Papa.
And when I wake, I’m smiling.
Smiling like a man who’s found what he lost.
Smiling like a father.
When I arrive at the set the day after my dream, things are…complex between myself and Liora. The air between us is thin, charged. Every time I step close to her, I feel the current—tight wires humming, ready to snap. I carry a scar in my chest where she kissed me in the park. The memory stings like a burn. But the truth still lies unspoken between us, and she flinches every time my shadow stretches toward it.
We’re on set again, lunch break under the stage lights. I stand near the load-in door, the smell of hot rigging and stale coffee in the air. Liora sits at a folding table, script in hand, eyesred. She’s toggled between being brilliant and breaking lately. I watch her. She doesn’t meet my gaze.
I chew a burger—synthetic patty, but I pretend it tastes like something alive. She bites her lip. She’s fiddling with the coffee cup I gave her this morning. I walk over.
“You okay?” I ask. My voice soft—too soft.
She looks up. “I’m fine,” she says, but the lie drips like acid.
I don’t reply. I sit across from her. She closes her script. “We should… talk,” she says.
I raise an eyebrow. “We should?”
She clears her throat. “About Pepper.” And there it is. The word. Pepper. The almost-truth.
I hold my breath. The burger tastes dry. I swallow. “What about her?”
She frowns. “I just—” She stops. She doesn’t finish.
I let space fill the room. The crew laughs somewhere behind the walls. Lights click. The smell of engine grease drifts in from the rig.
“I want you to know,” she finally says, voice quiet, “I’m doing this for her. For both of you.” She looks at me. My heart thumps.
“Then why hide?” My voice is steady, not cruel—but sharp. She flinches.
“I… it’s not that simple.” Her eyes flick to the script on the table. “I’m protecting her. Protecting us.”
I stare. The quiet is heavy. I pick up the coffee cup, drink. Bitter.
“I understand protection.” I draw the word out. “But hiding isn’t always protection.” I lean forward. Her pulse echoes in my ears. The studio hum, the buzz of frames, the faint beep of the jam-counter in Pepper’s inducer.
She exhales. “I know you’re not here for the cameras.”
My jaw tightens. “Then don’t act like you are.”
She looks away. “It’s not that easy.”
I hold my hand up. “I’m not asking you to make it easy. I’m asking you to make it real.” I touch her arm lightly. She doesn’t pull away, but she doesn’t lean in either. “Let me in.”
She closes her eyes. I feel the soft exhale. I taste the flavor of tears unshed. The smell of her perfume—vanilla and something else—fills me.
“I’m scared,” she whispers.
That word cracks something in me. I place my forehead against hers. “So am I.” My voice trembles. “But I’m not going anywhere.”
She opens her eyes. The green-hue of an old light reflects in them. “I need time.”
I nod. “You have it.”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know if I deserve it.”
