/styled_buffer.rs
index 04967bd8..abe96b72 100644
--- a/src/renderer/styled_buffer.rs
+++ b/src/renderer/styled_buffer.rs
@@ -85,13 +85,21 @@ impl StyledBuffer {
     /// If `line` does not exist in our buffer, adds empty lines up to the given
     /// and fills the last line with unstyled whitespace.
     pub(crate) fn puts(&mut self, line: usize, col: usize, string: &str, style: ElementStyle) {
+        if string.is_empty() {
+            // don't add trailing whitespace (from column offset) for blank strings
+            return;
+        }
+
         self.ensure_lines(line);
         let line = &mut self.lines[line];
+
+        let new_len = col + string.chars().count();
+        if new_len > line.len() {
+            line.resize(new_len, StyledChar::SPACE);
+        }
+
         for (offset, chr) in string.chars().enumerate() {
             let col = col + offset;
-            if col >= line.len() {
-                line.resize(col + 1, StyledChar::SPACE);
-            }
             line[col] = StyledChar::new(chr, style);
         }
     }