That was why losing her broke something fundamental in me—because she was the only relationship in my life that had ever been unconditionally kind.
David hadn’t meant to hurt me. But he taught me something dangerous anyway:
That love always costs something. That being close to someone means you owe them.
But Elliot wasn’t his parents.
The relationship I had with him was entirely our own. Elliot was a responsibility and a longing and a wound and a mirror all at once. He asked for nothing except that I stay. That I didn’t leave. That I didn’t vanish when things got ugly.
That should have been the easiest promise in the world. Yet somehow it was the hardest thing I’d ever tried to keep. Because every instinct in me wanted to give him more than I was allowed to. Every moral boundary in me told me I had to pull away.
So I overcorrected. I retreated. I distanced myself from him. I tried to be colder, steadier, safer. I tried to be what I thought he needed me to be. And in doing that, I hurt him anyway.
I finished the cigarette and crushed it under my heel.
My hands were shaking slightly now. I pressed them together until the tremor stilled. I inhaled slowly. Exhaled slower. Slowly I pulled myself together, piece by broken piece. When I headed inside I almost had myself fooled that I was functioning like a normal person.
I busied myself in the kitchen because standing still felt dangerous. Poured another mug of coffee and added too much milk because I knew he liked it that way, watching the color shift from dark brown to soft tan like something gentler was being layered over something bitter. My chest tightened at the familiarity of that knowledge—the quiet intimacy of knowing how someone took their coffee, how someone needed their toast just a little more done than necessary because they liked the crunch.
Uncertain of when he’d last eaten, I popped some bread in the toaster. Buttery, warm, simple. It wasn’t much, but it wassomething solid. Something his body could accept even if his heart couldn’t.
I moved slowly, deliberately, like if I rushed I might drop something—or make a decision I wasn’t ready to face.
The house was quiet in that suspended early-morning way where everything felt fragile. The toaster popped. The sound felt too loud and too soft at the same time.
Once I’d buttered the toast, I set it on a small plate then placed it and the mug onto a tray, and lifted it carefully. It felt heavier than it should have. Not because of the weight of ceramic and bread but because of what it meant.
Care was heavier than love sometimes.
I started toward the stairs with it balanced in both hands, my pulse thudding low and steady in my ears. How do you love someone without either consuming them or abandoning them?
The question followed me up every step. The stairs creaked under my weight like they always did. I paused halfway up, breath catching slightly, listening to see if he was awake yet. Nothing.
I continued without a second thought. The hallway was dim. Pale morning light filtered in through the window at the end, casting soft shadows across the doors. His door was closed.
That alone made something tighten inside me. It was open—just how I’d left it last night—when I passed it earlier. I stopped in front of it and hesitated. I told myself I was giving him privacy. That I was being respectful of the boundary he’d given me. That I’d simply knock and leave the tray by his door.
My hand lifted and just before I knocked I heard it. A breath that wasn’t quite a gasp. A soft, broken exhale that caught in something inside my chest. Then he breathed my name in a way that electrified me as his moan rang in my ears.
“Anthony…”
It wasn’t loud enough that it could have been meant for me. That he’d heard me outside his door. But it landed anyway, hooked right into my skin. My body went still. The tray trembled slightly in my hands before I forced it steady.
My throat closed. My heart stuttered once, hard enough I felt it in my neck. The sound wasn’t graphic. It was intimate. Private.
It was the sound of someone alone with their need. With their ache. Longing. Somehow that made it worse. Because it wasn’t about sex. It was about hunger. It was about wanting. It was about absence.
I stood there frozen, staring at the grain of the wood on his door like it could tell me what to do. A rush of things slammed into me at once—protectiveness, guilt, longing, restraint, shame.
The unbearable knowledge that I couldn’t be what he wanted without breaking something sacred between us.
My knuckles hovered inches from the door. If I knocked, I would interrupt him. If I didn’t, I was abandoning him. If I went in, I might not trust myself to leave. If I left, I might confirm the very thing he feared.
My breaths became shallow. Perspiration trickled down my neck. My jeans grew tighter with every whimpered moan I heard. I swallowed hard. My chest felt too tight for my ribs. I leaned my forehead briefly against the door, eyes closing, the wood cool against my skin.
“I’m trying,” I whispered to no one.
My body moved without permission. I straightened, wrapped my hand around the handle and pushed the door open. The sight that greeted me was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
