Seven minimum. Not a suggestion. An expectation.
Ptichka: I know. I'm trying.
Lis: I know you are. What's your color level right now?
The color system was something we'd developed together—his idea, adapted from something he'd learned somewhere. Green meant good, regulated, functioning. Yellow meant struggling but managing. Red meant crisis, need immediate support.
I thought about it honestly, the way he'd taught me to.
The meltdown had passed. Ghost had helped. I'd eaten, walked, recovered. The itch to paint still crawled beneath my skin, but it was manageable. The Repin mystery nagged at the back of my mind, but it could wait.
Ptichka: Yellow. Maybe green-yellow.
Lis: Better than this morning.
I'd messaged him briefly that morning, before starting work, and mentioned that I'd woken up already anxious. He'd told meto text him if I needed to, any time, and I hadn't—because I hadn't wanted to bother him, because the work had consumed me, because asking for help was still the hardest thing in the world.
Lis: I'm proud of you.
I pulled the blanket tighter around myself, warmth spreading through my chest.
This wasn't a real relationship.
The reminder came automatically now, a reflex I'd developed to protect myself from hoping for too much. We were friends. Online friends. Anonymous friends who shared a particular understanding of how the world worked.
But tonight, with the accidental "Daddy" still glowing on my screen and his acceptance still warm in my chest, the reminder felt hollow.
I wanted more.
I wanted him here, in my studio, in my armchair. I wanted his voice instead of his typed words. I wanted to know what his hands looked like, whether they were large or small, callused or soft. I wanted to lean against him the way I leaned against Ghost, to feel someone else's heartbeat and know that I wasn't alone in this.
Ptichka: Thank you.
I didn't know what else to say. The things I wanted to say were too big for typing, too fragile for screens.
Lis: Always, little bird. Always.
We talked for another hour after that. About my work (carefully anonymized, not mentioning painting or anything that could identify me), about his day (vague as always, something about "meetings" and "complicated logistics"), about books we were both reading. Normal conversation, easy conversation, the kind of talking I could only do with him.
But underneath it all, the new word pulsed.
Daddy.
He'd accepted it. He'd absorbed it into our dynamic without missing a beat. And now it was part of us, this thing that had been growing for months, finally named.
When I finally said goodnight and closed my laptop, Ghost had been asleep for hours. The studio was dark except for the city glow through the windows. The blanket was warm around my shoulders.
I sat there for a long time, not moving.
Daddy.
I wanted him to be real. I wanted this to be real.
But wanting things had never made them happen before.
I went to bed alone, and tried not to count how many hours until I could talk to him again.
Chapter 2
