We moved around each other like strangers. Brief words in the morning, briefer words at night. The careful choreography of two people trying not to collide.
I'd done this. I'd taken his warmth, hope, and stubborn, persistent care, and pushed it all away until he finally got the message.
Good,I told myself.This is better. This is safer.
It didn't feel better. It felt like watching something precious break, piece by piece.
I came home one evening to find him in the bedroom, folding clothes.
My clothes. The ones I'd lent him. Stacking them neatly on the bed in careful piles, sorted by type—shirts here, sweatpants there, socks paired and rolled.
"What are you doing?"
He didn't look up. "Organizing."
"Those are my clothes."
"I know. I've been borrowing them." His hands kept moving, folding a t-shirt with the same precision he brought to everything. "I thought I should give them back."
Something cold settled in my stomach. "Why?"
"Because I've been here too long." He smoothed a crease from a sleeve. "I've been taking advantage of your kindness, and I should figure out what comes next. Find a job. A room to rent. Something."
"You don't have to—"
"I do." He finally looked at me, his eyes flat and guarded, nothing like the warmth I'd grown used to. "You've made it clear you don't want me here. I'm not going to keep forcing myself on someone who can barely stand to be in the same room with me."
"That's not what's happening."
"Isn't it?" He set down the shirt. "You leave before I wake up. You come home after I've given up waiting. You won't eat the food I make. You won't talk to me. You flinch every time I get too close."
Each accusation landed like a blow. True. All of it true.
"I've spent days trying to figure out what I did wrong." His voice cracked slightly. "Trying to fix it. Trying to be less needy, less present, less everything. But nothing works. You still look at me like I'm a problem you don't know how to solve."
"Tobias—"
"I'm not stupid. I know when I'm not wanted."
The words hit like a punch to the gut.Not wanted.If only he knew how much I wanted him, how hard I'd been fighting against it, how every moment of distance had been an act of self-preservation disguised as kindness.
He turned back to the clothes, folding them mechanically, like he'd retreated to a place I couldn't reach.
I stood in the doorway and watched him pack away the evidence of our time together—my shirt, my sweatpants, the Army t-shirt he'd worn that first morning. Each item folded and stacked, neat and precise, as if he were erasing himself from my life.
I should say something. Should tell him the truth. Should cross the room, take those clothes from his hands, and explain that I wasn't pushing him away because I didn't want him. I was pushing him away because I wanted him too much.
But the words stuck in my throat. The fear was too strong.
So I stood there, frozen, and watched him fold another shirt.
And hated myself more than I'd ever hated anything.
Chapter11
Tobias
I used to count the hours until he came home.
