That stops her. Not entirely, but enough for the fight in her posture to waver.
For a moment she says nothing. Her chest rises and falls in short, uneven breaths. Her hands flex on her knees. She’s listening even if she doesn’t want to.
“Then why did you do it?” she asks quietly, and it’s not anger that fills the space between each word, it’s fear.
I drag a hand along the back of my neck, searching for footing in a conversation that has none.
“Because…”
The word stalls.
Not because I don’t know the ending, but because saying it aloud feels like lighting a fuse I can’t extinguish.
“Some part of me could not stop,” I finish, my voice low, unsteady. “And I’m trying to understand why.”
The room goes still.
She stares at me like she’s trying to decode something impossible, like she’s afraid of the answer and equally afraid it might not exist. Her throat works around a swallow, the sound barely audible in the tight, quiet space of my room.
A long moment passes before she finally speaks.
“What do you want me to say to that?” she whispers, notconfrontational now but exhausted, like she’s been carrying the weight of too many truths alone.
“Nothing,” I say, the word heavier than I intend. I move one step closer, not touching, but near enough she feels the shift. “Just… let me try to fix this.”
Her breath hitches.
Her shoulders tense.
Something shifts in her expression, not forgiveness, not softness, but a gathering force, like all the exhaustion etched into her bones is reshaping itself into something sharper, something that refuses to stay small. Harper stands abruptly, the mattress dipping beneath her weight before settling again. For a moment she just looks at me, jaw tight, breath uneven, as though deciding what part of herself she’s willing to risk.
Then she steps closer.
Not tentatively. Not cautiously. With purpose.
Her fingers catch my sleeve, and before I register what she intends, she pulls, forcing me upright, forcing me to face her. The movement is so sudden my balance shifts, and I’m left standing only inches from her, the warmth of her breath threading into mine.
“See,” she says, voice trembling with something that isn’t anger anymore but something far more dangerous. She takes another step, erasing what little distance remains between us. “See how easily you can control-”
The sentence collapses into silence.
Because we’re close now.
Close enough that I can see the faint freckle near her left eye.
Close enough that her hair brushes my collar.
Close enough that our noses nearly touch.
Her breath stops altogether, and mine follows.
Her eyes widen, not in fear, but in realization, at the proximity, at the heat humming beneath the surface, at the way we’ve fallen back into a gravity we pretend not to understand. My hands hover uselessly at my sides, fighting the instinct to reach for her. Every heartbeat feels louder than the rain outside, echoing in the space between us that is barely a hand’s width wide.
Then she looks down.
Only a fraction, just enough to see what I already feel, a tug at the front of my shirt. Her fingers are curled there, trembling, holding me as though she had meant to shove me back yet somehow pulled me closer instead. The sight knocks the breath from my lungs.
“I didn’t-” she starts, voice breaking apart.
