I nod again.
But I say nothing else.
Because if I open my mouth now, I don’t know what will come out.
Not truth.
Not yet.
He holds me tighter.
And still—I feel the space between us growing.
It’s not him.
It’s me.
It’s the note under the sweater.
The memory behind it.
The feeling that something is watching again, but this time not from across the room—not from the ceiling corners or the camera feeds.
From inside.
From before.
I close my eyes and bury myself in him, as deep as I can go.
Trying to find that place where it’s only him.
Only Damien.
Because if I let myself think about what that note really means…
I’ll have to admit it:
He wasn’t the first.
And if he wasn’t the first?—
Then maybe…
He won’t be the last.
I can still feel him long after he’s gone still.
Not the weight. Not the heat. Just the echo—how my body keeps reaching for him even as my mind drifts somewhere else. Somewhere older. Somewhere I don’t remember.
The room is quiet now. Too quiet. The kind that hums at the edges, a low vibration you can’t trace but can’t escape. It threadsthrough my veins until my pulse starts to stutter, and I can’t tell if it’s fear or memory rising under my skin.
I turn my face into his chest, pretending I’m tired. Pretending this is peace. But the words on that note won’t stop bleeding through the cracks:Do you remember what he took from you that night in the chapel?
I don’t.
I swear I don’t.
But the ache in my ribs says maybe I do—just not in a way that makes sense yet.
