I tend to write with music as a backbone to the stories. If a song makes you think of a specific scenario, you can suggest it… no promises, though.
I don’t write smut (yet?), and anything with weddings or pregnancy is just not my thing… my brain literally cannot romanticize it :/
Some characters I circle back to: Bucky Barnes, Loki, Steve Harrington, Stiles Stilinski, Clark Kent, Eddie Munson, Sebastian Sallow, Spencer Reid, Anakin Skywalker, Kylo Ren… and probably a few more I haven’t admitted to yet.
ENGLISH IS NOT MY FIRST LANGUAGE
Backbone Playlist 🦴
❅ILIA MALININ❅
❅ To Someone From A Warm Climate | Completed (x f! reader)
6 parts | ~28k words
What happens when an olympian and a volunteer find themselves stuck between floors, with nowhere to go, and nowhere else they’d rather be? What begins as chance turns into something quieter and deeper than friendship. Under watchful eyes and growing pressure, they steal moments just for themselves until, between distance and silence, something takes shape.
❅ A Couple Minutes (x f! reader)
One Shot | ~10k words
Six months after their breakup, the Olympics bring him back to her in the most unexpected way. After everything unravels on the ice, he reaches for the one person who still feels like home. She lets him in, even knowing how dangerous that familiarity is... his voice on the phone, his body on her sofa, the old habits returning far too easily, until the distance between them collapses all the way back to her bed. Because despite everything, she still cares. And worse, she still loves him.
❅ Coming Up Roses (x f! reader)
One Shot | ~13k words
They’ve always been inseparable. Best friends, constant, easy. Until it stops being easy. When feelings blur the line between them, he pushes her away in the worst way possible… and loses her.
But some people don’t stay gone. And when they find their way back to each other, it’s no longer about friendship. It’s about everything they never said.
❅ Haunted (x f! reader)
One Shot | ~17k words
She never meant to like him.
He was everything she had already decided she didn’t like, too talented, too admired, too sure of himself. But one snowy trip, one inconvenient laugh, and one very bad decision later, she finds herself caught in something she doesn’t quite understand.
What starts as a one night stand turns into something softer, deeper, and far more dangerous than either of them planned. Because somewhere between stolen kisses, late-night conversations, and a string of almosts, they build something real, while both quietly convincing themselves it’s nothing at all.
❅ Meddle About (x f! reader)
One Shot | ~13k words
She was supposed to be the future of figure skating until everything fell apart. Now she’s something else entirely, an untouchable presence at the edge of the sport she never really left behind. He is the future, all sharp edges and impossible jumps, everything she lost and everything she can’t ignore. When a careless comment turns into a public clash, their rivalry becomes impossible to look away from, pulling them into the same rooms, the same conversations, and eventually, the same mistakes.
X
❅ Don't Worry, I'll Make You Worry (x f! reader)
One Shot | ~12k words
In another version of her life, everything fell apart before she ever got the chance to become what she was meant to be. In this one, it doesn’t. She gets the gold medals, the fame, the perfect life everyone envies, but none of it fixes the loneliness underneath it all. Then there’s him, the only person reckless enough to keep reaching for her no matter how sharp she gets. What starts as rivalry slowly turns into something far messier, and the more openly he loves her, the harder she fights him for it.
❅ Hits Different (x f! reader)
One Shot | ~10k words
She’d always been good at keeping things casual until he showed up, all lingering glances, late-night visits, and flirting that feels a little too real to be harmless. Walking away from him is supposed to make things easier. Instead, it forces him to realize just how much he’s relied on her always being there, and how badly he’s about to lose her if he doesn't do anything.
⚛︎FRANK LANGDON⚛︎
⚛︎ Drag Path (x f! reader)
One Shot | ~10k words
She has a habit of taking in strays. This time, it’s a recently divorced ER doctor with a complicated past, a stubborn need to handle everything alone and a dog. Letting him move in is supposed to be simple. Temporary. Just helping someone get through a rough time. But between shared routines, quiet moments, and the kind of care neither of them knows how to ask for out loud, things start to shift. Lines blur, walls lower, and what begins as an arrangement slowly turns into something neither of them planned for.
☼CLARK KENT☼
☼ Hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have | Coming soon... (x f! reader)
Alternate version of Meddle About - Ilia Malinin x f!Reader
Summary: In another version of her life, everything fell apart before she ever got the chance to become what she was meant to be. In this one, it doesn’t. She gets the gold medals, the fame, the impossible kind of life people spend years dreaming about. None of it changes the quiet loneliness sitting underneath her skin.
Then there’s him. The only person reckless enough to keep reaching for her no matter how sharp she gets. What starts as rivalry slowly twists into something messier: late-night calls, cruel little games, public tension and private tenderness, two people circling each other so intensely it becomes impossible to tell where resentment ends and love begins. And the more he tries to love her openly, the harder she fights him for it.
Masterlist
Recommended to read Meddle About first, but it’s not necessary.
Warnings: no use of y/n, rivals(?) to lovers, he's down BAD, subby!Ilia if you squint, reader is MEAN and TOXIC, reader is rich RICH, angst, A LOOOOT of drama, this was supposed to be an enemies to lovers but it turned out being a she's a BITCH and he likes it (NFWMB by Hozier vibes, could be a continuation), english is not my first language.
Author’s note: I had so much fun with this! I need me a subby pathetic man who yearns!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh, I didn't feel like naming anyone else so it's all "another skater joins in" and "two ice dancers walk into a room".
Word count: 12k
Don't Worry, I'll Make You Worry - Sabrina Carpenter
Funny thing about fate and destiny is that they never really loosen their grip.
People like to believe there are alternate versions of themselves scattered across different lives, different choices, different turns taken at the right moment. As if one injury, one missed opportunity, one shift in timing could reroute an entire life into something completely different.
But some things seem determined to find you no matter what.
In this version of facts, the weight never left her. It simply changed shape.
In another life, it was grief for everything she could have become. A constant wondering about what could’ve been. But in this life she never had to imagine the version of herself that made it. She became her. She kept skating, kept winning. Every impossible thing people once predicted for her arrived exactly when it was supposed to.
World titles came first, then Olympic gold, bright and untouchable beneath arena lights that made everything look almost unreal. The kind of victory people later described as inevitable, though it hadn’t felt that way at all while she was living it. She remembered the pressure of it more than the glory. The suffocating awareness that the entire world had already decided who she was meant to become long before she had fully grown into herself.
Still, she did it.
Every expectation placed on her shoulders became something she carried flawlessly.
And yet, there was still that hollowness. The weight.
That was the part no one would have understood if she had tried explaining it out loud. From the outside, her life looked almost offensively perfect. Beautiful in the cold, polished way expensive things usually are. Titles. Endorsements. Money that had long ago stopped feeling real because there was simply too much of it. Crowds that adored her. Commentators who spoke about her skating like it belonged in history books already.
But underneath all of it sat something quiet and unfinished.
Not sadness exactly, just the persistent feeling that there was something missing from the center of her life, some unnamed absence she could never quite reach no matter how many medals she wrapped around herself.
Their rivalry had always been inevitable under those circumstantes.
There was simply no one else close enough to either of them for it not to happen.
She dominated women’s singles with the kind of consistency that made people stop questioning whether she would win and start questioning by how much.
He did the same in men’s.
Every competition they entered became predictable in outcome but somehow still impossible to look away from because dominance, when done at that level, became its own spectacle.
When two people stand alone at the absolute peak of their respective categories, the world starts pulling them toward each other whether they want it to or not. Comparisons become unavoidable. Interviews constantly circled back to the other person’s name. Journalists asked impossible hypotheticals with too much excitement in their voices.
Who was technically stronger?
Who handled pressure better?
Who was changing the sport more?
He had the quad axel under his belt, that impossible jump sitting between them like a taunt. The only quad she had never landed cleanly in competition. But she had something else instead. Something people struggled to quantify but felt immediately when she skated.
Presence.
Not performance. Presence. The ability to make an entire arena hold its breath.
And she countered his quad axel with her Olympic gold from Beijing 2022.
Even now people still talked about it like it belonged to mythology more than sport. She had arrived there under impossible pressure, carrying expectations so heavy they should have crushed her. Everything about the narrative had already been written for someone else. She was supposed to medal, maybe silver if things aligned perfectly, but not win. Not against the Russians.
Then she did.
Against all odds, against predictions, against pressure that would have shattered most people long before they stepped onto the ice, she took the gold medal anyway.
And something about that bothered him more than he liked admitting to himself.
Not because he resented her success. He didn’t. If anything, he understood too intimately what it cost to reach that level. But her victories unsettled him because they felt emotional in a way his own never did. When she won, people cried. When she skated clean, audiences looked overwhelmed afterward, like they had experienced something larger than sport itself.
He landed impossible jumps and people called him revolutionary. They spoke about him like he was reshaping the laws of physics every time his blade left the ice, like he had forced the sport itself to evolve around him through sheer audacity. His skating inspired awe, disbelief, admiration that bordered on scientific fascination. People watched him the way they watched storms or collapsing stars, overwhelmed by the spectacle of something that should not have been possible and yet existed anyway.
But her?
People spoke about her differently.
She stepped onto the ice and suddenly the conversation stopped sounding technical at all. No one reached first for words like rotation or base value or athleticism. Instead, they called her unforgettable. Haunting. Devastating. As if what she did could not be fully explained through sport alone.
It was art.
That distinction stayed in his head far longer than it should have.
It irritated him in ways he could never fully articulate, because some part of him understood exactly what it meant. He could land things she physically could not. He could push the technical ceiling of skating further than anyone alive. And still, when she performed, it felt larger than difficulty. Larger than execution. People left her programs emotional in a way they never seemed to leave his.
He hated how much he thought about it.
Hated how often he caught himself replaying her performances alone at night, searching for the thing she possessed that he couldn’t replicate no matter how hard he trained. He would tell himself it was analytical at first, professional curiosity, the natural obsession of someone who spent his life trying to perfect every aspect of skating. But eventually even he stopped believing that lie.
Because analysis didn’t explain the feeling sitting low in his chest every time she skated.
Analysis didn’t explain why he watched her like she was everything.
What frustrated him even more was that he could never quite bring himself to hate her for it.
It would have been easier if he could.
Easier if she were arrogant in a simple, ugly way. Easier if her skating felt overrated to him, or hollow, or constructed purely for applause. Easier if looking at her did not feel like standing too close to something incandescent.
But then she would skate.
And God, sometimes it nearly brought him to tears.
Not because she was delicate. She wasn’t. People often misunderstood her elegance for softness, when in reality there was something almost frightening beneath it. Her skating carried an emotional precision that felt surgical, like she knew exactly where to press inside people to make them feel something unbearable. Every movement seemed to arrive half a second before it was expected, every extension lingering just long enough to ache.
Watching her felt less like witnessing a performance and more like being let into something deeply private against your will.
And then there was the simple problem of her existence outside the ice.
The way she looked under arena lights. The cold beauty of her expression before a program began, so controlled it almost appeared detached, until the music started and suddenly she transformed into something impossible to ignore. The sharp intelligence in her eyes during interviews. The quiet entitlement she carried without apology, like the world had spent her entire life revolving around her and she had grown used to the motion of it.
Everything about her pulled attention naturally, cruelly.
Sometimes he thought she moved through life with the gravitational force of a celestial body, something too massive for anyone around her to escape unaffected.
And he hated how willingly he orbited her anyway.
It felt, at times, like she was the sun and he was trapped somewhere in her atmosphere, suspended close enough to feel the heat of her but never quite able to reach her without risking complete destruction. Every interaction with her left him feeling scorched in some small invisible way. She would look at him for too long, smile like she knew something he didn’t, say something casually cruel in that soft voice of hers, and suddenly he would spend days thinking about it despite himself.
Waiting.
Always waiting.
For the moment she would finally pull him in completely and burn him alive.
❅
The rink had mostly emptied by the time he finally worked up the courage to walk over to her.
It wasn’t completely empty yet. There were still coaches gathered near the boards speaking in low voices, a few skaters dragging guards onto their blades as they laughed about plans for later, but the sharp intensity of practice had dissolved, turning into the kind of atmosphere that only existed after long training days, when exhaustion lowered everyone’s guard just enough to make them human again.
She, however, still looked impossibly composed.
That irritated him too.
Even after three hours on the ice, after full run-throughs and jump repetition and enough physical exertion to leave everyone else flushed and disheveled, she somehow still looked expensive. Untouchable. A black cashmere wrap hung loosely around her shoulders while she scrolled through her phone with one hand, listening absentmindedly to her choreographer beside her. Her hair was tied back messily, but on her it looked intentional rather than careless. Even exhausted, she carried herself like someone perpetually aware of being watched.
He stood there for a second longer than necessary before approaching.
Immediately, her choreographer noticed him and excused himself with suspiciously convenient timing, leaving her alone by the boards.
She looked up slowly when his shadow fell across the ice.
And there it was again.
That look.
That unbearable, measured kind of attention she always gave him, as if she were silently deciding what version of herself he deserved today.
“Hi,” he said, trying to sound more casual than he felt.
Her gaze moved over him once before settling back on his face. “Hi.”
“You were good today,” he said after a moment. “Your free skate looked…” He hesitated briefly, searching for a word that didn’t sound too sincere. “Really good.”
One corner of her mouth lifted slightly.
“Really good, huh?” she repeated softly, almost amused.
He flushed immediately at how eager he sounded, which only made her smile widen faintly.
“It was great,” he tried to make it better, quieter this time.
That seemed to satisfy her even more.
She squinted slightly, studying him with those unreadable eyes of hers. “And yours was technically acceptable today.”
He tilted his head like a puppy hearing a new sound. “Technically acceptable?”
“Well,” she shrugged lightly, lashes fluttering with exaggerated innocence, “the quad axel survived, which I’m sure was very exciting for everyone involved.”
He lets out a breath he didn’t realise he was holding before muttering a low “you’re impossible.”
The thing was, she never sounded outright cruel when she said things like this. That was what made it worse. Her voice stayed soft, almost sweet, her expression relaxed enough to blur the line between teasing and insult until he could never fully tell where he stood. Sometimes he thought she enjoyed watching him try to figure it out in real time.
Actually, no. She definitely enjoyed it.
“You know,” he said carefully, leaning his arms against the boards beside her, “everyone’s going out tonight after dinner. Karaoke.”
At that, her brows lifted slightly.
“Karaoke?” she repeated, like he had just suggested they spend the evening digging through garbage behind the arena.
He suddenly became hyperaware of how stupid it sounded.
“Yeah,” he muttered. “A bunch of us are going.”
Her expression softened then, but not in the way he hoped. It became something far more dangerous, like she found him strangely endearing.
“Aww,” she said quietly.
His stomach dropped immediately. That tone never meant anything good.
“That’s actually so cute.”
There it was.
He exhaled slowly through his nose. “Why do you say things like that?”
Her lashes blinked at him innocently. “Like what?”
“Like I’m a Make-A-Wish kid asking you to prom.”
That earned a real laugh from her, bright and quick and devastating enough that it completely ruined his ability to stay annoyed.
“You’re so dramatic,” she murmured.
“You bring out that side of me.”
“Hm.” She looked back down at her phone briefly. “Unfortunately, I can’t today.”
“Why?”
“I have a Prada event.”
Of course she did.
Not even just an event. A Prada event. Because apparently she existed in a completely different reality from everyone else.
“Oh,” he said stupidly.
She glanced back at him immediately, catching the shift in his expression with frightening ease.
And then, because she was evil, she smiled sympathetically.
“That was brave, though.”
His eyes narrowed. “What does that mean?”
“It means,” she said patiently, like she was explaining something to a child, “you asking me to go scream Taylor Swift songs in a sticky karaoke room immediately after I confirmed attendance at an event filled with Oscar winners and European designers is…” She tilted her head thoughtfully. “Brave.”
He stared at her and she stared back with perfect composure, not even blinking, devilish smile not leaving her perfect lips.
Then she added softly, “Actually, it’s kind of impressive how you don’t read signs.”
He should have walked away then, any normal person would have, but instead he just stood there watching her, irritated warmth spreading through his chest in a way that made him feel deeply pathetic.
Because she was mean.
Objectively mean.
And somehow he still couldn’t stop looking at her mouth when she spoke and thinking about unspeakable things.
“You know,” he muttered, “most people would say no without inflicting psychological damage.”
“Yes, but where is the fun in that?”
He let out a short laugh despite himself, shaking his head.
Her expression shifted slightly then, softening almost imperceptibly as she looked at him. For one brief second, something gentler flickered beneath all the sharpness.
“You’re cute when you’re offended,” she said quietly, finger raising to brush a small strand of his hair away from his eye.
And there it was again.
That feeling like she had wrapped her fingers around the inside of his ribcage and squeezed just hard enough to keep him constantly off balance.
Before he could answer, her phone buzzed.
She glanced down at it, then sighed dramatically. “My driver’s here.”
She stepped away from the boards, gathering her bag onto her shoulder with effortless grace. Then she paused beside him.
Close enough that he could smell her perfume now, dark and expensive and entirely too distracting after hours spent breathing cold rink air.
“You should still go tonight,” she said lightly. “I’m sure everyone will love hearing you sing.”
“That feels like an insult.”
“It is.”
Then she smiled at him one last time, slow and beautiful and just cruel enough to leave damage behind and walked away.
He stood there for a long moment afterward watching the doors close behind her.
Humiliated.
Annoyed.
Hopelessly affected.
And, to his own immense frustration, a little bit completely in love with her already.
❅
By midnight, the karaoke bar had dissolved into exactly the kind of chaos she had imagined when he first invited her.
The private room was too warm, crowded with skaters and friends-of and half-finished drinks scattered across every available surface. Someone was aggressively butchering an ABBA song in the corner while two ice dancers screamed the lyrics like their lives depended on it. The lighting was terrible, pink and green neon casting everyone in the kind of blur that made people look prettier and drunker than they actually were.
Ilia sat slouched deeper into the booth with every passing hour, one arm thrown over the back of the seat, cheeks slightly flushed from alcohol and laughter.
He was drunk enough now that he felt lighter. Not wasted, just loose. Easier. The careful self-awareness he usually carried had started slipping somewhere around his second drink, replaced by something more open and boyish that his friends clearly found hilarious.
“You look devastated,” one of the guys laughed from beside him.
Ilia frowned into his drink. “I’m not devastated.”
“You got rejected by the hottest woman alive, anyone would be devastated.”
“She didn’t reject me.”
Everyone at the table looked at him.
“She literally called your karaoke invite cute,” someone pointed out.
Another skater winced sympathetically. “Dude, that’s brutal.”
Ilia rolled his eyes, though the embarrassment crept back warm into his face anyway. “She had an event.”
“Right,” one of the girls spoke up. “Because she’s that girl and it’s terrifying.”
That, unfortunately, was true and somehow it only made him want her more.
Which probably said deeply concerning things about him psychologically.
The music changed again. Someone shoved another microphone into his hands. He groaned loudly as the room erupted into drunken encouragement, immediately trying to push it away.
“No. Absolutely not.”
“Yes!”
“Malinin, sing!”
“I’d rather die.”
“Coward.”
He was halfway through losing the argument when the door opened.
At first, no one really noticed but then the room quieted in strange, staggered pieces.
One conversation stopping here. Laughter fading there. Heads slowly turning toward the entrance one by one until the noise thinned into stunned silence.
Ilia looked up last and forgot every coherent thought in his head.
She stood in the doorway like she had stepped out of an entirely different universe and accidentally wandered into theirs.
Still dressed from the Prada event, apparently.
Black silk draped perfectly against her body, elegant in that understated way only obscenely expensive clothing ever managed to be. Diamonds flashed briefly at her throat when the neon lights caught them. Her makeup was softer now than earlier, slightly smudged around the eyes in a way that somehow only made her look prettier. She held one hand lightly against the doorframe as she surveyed the room, expression unreadable for exactly one second before amusement slowly curved her mouth.
The contrast between her and the sticky karaoke room was almost absurd.
She looked like cinema while everyone else looked aggressively twenty-something.
His stomach dropped somewhere near the floor.
“You came,” he blurted out before he could stop himself.
Oh no. He sounded amazed.
Not smooth or composed or detached in the way he probably wanted. Just openly, helplessly pleased in a way that hit her somewhere unexpectedly soft. Like a child finally being handed the one thing they had spent months secretly hoping for and still couldn’t quite believe was real once it was finally placed in their hands.
“Well,” she said lightly as she stepped inside, slight pout on her lips, “I couldn’t let a pretty boy drive himself home drunk, could I?”
The room erupted in whispers, amused glances and discreet laughter instantly.
Someone actually choked on their drink.
Ilia just stared at her.
Pretty boy.
Jesus Christ.
She walked toward him slowly, entirely aware of the attention following her through the room. She always moved like someone born being watched. But tonight there was something even more dangerous in the way she looked at him specifically.
Playful. Like she had arrived solely because she knew exactly what effect this would have on him.
Which, honestly, was probably true.
“You’re overdressed,” he managed weakly as she stopped beside the booth.
She tilted her head. “And yet somehow you still look more nervous than me.”
A few people nearby laughed and he flushed immediately.
She sat beside him then, smooth and graceful even in six-inch heels, crossing one leg over the other as if this dingy karaoke room were just another exclusive afterparty.
“Did you sing yet?” she asked.
“No.”
“Aw.” She blinked at him sympathetically. “Stage fright?”
“I skate in front of thousands of people.”
Her gaze dragged lazily over his face like she was figuring something out. “Interesting.”
God, she was doing this on purpose.
And the worst part was he genuinely couldn’t tell if she was flirting with him or psychologically torturing him for fun.
Possibly both.
Most likely both.
The night blurred after that. More drinks. More songs. More moments where he caught himself staring at her while she laughed at something someone said, her head tilted slightly back, diamonds catching the colored lights every time she moved.
And every single time he looked over, she was already looking at him too like she knew.
But then again, it felt like she always knew everything.
By the time they finally left, the city outside had gone quiet in that strange late-night way that made everything feel softer around the edges.
He was definitely drunk now.
Not disastrously so. Just enough that his thoughts kept slipping out of his mouth before he could organize them properly.
“You didn’t have to actually come,” he said as she unlocked her car.
“I know.”
“You hate karaoke.”
“I do.”
“Then why did you come?”
She glanced at him over the roof of the car, slow and deliberate.
“You invited me.”
The simplicity of the answer hit him harder than it should have and because he was drunk and therefore stupid, he stared at her too long afterward.
“What?” she asked softly.
“You’re confusing.”
A quiet laugh escaped her as she slid into the driver’s seat.
“That sounds like a you problem.”
He kept talking during the drive, mostly nonsense, half-finished thoughts and observations and things he probably would have died of embarrassment remembering sober tomorrow morning. He rambled about training schedules, about how one of the ice dancers definitely had a crush on their coach, about the fact that he still couldn’t believe she had actually shown up tonight.
She listened quietly while driving through sleeping city streets glowing gold beneath streetlights.
Occasionally she’d hum in amusement.
Occasionally she’d glance over at him with that same unreadable little smile.
And every time she did, his heart stumbled around stupidly in his chest.
When she finally pulled up outside his place, neither of them moved immediately. The car settled into silence softly, the engine ticking quietly beneath them.
He was still, impressively, amusingly, talking.
Something about her free skate this season, words slightly slurred now as exhaustion and alcohol tangled together inside him.
“I still think the step sequence after the second jump pass is insane,” he murmured. “Like actually insane. I don’t know how you keep timing it like that.”
She turned slightly in her seat to look at him fully then.
God. She was so beautiful it genuinely made him feel a little sick.
“You’re very talkative drunk,” she observed quietly.
He laughed weakly. “You make me nervous.”
That seemed to catch her off guard for half a second. Just half.
Then her expression softened into something almost fond.
“Poor thing,” she murmured.
Before he could respond, she leaned toward him slightly.
One elegant hand lifted. Her fingers slid beneath his chin, cool rings pressing faintly against his skin while the sharp points of her stiletto nails dug just enough into his jaw to make his breath catch.
Not enough to hurt, just enough to hold his attention completely.
His thoughts went blank instantly.
She tilted his face upward carefully, studying him for one long unbearable second and then she kissed the corner of his mouth.
Soft.
Brief.
Cruel in its restraint.
A sharp chill ran through his entire body from the simple contact, sudden enough to make his breath catch. It was ridiculous how little it took from her sometimes.
“Go to bed, Ilia,” she whispered.
Then she pulled away like nothing had happened. Like she hadn’t just rearranged the entire structure of his nervous system with one tiny act of affection.
He stared at her stupidly, completely speechless for once in his life.
A small smile tugged at her lips as she opened his door from the driver’s side controls.
“Careful,” she said lightly. “You’re looking a little dizzy.”
The worst part was that she knew perfectly well it had nothing to do with the alcohol anymore.
❅
The problem with her was that she never did anything halfway.
Not her skating. Not her cruelty. Not whatever this was between them.
She had kissed the corner of his mouth like it meant nothing at all, then sent him home with a soft little smile and a “go to bed” that had lodged itself somewhere permanently inside his chest.
And the truly humiliating part was that it worked, because the next morning he woke up still thinking about her.
Not even the kiss itself, really. It had barely counted as one. It was the intimacy of it that stayed under his skin. The feeling of her hand beneath his chin. The quietness in her voice. The way she had looked at him afterward like she knew exactly what kind of damage she’d done and saw no reason to regret it.
By 10 a.m., he had convinced himself calling her would somehow make him feel less insane.
It did not. She didn’t answer.
He called again after practice.
Still nothing.
By the third attempt, he had started pacing outside the rink like a man experiencing the early stages of psychosis.
She hadn’t even shown up to training that day.
Usually, even when they avoided each other, he still knew where she was. There was comfort in that somehow. A strange consistency to their orbiting but now there was just silence.
No practice.
No replies.
No indication she had even acknowledged his existence after last night.
His thumb hovered over her contact again then pressed call.
This time, she answered immediately.
His entire body straightened.
“He—”
“Busy right now,” she interrupted smoothly, cutting him.
He blinked.
There was noise in the background. Music. Voices. The clinking of glasses somewhere far away.
“I just wanted to—”
“Aw,” she murmured, voice soft with mock sympathy. “Are you spiraling, baby?”
His face went hot instantly.
“No.”
“Hm.”
The silence stretched just long enough to feel intentional.
Then, casually—
“You’re being clingy.”
“I am not clingy.”
“You’ve called me four times.”
“It was three.”
There was a pause then he heard her laugh quietly under her breath.
Even exhausted and irritated, the sound still did something unbearable to him.
“I have to go,” she said lightly.
“You literally picked up just to insult me.”
“Yes.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
“I know.” He could practically hear the smile in her voice now. “Bye, sweetheart.”
The line disconnected before he could answer.
Ilia stood frozen outside the rink staring at his phone in complete disbelief.
Sweetheart.
Not even in a nice way but in a condescending way like she was patting him on the head for being emotionally unstable.
Which, unfortunately, he currently was.
He shoved the phone into his pocket hard enough to nearly crack the screen then immediately took it back out again ten seconds later just to stare at their call history like a deeply pathetic person.
At 2:07 in the morning, his phone started ringing.
He woke up disoriented and half tangled in his sheets, blindly reaching across the nightstand before finally managing to answer.
“…hello?”
A soft laugh filtered through the speaker immediately.
“There he is.”
His brain took several exhausted seconds to catch up.
Then—
Her.
He sat upright instantly.
“What the hell?” he croaked, voice rough with sleep. “Do you know what time it is?”
“Yes.”
“You woke me up.”
“I know.”
There was no remorse in her voice whatsoever. In fact, she sounded almost pleased with herself.
He rubbed a hand over his face, trying unsuccessfully to gather his thoughts. “Why are you calling me at two in the morning?”
“Hm.” She sounded thoughtful. “Because I felt like it.”
Of course.
A pause settled between them briefly, softer than usual somehow. Sleep still lingered heavily in his system, making everything feel slower.
“What are you doing?” he asked finally.
“Lying on my hotel balcony.”
His chest tightened unexpectedly at the image.
“You sound drunk.”
“I’m not drunk,” she replied immediately. Then, after a beat, “I’m just… in a good mood, believe it or not.”
He snorted despite himself.
“There it is,” she murmured softly.
“What?”
“That laugh.” He could hear the smile in her voice now. “I knew I could get it out of you.”
Something warm and dangerous unfurled low in his chest at that.
She really did do this on purpose every time.
“You’re insane,” he muttered.
“Maybe.” Fabric rustled softly on her end of the line. “But you like me anyway.”
“That’s a strong assumption.”
“It’s an obvious one.”
He rolled his eyes even though she couldn’t see it. “You called me at two in the morning for more torture?”
“No,” she said lightly. “I called because something funny happened tonight and I wanted to tell you.”
And then she started telling him the story.
Some absurd interaction at whatever impossibly glamorous event she had attended earlier, involving a French athlete they knew getting dramatically rejected by a model in the middle of a rooftop party. Her impressions were devastatingly good, her commentary even worse.
Half asleep and defenseless against her voice, he found himself laughing helplessly into the darkness of his room.
She sounded different like this, not the cold untouchable version of herself everyone else got. Not the sharp-edged girl who smiled while cutting people apart.
Just… her.
Quick-witted. Charming. Funny in a way that constantly caught him off guard because he was usually too distracted by her beauty to remember she was genuinely entertaining too.
“You should’ve seen his face,” she said through quiet laughter. “I thought he was going to throw himself into the Seine.”
The conversation drifted after that.
Training, travel, random nonsense.
At one point she made fun of the way he pronounced a designer’s name so viciously he nearly hung up out of principle.
“You’re evil,” he informed her.
“And yet,” she said sweetly, “you keep coming back for more.”
He fell quiet at that, not because he had nothing to say.
Because she was right. She always seemed to know exactly when to shift the conversation just enough to leave him emotionally off balance again.
There was a long pause after that and when she spoke again, her voice had softened slightly.
“You know what I think is funny?”
“What?”
“I think you were actually upset I ignored you today.”
He stared blankly at the dark ceiling above him.
“You ignored me for twelve hours.”
“Mm.” Amusement threaded through her tone lazily. “And look how affected you are.”
“I was not affected.”
“You called me four times.”
“Three.”
She laughed softly again. “You’re very cute when you’re obsessed with me.”
His stomach dropped.
“Who says I’m obsessed with you?”
A brief silence.
“Oh, honey.” The words were so gentle they almost hurt. “You’re in love with me.”
The air seemed to leave his lungs all at once. He opened his mouth immediately, ready to deny it, but nothing came out. No sharp response, no sarcastic comeback, nothing strong enough to survive the quiet certainty in her voice.
And somewhere on the other end of the line, she smiled. He could hear it in the silence that followed, soft and satisfied in the most devastating way.
Like she had finally said something out loud that both of them had already known for a very long time.
❅
Unfortunately for him, she had spent the entire week being both unavoidable and unreachable.
A video of her had gone viral three days earlier, filmed outside some exclusive afterparty in Paris after Fashion Week. In it, she stood on the sidewalk in a floor-length black dress, cigarette between her fingers while some actor everyone recognized chased after her trying to continue an argument. She barely looked at him while getting into her car, only pausing long enough to say something sharp enough to make the people filming gasp before the door shut behind her.
The internet lost its mind immediately afterward.
Half the headlines called her iconic. The other half called her cruel.
All of them talked about her.
And because the dating rumors surrounding her and Ilia had already been circulating for a couple of months, reporters started dragging him into it too.
By the time he finished practice that morning, he was already exhausted from hearing her name attached to every second question.
“What did you think about the video?”
“Do you think she went too far?”
“Is that how she normally is?”
At first he brushed them off carefully. Neutral answers, short ones that gave nothing useful away.
Then someone laughed and said, “Come on, you know how she is...”
And stupidly, tiredly, he let his guard slip.
He smiled before he could stop himself. Not mocking. Something worse. Fond. Like the mere suggestion that he understood her better than everyone else felt strangely good to him, something he carried with quiet pride even if he never admitted it aloud.
“She’s not actually a bitch,” he said lightly. “She just likes pretending she doesn’t care about anything.”
A few reporters exchanged glances immediately and he knew he should have stopped there.
Instead, he kept talking.
“Honestly, most of the time she pushes people away like that before they get close enough to hurt her.” His smile softened slightly, gaze drifting somewhere distracted for half a second. “I think she just expects everyone to leave eventually, so she likes causing a little chaos first.”
The silence afterward hit him almost immediately.
Not because what he said was cruel, but because it was intimate.
Too intimate.
The kind of observation that only came from seeing parts of her no one else was supposed to notice. The kind of thing she would absolutely hate hearing spoken aloud, especially in front of cameras and strangers and millions of people who already thought they knew her.
And suddenly he could already picture the look she was going to give him when she saw the interview.
She ignored him all day.
Not casually either, it felt deliberate. Almost professional done. A masterpiece of cruelty executed with perfect restraint.
At practice, she skated past him like he was invisible. During warmups, she laughed with other skaters while never once glancing in his direction. When he said good morning, she looked directly at him for one brief cold second before turning away without answering.
By lunch, he felt vaguely insane.
By dinner, he felt like he was dying.
It should not have affected him this much. That was the humiliating part.
Silence from anyone else would have been mildly irritating at worst. Silence from her felt slow and surgical, like being hollowed out piece by piece. He could practically hear her voice in the back of his head already, soft with amusement. Are you spiraling, baby?
And damn it, he was.
Because she knew exactly what she was doing. The silent treatment, the constant way she humbled him no matter how untouchable the rest of the world thought he was. World champion, once-in-a-generation talent, revolutionary skater. None of it seemed to matter around her. She could reduce him to pacing outside a rink checking his phone every thirty seconds with frightening ease.
And the worst part was that she was really, really good at it.
At some point late that evening, after another text went unanswered, he finally snapped.
It felt less like a conscious decision and more like his body reacting before his pride had the chance to stop it. One moment he was pacing circles through his room, phone clenched tightly in his hand while he tried to convince himself to leave it alone. The next he was already driving through the city toward her place with his jaw tight and pulse pounding hard enough to make him feel vaguely sick.
By the time he arrived, fury and humiliation had tangled together inside him so thoroughly he could barely separate one from the other.
The concierge recognized him immediately, which unfortunately made everything easier. Maybe if he had been forced to explain himself out loud, forced to hear how pathetic this sounded from outside his own head, he would have turned around and left. Instead, the old man simply greeted him politely and waved him inside like this had become a normal occurrence.
Maybe it had.
His heartbeat was already uneven by the time she opened the door.
And of course she looked completely unsurprised to see him.
A silk robe hung loosely around her body, hair still slightly damp like she had just showered. One bare shoulder rested lazily against the doorway while she looked up at him with infuriating calm, expression smooth and unreadable in a way that made something hot flare immediately in his chest.
Like she had been expecting him to come crawling back eventually.
“Oh,” she said softly. “You finally cracked.”
“Are you serious right now?”
“I’m always serious.”
She said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, which only irritated him more.
“You ignored me the entire day.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
She blinked at him slowly, almost thoughtfully, like she was genuinely considering how much honesty he could handle.
“Don’t you think you deserved it?”
The thing was, he probably did.
Sort of.
But hearing her say it out loud still felt dangerous somehow, like she had quietly repositioned the entire situation until he was the one apologizing for being hurt.
“I gave one interview.”
“You made me sound ridiculous.”
His jaw tightened immediately. “That wasn’t what I was doing.”
“But it’s what you did.” Her voice remained soft, almost gentle. “You made me sound like I’m obsessed with making people miserable.”
He stared at her for a long second.
“You are obsessed with making people miserable.”
“Yes,” she replied with a tired little sigh. “But that doesn’t mean I want it announced publicly.”
A sharp laugh escaped him before he could stop it, disbelieving and exhausted all at once.
“You hear how insane you sound, right?”
“No,” she said calmly. “I heard how careless you were.”
The argument escalated quickly after that, like it always seemed to do between them. Neither of them knew how to step away once something emotional cracked open. Every conversation became too sharp too fast, every feeling dragged immediately to the surface until they were both standing there stripped raw beneath it.
“You’re punishing me because I saw through you a little,” he snapped.
Her eyes narrowed immediately.
“Saw through me?”
“Yes.”
A cold smile touched her mouth then, small and beautiful and dangerous.
“That’s adorable,” she murmured.
He let out a frustrated breath, dragging a hand roughly through his hair as he looked away for a second, like he physically needed distance from her just to think clearly again.
“You really think you understand me,” she said quietly.
“I understand enough.”
“No.” Her tone softened strangely, almost patronizing now, like a mother correcting a child who had misunderstood something simple. “You understand what I let you.”
Something hot flared instantly in his chest at that.
“See?” He gestured toward her wildly. “This. This thing you do where you act like everyone’s beneath you because you’re terrified someone might actually get close enough to matter.”
For the first time that night, her composure cracked.
It was small, almost imperceptible, just a quick flash of hurt across her face, but he saw it immediately. Worse, she realized he had seen it.
The air between them shifted at once.
“You should leave,” she said, less softly this time.
“No.”
That surprised her. He could tell.
Usually, people folded the second she pulled away like this. They apologized first. Softened first. Handed control back to her because she knew exactly how to take it once it was offered. Most people could not tolerate the coldness long enough to push against it.
But he was too angry now. Too exhausted by her.
“You don’t get to freeze me out and then stand there acting untouchable,” he said. “I’m so sick of you pretending you don’t care about anything.”
Her laugh came quiet and sharp.
“And I’m sick of you acting like loving me makes you special.”
The words landed between them with brutal precision.
For a second, neither of them moved.
Then he looked at her like she had actually hit him. Not dramatically, just that brief unguarded expression of genuine hurt that crossed his face before he could hide it again.
And suddenly something ugly twisted low in her chest because she hadn’t meant to wound him that deeply.
Not really.
But the second he got too close to something real inside her, cruelty arrived almost instinctively now, fast and sharp like self-defense. Every vulnerable feeling inside her seemed to translate itself into damage before she even had the chance to stop it.
“Wow,” he said quietly.
She looked away first, which almost never happened.
Turning sharply, she motioned vaguely toward the door again, a silent invitation for him to leave before the argument cut any deeper. Under normal circumstances, that would have been the end of it. He would have walked out angry and she would have spent the rest of the night pretending the ache in her chest was irritation instead of something deeper.
Instead, he stepped closer.
His hand caught her arm with slightly more force than he intended, enough to pull her backward a step until she stumbled lightly against him, suddenly almost chest to chest.
The shift in him startled her.
Not because he was rough, he wasn’t, but because he usually yielded around her eventually. Usually he let her dictate the rhythm of things. But now, with the anger radiating off him in waves, he felt oddly in control. It was real anger too, stripped raw by exhaustion and hurt, and something about it made her head go strangely light.
Maybe it was the way he finally took control of the moment instead of waiting for her permission. Maybe it was the way he smelled that made her head go a little bit fuzzy. Maybe it was just the unbearable relief of him still being there despite everything.
Whatever it was, something snapped between them all at once.
The distance collapsed violently after that, the argument dissolving into something hotter and far more dangerous the second he kissed her.
It wasn’t soft the way she expected it to be. There was nothing hesitant about him now, none of the nervous restraint he usually carried around her. He kissed her like he was furious with her, like he was tired of letting her keep him off balance while pretending she wasn’t affected too.
Her hands caught the front of his shirt immediately, pulling him closer even as tension still burned between them. The kiss felt almost mean at first, messy with bruised feelings and unresolved anger, but underneath it sat a deeper feeling.
Relief.
Like they had both been holding their breath all day.
Eventually her mouth softened against his. His hands settled more firmly at her waist. The sharpness drained slowly out of the room piece by piece as clothes were discarded carelessly onto the floor and the argument dissolved into heat and the terrifying intimacy of finally stopping long enough to touch each other honestly.
Later, much later, lying tangled beside her in the dark while faint city lights spilled through the windows, he stared quietly at the ceiling with one arm wrapped loosely around her waist.
Somewhere deep down, he understood this had probably been a catastrophic mistake.
Mostly because he already knew he was going to love her even more after this.
But also because some instinct inside him whispered that eventually she would destroy him for it.
❅
Morning light came in too bright, waking him up first.
For a few disoriented seconds, he simply stared at the ceiling trying to remember where he was. Then he felt her beside him, warm and half asleep beneath expensive sheets, and something in his chest softened so painfully it almost scared him.
She looked different asleep.
Younger somehow. Less sharpened by performance and control.
One arm was tucked beneath the pillow, hair spread messily across it while sunlight traced gold across her bare shoulder. Without thinking, he reached out lightly, fingers brushing slowly against her arm.
Her eyes opened slowly at the feeling.
“Morning,” he murmured softly.
She looked at him for a long moment without speaking.
Then—
“Don’t be weird.”
He laughed quietly. “Not exactly the greeting I was hoping for.”
“You’re staring.”
“Can you blame me?”
“Yes.”
His smile widened despite himself.
God. He was so fucked.
He shifted closer instinctively, brushing his mouth lightly against her shoulder before speaking again. “You know I meant what I said last night, right?”
“Which part?” she asked lazily.
“That I care about you.”
A pause settled briefly between them before she sighed dramatically and rolled onto her back.
“Oh no,” she murmured. “You’re doing feelings before breakfast.”
“I’m serious.”
“I know,” she replied lightly. “That’s what makes it worse.”
He laughed automatically at first, but the sound faded quickly once the words actually settled in his head.
Because she wasn’t entirely joking.
She reached over then, fingertips brushing against his cheek in something almost resembling affection.
“You really fell hard, huh?”
Something uncomfortable twisted low in his stomach immediately.
It was the tone more than the words. Soft enough at first to blur the cruelty beneath it, like she was teasing him fondly instead of carefully pulling him apart while lying beside him.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
Her expression turned thoughtful for a moment.
“It is a little pathetic.”
The silence afterward felt strange suddenly.
But before he could fully sit with the shift in her tone, she was already pulling away from him again. She sat up slowly, stretching with lazy elegance before glancing toward the clock on the nightstand.
“You should probably leave soon,” she said casually. “I have fittings at ten.”
He stared at her for a second, still half tangled in warmth and exhaustion while she already sounded emotionally miles away from him.
“Seriously?”
“What?” She looked over at him with practiced innocence. “You can stay if you want, but I’m not cancelling Valentino to discuss your emotional vulnerability.”
A short breath escaped him that almost sounded like a laugh.
Almost.
By the time he finally left her apartment an hour later, she had fully shifted back into herself again. Untouchable, effortlessly composed. Standing near the doorway in silk while absentmindedly kissing his cheek and checking messages on her phone at the same time, like the night before had not cracked something painfully open inside him.
The elevator ride down felt strangely hollow.
And it wasn’t until he was halfway through the drive back to his place, pale morning light washing weakly across empty streets, that the full weight of it finally settled into him properly.
Not the sex.
Not even the argument.
The casualness of it all.
The way she could hold his heart in her hands and still treat it like something amusing. Something fun. Like his feelings were not dangerous and real and terrifying in the way they felt inside him, but just another thing she liked testing the limits of because she knew he would survive it.
Being around her had started feeling like some kind of emotional lottery. Every interaction carried the possibility of something devastatingly tender or quietly cruel, and he never knew which version of her he was going to get until it was already happening. One moment she was kissing him like he mattered more than breathing, the next she was making him feel ridiculous for feeling anything deeper.
And somehow, impossibly, the uncertainty only made him crave her more.
His grip tightened slightly against the steering wheel.
Because despite all of it… Despite the humiliation and exhaustion and the growing awareness that she could genuinely ruin him if she wanted to…
He already missed her.
And if she called him right now, he knew with horrifying certainty that he would go back immediately.
But of course, she would never call.
❅
After that night, something changed between them.
Not in a soft, romantic way people liked to imagine when two people finally crossed the line into intimacy. Nothing between them ever became easier after sleeping together. If anything, it grew more fragile because now there was something undeniably real sitting underneath all their games and arguments, something warm enough to hurt if either of them touched it carelessly.
And she did not know how to hold something delicate without eventually trying to break it first.
That was the problem.
The morning after, when he had looked at her with sleepy affection softening his entire face, something inside her tightened painfully. Not because she disliked it. That would have been simpler. It was because she liked it too much.
Liked the feeling of waking up beside someone who reached for her instinctively. Liked the quiet intimacy of his hand brushing lazily over her skin while he spoke to her in that rough morning voice. Liked the warmth sitting low in her chest when he looked at her like she was something precious instead of intimidating.
It came quietly at first, the relief she felt, almost too subtle to notice. The strange easing of that old hollowness she carried everywhere, the one that had followed her even through victory and success and all the glittering perfection of the life she had built for herself. For years it had existed like an empty room inside her no achievement could fully fill.
But around him, sometimes, it dulled.
Not disappeared, it probably never would completely. But softened enough that she could almost pretend she was not lonely in the deepest parts of herself.
That scared her more than anything else ever had because she knew exactly what happened when you let yourself need people.
They left.
Or worse, they died.
And afterward you spent years carrying around the shape of their absence inside your body like an extra organ.
She had survived her mother’s death by learning how not to need anyone fully ever again. By becoming untouchable enough that no one could hollow her out like that twice.
Then Ilia arrived and ruined the balance of it.
He slipped into her life gradually, persistently, until his presence became something she started unconsciously searching for. A text from him after practice could improve her mood for hours. His voice on the phone late at night made hotel rooms feel less empty. Even his annoying habit of hovering near her after competitions had started feeling strangely comforting.
And that simply would not do because if he became important enough to lose, eventually he would.
Everyone did.
So naturally, she pulled away.
Not completely, which was probably the cruelest part of it all. She always gave him just enough warmth to keep him reaching for her.
At first, it was subtle. She stopped answering immediately when he texted. Left messages unread for hours despite staring at them the moment they arrived. Became colder around him in public, less openly affectionate when cameras or other skaters were nearby.
She wouldn’t even smile.
Not because she stopped wanting him but because she wanted him too much. Every act of distance became a kind of test she couldn’t stop herself from performing. A terrible little experiment.
If I push, will you still come back?
If I hurt you, will you stay?
If I become difficult enough, cruel enough, exhausting enough, will you finally leave me first so I can stop waiting for it to happen?
And every single time, he returned anyway.
At first, that soothed something inside her, then it started making things worse. Because the more consistently he stayed, the more she believed him. And the more she believed him, the more dangerous he became to her.
One afternoon after practice, he found her sitting alone near the boards in an oversized black sweater, long legs crossed elegantly beneath her while she scrolled absently through her phone.
The second he sat beside her, warmth flickered instinctively through her chest.
“You disappeared after training yesterday,” he said.
“Did I?” she murmured without looking up.
“You know you did.”
Of course she knew.
She had spent the entire afternoon deliberately ignoring his texts while simultaneously rereading them every fifteen minutes like a lunatic.
A faint smile touched her mouth before she could stop it.
“I had somewhere to be.”
“You could’ve told me.”
Finally, she glanced at him.
Why?
The answer sat ugly and vulnerable inside her immediately because some irrational part of her liked that he noticed when she was gone. It mattered to her now whether he looked for her afterward. She had started carrying him around emotionally in ways she did not know how to undo.
But instead she tilted her head lightly and asked, “Would you have missed me?”
And there it was again. That familiar shift in his expression. The way she could physically watch him lose balance around her.
“I did miss you,” he admitted quietly.
Something soft moved painfully through her chest, so she just had to ruin it instantly.
“That’s cute.”
His face fell just slightly before irritation covered it over.
The emotional games grew meaner after that. Enough to destabilize him whenever he started sounding too certain about her.
She disappeared into crowds at events knowing he would watch. Spoke too long to beautiful men because she could feel his mood shift from across rooms now. Left conversations unfinished. Withheld affection right when he relaxed into it.
Every small act created distance again.
Distance felt safer.
But the problem was that she had started needing his presence too and that was the contradiction slowly tearing her apart.
And Ilia was starting to notice the pattern too.
At first he tolerated it because he was too infatuated to fully challenge her. Too overwhelmed by wanting her. But slowly frustration began building underneath the devotion.
Small cracks appearing beneath his patience. He started going quiet sometimes after she pushed too far.
At first it was small things, easy enough to miss if she had not already become hyperaware of every shift in him. The way his laughter would thin slightly after one of her sharper comments. The way he sometimes stopped reaching for her immediately afterward, like he needed a second to recover from her. Occasionally he would pull back just enough to make space between them, not enough to leave, never enough for that, but enough that she felt the absence instantly.
And she hated it.
That frightened her most of all, because for months she had been testing the limits of him without fully admitting it to herself. Pushing and pulling, hurting and softening, constantly searching for reassurance in the ugliest possible way. Some desperate part of her needed proof that no matter what she did, he would still return.
Now she was beginning to understand there might actually be a limit.
The worst part was that she knew exactly how to keep him from reaching it.
She always softened at the precise moment before real damage settled in permanently. It had become instinctive now, the way cruelty and tenderness balanced each other inside her. Every time she pushed him too far, she would unconsciously pull him close again before he could fully slip away.
A hand drifting absently through his hair while they lay alone together.
Late-night calls where her voice turned warm and sleepy and honest enough to make him forget all the colder versions of it.
Kisses against his jaw while half asleep, careless little displays of affection she never acknowledged afterward.
Tiny moments of sincerity scattered between acts of cruelty like breadcrumbs.
Enough to keep him hoping.
Enough to keep him confused.
Enough to keep him hers.
But slowly, something in him was changing anyway.
One night in Milan, after a gala where she had spent nearly the entire evening charming some Romanian model mostly because she knew Ilia was watching, they ended up alone together in the backseat of a car heading toward the hotel.
The city blurred outside the windows while silence settled heavily between them.
“You did that on purpose,” he said finally.
She turned her head slightly, expression smooth. “Did what?”
His laugh came quiet and humorless.
“You know exactly what.”
She pretended not to notice how tired he sounded. “Aw,” she murmured softly. “Are you jealous?”
“No.”
“You look jealous.”
This time, he didn’t rise to it immediately. He just leaned his head back against the seat, jaw tight as lights moved in fractured patterns across his face.
“I’m annoyed.”
The answer lingered strangely in the car.
Not embarrassed or playful.
Exhausted.
And for the first time, guilt twisted unpleasantly in her stomach instead of satisfaction.
Still, she couldn’t stop herself.
“You know,” she said lightly, “I actually think this is good for you.”
His eyes narrowed slowly. “What is?”
“The humbling experience.”
Usually he would have laughed despite himself. Usually she could feel the tension loosen again once she steered things back into teasing. But this time, nothing softened in him.
He just stared out the window quietly afterward, the muscles in his jaw tightening once before settling again.
And suddenly the silence inside the car became unbearable.
Something cold slipped into her chest then, not because he was angry but because he sounded tired of her.
The realization hollowed her out instantly.
For the first time, she could genuinely picture him reaching the end of whatever this was between them. Quietly deciding one day that loving her was too exhausting to survive.
And still, even sitting there with panic slowly spreading through her ribs, she did not know how to stop doing this to him. Cruelty had become tangled too tightly with self-protection inside her. Every time she felt herself caring too much, something sharp rose instinctively to meet it.
Because if she let him become important enough, truly important, then eventually he would be able to destroy her.
Or leave her.
And deep down, she was no longer sure which possibility terrified her more.
❅
The thing that finally broke them was so small from the outside that most people would not have understood why it mattered.
It happened after Grand Prix Final.
He had skated beautifully. Not perfectly, but beautifully in the way she had always wanted from him. More open now, less mechanical. There was emotion in his skating lately that had not existed before, vulnerability threaded carefully beneath all that impossible technical precision.
And she knew, with a sick twisting certainty, that she had something to do with it.
He looked for her immediately afterward.
He always looked for her first.
Only this time, she was nowhere to be found.
No text.
No congratulations.
Nothing.
At first he thought she had gotten caught with press or sponsors. Then an hour passed. Then another. And eventually someone showed him the photos.
She had left the event early with an actor.
Hand in hand.
Laughing.
The images spread quickly online, polished and intimate enough to imply exactly what she intended them to imply.
It should not have hurt as badly as it did because rationally, he knew she owed him nothing. They had never defined whatever this was between them. She had never promised him exclusivity or commitment or safety.
But emotionally—
Emotionally it felt like she had reached into his chest and squeezed his heart until it bled.
And worse than the jealousy was the realization underneath it that she had done it deliberately. Not because she wanted the actor because she wanted to see if he would still come back afterward.
For the first time since meeting her, something inside him finally broke instead of bent.
He did not call her.
Did not text.
Did not chase.
And when she reached out two days later with one of her usual breezy little messages “u alive?” or “did male ego finally kill you?” he left it unanswered.
At first she tried to pretend it didn’t hurt her
She sent another text six hours later.
Still ignoring me? Dramatic.
Nothing.
Then another.
This silent treatment thing is supposed to be my move.
Still nothing.
And suddenly she understood, with sharp nauseating clarity, that he was serious.
She had always assumed he would come back eventually. Always. Even angry, even hurt, even exhausted.
But now there was only silence. Cold and terrifying and familiar in the worst possible way.
The loneliness returned immediately after that.
The old emptiness inside her chest, the one he had slowly softened without her noticing, came rushing back all at once. Hotel rooms felt unbearable again. Victories felt dull. Every good thing in her life suddenly seemed too quiet without him there to witness it.
For the first time in years, she cried alone after a competition and the worst part was understanding she had done this to herself because somewhere along the way, she had stopped testing whether he would stay.
She had simply started hurting him out of fear he eventually wouldn’t.
She went looking for him three weeks later.
It was past midnight when she finally stood outside his place, rain collecting on the edges of the sidewalk while the city glowed faintly around her in blurred reflections. For several long seconds, she stayed completely still beneath the awning, staring at the lit windows above like she might still turn around and leave before he ever saw her.
Part of her wanted to.
Because suddenly, after weeks of silence, after all the certainty she usually carried so effortlessly, she felt terrified in a way she had not expected. Not of him exactly, but of the possibility that he would open the door and look at her with nothing left in his eyes. Just indifference.
The thought alone made something cold spread through her spine.
By the time he finally opened the door, her pulse was pounding hard enough to make her feel faint.
And God, he looked tired.
Not angry in the explosive way she had imagined during every sleepless night leading up to this moment. Worse than angry. Like the last few weeks had slowly ripped something out of him piece by piece. His hair was still damp from a shower, a gray hoodie hanging low on his frame, and for a second neither of them spoke. The familiar warmth of his apartment spilled softly around him into the hallway, carrying the faint smell of coffee and his laundry detergent.
She smiled lightly because she did not know what else to do.
“Well,” she said softly, forcing something teasing into her voice, “this is getting embarrassing for both of us now.”
Nothing changed in his expression.
Usually, by now, something in him would have softened automatically just from seeing her standing there again. Irritated maybe, but still visibly affected by her in that helpless way she had spent months simultaneously craving and resenting.
Now he only looked tired.
“You’re really going to keep ignoring me forever?” she tried again, quieter this time.
He stepped aside eventually, letting her inside without a word.
The apartment was dim except for the warm glow of a lamp near the couch. Clothes were draped carelessly over a chair, skating tape stacked unevenly on the coffee table beside half-finished mugs of coffee. It looked lived in. Comfortable, intimate in a way that made her chest ache unexpectedly.
The door shut behind her with a soft click.
Then finally, without looking directly at her, he spoke.
“You left with another guy just to upset me.”
There was no accusation in his tone. No jealousy sharp enough for her to twist into something playful. Just exhaustion.
She folded her arms instinctively, retreating into herself before she even realized she was doing it. “You don’t know that.”
A quiet humorless laugh escaped him.
“See?” he murmured, finally looking at her properly. “That’s exactly what I mean.”
Something defensive flared immediately in her chest. “Oh my God, are we seriously doing this?”
“Yes!”
The force behind the word startled her into silence.
“Yes,” he repeated, voice rougher now. “We are.”
She went still then, because there was anger in him she had never really seen before. Not loud anger or emotional chaos. Worse. Controlled anger. The kind built slowly over time from accumulated hurt.
And suddenly she realized, with a sick twisting certainty, that she had done that to him.
“I’m tired,” he said quietly.
The words landed heavier than shouting would have.
“You don’t get to keep treating me like shit just because you know I love you.”
Her breath caught violently in her chest.
He had never said it like that before. Never stripped it so bare between them without hiding behind humor or flirting or tension.
It left her speechless.
“I don’t—”
“You do,” he interrupted immediately, frustration finally cracking through the exhaustion. “You know exactly what you’re doing every single time.”
She opened her mouth again automatically, ready to defend herself the way she always did, but nothing came out. Because the horrible thing was that he was right.
“You disappear every time things get too real,” he continued, stepping closer now. “You pull me in and then punish me for being there. You keep testing me over and over like eventually I’ll prove whatever it is you want me to prove if I stay long enough.”
Her chest tightened more.
“You think if you hurt me first,” he said more softly now, “then maybe it won’t kill you when I leave.”
Silence flooded the room afterward.
Not empty silence. The kind so full of truth it became almost unbearable to stand inside.
Her eyes burned instantly.
“No,” she whispered automatically, but even she could hear how weak the denial sounded.
He looked at her for a long moment, and something in his face broke slightly.
“And I kept letting you do it,” he admitted quietly. “Because I love you so much I stopped caring about what it was doing to me.”
That was what finally shattered her.
Not the anger or the harsh accusation, but the love.
The awful unwavering tenderness of it after everything she had done to him.
The tears came immediately and violently enough to genuinely frighten her. She turned away at once, one hand pressing hard against her mouth while she fought desperately for control that simply was not there anymore.
“Great,” she choked out bitterly through a broken laugh. “This is so humiliating.”
His expression changed instantly.
Shock first, then concern so immediate and genuine it almost looked painful because she never cried.
Not in front of people.
Not even in front of him.
“Hey,” he said softly, taking a step toward her.
She shook her head hard before he could get closer. “Don’t.”
Another tear slipped free anyway, then another, and suddenly it felt like her entire body was betraying her. Years and years of carefully contained emotion pushing violently to the surface all at once.
“I hate this,” she whispered, voice breaking apart. “I hate that I can’t just—I can’t—”
Frustration hit her so hard she pressed both hands against her own face like she physically could not force the words out properly.
That was the horrible truth of it: she wanted to tell him everything.
Wanted to tell him she had missed him so badly the silence made her feel physically ill. Wanted to admit that every cruel thing she had done came from terror rather than malice. That loving him had become unbearable because it made her feel fragile in ways she had spent years teaching herself not to be.
But every time the honesty rose inside her chest, something deeper recoiled violently from it.
Like her body itself no longer knew how to survive vulnerability.
“I don’t know how to do this,” she whispered desperately through tears. “Every time I try to say something real, it feels like I physically can’t get the words out. I don’t know how to let people in without feeling like they’re eventually going to stab me in the back.”
And hearing her say it like that nearly made his heart stop.
He crossed the room carefully then, both hands lifting instinctively to hold her face as though he were handling something impossibly fragile. His thumbs brushed softly beneath her eyes, wiping tears away while she trembled beneath his touch.
He placed the gentlest kisses on her cheeks before speaking again.
“Why won’t you let me love you?” he asked so quietly it was almost a whisper.
The question cracked something open inside her.
There it was. The thing she had been running from all this time.
It was never him, it was never commitment.
But love itself.
The unbearable terrifying reality of needing someone enough that the thought of losing them alone could turn you into a pathetic sobbing mess.
Her mouth trembled violently before she finally whispered the truth.
“I don’t know how to.”
The raw honesty of it softened something inside him completely.
Because suddenly, for the first time, he understood the full shape of it.
It was never that she enjoyed hurting him. Not really. The cruelty, the games, the constant pushing and pulling had never come from malice in the way he sometimes convinced himself they did during the worst moments. It was fear. Fear sharpened into instinct after years of teaching herself that vulnerability only ended in abandonment.
She had not been loving him incorrectly on purpose.
She simply did not know any other way to do it.
Everything she felt came out twisted sideways. Affection became teasing sharp enough to wound. Need became distance. Fear of losing him became attempts to make him leave first so at least she could control the timing of it. Every cruel thing she did had really just been panic wearing expensive perfume and a beautiful smile.
Underneath all of it, beneath the arrogance and manipulation and impossible emotional whiplash, she had been trying in the only ways she knew how. Poorly. Destructively. But genuinely.
It was never that she didn’t love him.
Never that she didn’t care.
It was that nobody had ever taught her how to hold love gently without waiting for it to disappear.
“Oh, baby,” he whispered.
Fresh tears spilled down her face at the tenderness in his voice because no one had ever looked at her like this before. Not with pity or with overwhelming expectation. Just love.
Steady and patient and heartbreakingly gentle.
He rested his forehead softly against hers.
“I’ll teach you,” he murmured.
That’s what broke her completely.
A shattered sob escaped her before she could stop it and suddenly she was clutching desperately at the front of his hoodie like she was afraid he might disappear if she loosened her grip even slightly.
And for the first time in years, she let someone hold her while she fell apart honestly.
Not gracefully. Not beautifully. There was nothing elegant about the way her breathing kept breaking apart against his chest or the way her hands clutched desperately at the fabric of his hoodie like she was afraid he might disappear if she loosened her grip even slightly. But he held her through all of it without hesitation, one hand moving slowly up and down her back while the other stayed cradled gently against the back of her head.
Emotion closed painfully around his throat as he held her there.
He kept whispering soft little reassurances close to her ear without even thinking about them, words warm and quiet and impossibly tender. Every so often he pressed small kisses against her temple, her hair, the damp skin beneath her eyes, like he was trying to love every fractured part of her gently back together.
Eventually her breathing began to steady against him.
Not completely. She still trembled slightly every now and then, but the sharp desperation slowly softened into exhaustion instead. When he finally pulled back just enough to look at her properly again, her face was flushed and tear-streaked, eyes swollen and vulnerable in a way he had never seen before.
And yet she smiled at him.
Softly.
Almost shyly.
The sight of it hit him so hard it nearly hurt.
He leaned in instinctively after that, kissing her slowly this time, carefully, like he was terrified of startling her back into running again. And when she kissed him back, something inside her finally loosened for the first time in longer than she could remember.
Not all at once.
Grief rarely worked that way.
The loneliness she had carried her entire life did not suddenly vanish just because someone loved her enough to stay. The fear was still there too, somewhere deep inside her, quiet and wounded and waiting for loss the way frightened things always do.
But standing there wrapped in his arms, feeling him hold her like she was something worth staying for instead of something difficult to survive, she realized something quite life-changing.
Maybe love was not another thing waiting to abandon her.
Maybe this time, if she stopped running from it long enough—
Author’s note: #VentingTime I know she's like a walking red flag and Sabrina is a walking red flag in this song, but I aspire to be this. I'm so dooooneeee with being nice to men!!!! I'll leave the next one feeling like a shell of a man, I swear Sabrina!!!
which of ur storys is your favorite? I dont know where to start
Hii! I'll assume you're here for Ilia hihi
My favorite is still probably A Couple Minutes, the trope is "second chance romance" and it's super fluffy and funny, but also a little bit angsty. Also I did nail the parallels with the song..............
The latest I wrote is Hits Different and it came together super fast, I really enjoyed it, it's a lot of drama and playboy!Ilia makes you want to punch him in the face, but he gets what he deserves and I can't write anything but happy endings.
Right now I’m working on an alternate reality version of Meddle About where she never gets injured and actually gets to reach her full potential. It’s basically exploring how their relationship would play out under those circumstances. It's also an enemies to lovers, rivals kinda situation...
Summary: She’d always been good at keeping things casual until he showed up, all lingering glances, late-night visits, and flirting that feels a little too real to be harmless.
Walking away from him is supposed to make things easier. Instead, it forces him to realize just how much he’s relied on her always being there, and how badly he’s about to lose her if he doesn't do anything.
Masterlist
Warnings: no use of y/n, 'she fell first, he fell harder', drinking (a lot of it), swearing, kissing, he is MEAN and TOXIC, jealousy (both parts), head injury?, angst, a lot of drama, english is not my first language.
Author’s note: lil' time no see! How are you guys? I missed it here.
I think I made this a little dubious like, were they hooking up before this? In my opinion, no, but it's up to your imagination.
Kinda funny I always write about a lot of drinking and I hate drinking...
She had wanted noise, something overwhelming enough to drown out the constant hum in her mind, the endless loops of routines, expectations, his name slipping in where it shouldn’t.
Lights sliced through the darkness in restless flashes of pink, blue and white, turning the room into something fractured and unreal. Faces dissolved into shadows, bodies into motion, laughter into something indistinct and fleeting. Ice clinked in glasses, drinks spilled, people collided and reformed like waves against each other. It was the kind of place where nothing had to matter, where everything could blur just enough to be harmless.
Except him.
She stood near the bar, her fingers curled too tightly around a glass she hadn’t touched in ten minutes, condensation dampening her skin. She didn’t notice it. She didn’t notice anything, not really, because her gaze had locked onto him the moment she walked in, as if something instinctive and unavoidable had pulled her there.
Ilia.
He was dancing.
Not the sharp, deliberate precision she knew from the ice, not the clean lines and controlled landings that made people hold their breath in arenas. This was something else entirely. Loose, unrestrained, careless in a way that felt intimate, like seeing a version of him she was never meant to witness. There was a kind of freedom in it that unsettled her, a reminder that there were parts of him untouched by the world she knew him in.
And he wasn’t alone.
The girl pressed against him fit there too easily, like she belonged in that space he occupied. She laughed at something he said, her head tilting toward him, her hand resting on his shoulder as if it had always known where to go. He leaned down, close enough that his lips brushed the curve of her ear, his voice lost to the music but clearly meant only for her.
Whatever he said made her react instantly. Her smile widened, soft and knowing, like she had just been handed something private, something special.
Something that was never hers.
A slow, sinking feeling spread through her chest, heavy and undeniable. It wasn’t sharp at first, not a sudden break, but something deeper, more insidious. The kind of hurt that seeped in quietly and then refused to leave.
Because this wasn’t just him dancing with someone else.
This was the undoing of something she had let herself believe in for a little too long.
Every glance at the rink had weight, held just a second too long to be nothing. Every teasing remark came too close, his voice dipping, his words lingering like he wanted them to mean more. He didn’t just look at her, he watched her, like he was waiting for something unspoken to pass between them. And it was always her. Her name, her reactions, her space he stepped into without hesitation.
She hadn’t imagined the nights he showed up at her door, more than once, standing there at two in the morning like it was the most natural thing in the world. No real reason, just him leaning against the frame, talking nonsense until the hours softened into something that felt too close to intimacy. It wasn’t nothing. It was too consistent, too deliberate to be nothing.
So she hadn’t made it up. She had taken what he gave her and believed it meant something. And maybe that was the worst part. Not that she hoped, but that he had made it feel like there was something to hope for at all.
Standing there now, watching him exist so easily with someone else, she could feel that fragile thing collapsing in on itself, each memory turning against her, reshaping into something foolish.
She tried to look away. She didn’t.
Because some part of her needed to see it fully, needed to understand the truth without softness or illusion.
And the truth was simple.
He looked at that girl the way she had once imagined he might look at her.
She felt stupid. Not in a passing, laugh-it-off kind of way, but in a way that made her chest tighten with embarrassment. It burned under her skin, sharp and relentless, like she wanted to crawl out of herself just to escape it. If she could have reached back in time and shaken herself, told herself to stop, she would have.
God, she had actually gotten ready tonight thinking about him.
The outfit she had changed twice before settling on, the careful way she had done her hair, the extra ten minutes spent standing in front of the mirror, tilting her head slightly, wondering if he would notice. Wondering if he would look at her the way she had imagined, just once, just enough to confirm that what she felt wasn’t entirely one-sided.
It all felt unbearable now.
Her gaze flickered back to him, almost against her will, like she needed to punish herself a little more. And that was when it happened.
Ilia pulled the girl closer, his hand settling at her waist with an ease that suggested familiarity, or at least the absence of hesitation. There was no pause, no second thought. He just leaned in and kissed her.
Something inside her dropped so suddenly it left her breathless. It was physical, violent, the way her stomach lurched, the way the room seemed to tilt for a second as if the ground beneath her had just split up.
“Hey—” one of her friends started, the word cutting through the noise just a moment too late.
She was already moving.
It wasn’t a decision so much as an instinct, her body acting before her mind could catch up. She pushed through the crowd without apology, past blurred faces and unfamiliar hands, through the suffocating heat and relentless music. The lights felt harsher now, the air too thick, everything pressing in on her at once.
She needed out.
The cold night air hit her like a shock, sharp and immediate, but it didn’t steady her the way she thought it might. If anything, it made everything more real.
She barely made it to the alley by the side of the club before the nausea surged up, sudden and overwhelming. She bent slightly, hands wrapping around her stomach as if she could physically hold herself together.
“What the fuck…” she muttered, the words shaky, barely there.
Her friends rushed out after her, their voices overlapping, concerned and urgent.
“Okay, okay, breathe, just breathe—”
“Seriously, he’s not even worth it.”
“That girl? She’s not even ranked in the top hundred, like, be serious—”
None of that mattered.
Not the girl, not who she was, not where she stood in rankings or reputation. None of it even touched the real problem.
This wasn’t about her.
It was about him.
It was about the way she had let herself believe in something that clearly hadn’t existed the way she thought it did. About the way his attention had felt meaningful, how easily she had mistaken it for something real.
And now she was left standing outside a club, trying not to fall apart over a boy who had never once promised her anything.
“I’m gonna be sick.”
Moving on had always come easily to her, almost instinctively, like something she had mastered without ever needing to think about it.
She cycled through people the way others changed routines or costumes. There had always been someone new waiting in the wings, someone ready to fill whatever empty space a previous name had left behind. Her friends used to joke about it, laughing as they helped her get ready, saying she picked men the way she picked outfits, something to match the mood, the place, the version of herself she wanted to be that night. New city, new competition, new guy. It had never felt like a problem. It had felt like freedom.
There had always been comfort in keeping things temporary. No expectations, no attachments, nothing that could really hurt her. It was easy, controlled, something she had always been good at.
That was what made this different. Moving on didn’t feel easy anymore. It felt heavy, like she was forcing herself through something that wouldn’t let go.
She hadn’t even been with him, and still it felt like a loss. Not because of what he had done, but because of what she had believed, the meaning she had given to every look, every word.
Lying in her hotel bed, her phone lighting up with messages she ignored, she knew she had options. There were always options. It would have been easy to reach for one, to fall back into something familiar.
But none of them were him.
And that was the problem.
Because no matter how hard she tried, her mind kept dragging her back to the same image. Him, in that club, laughing, kissing someone else like it meant nothing.
Like she meant nothing.
She turned onto her side, the ache settling deeper.
This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not to her.
He shouldn’t have mattered this much.
But he did.
Somehow.
❅
Morning came too quickly and not quickly enough at the same time.
She hadn’t really slept. Her body had gone still, her eyes had closed, but her mind had kept moving, circling the same thoughts until they blurred together into something dull and exhausting. By the time sunlight slipped through the thin gap in the curtains, she felt heavier than she had the night before, like whatever had settled inside her had only grown in the quiet.
The rink was colder than usual, or maybe she just felt it more.
The familiar scrape of blades against ice echoed through the nearly empty arena, a steady, grounding sound that usually brought her back into herself. Today, it barely helped. She moved through her warm-up on autopilot, every jump slightly sharper than necessary, every landing carrying a fraction too much force, like she was trying to press something out of her system.
She told herself she wouldn’t look for him.
She looked anyway.
He was already there, of course. He always was. Moving across the ice like it belonged to him, like it answered to him. Effortless, controlled, impossible to ignore. It irritated her, the way he could exist so normally, like nothing had shifted, like the night before hadn’t left a mark.
She pushed off harder than she needed to, skating past him without slowing, keeping her focus fixed ahead like she hadn’t noticed him at all.
“Good morning to you too.”
His voice followed easily, light, almost amused.
She kept going, tracing a clean line across the ice, pretending the rhythm of her blades was enough to ground her. It should have been. It usually was.
He caught up to her anyway. Of course he did.
“What's up?” He asks, falling into pace beside her without effort.
“Nothing,” she replied, not looking at him. “Just focusing.”
“Right.”
There was a pause, brief but noticeable. She could feel him watching her, that same quiet, intent attention that always made her more aware of herself than she wanted to be.
“You’re different today,” he added.
She shrugged slightly, like it didn’t matter. “Not really.”
He didn’t push. Not at first.
They skated side by side for a moment, the silence stretching just enough to feel deliberate, like something unspoken was sitting between them.
She exhaled quietly, easing her pace just a fraction, like she was trying to settle back into something neutral. Something safe.
He circled ahead of her, then turned, skating backward just enough to catch her eye, forcing her to either acknowledge him or make a point of not doing so.
“You’re acting like I did something wrong.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t say much of anything,” he pointed out, softer this time, like he wasn’t teasing so much as noticing.
She hesitated, the truth sitting heavy on her tongue before she let it out anyway. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”
And that was the problem.
Because she had nothing to hold against him, nothing concrete to justify the distance she was trying to create. Just a feeling, built from too many moments that blurred the line between something and nothing.
He watched her for a second longer, like he didn’t quite believe her, but he didn’t push. Not yet.
“Why didn’t you come talk to me last night?” he asked instead, easy, casual, like it hadn’t meant anything at all.
That did it. If looks could kill he would’ve dropped dead then and there.
Her look was sharp enough that it almost surprised even her, the tone she used carried a bite to it. “You looked busy.”
“Hey,” he said, a hint of something more serious slipping in. “I’m never too busy for you.”
Something in her chest tightened, immediate and unwelcome.
“Don’t say shit like that,” she muttered, pushing off a little faster, trying to put space between them before it settled too deep.
He followed anyway, of course he did, a quiet laugh trailing behind him. “There it is. You are mad at me.”
“I’m not mad,” she said, not stopping. “I just—”
She cut herself off because she didn’t have a clean answer.
“For what it’s worth,” he continued, like nothing had shifted, “you looked really good last night.”
She stopped so abruptly her blade scraped harshly against the ice.
“What is wrong with you?”
He shrugged, easy, unaffected, turning around like he already expected it. “What? I pay attention.”
She looked at him again, searching for something careless in his expression, something she could dismiss. But he just looked… normal. Calm. Like nothing had changed, like he hadn’t tilted something inside her without even trying.
“You have a funny way of showing it,” she said, quieter now, the edge softening despite herself.
“Do I?”
“Yes.”
He didn’t argue. Just slowed, turning slightly toward her, his attention narrowing in a way that made her pulse pick up.
“I notice when you walk into a room,” he said, his voice lower now, more deliberate. “I notice when you land something clean...”
Her breath caught, subtle but real.
“I notice especially when you look extra hot like last night,” he added simply.
She didn’t answer.
Because this was how it always happened. This was his M.O.
Not obvious. Not overwhelming. Just enough. Just enough to make everything feel like it meant something, even when she told herself it didn’t.
“I’m serious,” he said, holding her gaze a second longer than necessary. “Hard not to.”
There it was again.
That quiet, dangerous pull.
She looked away first, shaking her head slightly like she could clear it. “You’re impossible.”
“Yeah,” he said easily. “But you like it.”
She let out a small breath, something that almost turned into a laugh before she could stop it.
And that was the biggest problem. She wasn’t fighting him. She wasn’t angry, not in any way she could justify.
She was just trying to stay away.
And somehow, without doing anything at all, he kept making that feel impossible.
❅
The next time it happens, it feels almost inevitable.
It’s at an event, something official enough to require effort but informal enough that people relax into it too quickly. A post-competition gathering, full of familiar faces and practiced smiles, the kind of place where everyone is performing in quieter, more controlled ways. Dresses instead of costumes, tailored suits instead of training gear, but the same undercurrent of competition humming beneath everything.
She tells herself she’s fine when she arrives.
She even almost believes it.
The room is warm, filled with low music and overlapping conversations, the soft clink of glasses and polite laughter. It should feel easier than the club, more grounded, less chaotic. And for a while, it does. She drifts between groups, smiling when expected, answering questions, slipping back into the version of herself that everyone recognizes.
Until she feels it.
That shift in awareness, subtle but immediate, like her body recognizes him before her mind catches up.
She turns and there he is.
Across the room, already looking at her.
It’s not accidental. It never is with him. His gaze lands on her like he’s been waiting for the moment she’d notice, like everything else in the room is secondary.
He smiles.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
And just like that, everything in her unravels a little.
It’s quiet, almost embarrassing how immediate it is, how something as simple as that expression can undo all the distance she’s been trying to build. She feels it in the way her chest softens, in the way her thoughts scatter for a second too long.
She hopes it doesn’t show.
Hopes it stays contained somewhere behind her eyes, behind the practiced indifference she’s trying so hard to hold onto. But she knows better. It never really stays hidden with him. There’s always something that gives her away, some flicker, some hesitation, some small shift that makes it obvious.
He crosses the room without hesitation, weaving through people like it’s effortless, like there’s no question about where he’s going. And when he reaches her, he doesn’t stop at a polite distance.
He stands just a little too close.
“You clean up well,” he says, his voice low enough that it doesn’t carry beyond her.
Her breath stumbles slightly, but she recovers fast enough to roll her eyes. “You say that to everyone?”
“Only when it’s true.”
His gaze lingers, not in a way that’s rushed or careless, but deliberate, taking her in like he has all the time in the world.
It makes her feel exposed in a way she can’t quite explain.
“You’re staring,” she says, trying for annoyance, but it comes out softer than she intended.
“Yeah,” he replies easily. “I am.”
There’s no embarrassment in it. No attempt to deflect, just honesty, simple and disarming.
It throws her off more than it should.
He shifts slightly closer, his hand brushing her arm as he reaches past her for a drink from a passing tray. The contact is brief, almost incidental, but it lingers in her awareness longer than it has any right to.
“You’ve been avoiding me again,” he adds, glancing at her over the rim of his glass.
“I’ve been busy.”
“With what?”
“Things that don’t involve you.”
He smiles as he raises his glass to his mouth, the smile not leaving even to take a sip. “Ouch.”
He watches her for a moment, something more serious flickering beneath the surface, but it doesn’t last. It never does.
Instead, he leans in slightly, close enough that she can feel the warmth of him, the faint trace of something clean and familiar.
“You’re thinking too much about it,” he murmurs.
Her pulse quickens, traitorous.
“Maybe you don’t think enough,” she shoots back, but there’s less force behind it now.
“Maybe,” he concedes, his mouth curving faintly. “But it seems to be working for me.”
Before she can respond, someone calls his name.
He doesn’t move right away. He lingers, just long enough to make it feel like a choice, like staying with her matters more than whatever is pulling him away.
“Don’t disappear,” he says softly, almost like a request.
Then he’s gone.
And she’s left standing there, heart beating faster than it should, replaying the way his hand had brushed her arm, the way his voice had dropped when he spoke to her, the way he had looked at her like she was the only person in the room.
It happens slowly after that.
A glance across the room. A moment where she catches him watching her again. A passing touch at her waist as he moves by, brief but intentional this time, like he knows exactly what he’s doing.
Each interaction small on its own. But together, they build.
And she feels herself slipping, piece by piece, back into something she had promised herself she wouldn’t fall into again.
She starts to believe it again. That maybe this time is different. That maybe there’s something real beneath the surface, something he just doesn’t know how to say yet.
It’s subtle, the shift inside her, but it’s there.
Hope.
Quiet, fragile, dangerous.
And then her eyes find him across the room for a single time that night.
Only this time, he isn’t looking at her.
He’s standing close to someone else, a girl she vaguely recognizes, laughing at something she says. His posture is relaxed, open, familiar in a way that feels too easy.
Too practiced.
The girl touches his arm, he doesn’t move away. Instead, he leans in slightly, just enough to hear her better over the noise. Just enough that it feels intimate.
Something cold settles in her chest.
Not sharp like before.
Worse.
He says something, and the girl smiles, that same kind of smile she remembers too well. Soft, a little breathless, like she’s just been let in on something.
The room doesn’t blur this time.
Everything is too clear. Too familiar. It’s the same pattern.
The same effortless way he moves between people, between moments, between almosts that never quite become anything real.
And for a second, she just stands there, watching it happen again, feeling something inside her start to crack in a quieter, more dangerous way.
Because this time, she can’t even pretend she didn’t see it coming.
It happens a few nights later, long after the noise of the event has faded, long after she’s convinced herself she’s steadier than she really is.
She’s half-asleep when the knocking starts.
Not a polite knock. Not measured or patient. It’s uneven, dragging slightly between each hit against the door, like whoever’s on the other side can’t quite find a rhythm to hold onto.
Her first thought is confusion.
Her second is immediate.
She knows.
By the time she pulls herself out of bed and crosses the room, something in her chest is already tightening, bracing for something she can’t quite name but somehow expects anyway.
When she opens the door, it’s worse than she imagined.
Ilia is barely upright.
He’s leaning heavily against the frame, one shoulder slumped into it, his head tipped slightly forward like it’s too much effort to hold it up properly. His hair is a mess, his shirt half-untucked, and there’s a faint, unmistakable smell of alcohol clinging to him even from where she stands.
“Hey,” he says, the word drawn out, slurred just enough to blur at the edges.
Her stomach drops.
“Ilia,” she breathes, stepping forward instinctively before she can stop herself. “What are you doing?”
He grins, slow and unfocused, like it takes him a second to land on her face properly. “Came to see you.”
Of course he did.
She reaches for him without thinking when he sways slightly, her hands settling on his arms to steady him. He’s heavier like this, less controlled, his weight leaning into her in a way that feels too familiar and completely different all at once.
“You’re drunk,” she says, unnecessarily.
“Little bit,” he admits, holding his fingers up like he’s measuring something small, then missing the space entirely and letting his hand drop.
“This is not a little bit.”
He laughs softly, the sound loose and uncontained, and it sends something uneasy through her.
“Come on,” she says, shifting her grip so she can guide him. “Let’s get you back to your room.”
He doesn’t resist, but he doesn’t exactly help either, his steps uneven as she leads him out into the hallway. His shoulder bumps into the wall once, then again, and she tightens her hold on him, trying to keep him upright.
“Careful,” she mutters, tightening her hold as he leans a little too much of his weight into her.
“You got me,” he says easily, like it’s the most natural thing in the world, like it’s always been that simple.
The words settle somewhere uncomfortable, somewhere she pointedly avoids thinking about.
They make it a few steps down the hall before he stops without warning. She nearly goes with him, catching herself at the last second.
“What?” she asks, adjusting her grip.
He pats his pockets slowly, clumsily, like the thought is taking its time to reach him. Then he frowns.
“I don’t have my key.”
She blinks at him. “What do you mean you don’t have your key?”
“I mean,” he says, looking at her like she’s the one making this complicated, “I lost it.”
She stares.
“Where?”
He shrugs, completely unbothered. “Somewhere.”
“Ilia—”
“Bar, maybe,” he adds, as if that somehow makes it better.
Of course it doesn’t.
She exhales slowly, pressing her lips together as she tries to think. There’s no way she’s dragging him back out like this, not when he’s barely managing to stand as it is.
“Okay,” she says finally, the word carrying more resignation than she intends. “You’re not sleeping in the hallway, so just… go back.”
His smile comes quick, brighter than it should be, like he’s been waiting for that exact answer.
“Knew you’d say that.”
Getting him back into her room is harder than it should be. He leans into her more now, his balance slipping further, his arm draping loosely around her shoulders at some point like it belongs there. His hand brushes her side as he adjusts, his fingers dragging slightly before settling, and she has to bite back the immediate reaction it sparks.
“Stop moving,” she says, trying to keep him steady.
“I’m not,” he protests, even as he shifts again, his grip tightening just enough to pull her closer than necessary.
He smells like alcohol and something underneath it, something familiar and warm that makes her want to bury her face on the crook of his neck.
“Sit,” she tells him once they’re inside, guiding him toward her bed.
He drops onto it heavily, then immediately leans back on his hands, looking up at her with that same unfocused, intent gaze.
“You’re really pretty,” he says.
She closes her eyes briefly with a sigh.
“Okay.”
“No, like,” he continues, sitting up a little, swaying slightly with the effort. “Really pretty.”
“Ilia, you need to sleep.”
“Or,” he counters, his mouth curving into something almost mischievous, “We could stay awake.”
“Not happening.”
He watches her as she moves around the room, grabbing a glass of water, setting it on the bedside table, trying to create some kind of order out of this situation.
“You’re taking care of me,” he states after a moment, softer now.
“Someone has to.”
“Yeah,” he murmurs. “It’s always you.”
She ignores that too.
“Drink it,” she says, pointing at the glass.
He looks at it, but instead of reaching for it, his fingers brush over hers, lingering longer than necessary. His grip shifts, catching her wrist lightly, pulling her a step closer before she can react.
“Ilia—”
“What?” he asks, looking up at her, his expression open in that careless, unguarded way that comes with being this drunk.
“This isn’t—” she starts, but the words fade when he pulls her in further.
It’s not coordinated, not smooth. He misses the angle slightly, his lips brushing somewhere near the corner of her mouth before she turns her head quickly.
“You’re acting like a child,” she mumbles, pulling back.
He laughs under his breath, like it’s a game, then reaches for her again, slower this time, his hand finding her waist as he steadies himself, his thumb brushing absentmindedly against the fabric of her shirt.
Her breath catches despite herself.
“Ilia,” she says, firmer now, gently but deliberately removing his hand. “You need to lie down.”
He watches her for a second longer, then lets himself fall back onto the bed with a soft exhale, like it’s easier to give in than argue.
“There you go,” she murmurs, pulling the blanket over him.
For a moment, she thinks it’s over. He’ll just pass out and that will be the end of it, but he shifts, turning his face into her pillow, inhaling slowly like he’s trying to place something.
“You smell good,” he mumbles, voice muffled against the fabric.
She huffs out a quiet breath, something almost like a laugh slipping through despite everything.
“Go to sleep.”
“Mmm,” he hums, nuzzling further into the pillow, his expression softening, his body finally starting to relax into the mattress.
For a second, it’s almost… harmless. Almost funny.
And then he keeps talking.
“You always do this,” he murmurs, words slower now, heavier. “Care about me.”
She stills slightly, something in his tone shifting just enough to make her listen.
“Don’t even have to try,” he continues. “You’re just… there.”
Her chest tightens.
“You don’t go anywhere,” he continues, his voice softer now, blurred at the edges but still carrying that same careless certainty. “I can do whatever I want, and you’re still…” he gestures vaguely toward her, like the word isn’t even necessary. “Here.”
Something in the room shifts. It feels colder, like the air has thinned without warning.
“And you always let me,” he adds, almost absentmindedly, his mouth curving faintly against the pillow as his eyes start to slip shut. “You’re kinda easy like that.”
She doesn’t react at first.
She just stands there, watching him, waiting for something to follow. For him to take it back, to soften it, to say something that makes it land differently. Something that turns it into a joke, into anything but what it is.
Nothing comes.
His breathing evens out, slow and steady, his body sinking further into the mattress like the words had cost him nothing at all. Like they hadn’t meant anything.
He’s already asleep.
The silence that follows feels too loud, stretching out around her, pressing in from every side.
She doesn’t move right away. She can’t. It’s like her body hasn’t caught up to what just happened, like she’s still waiting for it to make sense in a way it never will.
Then, slowly, she lowers herself to the floor beside the bed, her back resting against the edge of the mattress. The contact is grounding in a way she doesn’t want to think about. Her arms wrap loosely around herself, not tight enough to comfort, just enough to keep from coming apart.
The room is quiet.
Her throat tightens, and she tries to swallow it down, tries to push it back where it came from, but it doesn’t stay. The tears come anyway, at first in silence, then heavier, slipping down her face as her gaze fixes somewhere unfocused ahead.
It isn’t just what he said, it’s how easily it came to him. How natural it sounded, like it wasn’t something he had to think about, like it had always been true and he had simply said it out loud.
And maybe that’s what settles deepest. She can see it now, without the softness she had kept wrapping around it, without the excuses she had given him, given herself.
Every time she showed up.
Every time she stayed.
Every time she let him close when she should have stepped back.
Just that. Something warm and familiar he could reach for whenever he wanted comfort, attention, softness. Something he never had to earn because she kept giving it freely. And when something brighter caught his attention, something easier to chase in the moment, he could let go without thinking twice, confident she would still be there when he looked back.
The worst part was that she had always known. Somewhere deep beneath all the hope and excuses and carefully stitched-together justifications, she had known exactly what this was turning into. She just hadn’t been ready to face it. Hadn’t been ready to look directly at the thing she kept trying to soften into something less painful.
Until he said it out loud.
Easy.
One stupid, careless word, and suddenly there was nowhere left to hide from the truth of it. It sat between them now, heavy and undeniable, stripping every moment down to its barest shape.
And sitting there on the floor beside his bed, only inches away from him, she felt further from him than she ever had before. Not confused anymore. Not aching. Not angry.
Just clearheaded in a way that hurt almost more.
Because she understood now, with a certainty that settled deep into her bones, that whatever this had been, whatever she had tried so desperately to make it into, it was no longer something she could afford to stay inside.
❅
He notices the change immediately.
Not because she says anything, but because she doesn’t. That’s what throws him off.
If she were angry, he thinks he could handle it better. If she snapped at him or picked a fight or gave him something concrete to push against, at least he would understand where he stood. But this is different. Colder in a way he didn’t know she could be.
At least not to him.
At the rink, she no longer looks for him when she arrives. No longer drifts into conversations with him between run-throughs or slows when he skates past her. It’s like some invisible thread that had always pulled them toward each other has suddenly been cut, and he doesn’t know when it happened.
At first, he assumes she’s just in a mood.
Then a day passes. Then another. And she still barely acknowledges him.
“Hey,” he says one morning as he falls into step beside her near the boards.
She keeps walking, tone completely flat. “Hi.”
He frowns slightly. “That’s all you’ve got?”
“What else do you want?”
The question catches him off guard because her tone isn’t sharp. It’s worse than sharp. It’s empty. Like she’s already somewhere else mentally, already done with the conversation before it’s even started.
“You’ve been weird with me for days,” he says carefully. “Did something happen?”
“Not at all.”
“You sure?”
She shrugs, eyes fixed ahead. “Pretty sure.”
And then she walks away before he can ask anything else.
It keeps happening after that.
Every attempt at conversation dies in seconds. Every joke falls flat against her silence. She doesn’t linger anymore, doesn’t soften when he smiles at her, doesn’t look at him the way she used to.
It unsettles him more than he wants to admit because he genuinely doesn’t know what he did.
The night at her room exists only in fractured flashes in his memory. Her hands steadying him. The smell of her shampoo when she leaned close. Falling into her bed half-conscious. After that, everything blurs into nothing.
So now he keeps replaying every recent interaction in his head, trying to figure out where this started, what shifted so completely without him noticing.
By the fourth day, frustration starts creeping in alongside the confusion.
He catches her after practice, skating beside her while she does laps.
“Okay, seriously,” he says. “What’s going on with you?”
She doesn’t even look at him.
“There’s obviously something.”
She says nothing, just keeps skating.
“That’s getting old, by the way.”
Still nothing.
He exhales sharply, pushing harder to keep up with her. “Can you at least pretend to care that I’m talking to you?”
That gets the smallest reaction. Her jaw tightens slightly, but she keeps her eyes forward.
“I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“The truth would be nice.”
At that, she lets out a quiet laugh that sounds nothing like amusement.
“That’s funny.”
“What does that even mean?”
“Nothing.”
“See, you keep doing that,” he says, irritation bleeding through now. “You keep acting like I’m supposed to know what happened.”
She pushes into a sharper turn, clearly trying to end the conversation, but this time he reaches for her before he can stop himself. His hand catches around her wrist lightly enough not to hurt, but firmly enough to stop her momentum.
The second he touches her, she freezes before she turns toward him so fast it almost startles him.
“Stop it, Ilia.” Her voice is low, controlled too tightly, like anger forced into too small a space.
He lets go immediately, confused more than anything now. “Okay, what the fuck is this?”
She shakes her head once, looking away briefly like she’s trying to steady herself.
“You really don’t remember anything, do you?” she asks quietly.
His stomach drops slightly. “Remember what?”
She laughs again, softer this time, but there’s something awful in it. Something embarrassed.
“Wow.”
“What did I do?”
“You talked,” she says simply. “A lot.”
His brows pull together. “And?”
She looks at him then, finally, and there’s something in her expression he’s never seen directed at him before.
“You know,” she says slowly, “there’s only so many ways someone can tell you exactly what they think of you before you start believing them.”
His confusion deepens. “I honestly don’t know what you mean.”
“Yeah,” she murmurs. “That somehow makes it even better.”
“Can you stop talking in riddles for two seconds?” he snaps, frustration finally winning out. “Why are you being so difficult?”
Something in her expression hardens instantly.
“Difficult?” she repeats softly.
The word hangs there for a second before she smiles, but it’s small and bitter and nothing like the smiles he’s used to from her.
“Last I heard from you I was pretty easy.”
The words and the memory hit him like a ton of bricks and judging by the way her face closes off immediately after she says them, she sees it too.
Before he can respond, she pulls away from him completely and skates off, leaving him standing there with the strange, sinking feeling that he just messed up astronomically.
And then there are the other guys.
At first, he tries not to think too much about them. It isn’t exactly new behavior for her, after all. He used to think it was funny, the way she collects brief almost-connections in every city they travel to, the way her friends tease her about it like it’s part of her charm.
But this feels different now.
Maybe because she isn’t doing it while still circling back to him anymore. Maybe because, for the first time, he understands what it looks like when she actually stops waiting around.
The realization settles in slowly over the course of a competition weekend abroad. The rink buzzes with the usual chaos of international events, different languages overlapping, music cutting in and out while skaters drift between warm-ups and conversations at the boards. He has just finished a run-through when he notices her on the opposite side of the ice.
She’s laughing. Standing near one of the European pair skaters, tall and blond and leaning too comfortably into her space, while she tilts her head up toward him with that familiar look in her eyes. The one that used to make Ilia feel like he had won something without even trying.
Now it just makes his stomach twist.
At first, he tells himself he’s imagining it. That she’s only being friendly. But then the guy touches her waist lightly to steady her after she nearly slips stepping off the boards, and she doesn’t move away. Instead, she smiles at him, soft and bright in a way Ilia hasn’t seen directed at him in weeks.
Something ugly flares in his chest. Sharp enough to surprise him.
Without fully meaning to, he skates toward her friend Nat, who is leaning against the barrier nearby scrolling through her phone.
He nods vaguely toward the other side of the rink. “So… what’s that?”
Nat glances up once before smirking immediately. “Jealous much?”
The word hits harder than it should.
“I’m not jealous,” he replies too quickly.
“Sure,” she says, laughing softly under her breath. “You’ve been looking at Captain Ikea over there like you’re about two seconds away from checking him into the boards hockey style, but yeah. Totally not jealous.”
His jaw tightens slightly as he looks away. Across the rink, the guy says something else that makes her laugh again, and he can’t help but roll his eyes.
It bothers him in a way he can’t even explain away anymore.
Natalia studies him for a second before her expression softens just slightly. “You know she actually liked you, right?”
His chest tightens immediately.
Liked. Past tense.
“Yeah,” he says quietly, though the truth is he doesn’t think he really understood it until now. Not fully. Not until she stopped looking at him the way she’s looking at Captain Ikea now.
The problem was never that he didn’t feel anything. That’s the part he’s only starting to understand now. The feelings were there, tangled underneath the flirting and teasing and constant push and pull between them. He just kept them trapped in a space where they never had to become real.
As long as it stayed playful, he never had to make a choice.
He never had to risk actually being with her, risk ruining it, risk disappointing her once it stops being fun and easy and undefined. But he also never has to face losing her either, because some stupid part of him assumes she will always stay exactly where he leaves her. Close enough to reach for whenever he wants.
Now she’s pulling away completely, and it feels like someone is reaching into his chest and tearing things out by hand.
Because suddenly there are only two options left:
Step up or lose her for real.
And for the first time, he realizes he doesn’t think he can survive the second one.
❅
It happens on an ordinary day.
There’s nothing dramatic about the start of it, no warning that something is about to go wrong. Practice runs like it always does, blades carving familiar patterns into the ice, music cutting in and out, coaches calling corrections from the sidelines.
He’s in the middle of a run when it happens.
She isn’t even watching him at first. She’s been trying very hard not to lately, keeping her focus on her own practice, her own routines, pretending she no longer feels him everywhere in the rink the way she used to.
But then she hears it.
The sound cuts across the ice sharply enough to make the entire rink seem to flinch with it. Not the usual noise of a rough landing or a controlled fall, but something wrong, something hollow and sickening that instantly pulls every head in the same direction. Conversations stop mid-sentence. Music continues playing faintly overhead, strangely disconnected from the sudden stillness settling over everything else.
By the time she looks up, he’s already down.
Flat against the ice, unmoving.
Something cold seizes in her chest before she can stop it. The feeling is immediate and terrifying, all instinct, no thought. One second she’s frozen in place, the next she’s pushing off hard enough that her blades scrape violently against the ice as she crosses the rink toward him. Everything around her narrows into a blur. The coaches gathering nearby, the murmurs rising from the boards, the distant sound of someone calling for the medic all fade into background noise.
“Ilia—”
His name leaves her sharper than she intends, edged with panic she doesn’t bother hiding quickly enough.
He groans softly at the sound of her voice, shifting slightly where he lays. One hand moves weakly toward the back of his head, and relief crashes into her so fast it almost makes her dizzy.
“He’s okay,” someone says nearby, but she barely hears them.
She drops down beside him anyway, her pulse still hammering painfully against her ribs. “Don’t sit up,” she says quickly, reaching for his shoulder before he can try. Her voice comes out steadier than she feels.
For a second he just squints up at her, dazed and unfocused, like it takes him a moment to place where he is. Then recognition settles slowly across his face.
“Hey,” he murmurs.
Like this is normal. Like he isn’t sprawled across the ice after scaring the life out of her.
Her throat tightens so suddenly it hurts.
“Idiot,” she mutters under her breath, softer than she means to.
And despite everything, despite the pain still written across his face, he almost smiles.
They take him to the infirmary almost immediately. Mostly precaution because head injuries are nothing to play around with, but the fact that Ilia doesn’t argue much tells her more than anything else could. He’s pale beneath the harsh fluorescent lights, quieter than usual as the medic guides him down the hallway with a hand on his shoulder.
She tells herself she isn’t going to follow.
She tells herself that whatever exists between them now no longer includes this kind of care, this instinctive panic clawing up her throat every time he winces slightly or presses his fingers against the back of his head.
But somehow she ends up walking beside him anyway.
The infirmary smells faintly like antiseptic and cold air conditioning. She sits in the corner while the doctors check his pupils, ask him questions, shine lights into his eyes. He answers with that same irritating calmness he always has, like he’s more annoyed at the interruption than concerned about himself. Every so often his gaze drifts toward her where she sits stiffly in the chair, arms crossed tightly over herself.
She looks away every time.
Eventually, one of the doctors straightens with a small nod. “You’re fine. Mild bump, maybe a slight concussion at worst. Just rest, no training today, and someone keep an eye on him for a few hours.”
“I’m fine,” Ilia says immediately.
“You hit your head hard enough to forget what planet you’re on for a second,” she says for the first time, stepping in. “You’re resting.”
The doctor nods in agreement and soon enough they leave, the room falls quiet in a way that suddenly feels too intimate.
He’s stretched back against the narrow infirmary bed now, one arm resting over his stomach while an ice pack sits awkwardly against the side of his head. There’s a small cut near his hairline, barely serious, but seeing it still twists something painfully tight inside her chest.
“You look terrible,” she says finally, because it’s easier than admitting she nearly had a heart attack watching him hit the ice.
A faint laugh escapes him, quieter than usual, dulled slightly by the headache. “And you stayed.”
She immediately shoots him a look sharp enough to cut through the room.
“What?” he asks, lifting one shoulder carefully against the pillow. “I thought we were both pointing out shocking things.”
“You looking terrible is a shocking thing since when?” She frowns, faking confusion.
“Wow,” he murmurs. “You really know how to kick a guy when he has a concussion.”
“You’re being dramatic. They said you’re fine.”
“Still,” he says, squinting slightly at her. “You being here feels statistically less likely.”
She shifts in the stiff plastic chair beside the bed, suddenly too aware of how long she’s been sitting there watching him breathe, making sure he’s okay.
“Well,” she mutters after a second, avoiding his eyes, “you know what they say about old habits and hard deaths.”
Something softer settles over his expression then, quieter than his usual teasing, like the answer means more to him than she intended it to.
“Yeah,” he says lightly, though the small smile lingering on his mouth feels anything but casual. “I guess they do.”
“You really okay?” she asks after a moment, softer than intended.
“I’ve been better.”
The silence that settles after that isn’t hostile. If anything, it feels too delicate, stretched thin with all the things they haven’t said to each other in weeks.
She exhales slowly before stepping closer despite herself, reaching up before she can overthink it. Her fingers brush lightly against his temple, careful around the swelling beginning to form there.
“Does it hurt?”
His eyes lift to hers immediately. “Not as much as you pretending I don’t exist lately.”
She pulls her hand back like she’s been burned. “Don’t.”
“I’m serious,” he shifts slightly against the pillow, wincing before settling again. “Can you just listen to me for a second?”
“I really don’t want to do this right now.”
“I know,” he says quickly. “I’m not asking you to say anything back. Just… let me say it.”
Every instinct in her tells her to leave before he says something capable of undoing all the distance she’s fought to create. But sitting here, with him stripped of all the easy confidence he usually hides behind, she feels dangerously unsteady again.
“Fine,” she says eventually, arms crossing tightly over herself. “Talk.”
He looks at her for a long second before speaking.
“I miss you.”
No teasing, no laughing it off, just the truth. Quiet and direct enough to make her chest tighten painfully.
She says nothing.
“I didn’t realize how much you were part of my life until you stopped being there,” he continues, voice rougher now. “Not just around me. I mean really there. Talking to me. Looking at me like…” He exhales quietly. “Like I mattered.”
“You did matter to me,” she says before she can stop herself.
The past tense lands between them instantly. She sees him feel it.
“I know,” he says softly. “And I took that for granted.”
Her jaw tightens.
“I think I just assumed you’d always be there,” he admits. “No matter how stupid I acted.”
“You are stupid.”
“Okay, I deserve that.” A faint laugh escapes him.
Silence settles between them again, heavier this time, as she watches him carefully. The way his gaze drifts away from her for a moment, unfocused and distant, like he’s caught somewhere deep inside his own head.
Something shifts across his face then. Not hesitation exactly, but the look of someone standing at the edge of something irreversible, realizing too late that once it’s said out loud there’s no taking it back.
When he finally speaks, his voice is quieter than before, stripped completely of teasing or defensiveness.
“I think I’m in love with you.”
The words hit her so hard she almost physically recoils from them.
She shakes her head immediately, like she can shake off the weight of hearing them out loud. “You think?”
“No! No…” he rushes. “I know.”
“You didn’t know before.”
“I didn’t understand it before.”
A bitter laugh slips out of her before she can stop it. “How convenient for you.”
“It’s not convenient at all,” he says, more firmly now. “But it is late.”
“That’s the problem with you,” she replies, finally letting some of the hurt bleed through. “Everything with you is late. You wait until it’s almost gone before you decide it matters.”
He doesn’t argue because he knows she’s right. Still, he clings to the almost.
She looks away from him, throat tightening. “What happens when this is just you freaking out because I stopped talking to you? Because I’m not there anymore and suddenly it feels intense?”
“It’s not that.”
“And if I believe you?” she presses quietly. “What happens if I let myself believe you and you wake up one day and decide I’m easy enough to be taken for granted again?”
That one visibly lands. She watches the guilt move across his face in real time but he still doesn’t have an answer.
Somehow, that hurts more than if he lied.
“That’s what I thought,” she murmurs.
She leans back then, putting distance between them before she can let herself soften any further.
“I can’t do this again,” she says quietly, with something strained underneath it, something worn thin from feeling both too much and not enough for too long. “I can’t keep being the person who stays while you figure out whether or not you actually want this.”
“There’s nothing left to figure out,” he says immediately, more firmly than before. “I already know.”
She shakes her head slightly, like she doesn’t trust how quickly the words come to him now.
“No,” he continues, sitting up a little despite the discomfort pulling across his expression. “I mean it. I decided.” His gaze stays fixed on her, steady. “You’re the one who decides now. Whether you’ll even have me back.” A faint, self-deprecating laugh slips out of him then. “Shit… whether you’ll even want more from me at all.”
She just stares at him.
Long enough that the silence starts shifting into something uneasy. Long enough for him to finally look away for a second, like even he can feel how exposed he’s made himself.
Because this is new for him too.
Not the feelings. The honesty of them. The fact that he’s sitting there with no charm to hide behind, no teasing escape route, just waiting for her to either step toward him or walk away completely.
“I’m not asking you to decide right now.”
“Good,” she replies, already standing and moving toward the door. “Because I’m not going to.”
She leaves before he can say anything else.
But long after the door closes behind her, his words stay lodged somewhere deep inside her chest anyway.
❅
The feelings don’t fade after she leaves the infirmary.
If anything, they settle deeper.
They follow her through the rest of the day like something lodged beneath her skin, impossible to shake loose no matter how hard she tries to distract herself. She goes through the motions automatically, answers questions she barely hears, nods through conversations while her mind loops endlessly back to the same few moments. The look on his face when he said it. The complete absence of teasing in his voice. The way he had looked almost nervous saying it out loud, like he understood exactly how much power he had handed her in that moment.
I think I’m in love with you.
No matter how many times she replays it, it still doesn’t sound like him. Or maybe that’s the problem. Maybe it sounds more like him than anything else he’s ever said to her.
By evening, Nat and the others drag her out anyway, insisting she needs alcohol and loud music and at least one terrible decision before the night is over. Normally she would lean into it easily. Usually this is the part where she lets herself disappear into noise and flirtation and temporary things that ask nothing of her.
But tonight feels different.
She tries, though. She really does. She lets herself laugh too loudly at stupid jokes, lets Nat shove another drink into her hand while they squeeze together in a crowded booth somewhere downtown. The music pounds hard enough to blur thought for a while, and for a few precious moments she almost manages not to think about him.
Almost.
Because eventually Nat notices. Halfway through her second drink, after listening to her ramble through the entire infirmary conversation in fragments and contradictions, Nat just stares at her for a long moment before leaning back dramatically with a hand over her chest.
“Oh my God,” she says solemnly. “Love is actually the biggest scam ever invented.”
That makes her laugh, a real laugh this time, sudden enough that it catches her off guard.
“Seriously,” Nat continues, shaking her head. “One minute you’re reclaiming your power and emotionally detaching, the next he almost dies once and suddenly he’s giving tragic romance monologues in the infirmary.”
“He didn’t almost die.”
“You still followed him in there like a grieving widow.”
“I hate you.”
“No, babe,” Natalia replies, lifting her glass toward her. “Unfortunately, I think you love him.”
The words should sting more than they do. Instead, she just stares down into her drink for a second, watching the ice shift lazily against the glass while something quieter settles inside her. Not certainty exactly, but acceptance.
Because the truth is, she does love him. She probably has for longer than she wants to admit. The difference now is that she no longer feels consumed by it. It no longer feels like standing beneath someone else waiting to be chosen.
For the first time, it feels balanced because now he knows too and, more importantly, now he’s the one afraid to lose her.
That realization stays with her long after the night starts winding down. By the time she leaves the bar, she’s warm with alcohol and laughter, pleasantly tipsy rather than drunk, her thoughts softened just enough that they stop fighting each other for once.
She finds herself outside his door almost without meaning to.
For a second she just stands there staring at it, her hand hovering before she knocks lightly against the wood. The sound feels strangely intimate in the quiet hallway.
When he opens the door, the surprise on his face is immediate and completely genuine.
“Hey,” he says slowly.
She leans lightly against the frame, looking up at him for a moment without answering right away. He looks tired, softer somehow in sweatpants and a loose hoodie, the faint bruise near his hairline still visible beneath the warm apartment light.
“You’re okay?” she asks finally, gesturing vaguely toward his head.
“I’m fine.” He pauses, studying her carefully now. “Are you?”
“Debatable.”
A small laugh escapes him, confused but hopeful. “What are you doing here?”
She thinks about pretending she doesn’t know. Thinks about teasing him for a second longer just because she can. But instead she steps inside, pushing the door shut behind her with one careless swing before turning back toward him.
“I made a decision,” she says.
Something in his posture changes instantly. Not dramatic, just subtle tension pulling through him all at once.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
She walks closer until there’s barely any space left between them, close enough now to catch the faint smell of laundry detergent and mint and something distinctly him, her fingers moving up to play with the strings of his hoodie. He watches her carefully the entire time, like he’s afraid one wrong movement will make her disappear again.
“You’re very lucky,” she says thoughtfully, tilting her head as her gaze drifts slowly across his face. “That you’re this pretty.”
His eyebrows lift immediately. “Pretty?”
“Painfully.” She sighs softly, like it’s inconveniencing her personally. “It’s honestly working in your favor right now.”
A laugh breaks out of him then, quiet and disbelieving, and something warm twists low in her chest at the sound.
Before he can say anything else, she reaches up, sliding her arms loosely around the back of his neck. His body reacts instantly, hands finding her waist like instinct, warm and steady against her skin. The touch sends a slow shiver through her, not sharp or uncertain like before, but grounding.
“You’re getting one more chance,” she murmurs, her voice softer now as she leans closer. “One. And if you ruin it, I’ll actually kill you this time.”
His hands tighten slightly at her waist, careful but unmistakably emotional, like he’s holding onto something precious he thought he’d already lost.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he says quietly.
“Good,” she replies. “Because I’m done chasing you.”
“You won’t have to.”
The certainty in his voice settles into her slowly, warmly. She searches his face for hesitation out of habit, for some trace of the boy who used to hide behind flirting and ambiguity whenever things got too real.
She doesn’t find him anymore.
“Okay,” she whispers.
And when he kisses her this time, she doesn’t pull away.
It’s softer than she expects, slower too, his hand sliding carefully from her waist to the small of her back as if he’s afraid to rush her. She feels the breath leave him when she kisses him back fully, feels the exact moment he melts into it.
His fingers spread against her spine, pulling her closer until her chest presses against his, and something deep inside her settles at the feeling. Not anxiety. Not desperation. Nothing sharp or fragile.
Just warmth.
The kiss lingers without urgency, chosen instead of stolen, and when his thumb brushes lightly against her side she feels it everywhere. The tenderness of it. The restraint. The fact that he’s touching her like someone afraid to mishandle something important.
When they finally pull apart, both a little breathless, she stays close enough to feel his heartbeat against her.
And suddenly she understands why this feels so different now.
Because for the first time since this started, she isn’t standing beneath his attention hoping it means something. She isn’t waiting around for him to choose her.
Now he already has.
And she’s the one deciding what happens next.
God help her, she likes that feeling entirely too much.
Summary: She has a habit of taking in strays. This time, it’s a recently divorced ER doctor with a complicated past, a stubborn need to handle everything alone and a dog.
Letting him move in is supposed to be simple. Temporary. Just helping someone get through a rough time. But between shared routines, quiet moments, and the kind of care neither of them knows how to ask for out loud, things start to shift. Lines blur, walls lower, and what begins as an arrangement slowly turns into something neither of them planned for.
Masterlist
Warnings: no use of y/n, mentions of addiction, almost relapse, mentions of divorce, mentions of hurt animals, drinking (I know people in recovery shouldn't drink, but let me have this), swearing, a lot of angst, langdonmel/kingdon if you squint, I think they get a little codependent, a lil bit of a toxic relationship with work on her part, terrible depiction of therapists, happy-ish ending, english is not my first language (I don't know my ins, ons and ats or the difference between then and than :D).
Author’s note: HI!! I haven't been posting on tumblr too long and this is my first time writing for The Pitt (PBall makes me feel things only Sebastian Stan has managed before). I named the dog Bones :D (genuinely don't remember if he's ever named in the show) and I'm a kingdon girly at heart, but really wanted to give this a try.
This is a feel good type of fic, I guess. No real plot, I just really fanticize about giving that man a fucking break! I also feel like this is a little messy, but oh well...
Feedback is always appreciated as well as likes, coments and reblogs! Thank you!!!
She always had a terrible habit of bringing in strays.
Not in the way people found cute and joked about lightly, not the occasional soft spot that showed up when it was convenient. It was something deeper, something rooted so far back it had never really felt like a choice.
Her mother used to say she was born with it, that instinct to notice what others walked past, to feel things too sharply and too quickly to ever pretend she hadn’t seen.
It started when she was six.
A bird had fallen into their yard, its wing bent at an unnatural angle, feathers trembling with each shallow breath. She remembered the sound more than anything, the fragile, frantic flutter. She had cried immediately, a full-bodied, desperate kind of crying that made it seem like a piece of her body had been ripped off.
By eight, it had become impossible to ignore.
A kitten came first, tucked carefully into her jacket after being found on the side of the road, all ribs and wide eyes. She had walked home with it like she was carrying something sacred, heart pounding with the quiet fear that someone might take it away before she could prove it deserved to stay.
A year later, it was a puppy. Then something else, and something else after that.
Her parents had tried, at first, to set limits. Practical ones. Reasonable ones. But they never lasted because every time she looked at them, eyes glassy and voice trembling with that same unwavering conviction, they understood what she could not yet explain. It wasn’t just about wanting a pet. It was about needing to ensure that nothing small and defenseless slipped through the cracks unnoticed.
That part of her never really changed. It just softened at the edges, learned how to stay quiet when it needed to, shaped itself into something that fit the life she had built. From the outside, it looked contained, intentional, like she had found a way to manage it.
People had told her, more times than she could count, that she should have been a vet. It always sounded logical when they said it, like it was the obvious extension of who she was. But they didn’t understand. She had never even considered it, not truly. The idea of facing sick, dying animals every day wasn’t something she could harden herself against. It would undo her in ways she wouldn’t be able to come back from.
So she chose people instead.
She built a life around listening, around understanding, around sitting with others in the moments when they no longer knew how to carry themselves. She learned how to hold space without falling apart inside it, how to offer steadiness without losing herself completely. Being a therapist was a version of care that looked more controlled, more sustainable.
But underneath it, nothing had really changed.
It was still the same instinct.
Which was how she found herself, many years later, standing in her apartment while one of her best friends stood in front of her asking for something she already knew she wouldn’t be able to refuse.
Another stray.
Only this time, it wasn’t small. It wasn’t wordless. It wasn’t something she could scoop up and protect with gentle hands and quiet reassurances.
This time, it was complicated.
“This is different,” Mel was saying, her tone carefully measured in that way it always became when something truly mattered. “He’s—”
“No,” she cut in, faster than she meant to, the word landing with a firmness that felt foreign even to her own ears.
Mel blinked. That alone was enough to make something twist uncomfortably in her chest. She wasn’t used to pushing back like this, not when it came to helping, not when it came to something Mel cared about.
But this was too big.
“Absolutely not, Mel,” she repeated, steadier now, even as something inside her already began to waver.
Because she could feel it, creeping in at the edges. That familiar pull. The quiet, persistent voice asking her to look closer, to understand, to consider what might happen if she turned away.
And she hated that it was already working.
Mel didn’t rush into it, which was how she knew it was important. There was a carefulness to the way she stood in the living room, like she was measuring every word before letting it exist, something that didn’t usually happen when they were alone together.
“You know I wouldn’t ask if there were other options,” Mel said, quieter than usual. “If there was anything I could do, I’d do it.”
She stayed where she was, arms loosely crossed while she leaned against the couch and looked at Mel. The first instinct had already been to say no, and she was still holding onto it, even as it started to feel less solid.
“You’re asking me to let someone I’ve never met move into my home,” she replied, trying to keep her voice even, reasonable. “To let a man live here. To exist in my space like that’s not… a massive thing.”
“It is a massive thing,” Mel admitted immediately, eyes wide behind her glasses and head nodding a little too fast as she played with her fingers more openly. “I know that. I do.”
There was no pushback, no attempt to minimize it. Just that steady, earnest look that had always been impossible to argue with.
“He’s not just someone from work,” Mel added after a moment, like she was trying to bridge the distance between stranger and something more human. “He’s—he’s one of the best people I know.”
The words came out softer at the end, uncertainty threading through them in a way that didn’t quite match the claim. Not doubt, exactly. More like she was struggling to translate something bigger into something that would make sense.
“That’s not exactly reassuring,” she said, though there was less bite in it now. “Everyone says that about the people they care about.”
“I’m not saying it because I care about him,” Mel said, and then paused, exhaling like she had stepped into something complicated. “Or maybe I am… I don’t know, but that’s not the point. The point is that he’s… good. Great, even. And right now that may not enough to keep him steady.”
She shifted her weight, gaze dropping briefly to the floor before coming back to Mel. “You’re still asking me to take a risk. Not a small one. I don’t know him. I don’t know what he’s like to live with, how he handles things, what happens when it gets bad.”
Mel nodded, looking anywhere but at her friend’s eyes, absorbing every word instead of pushing past it. “That’s fair. You’re right. You should be thinking about all of that.”
There was a pause, and for a second it felt like maybe, just maybe, Mel would let it go.
She didn’t.
“I just don’t think he should be alone right now,” Mel said finally, and something in her voice shifted again, like she was genuinely afraid. “I think if he is, there’s a real chance he won’t be okay.”
There’s a real chance he’ll relapse. It’s what Mel meant to say, she knew it.
The simplicity of it made it worse.
“You’re asking me to take responsibility for that,” she said, quieter now.
“No,” Mel shook her head immediately. “I’m asking you to give him a chance to not go through it alone. That’s different.”
It didn’t feel that different.
She let out a slow breath, pressing her lips together as she tried to hold onto her logic, her boundaries, all the things she knew were supposed to matter here.
“I can’t just fix people, Mel,” she said. “That’s not how this works.”
“I know,” Mel said, softer now. “I know you can’t.”
There was something in her expression she rarely showed, something that only surfaced when she was truly worried about someone she loved, a quiet tightness, like she was holding herself together with careful effort, keeping everything from slipping out all at once. She had only ever seen it when it came to Becca.
“But you don’t fix people,” she continued. “You see them. You sit with them when things get ugly and confusing and they don’t know how to hold themselves together. You make it… less unbearable. Easier to navigate”
The words settled somewhere deep, uncomfortably precise.
Mel held her gaze, unwavering now, which was a rare occurrence.
“You did that for me,” she said.
There it was.
The memory came back instantly, uninvited but vivid. Late nights, shared silence, the quiet understanding that Mel didn’t need to explain everything to be understood, not by her. She had never thought of it as something extraordinary. It had just been what felt right at the time.
Mel had always moved through the world a little differently. She was shy at first glance and then, once she felt even a little safe, the words would come all at once. Too many, too fast, like she had been holding them in for too long. She was easily overwhelmed, struggled to balance everything life demanded of her, especially back then. College had stretched her thin in ways she didn’t always know how to handle.
And somehow, without ever making a point of it, she had become a constant in Mel’s chaos.
Not just someone who understood, but someone who stayed. Someone who showed up in ways that felt simple to her and essential to Mel. Rides across town without a second thought. Sitting side by side in silence just so tasks felt less impossible. Being there in the middle of the night when things went wrong, when fear took over and Mel couldn’t hold herself together long enough to act.
She never questioned it. Never weighed what it cost her or what it meant.
“Mel…” she started to say after a small sigh.
“He needs that,” Mel pressed, with a kind of quiet urgency that was hard to resist. “He needs someone who won’t panic when it gets hard. Someone who knows how to deal with it.”
Her chest tightened.
“I know it’s a lot,” Mel added, her voice softening again. “I wouldn’t ask if he wasn’t important to me. And I wouldn’t ask you if I didn’t trust you to handle it.”
That did it.
Not the argument or the logic, but the trust behind it.
She looked away for a moment, gathering herself, already feeling the edges of her refusal begin to erode.
“Okay,” she said with a deep sigh. “But this hot-shot doctor friend of yours is paying half the rent.”
Mel lit up immediately, the tension dissolving all at once. She let out a small, disbelieving laugh and pulled her into a tight hug, relief written all over her.
“Thank you,” Mel said quickly, like the words had been waiting.
She rolled her eyes, though she didn’t pull away. “Don’t make it a big thing.”
Mel did anyway, if only for a second longer before stepping back, something else crossing her expression like she had just remembered a detail she wasn’t sure how it would land.
“Oh,” she added. “He has a dog.”
She paused, blinking once, then let out a quiet breath through her nose. That… wasn’t bad. Out of everything this arrangement could have been, that was almost reassuring.
“Okay,” she said again, softer this time.
And if anything, she trusted him a little more now.
⚛︎
It didn’t go as badly as she had prepared herself for.
That was the first thing she noticed and it unsettled her more than it should have. She had built this quiet expectation in her mind, something tense and fragile, a living arrangement that would feel intrusive, unnatural, like two people forced too close together without enough room to breathe. Instead, from the very first day, it settled into something softer. Not effortless, but not strained either.
Frank stepped into the apartment like he was aware of every inch of it, like he understood instinctively that he was entering someone else’s space and had no intention of disrupting it. There was a carefulness to him. Every movement felt measured, every word considered before it was spoken. It looked practiced, the kind of restraint that didn’t come naturally but had been learned over time, shaped by necessity.
The dog, on the other hand, had no such reservations.
Bones, the goldendoodle.
Bones crossed the distance between them without pause, all warmth and immediate attachment, pressing into her like he had already decided she belonged to him. She laughed softly, instinctively reaching down, her fingers disappearing into soft fur as the dog leaned into her like it was the easiest decision in the world.
“Little traitor,” Frank muttered, but there was no real complaint in it. Just that same fleeting smile, quick and unguarded before it disappeared again.
That was when she noticed it properly.
Not just that he was attractive, though that was obvious in a way that felt almost inconvenient. All tall and broad shoulders, the kind of physical presence that demanded attention even when he was trying not to draw any. There was something unpolished about him too, something softened by the slight disarray of his hair, the tiredness in his eyes that made the blue of them feel less sharp.
It would have been easier if he wasn’t so attractive. Mel had left that part out.
But that wasn’t the only thing she noticed.
The rest came automatically, instinctively, the way it always did. The tightness held in his shoulders, like tension had settled there permanently. The way his gaze moved through the apartment, not with curiosity but with quiet assessment, noting exits, corners, distances. The slight pause before he answered even the simplest questions, like there was a filter he had to pass everything through before letting it exist out loud.
Mel had not left that part out.
It was easy to see the fresh edges of a life that had come apart. The carefulness of someone who had spent the last year rebuilding something fragile. One year sober. A job that demanded more than it gave back. Chronic pain that lingered under the surface. And a divorce muffled somewhere in the background, never loud, but never gone either.
Their lives began to overlap in fragments rather than full moments. Early mornings where they crossed paths in the kitchen, both half-awake, sharing space without needing to fill it. Late nights where he came home long after his shift had ended, exhaustion written into the way he moved. Conversations that existed in passing, brief but steady, building something without either of them naming it.
Their lives began to overlap in fragments rather than full moments.
Early mornings where they crossed paths in the kitchen, both half-awake, sharing space without needing to fill it. Late nights where he came home long after his shift had ended, exhaustion written into the way he moved. Conversations that existed in passing, brief but steady, building something without either of them naming it.
She didn’t push.
And that mattered a lot to him.
Not because he would have resisted in any obvious way, but because he didn’t seem like someone who needed pushing at all. If anything, he was already too aware of himself, too careful about the space he took up. His things never spread beyond what was necessary, always contained, always in their place. The way he moved through the apartment felt deliberate, like he was trying not to leave a mark, not to take more than what had been quietly given to him.
And she was very aware that he didn’t know how much convincing it had taken for her to agree to this. As far as he knew, it had been simple. Mel mentioned, casually, that she had a friend looking for a roommate when he said he wanted something close to the hospital. She doubted Mel had been as effortless about it as she made it sound, but even so, even believing this was just a normal roommate arrangement, he still carried himself like he was borrowing the space rather than living in it.
It wasn’t what she had expected.
Some part of her had assumed, unfairly, that someone like him, someone who had built a life early might carry a kind of carelessness with him. That there would be habits formed from being taken care of, from having someone else fill in the spaces he didn’t have to think about.
But Frank wasn’t like that. If anything, he seemed determined not to need anything at all.
The only thing he ever asked of her barely felt like asking.
To walk Bones when he couldn’t.
And the truth was, he almost never could.
It became part of her routine before she realized it had.
The leash hung by the door, always in the same place, and sometime between his early departures and her quieter mornings, she started reaching for it without thinking. Bones learned the rhythm quickly, waiting by the door with a kind of patient excitement that made it impossible to ignore him.
Frank noticed, of course. He noticed everything.
“You don’t have to do that every day,” he said one morning, already halfway into his jacket, stethoscope tucked into his bag like an afterthought. “I can figure something else out.”
She clipped the leash onto Bones’s collar, glancing up at him briefly. “You say that like I’m being held hostage.”
“I’m just saying it wasn’t part of the agreement.”
She smiled faintly. “Neither was your dog adopting me on day one, but here we are.”
That got a quiet laugh out of him, the kind that came easily before he had time to think about it.
“He does like you,” Frank said, watching Bones wag his tail like that was the most obvious fact in the world.
“He has excellent judgment,” she said. Then, tilting her head slightly, “Also, I’m starting to think he’s figured out you’re not a reliable morning person.”
Frank looked down at the dog, then back at her, mock offense settling in. “You really just said that in front of him?”
“I think he already knows.”
“That’s messed up,” he said, shaking his head. “You’re turning him against me.”
“Oh please, he made that decision on his own.”
“Unbelievable,” he muttered, though the corner of his mouth gave him away. “I bring him into this home, and this is how I’m treated.”
“You brought him into my home,” she corrected lightly. “Let’s be clear.”
He let out another small laugh, softer this time, his gaze lingering on the dog for a second before shifting back to her.
“Still,” he said, quieter now, “I appreciate it.”
She shrugged, standing up and reaching for the leash. “It’s not a hardship. He’s good company.”
“Yeah,” he said, almost to himself.
She waved him off. “Go save lives, Langdon. I’ve got this.”
He hesitated just for a second, like there was something else he could say, then nodded.
Then he was gone, and the apartment settled back into its quiet, Bones already pulling gently toward the door like he had somewhere to be.
⚛︎
They fell into each other’s routines without needing to define them, slowly turning into full moments.
Sometimes it was small things. A plate she left covered on the counter for him after a late shift. Coffee from her favorite place he brought home every now and then after an early gym session. Bones stretched out between them on the couch like a permanent fixture neither of them questioned anymore.
Other times, it was conversation.
Easy, light, and somehow always meaningful.
“Did you eat anything today that wasn’t coffee?” she asked one night, leaning against the counter while he rummaged through the fridge.
He paused, thinking. “Define eat.”
“That’s not a good start.”
“I had… something,” he said, vaguely.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Frank.”
“It had calories,” he defended.
“A redbull is not a meal,” she said simply. “Trust me, I learned that the hard way in college.”
He glanced at her over his shoulder, a hint of a smile forming. “You keeping track now?”
“Someone has to,” she said simply.
He huffed a quiet laugh, closing the fridge. “I’m doing fine.”
“Mhm,” she hummed, unconvinced. “You’re a ‘do what I say, not what I do’ kind of doctor, then...”
He hummed, closing the fridge and leaning back against the counter across from her, their hands almost brushing in the space between them.
“You’re not what I expected,” he said after a moment.
She tilted her head slightly. “That usually means something bad.”
“I just thought—” he paused, adjusting his words. “Mel made you sound… intense.”
She let out a quiet scoff. “Wow. Great start.”
“I mean it professionally,” he added, a hint of a smile pulling at his mouth. “Like you’d be analyzing everything I say.”
She considered that for a second, then gave a small shrug. “I mean… I am.”
He blinked. “You are?”
“It’s not on purpose,” she said. “I just notice things.”
He let out a soft laugh, shaking his head. “Yeah, I’m starting to get that.”
She studied him for a moment. “You’re not what I expected either.”
“Let me guess,” he said. “A disaster.”
“Surprisingly functional and tolerable, actually,” she corrected.
He nodded once. “High praise.”
“Mhmm… The highest.”
Something settled in that moment, something just beneath the surface of the conversation. It caught her off guard, how natural it felt. How quickly the edges of uncertainty had softened into something that resembled comfort.
She had expected effort. Adjustment. The constant awareness of another person occupying her space.
Instead, it felt like he fit into it without forcing anything out of place.
And somehow, without either of them noticing exactly when it happened, they stopped feeling like two people sharing an apartment and started feeling like something that worked.
Friends, perhaps.
It happened on a night that felt heavier than the others.
She had stayed up longer than usual, not for any real reason she could name, just a vague restlessness that kept her in the kitchen with a mug growing cold between her hands. Bones was stretched out nearby, breathing slow and steady, filling the silence.
When the door finally opened, she looked up without thinking.
Frank stepped inside like he always did, controlled, contained, but more worn down than usual. There was a weight to the way he moved, subtle but unmistakable if you knew where to look. His shoulders were tighter, his expression more distant.
“Hey,” she said gently.
“Hey,” he replied, voice lower than usual.
He set his keys down, shrugged out of his jacket, moved toward the kitchen more out of habit than intention. For a moment, it seemed like he might just go through the motions and disappear into his room like he sometimes did on harder days.
Then he bent slightly to open a cabinet.
The movement stopped halfway.
It was small, almost nothing. A pause. A tightening. But she saw it clearly, the way his body resisted, the way he held himself still for a second too long before forcing the motion to finish.
She straightened slightly, her attention sharpening.
“You okay?” she asked, already knowing the answer.
“Yeah,” he said quickly, too quickly. “Just a long shift.”
She watched him for a second longer, taking in the way he avoided fully straightening, the subtle way he adjusted his stance like he was trying to outrun the discomfort.
He wasn’t going to say anything.
Of course he wasn’t.
“That looked like it hurt,” she said slowly, setting her mug down.
“It’s fine,” he repeated, though there was less certainty in it now.
She hesitated.
This was the part that mattered. The line between noticing and stepping in. The moment where she could still pretend she hadn’t seen enough to act.
She never did well at that part. And with him, she was a little more careful. A little more aware of how easily this could feel like too much.
“You know…” she started, voice measured. “I used to have pretty bad back pain when I was younger. Years of terrible posture.” A small pause. “I picked up a few things that helped.”
That got his attention. He glanced at her properly this time, studying her with that same quiet caution. Not distrust, just hesitation. Like he was deciding whether to let her see something he usually kept to himself.
“It’s not a big deal,” he said.
“It doesn’t have to be a big deal to hurt,” she replied, softer.
The words stayed there for a moment.
He looked away first, jaw tightening slightly, like he was arguing with himself more than with her. She could see it, the instinct to brush it off, to keep it contained.
Then he exhaled.
“…What you got?” he asked.
She nodded once, keeping it simple, like this wasn’t anything unusual. “Go take a warm shower first,” she added, almost casually. “It’ll help.”
He blinked, a little caught off guard, then huffed a quiet breath. “Bossy.”
A beat passed, then he gave in with a small nod and disappeared down the hall.
When he came back, hair still damp, shoulders a little less rigid but not by much, she had already set everything out. The arnica cream, the patches. Things that looked almost underwhelming for something that he once had to resort to benzos to deal with.
“You’ll smell like you rolled around in a field of mint,” she said, glancing at what she had laid out. “But it’ll help you sleep.”
He let out a breath that almost turned into a laugh. “At this point, I’ll take anything.”
“You should.”
There was a shorter pause this time.
Then he nodded. “Okay.”
It was still awkward.
He sat at the edge of one of the kitchen stools, posture tight, like he wasn’t entirely sure what to do with himself. When he lifted his shirt just enough, there was that brief, unavoidable awareness of how close this suddenly was. How different from everything before.
She ignored it, grounding herself in the task.
“Tell me if it’s too much,” she said, hands hovering for just a second before settling against his back.
His back was tense under her fingers, the muscles tight in a way that spoke of long hours and longer habits of ignoring it.
“It’s already too much,” he said dryly.
“That’s not helpful feedback.”
“It’s honest.”
She huffed a quiet laugh, and something in the tension eased just slightly.
She worked carefully, not too much pressure, just enough to start loosening what had been held too tight for too long. Under her hands, she could feel the resistance, the way his body held onto everything.
“You’re really tense,” she murmured.
“Comes with the job.”
The silence that followed wasn’t uncomfortable. It was focused, steady, like something had settled into place without needing to be acknowledged.
After a few minutes, she felt the shift. Subtle, but there. His shoulders lowering just a fraction, his breathing evening out.
“Better?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he admitted quietly. “A little.”
She reached for the patches, placing them carefully against his skin, smoothing them down with practiced ease.
“They should make it better,” she said. “At least a bit.”
He nodded, pulling his shirt back down slowly.
For a moment, neither of them moved.
Then he stood, testing the movement like he didn’t fully trust it yet.
“…Thanks,” he said, and there was something different in it. Not just politeness. Something more grounded.
She shrugged lightly, stepping back to give him space again. “I may not be a doctor, but I know some things.”
He let out a soft breath that almost became a laugh, shaking his head.
“Yeah,” he said. “You do.”
He lingered for a second, like he might say something else, do something else… but nothing came.
“Goodnight,” he settled on.
“Goodnight, Frank.”
He walked away a little slower than before, but steadier.
And when the apartment fell quiet again, it didn’t feel quite the same.
Something had shifted.
⚛︎
A few nights later, the rhythm shifted again.
He came home earlier.
Early enough that the light outside hadn’t fully faded yet, the sky still holding onto that soft in-between color, something not quite day and not quite night. She noticed it immediately, the sound of the door opening at an unfamiliar hour pulling her out of the quiet focus of whatever she had been pretending to read.
“You’re home,” she said, a little surprised as she stepped into the living room.
“Yeah,” he answered, and there was something lighter in it this time. Not unburdened, but not weighed down in the same way either. “I got a day off so I decided to actually leave when the shift ended for once.”
He held something up slightly, almost like an afterthought. A bottle.
It took her a second to recognize it, and when she did, her brows lifted just a fraction.
“That’s—”
“Your favorite, right?” he said, not entirely certain, like he was bracing for the possibility that he had gotten it wrong.
She stared at it for a second longer than necessary, something quiet and unexpected settling in her chest.
“You remembered.”
He shrugged, like it hadn’t taken any effort. “You mentioned it.”
That felt like more than it should have.
She shoots him a small smile. “I’m impressed.”
“Don’t make it a big thing.”
“Too late,” she said, but there was no teasing edge to it this time, just something warmer.
A pause settled between them, not awkward, just open.
“Do you—” he started, then nodded toward the door. “It’s… nice out.”
She didn’t hesitate. “Yeah. Okay.”
The rooftop was quiet and empty. The city stretched out around them, lights slowly flickering on as the evening settled in. There were some old couches that looked improvised and they sat close enough that the space between them felt… intentional.
He opened the bottle with more focus than necessary, like it gave him something to do with his hands. She watched him for a second, noticing the absence of urgency in him tonight, the way he didn’t seem to be racing against time or exhaustion.
He handed her a glass.
“Thanks.”
For a while, they didn’t say much.
They didn’t need to. The quiet between them had started to feel like something they both understood.
Then, after a moment, “Can I ask you something?”
She tilted her head slightly. “Shoot.”
“When you look at me like that,” he said, more carefully now, “what are you thinking? What do you see?”
She didn’t answer right away.
Not because she didn’t know, but because she did and saying it felt like crossing into something more honest than they had been before.
“You really want to know?” she asked.
He nodded.
She took a slow breath, turning her glass slightly in her hands as she chose her words.
“I see someone who’s always aware of himself,” she said quietly. “Every movement, every word. Like you’re trying to make sure you don’t take up more space than you’re allowed.”
He didn’t interrupt.
“I see someone who doesn’t like asking for things,” she continued. “Even when he probably should. Someone who’d rather deal with pain than admit it’s there.”
A small shift beside her. Subtle, but there.
“And I see someone who’s tired,” she added, softer now. “Not just physically.”
The silence that followed was heavier this time, but still not uncomfortable.
He let out a slow breath, gaze fixed somewhere far off.
“That’s… annoyingly accurate,” he admitted.
She glanced at him. “Sorry.”
“No,” he shook his head slightly. “Don’t be. It’s just—” He hesitated, searching for something. “I didn’t think it was that obvious.”
“It’s probably not,” she said. “Not to everyone.”
He was quiet for a while after that, like he was deciding whether to stop there or keep going.
“I don’t really know how to… not be like that,” he said finally. “The whole… holding everything together thing.”
“You don’t have to all the time,” she said gently.
He huffed a faint laugh. “Kind of feels like I do.”
There was something in his voice that made her chest tighten.
“I messed things up,” he went on, more quietly now. “My marriage. Myself, for a while.” His grip tightened slightly around the glass. “I don’t trust that if I let things slip again, I’ll catch it in time.”
She didn’t rush to fill that. Just let it exist between them.
“That’s fair,” she said after a moment. “But there’s a difference between being careful and isolating yourself.”
He looked at her then, really looked.
“And you?” he asked. “What is your big character flaw?”
She takes a long breath in, pressing her lips together before setting her eyes on him.
“I take in strays,” she smiled lightly as she said it, like it was an inside joke.
He mimicked her smile, but didn’t let her deflect completely. “Seriously.”
She hesitated. It was easier to observe than to be seen. Easier to understand than to explain.
“I… stay,” she said after a moment. “With people. With things. Probably longer than I should sometimes.”
“Sounds like a good thing.”
“It can be,” she said. Then, quieter, “It can also mean I don’t always know when to step back. Not even when it's hurting me.”
He nodded slowly, like he understood more than she had said out loud.
For a moment, neither of them spoke again.
Then, almost absentmindedly, his hand shifted slightly where it rested between them, brushing lightly against hers.
It wasn’t intentional. Or maybe it was, just not fully conscious.
She didn’t pull away.
Instead, her fingers adjusted just slightly, the contact becoming something steadier, something acknowledged without needing to be pointed out.
They stayed like that, side by side, the city stretching endlessly in front of them, the quiet no longer just silence but something shared.
⚛︎
The knock at her door was very soft a couple nights later.
She sat up slighlty, the room dim and quiet around her, and waited for a second knock.
It came, just as quiet.
“It’s open,” she called, voice still thick with sleep.
The door pushed in slowly.
Frank stood there, and for a moment neither of them said anything. The faint hallway light framed him just enough for her to see the tension in the way he held himself, shoulders tight.
“Hey,” she said, softer now, already more awake.
“Hey,” he replied, and there was something in his voice that made her fully sit up. “Sorry. I know it’s late.”
“It’s fine,” she said, pushing the covers back. “What’s wrong?”
He exhaled, glancing down briefly before meeting her eyes again.
“My back’s… bad tonight,” he admitted. “I tried to just wait it out, but it’s not—” He stopped, jaw tightening slightly. “I can’t sleep.”
There was something almost frustrating about the way he said it, like he was annoyed with himself for needing to be there at all.
She didn’t hesitate.
“Come here,” she said, shifting to make space.
He stepped in, slower than usual, and sat carefully at the edge of her bed, posture rigid, like even sitting didn’t quite help. For a second, he seemed unsure of what to do next, then he reached down and lifted the hem of his shirt slightly, like he had the first time, like that was as far as he was willing to go.
She watched him for half a second.
Then shook her head.
“No,” she said gently. “Take it off and lay down.”
He froze.
It wasn’t dramatic, but it was immediate. His hand stilled where it was, his shoulders tightening again, something flickering across his face that wasn’t just pain this time.
“What?” he asked, caught off guard.
“You’re not going to get much relief sitting like that,” she said, calm, like this was the most obvious thing in the world. “Lay down. It’ll be easier.”
He hesitated.
She could see the hesitation clearly now. Not discomfort with her, not exactly. More like the idea of letting himself be that vulnerable, that unguarded.
“Hey,” she said quietly, tilting her head just enough to catch his attention, her hand landing on his shoulder lightly. “Do you trust me?”
He looked at her properly then, really looked, like he was weighing the question instead of deflecting it.
“…Yeah,” he said after a moment.
“Then lay down,” she replied, just as gently.
There was still a flicker of uncertainty, but it didn’t hold.
He exhaled slowly, like he was letting go of something internal, and pulled his shirt off, setting it aside before shifting carefully onto the bed. He lay on his stomach, one arm bent under his head, still holding some tension like he wasn’t entirely sure how to relax into it yet.
Her pillow smelled overwhelmingly like her, he noted but didn't say anything.
She moved closer, settling beside him, grounding herself in the familiarity of the task even as the setting made it feel different. More personal. More… intentional.
“Tell me if it hurts,” she said, hands hovering for just a second before making contact.
He let out a quiet breath as her hands pressed into his back, the reaction immediate, like his body had been waiting for something to break the tension.
“Yeah,” he murmured. “Okay.”
This time, she didn’t rush it.
She worked slower, deeper, letting her hands follow the tension instead of just easing it at the surface. His back was worse than before, muscles tight in a way that felt almost stubborn, like they had been holding on for too long.
The scent of arnica filled the room, sharp and medicinal, but it barely registered for him. It faded into the background, overtaken by something warmer, something closer. All he could focus on was the steady pressure of her hands, the way the tension in his back slowly gave way under her touch, the quiet relief settling into his body in a way he hadn’t felt in a long time.
“You’ve been ignoring this,” she said quietly.
“Yeah,” he admitted, voice muffled slightly against the pillow.
“You can’t just power through everything.”
“I know.”
“You don’t act like it.”
That earned a faint huff of something that might have been a laugh.
“I’m working on it,” he said.
She softened her pressure slightly, adjusting as she felt the tension begin to shift under her hands.
“You can ask for help,” she said, not as a correction, just as a fact. “You don’t have to wait until it gets this bad.”
There was a pause.
Then, quieter, “I’m starting to realize that.”
Something in the way he said it made her slow down, just slightly. Not because she needed to, but because the moment felt like it deserved it.
She kept working, steady and careful, until his breathing began to change.
At first, it was subtle. A little deeper. Less controlled.
Then more.
The tension under her hands eased in a way that wasn’t just physical anymore, his body finally letting go of something it had been holding too tightly.
“Frank?” she murmured softly.
No answer.
She paused, leaning slightly to look at his face.
He was asleep.
Not the light, restless kind. Fully out, like the relief had caught up to him all at once and pulled him under before he had a chance to resist it.
She stayed still for a moment, just watching, something quiet settling in her chest.
Then she carefully reached for the patches, placing them gently against his back, making sure not to wake him. Her movements slowed, deliberate, like she was handling something fragile.
When she was done, she hesitated.
Then reached out, brushing a strand of hair that was falling on his face back.
“Good,” she whispered, more to herself than to him.
She didn’t wake him.
Instead, she adjusted the blanket over him, turned off the dim lamp beside the bed, and moved carefully around the room, making space for him to stay exactly where he was.
Because for the first time, he hadn’t just asked for help.
He had trusted her enough to fall asleep.
For a while, she just stood there, watching the slow rise and fall of his back, making sure it wasn’t the kind of sleep that would break at the smallest shift. It wasn’t. He had gone under completely, like his body had finally given up the fight the moment it felt safe enough to.
That alone made the decision harder.
She glanced at the clock. It was too late to think about alternatives that made sense. Too late to wake him, too late to move him without undoing whatever fragile relief he had finally reached.
And if she was honest with herself, that wasn’t the only reason she stayed.
For a moment, she hovered at the side of the bed, considering the distance she could keep, the space she could create to make it feel less like something it wasn’t supposed to be.
Then, carefully, she slipped back under the covers.
She stayed on her side, angled slightly away from him at first, giving him as much space as she could. The mattress dipped just enough to remind her he was there, but he didn’t stir. Not even slightly.
It should have felt strange.
It didn’t.
There was something steady about it, something that settled into her chest in a way she hadn’t expected. The quiet wasn’t empty anymore. It felt… shared.
At some point, without realizing when, she shifted just slightly, turning onto her other side.
Closer.
Not touching. Not quite. But near enough that she could feel the warmth of him, the quiet presence of someone who, for once, wasn’t holding himself so tightly together.
Her eyes drifted shut not long after.
When Frank woke up, it took a second for anything to make sense.
The first thing he noticed was the absence of pain.
Not completely gone, but dulled, distant in a way that felt almost unfamiliar. His body felt heavier, relaxed in a way he hadn’t experienced in a long time, like something had finally loosened its grip.
Then he noticed where he was.
The room wasn’t his.
That realization came slowly, his mind catching up in pieces. The unfamiliar angle of the light, the faint sweet scent that wasn’t his own, the softness of the sheets that didn’t belong to him.
And then...
Her.
She was there, just a few inches away, still asleep, her breathing even, her face softer in a way he hadn’t seen when she was awake. For a moment, he didn’t move at all, like shifting might break something he didn’t fully understand yet.
Memory settled in gradually. The knock. The way he had stood in her doorway, unsure and exhausted. Her voice, steady and calm. The warmth of her hands against his back.
The way she had said 'do you trust me?' as if it were even a question, when the answer had already been there, unquestioned, like he would have said yes before even thinking about it.
His chest tightened slightly at the thought.
He turned his head just enough to look at her properly, careful not to disturb her. There was something quietly overwhelming about the scene, about the simple fact of it. That he had come to her like that. That she had let him. That he had fallen asleep without even realizing it.
He couldn’t remember the last time that had happened.
Something shifted in his chest, subtle but real.
Gratitude, maybe. Or something close to it.
He stayed still for a while, longer than he probably should have, just taking it in. The quiet, the closeness, the unfamiliar lightness in his chest instead of the usual weight waiting for him when he woke up. The faint scent of her around him, subtle but grounding, and the soft, unguarded way she slept, almost unreal in how beautiful she looked.
Eventually, he exhaled slowly, careful and controlled, and started to move.
He eased himself up just enough to sit at the edge of the bed, testing his back as he did. It held. Not perfect, but better.
Before he stood, he glanced back at her one last time. Something softened in his expression, something unguarded that no one else was there to see.
Then, quietly, he got up, pulling his shirt back on and moving toward the door with the same carefulness he always carried.
But this time, it felt different.
Less like he was trying not to take up space, more like he was trying not to lose something he hadn’t realized he needed.
⚛︎
Something feels off when he reaches to open the door.
He can’t explain it in a way that makes sense, but there’s a quiet instinct that’s been sharpened over years of walking into rooms where something is definetely wrong. The apartment is too still. Too quiet. Just… off.
When he steps inside, he finds her on the couch.
At first glance, she looks like she always does after a long day, curled slightly into herself, shoes kicked off carelessly, head tipped back. But it takes him less than a second to realize it’s not that.
“Hey,” he says, already moving closer.
She opens her eyes slowly, like it takes effort. “Hey.”
Her voice is wrong.
That’s all it takes. Everything in him shifts. The exhaustion from his shift disappears into the background, replaced by something sharper, more focused.
“How long have you felt like this?” he asks, already reaching out.
She frowns slightly, like she’s trying to catch up. “Like what?”
“This,” he says, his hand brushing briefly against her forehead before she can lean away.
“Frank—”
“You’re warm,” he cuts in, more to himself than to her. His hand lingers for a second longer, confirming it. Not just warm. Feverish.
“I’m fine,” she insists, pushing herself up a little too quickly. The movement wobbles, just slightly.
He notices.
“Don’t do that,” he says, steady but firm, one hand hovering near her arm like he’s ready to catch her if she tips too far. “Sit back.”
“I said I’m fine,” she repeats, more insistent now, like saying it louder might make it true.
He ignores that.
“When did it start?” he asks instead.
She exhales, already frustrated. “It’s just a cold.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
She presses her lips together, clearly weighing whether to answer or keep resisting.
“…Last night,” she admits finally.
“You went to work like this?”
Silence.
He lets out a breath, something tight pulling at his expression. “Of course you did.”
“I had patients,” she says, like that explains everything.
“It doesn’t mean you ignore being sick,” he replies.
“It’s not that bad.”
He looks at her. Really looks.
Her eyes are glassy, her movements slower than usual, the way she’s holding herself just slightly off like her body doesn’t feel entirely stable.
“Headache?” he asks.
She sighs. “Frank—”
“Headache?” He repeats, not raising his voice, but it's more insistant.
“…Yes.”
“Sore throat?”
“Yes.”
“Body aches?”
She hesitates.
“That’s a yes,” he answers for her.
“This is unnecessary,” she mutters.
“No, what’s unnecessary is pretending you’re not sick,” he says, already shifting in front of her.
Before she can protest again, he crouches down slightly, reaching up to tilt her chin just enough to get a better look.
“Open your mouth.”
She blinks at him. “Are you serious right now?”
“Yes.”
She lets out a disbelieving breath but does it anyway, more out of reflex than agreement.
He leans in closer, focused, clinical, completely in it now.
And that’s when she notices the way he's bending down.
“Frank,” she says quickly, her hand coming up to his arm. “Don’t—your back.”
He pauses, just for a second.
Then straightens slightly, the movement controlled, measured.
“It’s fine,” he says.
“No, it’s not,” she pushes, more alert now despite everything else. “You shouldn’t be bending like that, you just—”
“Can you stop?” he snaps.
The words come out sharper than anything he’s said so far, cutting clean through the space between them.
She goes still.
He exhales immediately after, running a hand through his hair, the frustration not aimed at her so much as the situation itself, the way she’s deflecting even now.
“Can you just let someone take care of you for once?” he says, quieter now, but no less intense.
Her hand falls back into her lap, defeated.
“You don’t have to do that right now,” he continues, his voice steadier, but there’s something under it now. Something real. “You don’t have to be the one holding everything together all the time.”
She looks at him, something shifting behind her eyes.
“But I’m fine,” she tries again, but it sounds weaker now. Less certain.
He shakes his head. “No, you’re not.”
A pause.
“Just… let me help,” he adds, softer.
The room goes quiet.
She could still argue. Push back. Insist.
But she’s tired and he’s right there, steady, unwavering in a way she recognizes too well.
It’s what she does for everyone else.
“…Okay,” she says finally, the word quiet, reluctant.
It’s enough.
He nods once, like that’s all he needed.
“Okay,” he repeats, already shifting back into motion.
He stands, moving toward the kitchen, pulling things together with practiced ease. Water. Medicine. Something light for her to eat.
When he comes back, she’s still sitting there, but there’s less resistance in the way she holds herself now.
“Take this,” he says, handing her the glass.
She does. No argument this time.
He watches her for a second, making sure, then sits on the edge of the coffee table across from her, close enough to step in if she needs it.
“You should rest,” he says.
“I am resting.”
“You were passing out on the couch,” he counters.
“Same thing.”
“Not the same thing.”
A faint, tired smile pulls at her mouth despite herself.
“You’re very intense,” she murmurs.
He reached toward her without thinking, pulling the blanket higher around her shoulders, tucking it in like it was the most natural thing in the world.
For a second, he looked at her.
Really looked.
And it felt almost overwhelming in its clarity. The closeness, the quiet care in the gesture, the strange, steady feeling of not being alone anymore.
“And you’re a ‘do what I say, not what I do’ kind of therapist,” he said.
She shook her head softly, a small smile forming, her eyes never leaving his.
He stays where he is. Doesn’t move away or fill the silence unnecessarily.
Just there.
And for once, she doesn’t try to carry it on her own.
⚛︎
It doesn’t happen all at once.
If it had, she would have caught it immediately. Named it, confronted it, forced it into the open before it had time to settle into something harder to reach. But that’s not how it unfolds with him.
With Frank, things slip.
Quietly. Carefully. Almost politely.
At first, it looks like nothing more than a bad stretch of days. Longer shifts. Less sleep. The kind of exhaustion that comes with his job, something she’s learned not to question too quickly.
But then the small things start to add up.
He stops bringing coffee in the mornings.
It’s subtle, easy to miss if she wasn’t already paying attention, but the routine disappears.
He starts coming home later again.
Not just late, but off. The kind of late that doesn’t follow a pattern, the kind that suggests he’s lingering somewhere before coming back. Bones waits longer by the door some nights, restless in a way that mirrors something she can’t quite see yet.
And then there are the objects.
Not hidden. Never hidden.
A receipt left on the counter, crumpled but not thrown away. A pharmacy name she recognizes immediately, even if what he bought isn’t listed. A few too many bottles of over-the-counter painkillers placed just a little too deliberately on the kitchen surface, like it’s both there and not there at the same time.
A question without being asked.
She notices all of it but she doesn't say anything. Not yet.
Because there’s a difference between catching something and understanding how to approach it. And with him, pushing too soon feels like it might make him pull back in ways that are harder to reach later.
So she watches.
Listens.
Waits.
He still laughs sometimes. Still moves through the apartment with that same quiet awareness. Still thanks her when she does small things, still asks about her day in that low, steady voice.
But there’s something underneath it now.
One night, she finds him sitting at the kitchen table long after he should have gone to bed.
The lights are low. The apartment quiet in that deep, late-hour way that makes everything feel more exposed.
He’s not doing anything. Just sitting there, elbows resting on the table, staring at nothing in particular.
“Frank,” she says softly.
He looks up, like he hadn’t heard her approach.
“Hey,” he replies, and for a second, it almost sounds normal.
“Why are you still up?”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
It’s a simple answer.
She steps closer, leaning lightly against the counter, studying him without making it obvious.
“You’ve been saying that a lot lately.”
He shrugs, like it’s nothing. “Comes and goes.”
It doesn’t. She knows it doesn’t.
Her gaze shifts briefly, catching on something near his hand.
A small piece of paper.
Folded. Unfolded. Folded again.
She doesn’t reach for it. Doesn’t need to. The edge of it is enough to recognize what it is.
Another pharmacy receipt.
He notices her looking and his hand moves, not quickly, just enough to slide it slightly out of view.
Not hiding. Just… acknowledging.
There it is.
The line drawn quietly in the sand.
She exhales slowly, keeping her tone even. “You want tea?”
It’s not the question she wants to ask but it’s the one he might answer.
He hesitates, then nods. “Yeah. Sure.”
She moves through the kitchen, the routine grounding. Gives her something to do while her mind works through what she’s seeing, what she’s not saying yet.
“You’re working tomorrow?” she asks, glancing back at him.
“Yeah.”
“What time?”
“Early.”
She hums softly. “You should sleep.”
“Yeah.”
She pours the water, sets the mug in front of him, their fingers brushing briefly as he takes it.
The contact lingers for a fraction of a second longer than usual.
Then it’s gone.
“Thanks,” he says.
She nods, staying where she is, not leaving him alone just yet.
The silence stretches. It's not uncomfortable but it's not easy either.
He stares into the mug for a while, like he’s expecting something to settle there.
“Back bothering you again?” she asks, finally.
It’s a careful question. Close enough to the truth without touching the center of it.
“A little,” he says.
Another half-answer but she nods, accepting it for now.
She doesn’t miss the way his hand tightens slightly around the mug. The way his shoulders are holding more than just physical tension.
The way he doesn’t look at her when he says it.
By the end of the week, she doesn’t need more proof. She already knows.
He’s slipping.
Not in a way that’s loud or obvious but in a way that leaves traces behind.
A path.
Subtle and intentional like he doesn’t know how to ask for help directly so he’s leaving pieces behind instead.
Hoping someone will follow them.
Hoping she will.
⚛︎
It’s around 8 p.m. when Mel calls.
Late enough that the office has emptied out, the quiet settling in around her in that familiar, end-of-day stillness. She’s halfway through a report she’s no longer really reading when her phone lights up, Mel’s name cutting through the calm in a way that immediately feels wrong.
She answers without hesitation.
“Hey,” she says, already shifting in her chair.
“Is Frank home?” Mel asks, skipping any greeting.
The question makes her pause.
“No,” she says slowly. “I don’t think so. Why?”
There’s a beat on the other end. Not silence exactly, but something close to it. The kind that fills with too many thoughts at once.
“I’m still at the hospital,” Mel says, and that alone doesn’t make sense. “Our shift ended a couple hours ago. We all stayed back a bit to help the night shift and then…” She exhales sharply. “He just left. Didn’t say anything. Didn’t tell anyone where he was going.”
Something in her chest tightens.
“That’s not like him,” she says.
“I know,” Mel replies quickly. “That’s why I’m calling. He’s been off all day. Snappy. On edge. I thought it was just… stress or lack of sleep or something, but...” She stops, like she’s trying to organize the feeling into something concrete. “It didn’t feel right.”
She leans forward slightly, her focus sharpening.
“Did you try calling him?”
“Yeah. Straight to voicemail.”
Another pause.
“I went down to the parking lot,” Mel adds, quieter now. “His car’s still here.”
For a second, neither of them says anything.
“Okay,” she says finally, already pushing her chair back. “Okay, I’m going to check.”
“You don’t have to—”
“I know,” she cuts in gently. “But I’m going anyway.”
Mel exhales, something like relief slipping through. “Can you just… call me if you find him?”
“I will.”
She hangs up before anything else can be said.
For a moment, she just stands there, the phone still in her hand, the weight of the conversation settling in. All the small things she’s been noticing over the past few days start lining up too quickly, too clearly.
The late nights. The distance. The way he’s been leaving things behind without saying anything directly.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
She grabs her bag, her keys, not bothering to finish anything she was doing.
By the time she’s out the door, she’s already calling him.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Straight to voicemail every time.
“Come on,” she mutters under her breath, her grip tightening slightly on the phone as she walks faster, her pace picking up without her realizing it.
She tries again as she reaches her car.
Nothing.
The drive to the hospital feels longer than it should.
Every red light feels like an interruption, every second stretching just enough to let her thoughts spiral into places she doesn’t want them to go. She calls again. And again.
Still nothing.
By the time she pulls into the parking lot, her heart is already beating faster than it should be.
Mel was right. His car is still there. Parked exactly where it should be.
She doesn’t stop to think about it.
Just gets out and heads inside, already knowing she won’t find him where she’s supposed to.
The stairs to the roof feel endless, her pace quickening the higher she climbs, breath catching not from the effort but from the growing certainty settling in her chest.
Please be there.
When she pushes the door open, the night air hits her immediately.
And then she sees him.
Sitting on the low wall, shoulders hunched forward, elbows resting on his knees, staring out at nothing in particular. The city stretches in front of him, but he doesn’t seem to be seeing any of it.
She stops for a second. Just watches.
He looks… lost.
She walks toward him slowly, the sound of her steps quiet against the concrete. When she reaches him, she sits beside him without asking, close enough to be felt but not enough to startle.
“Hey,” she says softly.
He doesn’t look at her right away.
“Took you long enough,” he says after a moment, his voice rough.
Something in her chest tightens. “Yeah,” she replies, trying to keep it light. “Next time I’ll follow the clues faster.”
That earns the faintest hint of a smile. It fades almost as quickly as it appears.
Silence stretches between them.
He turns to look at her then, and up close it’s harder to ignore. The exhaustion in his eyes, the kind that sits deeper than just a long day. The honesty in it, stripped down in a way he rarely allows.
“I didn’t,” he adds after a moment, quieter now.
She holds his gaze. “Why not?”
He hesitates, like the answer is more complicated than it should be. His jaw tightens slightly before he exhales.
“I knew you’d notice,” he says, voice low, almost unsure. “Not right away, maybe. But eventually.” A small, humorless breath leaves him. “And I didn’t… I didn’t want to see that look on your face.”
“What look?” she asks, softer now.
“Disappointment,” he says simply. Then, after a beat, “Or worse. Concern.”
She can almost feel her heart tightening.
“I didn’t want to let you down,” he finishes.
For a moment, neither of them speaks.
Then she shakes her head slightly, her voice gentler when she answers. “You didn’t have to leave pieces behind for me to find, you could've said something.”
He lets out a quiet breath, something caught between a laugh and frustration. “I didn’t even realize I was doing that, at first.”
She studies him for a second, then nods faintly.
“I feel like I have nothing left,” he says after a moment, his voice quieter now. “No marriage. No… normal life. Just work and... this...” He frowns taking a deep breath in. “This never ending pain.”
Her throat tightens, and for a moment she doesn’t dare look at him, afraid he’ll see the tears she’s barely holding back.
“Well... you have me,” she says simply.
The words come out steadier than she feels.
He blinks looking at her properly now, like he hadn’t expected that.
She meets his eyes this time.
“You have me,” she repeats, softer. “And I’m not going anywhere.”
There’s a slight tremor at the end of her voice, but she holds his gaze.
“Why?” he asks quietly. “Why do you care this much?”
She exhales, slow and unsteady, the answer already there, heavy in a way that makes it hard to say out loud. For a moment, she looks down, like she’s gathering something fragile before offering it up.
“I know I have a tendency to care too much,” she admits softly. “About everything. I don’t always know where the line is, when it’s mine to carry and when it isn’t.” A small pause, her voice catching just slightly before she continues. “But this isn’t just that.”
She lifts her gaze back to him, and there’s nothing guarded in it now.
“You matter to me,” she says, quieter, but more certain. “More than I expected. More than I think I was ready for. In a way I didn’t even remember was possible.”
He stares at her, searching her face like he’s trying to find something that will make it easier not to believe her.
She doesn’t give him that.
“And I know you think there’s something wrong with you,” she continues, the words coming a little faster now, like they’ve been waiting too long. “Like you’re broken in some way that can’t be fixed. But I wish you could see yourself the way I do.” Her voice softens. “Because I see someone who’s trying. Someone who keeps going even when it’s hard. And that… that matters more than you think.”
The silence that follows stretches, fragile, uncertain, like it could shift in either direction.
Then, very quietly, almost like it surprises him as much as it does her,
“I care about you too.”
The words settle into her, deep and steady, like something finding its place.
He exhales slowly, like he’s been holding his breath for far too long, and something in his expression softens in a way she hasn’t seen before. Not guarded, not careful. Just open.
They don’t move at first.
They just sit there, close enough that the space between them no longer feels accidental, but chosen.
Then, slowly, his hand shifts, brushing against hers before settling there. This time, she doesn’t just let it happen. She turns her hand slightly, fingers threading with his, grounding the moment into something real.
He looks at her again.
Closer now.
There’s no hesitation left in it. Just something steady, something certain in a way he hasn’t been in days.
She doesn’t pull away, doesn’t overthink it, and when he leans in, it’s careful at first, like he’s still giving her time to stop him.
She doesn’t.
The kiss is soft, hesitant only for a second before it settles deeper, something that carries everything they haven’t said out loud yet. Relief. Fear. Want. The quiet understanding that this has been building for longer than either of them admitted.
When they pull back, it’s not far.
Foreheads touching, breaths still uneven.
Neither of them speaks.
They don’t need to.
Because for the first time in a long time, neither of them feels lost.
The end.
Author’s note: I think my brazilian side just randomly activates sometimes, because the second I wrote that first “massage” scene, my brain went: “HE JUST DID A THOUSAND-HOUR SHIFT AND HE’S NOT SHOWERING??? WDYM???”
Like... girl, chill, it’s fanfiction, be practical... But also, I cannot. I cannot chill. So yeah, I added the shower.
hello lilith! you haven’t been active in a while and i just wanted to check in and see if everything is well with you
heyyy
I’ve been working like… A LOT a lot lately!! It’s been kinda insane and by the time I get home my brain is just… gone
so yeah, zero writing happening rn 💀 I’ve just been reading a bunch and calling it a day
·.❅.Meddle About.❅·.
One Shot - Ilia Malinin x f!Reader
Summary: She was supposed to be the future of figure skating until everything fell apart. Now she’s something else entirely, an untouchable presence at the edge of the sport she never really left behind. He is the future, all sharp edges and impossible jumps, everything she lost and everything she can’t ignore. When a careless comment turns into a public clash, their rivalry becomes impossible to look away from, pulling them into the same rooms, the same conversations, and eventually, the same mistakes.
Masterlist
Warnings: no use of y/n, enemies to lovers, career ending injury, trauma, spreading rumors, mentions of death, heated arguments, very light physical altercation (she holds his face a little aggressively), shit-talking each other, reader is a nepobaby, drinking, mentions of sex, sex is implied, using sex to cope with loss, being a bitch to cope with loss, using interviews to communicate, angst, a lot of drama (as always), english is not my first language
Author’s note: ok sooo I def used “meddle about” like it means “argue about”… just roll with it lol. Also… I still can’t write smut to save my life, but I feel like this would hit harder if it had some… OH WELL…
To the person who requested a tension filled story with a chase atlantic song I HOPE YOU LOVE IT!!!!!!!
The weight of everything that was meant to be hers, everything that once felt inevitable, settled into her like something permanent.
It followed her through each day without ever asking to be acknowledged, shifting in size but never in presence. Some mornings it was almost forgettable, a small and quiet presence, like something tucked into the pocket of her coat. Other days it pressed down so hard she could feel it in her bones, as if she were dragging something huge and unyielding behind her, something that did not belong to the present but refused to stay in the past. It never left. It never would.
She had done everything right. That was the part she could never make sense of. She had started young, earlier than most, and nothing about it had ever felt forced. The ice had come naturally to her, like it had always been waiting. There was no awkward phase, no struggle to catch up. She had simply known how to move.
People noticed.
Not just the technique, not just the consistency, but something harder to define. The balance between precision and feeling, the way nothing looked overworked or lacking. It made people go quiet when she skated, the kind of silence that didn’t need to be explained.
The expectation wrapped around her just as tightly as the ice once had, but it was colder in a different way.
At seventeen, it wasn’t just her body that failed her. It felt larger than that, like something fundamental had shifted out of place. As if the world itself had lost its balance and taken her with it.
It all happened too quickly to understand in real time. A bad landing, a slight miscalculation in angle, something so small it barely registered at first. She had felt it, of course, a sharp wrongness where there should have been none, but she had kept going because that was what you did. You pushed through, adjusted, told yourself it would settle.
It didn’t.
It’s a strange thing, to be that young and feel like your life has already ended.
But that was the only way she could describe it. Sitting in a sterile room, hearing the words spoken in a tone that tried too hard to be gentle. Career over. As if it were something clinical, something clean. As if it had not already been taken from her piece by piece.
It came only two months after her mother died.
The timing made it feel less like coincidence and more like something deliberate, as if loss had found her once and decided not to stop there. Grief had already hollowed something out inside her, left everything quieter, dimmer. And then this, closing off the one place where things had still made sense.
It felt, in a way she could not fully articulate, like there was nothing left to hold on to.
Up until then, her life had been untouched by that kind of instability. It had been perfect in the way only certain lives are, the kind built on money so old and ingrained it never had to announce itself. There had never been questions about what she could afford, never a moment where she had to choose between staying or continuing. Everything had always been there, steady and unquestioned.
Her father came from that kind of wealth. Old, quiet, the kind that moved through industries without ever needing recognition. Production companies, foundations, investments that shaped things from a distance. Power that did not ask to be seen.
Her mother was the opposite. She drew attention without trying, and it followed her everywhere.It followed her onto every film she starred in, across red carpets, through interviews, into every room she entered, and inevitably, it followed her daughter too. People loved the story of her. The videos of her at eight years old, spinning clumsily but determined across the ice, always paired with the same careful reminder of who she belonged to. The daughter of someone unforgettable.
Death only made her mother larger. Less real, more myth.
After that, everything felt off balance.
Silence settled into spaces that had never known it before. The house felt too large, too still, as if it had lost its center. And the ice, the one place that had always been separate from everything else, suddenly felt fragile too.
She couldn’t bear to lose it the same way she lost her mother.
That was why she lingered on the edges of it.
She told herself it was temporary at first, that she just needed time to adjust to life without it and she’d move right on. But time passed and she stayed, hovering just close enough to still feel it. Close enough that it never became something she could let go of.
And while she lingered, life reshaped itself around her.
If anything, she became more visible, not less. Her mother’s name opened doors before she even had to reach for them, carrying her into rooms she had no real claim to yet. Her father’s money made sure she never had to leave them. It created a strange kind of balance, one she learned to navigate quickly.
As she got older, something about her began to settle into place. Not the life she had planned, but something adjacent to it. She found a rhythm outside the ice, built a presence without ever seeming to try. Social media came naturally, or at least it looked that way from the outside. The way she dressed, the way she moved, the way she allowed herself to be seen. It all translated.
Fashion houses started to notice.
Then they started to reach out.
Brands loved the story. They reshaped it into something cleaner, something easier to consume.
The fallen prodigy. The quiet heiress. The girl who almost had everything.
She never corrected them. It was easier not to. Easier to let them believe in something polished, something distant from the reality of it. And slowly, without ever making a deliberate choice, she became something else. Not the athlete she was supposed to be, not the future that had once felt so certain, but something that fit just well enough to be convincing.
An 'It' girl.
Effortless in a way that made people look twice. A presence more than a person sometimes. Her name moved through spaces quickly, appearing in conversations, in captions, in headlines that did not need much explanation. Photos of her circulated constantly, studied, saved, picked apart for inspiration.
But she could never leave figure skating behind.
Front row seats at competitions, her face familiar enough that people expected to see her there almost every time. Donations that kept programs running, her involvement quiet but consistent. She never explained it, and no one ever asked directly, but it was noticed.
She watched everything, was everywhere and because of that, she noticed him.
Ilia Malinin.
It was almost impossible not to, since all everyone seemed to talk about around her was the impossible quad axel that suddenly became a possibility. And with that recognition came something else.
Something particularly annoying.
No.
Something personally annoying.
He was exactly what she was supposed to be. The trajectory, the attention, the inevitability of it. The way people spoke about him, the way they watched him, like they already knew where he was going and couldn’t look away from it.
It was all there. Everything she had lost.
Everything she would have been, if things had gone differently. If timing had been kinder. If life had chosen, just once, not to take something from her.
And he was doing it wrong.
The first time she saw him live, she felt it almost instantly.
He landed something impossible right before her eyes, the kind of jump that shifts the air in the arena, that pulls a reaction out of everyone in the room before they even realize it...
And she felt nothing.
No tension building in her chest before the takeoff. No brief, suspended breath in the air. No release when his blade met the ice again. There was no story behind it, nothing that carried through from beginning to end.
Just execution. Perfect yes, but also empty.
It unsettled her more than she expected. She had felt that same nothingness watching through a screen, but distance leaves room for doubt. She had assumed she was missing something, that it wasn’t translating properly, that a performance like that had to feel different in person.
It had to.
So she came, sat close enough to see every detail, every shift of movement, every expression that might have been lost through a camera.
And still, nothing.
The realization settled slowly, heavy in a way that didn’t match the moment unfolding in front of her. Around her, people were still reacting, still caught up in it, still believing in what they were seeing.
What unsettled her even more was the way he carried it, like he already knew it was his, like there had never been a version of that performance where things went wrong, like none of it required anything from him because the outcome was guaranteed.
But her focus didn’t stay there for long. It kept slipping.
Catching on details she hadn’t noticed before. The way his hair fell forward, strands of blond dropping into his face no matter how many times he pushed it back. The color of his eyes, too light to ignore, something cold in them that matched the ice beneath him. His skin pale under the arena lights, flushed at the edges from exertion, from effort he made look almost effortless.
She watched him longer than she should have.
It irritated her, how easily her attention settled on him, how it refused to move away.
❅
The war didn’t start on the ice, but rather around it.
It was supposed to be something small. A comment that most people would have forgotten the moment the interview ended.
It had been quick, casual. The kind of exchange meant to fill space more than define anything. The journalist asked about the sudden influx of celebrities around the sport, circling closer with the Winter Olympics approaching, drawn in by the attention, by the spectacle of it.
He barely seemed to think about it.
“Some people love the aesthetic, huh?” He said it lightly, a half smile at the corner of his lips, like it wasn’t meant to land anywhere specific. Like it wasn’t sharp enough to matter.
But it did. It landed on her.
Her entire life, from the outside, looked like an aesthetic choice. Her social media was carefully composed without ever appearing forced. Dark tones, blurred lights, designer pieces placed just right without seeming deliberate. Effortless in a way that made it easy to dismiss.
That same day, she had posted a photo by the boards. Black fabric of a designer coat against pale ice. It was a nice picture, but she could see it now… How it might seem like a choice made for appearance rather than something deeper. Like she was just another person orbiting the sport because it looked good from the outside.
Still, he shouldn’t have said anything at all.
Because now, whether he meant to or not, she was out for blood.
The opportunity for a counterstrike came quietly, almost effortlessly, as if it had been placed in her path rather than something she had to chase.
A cover for Vogue. The kind of gig that did not ask twice, did not need convincing, did not wait. They already knew what she was worth, or at least what she looked like from the outside. That was enough.
She sat beneath controlled lighting, every detail curated but never excessive. The styling was sharp, minimal, intentional in the way that made it seem almost effortless. Nothing pulled attention away from her because nothing needed to.
They did not start with skating. They never did.
They circled around it first, carefully, predictably. Her mother came up before anything else, as she always did. The memory of her shaped into something softer, something easier to consume. Then fashion, then influence, then the quiet power of being seen without explanation. They spoke about her like she was something constructed, something deliberate, the sum of carefully placed pieces rather than a living, breathing human being.
She let them. It was easier that way.
Only after they had exhausted everything else did they shift, slowly, like they were aware they were stepping into something less controlled.
“You’ve stayed very connected to figure skating even after retiring.”
The word lingered in the air for a second too long.
“I never left completely,” she said.
The answer came easily, but it carried something underneath it, something that did not quite settle.
“Do you miss it?”
For a moment, she said nothing.
The pause stretched just enough to feel intentional, though it wasn’t entirely. It wasn’t hesitation, it was something closer to resistance, like the truth existed too clearly and she had to decide how much of it she was willing to let through.
“Some days.”
It sounded measured. Controlled.
Not quite honest. Not quite a lie.
“Is that why you still watch?”
“Partialy.”
It should have been a neutral answer, something that passed without weight. Instead, it landed differently. There was something in the stillness of her expression, in the way her voice did not soften around it, that made it feel sharper than it was meant to be.
The interviewer noticed. His smile faltered, just slightly, the ease slipping.
“Do you watch as a fan or…?”
She tilted her head, slow and deliberate.
“Or do I want to get back to it?”
The question hung between them, though he had not fully asked it. A quiet exhale left her, edged with something that felt dangerously close to impatience.
“I have a career. I’m happy. I haven’t been on the ice for five years.” Her words were steady, but there was tension beneath them now, something that tightened her voice just enough to make it cut. “This isn’t the kind of sport you just pick up where you left off.”
For a brief moment, something flickered behind her eyes. Not visible enough to name, but present.
“Especially not with the injury I had.”
That part settled heavier.
Not in a dramatic way, not in a way that required pity or attention. Just final.
“Right…” The interviewer tried to recover with another careful smile, the kind that didn’t quite reach his eyes. He shifted in his chair, fingers brushing over his cards as if searching for something safe, something that would not turn against him the moment he said it out loud. The ease from earlier was gone. Now there was hesitation in him, a quiet awareness that the conversation had edged into something more dangerous. “So… is there any particular reason you stayed so involved?”
She didn’t answer immediately. For a second, she just stared at him, as if measuring how much patience she had left for questions that circled instead of delivering.
“Well, just because I don’t skate anymore doesn’t mean I don’t still love the sport.”
The words were simple, but the tension was still beneath them. She could feel it building, that familiar restlessness that came when people spoke about skating like it was something she had simply stepped away from, like it had not been taken from her cruely.
“And do you think the current skaters deliver what you expect?”
She exhaled, slow and quiet.
There it was.
The question she had been waiting for, even if she had not admitted it to herself. Not anticipation, not exactly, but something close. A pressure finally given direction.
“Some do.”
“Some don’t?”
She let the silence settle instead of answering. It stretched just long enough to become uncomfortable, to press against him until he felt the need to move past it. She could see it happen in real time, the way his composure slipped more and more, the way caution gave way to curiosity.
“The things being done now are, of course, very impressive,” he said, more careful now. “Have you seen the quad axel in person?”
The implication of him lingered in the air between them.
She leaned back, unhurried, buying herself a moment she didn’t really need. It wasn’t hesitation. It was control.
“Well… Ilia is technically brilliant,” she said at last. “No one else is doing what he’s doing, and no one else is making it look that easy either.”
That was enough to ease him a bit, she could see that. Relief flickered across his expression like he thought he had managed to avoid a catastrophe.
“But I don’t find him memorable.”
It disappeared just as quickly. The shift in the room was immediate.
“I watch him and I see execution,” she continued, her voice steady, almost detached. “I don’t see art. I don’t understand the story he’s trying to tell.”
“He takes... risks,” the interviewer offered, carefully now, like he was testing the ground before stepping further.
Her lips curved into something that almost resembled a smile, but there was no warmth in it. It carried a kind of quiet disbelief.
“He performs like the outcome is guaranteed,” she said. “And that kills the performance.”
The words settled heavier than anything she had said before. The interviewer hesitated, caught between backing away and pushing forward.
“So what is it about him, then? Just and impossible jump and—”
She didn’t look away.
“A huge ego.”
The interruption cut clean, unsoftened, with no room left for interpretation.
“And performing to your own voice?” She continued, almost absently, a slight movement of her hand dismissing the thought as quickly as it came, “it feels very self centered.”
A brief pause followed, just enough to let it sink in.
“I think his ego might be bigger than his head, actually.”
She didn’t smile.
That made it even worse.
This time, the reaction did not stay contained.
It spread quickly, louder than anything before it, cutting through the usual noise with a clarity that made it impossible to ignore. This was not another passing opinion, not something easy to dismiss. It came from someone who understood the sport from the inside, but who mattered outside of it, so of course it became a huge thing.
People held onto her words, repeated them, turned them over like they were trying to find something hidden beneath them. Not because they were dramatic, but because they felt personal in a way she never made things.
It reached him, of course. And when it did, it did not feel like criticism. It felt like being singled out under a light he had not agreed to stand in.
He recognized it immediately for what it was. Not an accident, not carelessness. There had been too much control in the way she spoke, too much restraint for it to be anything else. Every word had been placed exactly where it needed to be, not loud enough to sound like an impolite attack, but sharp enough to cut through everything else around it.
He understood then. This was not commentary, this was her move.
It pulled a line between them that had not existed before, or maybe had always been there, waiting to be acknowledged. Something quiet and tense, no longer unspoken. The kind of beginning that does not announce itself as conflict, but settles into place like one.
And he knew exactly where it had started.
And the worst part was that, beneath all of it, past the instinct to push back, to dismiss, to refuse it entirely he did not think she was entirely wrong.
❅
The event was not optional.
It had the kind of weight that made absence noticeable and quietly demanded presence without ever having to say it outright. A charity event for skating development, polished and deliberate in its purpose. Her family’s foundation stood behind it, one of the primary names keeping it afloat. His presence, on the other hand, was what drew people in, what made it feel current, relevant, worth being there.
It was built around both of them, in a way.
That much became clear the moment she walked in and when she saw the seating arrangement, she understood the rest.
Someone had decided to place them side by side.
Not by accident.
There was intention behind it, she recognized it in everything else that had been unfolding around them. People wanted something from this. A reaction, a moment, something they could take and turn into gossip later. It was easier to place them together and wait than to ask for it outright.
She took her seat without hesitation, her expression untouched, as if none of it mattered.
He arrived not long after.
The tension settled before a single word was exchanged. It moved through the space quietly, subtle enough to be ignored but present enough that no one actually did. The people around them continued talking, smiling, filling the air with easy conversation that felt just slightly off. There was a pause beneath it all, something unspoken, like everyone was aware of what sat between them but was unwilling to be the first to acknowledge it.
She did not look at him immediately, but she was aware of him in a way that made everything else fade slightly at the edges. The shift of movement beside her, the quiet presence that carried more weight than it should have.
And then someone said it.
“This is interesting,” an older man stopped by the table, a quiet laugh slipping through as he looked between them. “I was wondering when you two would finally end up in the same room again.”
She glanced at him, then back at her glass, turning it slightly between her fingers like the question didn’t require much from her.
“Finally?” She repeated, her tone light, almost absent. “That implies there's something to wait for.”
The man seemed amused by that, leaning in just a little. “Oh, I think there is. When you start avoiding someone so much it starts to look intentional after a while.”
She let out a soft breath, something close to a laugh but not quite.
“People see intention in everything,” she said. “It makes things more interesting for them.”
A small pause followed. Just enough space for the conversation to settle.
Then, almost as an afterthought, she added, turning to the blonde to her left, “I don’t think we’ve ever actually been introduced.”
It was subtle, but it landed exactly where it needed to. Ilia shifted beside her, his attention no longer passive. There was something sharper in his eyes now, something that had been waiting for an opening.
“No, we haven’t,” he said.
His gaze didn’t waver from her, steady in a way that looked deliberate. The words lingered for a moment, his voice quieter now, edged just enough to cut through the noise around them.
“Of course, that didn’t stop you from talking about me on the cover of Vogue.”
The smile on his face almost softened it, almost made it seem lighter. But it never reached his eyes, and that was how she knew it wasn’t ease, it was deliberate, something placed there to make the point land exactly the way he wanted.
She didn’t react immediately. Just lifted her glass, took a slow sip, her attention drifting past him like she was searching the room for something more interesting.
“What can I say,” she murmured. “I’ve always loved the aesthetic.”
Something in his expression tightened, subtle but there. He leaned in slightly, close enough that his voice didn’t need to rise.
“You couldn’t just let it go, could you?”
There was palpable tension between them now, controlled but unmistakable. She turned her head back toward him, finally giving him her full attention. Her smile this time was softer, almost sweet, the kind that didn’t match the words that followed.
“No,” she said. “I really couldn’t.”
For a moment, neither of them moved.
Then she held his gaze, something shifting behind her eyes, something quieter but more intentional. She leaned in just slightly, close enough to feel like a secret, then straightened and stood.
An invitation without asking.
She walked away. Her heels clicking against the polished floor with quiet precision, each step measured, unhurried. She didn’t look back. She didn’t need to. The awareness of him right behind her followed her just as steadily as she moved, something she could feel without confirming.
The room stretched wide around them, all polished floors and warm, low lighting, filled with soft conversations that blurred into a constant, muted hum. Everything about it felt intentional, from the placement of the tables to the way people carried themselves, as if even their presence had been carefully curated to fit the space.
A few familiar faces caught her eye, and she acknowledged them with small, practiced nods, just enough to be polite, never enough to slow her pace. A few steps further and her hand came up to take a glass of wine from a silver tray beside her, not even glancing at it, just picking it up and continuing forward.
And the further she moved, the quieter it became, until the noise faded almost entirely.
When she looked around realising the hallway was empty she stopped and turned to face him, her expression unreadable now, whatever had been there before smoothed over into something more controlled.
“What?” He asked, irritation already surfacing as his hands slipped into his pockets, like he was bracing himself against something he hadn’t decided how to handle yet.
She studied him for a second, slower than necessary.
“Just had a feeling you wanted to say something you wouldn’t want overheard,” she said. “And I’m not in the mood to make headlines tomorrow.”
There was a pause.
“Ah,” he said, his voice lower now, something sharper beneath it as he took a step closer. “Of course. Because everything revolves around what you want.”
She could see it clearly now. His frustration sat just beneath the surface, controlled but visible, and it pulled something sharp and satisfied out of her. It curved into a smile before she could stop it, bright in a way that didn’t match the quiet tension of the hallway.
It only made it worse.
His expression tightened further, something caught between irritation and something else he didn’t seem willing to name. Because standing there, under the muted yellowish light, she was impossible to ignore. The black dress fit her like it had been made for her, which it probably had, every line precise without ever feeling forced. The sheer tights softened nothing, only sharpened the contrast, and the height of her red-bottomed heels added to the quiet confidence in the way she moved. She carried it all like it belonged to her, like it had always been hers.
It was distracting and annoying.
If he didn’t hate her, he would want her.
The thought flickered, unwanted, gone just as quickly as it came, replaced by something harder.
Her gaze didn’t leave his.
“It usually does,” she said softly.
She lifted her glass as she spoke, taking a slow sip, her eyes still on his the entire time, like she already knew exactly what effect she was having and had no intention of easing it. He let out a quiet, humorless breath, his gaze dragging over her face like he was trying to decide where to place his next move.
“Funny,” he said, voice low. “Because from where I’m standing, it looks like you built an entire narrative around me.”
She didn’t react immediately. Just tilted her head slightly, studying him like he was something she hadn’t quite figured out yet.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she replied, just as quiet. “You happened to fit the point I was making.”
Something in his jaw tightened.
“Right,” he nodded once, slow, like he didn’t believe her for a second. “I’m just convenient.”
“Very,” she said, without hesitation. The smile on her lips now was mischievous.
He stepped closer. Not enough to touch, but enough that the space between them shifted, tightened, became something neither of them could ignore.
“You said I’m not memorable,” he continued, his voice more controlled now, like he was holding something back instead of letting it slip. “And yet here you are. Still watching. Still talking about me.”
Her expression didn’t change, but something behind her eyes sharpened.
“I watch everyone,” she said.
“That’s not an answer.”
A pause.
Then, quieter, almost thoughtful. “Maybe you should ask yourself why you care that I’m watching.”
He let out a small laugh under his breath, but there was no amusement in it.
“Because I know what you’re doing,” he said. “You don’t like that I make it look easy. You don’t like that I don’t have to fight for it the way you did.”
That was his first real blow.
Her fingers tightened slightly around the stem of her glass before she set it aside without looking.
“You don’t know anything about what I had to fight for,” she said, her voice still controlled, but colder.
“I know enough,” he shot back. “Enough to see that this isn’t about skating. It’s about you.”
Another blow, but this time she moved.
Closer.
It was controlled, deliberate, the way everything she did was. The distance between them disappeared in a step, then another, until there was nothing left of it.
Her hand came up before he could react, palm closing underneath his chin, firm enough to hold him there, to keep his attention exactly where she wanted it. Her thumb rested against one of his cheeks while the rest of her fingers curved along the other, her perfectly manicured nails, slightly sharpened at the tips, pressing just enough into his skin to be felt. Not enough to hurt, but enough that he couldn’t ignore it.
For a second, neither of them spoke. He didn’t pull away. Didn’t move at all.
Her gaze held his, steady and unshifting, studying his face with a quiet intensity, like she was searching for the smallest crack, something she could press into until it gave.
“You want to know the difference?” she said sharply.
Her grip didn’t loosen.
“Your skating isn’t memorable.”
Then, just slightly, her fingers pressed a fraction deeper against his cheeks.
“But you just might be.”
She let go of him abruptly, stepping back before he could respond, the moment breaking as cleanly as it had formed.
And then she was gone.
It was only then he noticed it, the way his heart had picked up, beating faster than it should, like something in him had reacted before he could catch up to it.
❅
The next time he saw her, it wasn’t planned.
It never really was.
A competition, smaller than the last one, but crowded enough to matter. The kind of event where people lingered, where presence said something even if no one spoke about it directly. He noticed her before he meant to, the same way he always did now, like his attention had learned her shape and no longer knew how to let go of it.
Front row.
She sat like she always did, composed, unreadable, her attention fixed on the ice as if nothing else in the room existed. Not the crowd, not the cameras, not him. Not even when he stepped onto the ice.
The awareness of her was still unsettling, sitting just at the edge of everything he did. It shouldn’t have mattered. He had performed in front of thousands, under pressure that would have broken most people, and none of it had ever felt like this.
This was different.
There was no visible shift, no expression, nothing to read. Just stillness. Like she was watching something distant instead of something happening in front of her.
It got under his skin more than anything she had said.
After, when the noise settled and people began to move again, he looked for her without thinking but she was already gone.
The next time was the same.
And the one after that too.
Different events, different rooms, different crowds, but always the same pattern. She was there. She saw him. And she ignored him with a precision that felt deliberate.
Not avoidance, but something far worse: indifference.
It didn’t make sense. Not after the way she had looked at him in that hallway. Not after the way she had said that last thing.
‘But you just might be.’
That part stayed with him and the contrast of it did too, the way she now acted like he was nothing more than background noise, began to press at something he couldn’t quite contain.
So he stopped waiting for her next move and took one of his own. The question came too directly for him to ignore, dropped into the middle of a routine interview like it had been waiting for the right moment.
“You’ve both been in the spotlight lately,” the interviewer said, watching him a little too closely. “Have you spoken to her since the interview?”
There was a brief pause, just enough time for him to consider doubling down on it and then decide against it. He let out a small breath through his nose, something that could almost pass as a quiet laugh, his gaze shifting for a second before returning.
“Yeah,” he said, tone smug. “We talked.”
The interviewer leaned in slightly. “Oh?”
He hesitated, but it didn’t feel like uncertainty. It felt measured like he was choosing how much to give.
“It wasn’t exactly public,” he added, a small smile tugging at the corner of his lips.
That was all it took for him to notice the interviewer’s attention, the flicker of interest, the curiosity sharpening.
“What do you mean by that?”
He shrugged, casual on the surface.
“She cornered me at an event a few weeks ago,” he said. “Some hallway in the back. Didn’t seem like she wanted an audience.”
The implication hung there, unspoken, but obvious.
The interviewer blinked, caught somewhere between surprise and interest. “And what happened?”
Another pause.
This one longer.
He let his expression settle into something unreadable, something that could be interpreted a dozen different ways depending on who was looking.
“You know how these rich, spoiled girls are,” he said, his smile widening now, almost like he was bragging. “They see something they want and don’t really know how to stop themselves until they get it.”
He glanced away then, like the conversation had already moved on in his mind, like it wasn’t worth expanding on.
The clip didn’t need help spreading. It moved quickly than anything else had before, and turned into something larger than what he had actually said, not that he hadn’t given them just enough to twist it that way.
It didn’t take long at all before it reached her and this time, there was no ambiguity in what he had done.
By the time she decided she had to see him, it wasn’t impulsive. It felt deliberate, calculated, even if the words she planned to say carried far less restraint. She found out where he trained without asking, worked around schedules that weren’t meant to be public, and showed up like she had every right to be there.
The rink was quiet. Cold in that particular way it only was when most people had already left. The lights dimmer than usual, the air sharper, every sound carrying further than it should. And he was still on the ice.
She waited by the boards, arms crossed, saying nothing.
It didn’t take long for him to notice her, his focus shifting mid-run, something in his movement faltering just slightly before he slowed, then stopped. For a second, he just looked at her.
Then he skated over.
“Didn’t think you’d actually come find me,” he said humorously.
She didn’t return the sentiment.
“You don’t get to talk about me like that and act like it was nothing.”
Straight to it then.
He rested his arms on the barrier, close enough now that the tension settled back into place, familiar and unresolved.
“I didn’t say anything that wasn’t true,” he replied.
Her expression shifted, just enough to make him scared of what was coming.
“You implied enough,” she said. “You knew exactly what you were doing.”
“And you didn’t?” he shot back. “You went on record calling me forgettable.”
“I said your skating was,” she corrected immediately.
He let out a quiet breath, something close to a laugh.
“Right. That makes it better.”
“It does,” she said, stepping closer now, her voice lowering. “Because I didn’t turn it into something else.”
“Neither did I.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“That’s not how it looks,” she said. “You made it sound like I dragged you somewhere private because… What? I wanted to jump your bones and couldn’t keep my hands to myself in public?”
The words hung there, heavier than anything else she’d said so far.
His jaw tightened.
“You’re the one who pulled me there,” he said. “What was I supposed to say about it?”
The answer came faster this time, sharper.
“You weren’t supposed to say anything,” she snapped. “Especially not that I wanted you.”
He pushed off the barrier, stepping off the ice, closing the distance between them with intention.
“That’s not what it sounded like,” he said, quieter now, knowing it was a lie.
“You wanted to invalidate everything I had to say about your program so you implied I said it because I wanted your attention,” she shot back. “That’s why you said it like that.”
He stopped just in front of her now, “maybe you’re the one reading too much into it.”
Her laugh was soft, but there was nothing amused about it.
“You don’t get to use me like that,” she said, her voice quieter now, but also colder. “Not to protect your ego, not to distract from what I actually said.”
“My ego?” he repeated, his tone also getting lower. “You’re the one who started this.”
“I’m finishing it then,” she said.
The silence that followed wasn’t empty. It pressed in around them, heavy and charged, too much sitting just beneath the surface with nowhere to go.
“You keep showing up,” he said, even lower now. “You keep watching.”
“And you keep talking about me.”
“Maybe because you keep giving me a reason to.” He snapped.
She moved first at the sound. Her hands caught the front of his jacket, pulling him forward just enough to break whatever distance was left between them.
“Stop turning this into something it’s not,” she said, her voice tight, closer to anger than control, noses almost touching. “You don’t get to stand there and act like I—”
He kissed her.
No warning, no hesitation, no space for another word. Just the sudden decision to cut through everything she was saying, the only thought in his head reduced to something simple and immediate: ‘shut up’. So he did just that. He shut her up.
It wasn’t soft. It wasn’t careful, either. It was abrupt, sharp, something that felt more like a collision than intention, like all the tension between them had been building toward something and neither of them had found a better way to let it break.
For only a second she froze before her grip tightened instead of pushing him away.
It didn’t make sense, the way the anger didn’t disappear but shifted.
One of her hands slid higher instinctively, catching against his hair, not stopping.
It lasted longer than it should have.
Then again, it shouldn’t have been happening at all, so the line had already been crossed long before either of them thought to pull back. There was no point in stopping something that had already lost all sense of reason.
And it didn’t feel like something to stop.
But at that thought she pulled back abruptly. Breathing uneven, her eyes locked onto his with something that was no longer just anger.
“This doesn’t fix anything,” she said.
But her voice wasn’t steady and neither were them when they stepped away.
❅
The strike back to the rumor he started came fast after the kiss.
At first, it looked like it could be a coincidence. A photo leaving a restaurant with an actor whose name had been circulating for months. A week later, a different city, a different man, a musician this time, something softer, even more curated. Then again, not long after, this time louder. A hockey player, broad shouldered, easy to read, his hand placed a little too familiarly at her back as cameras flashed.
It didn’t stop.
The pattern became impossible to ignore. Every appearance was public enough to be seen, controlled enough to never cross into confirmation. There were no statements, no captions that explained anything, no acknowledgment of what people were saying.
She didn’t deny it. She didn’t clarify it. She let it exist exactly as it was. Speculation shifted almost overnight. The narrative stretched, redirected, reshaped into something easier to follow. The tension that had once centered around him was diluted, pulled apart by too many variables, too many faces, too many possibilities.
And she didn't mentioned Ilia again. Not even once. Not even when asked.
That was what made it obvious for him. None of it was accidental. The constant rotation of men, the way each one blurred into the next, it all felt staged, like she was building toward something without ever quite saying it. Like what she really meant was… what, exactly? That she and Ilia had been something once, and now he was just another thing she had outgrown, tossed aside as easily as last season’s Prada coat? Yes, that had to be it. She did not need to say a word. She was making sure he understood anyway.
At first, he ignored it… Or, at least, he tried to. Told himself it didn’t matter, that it had nothing to do with him, that whatever she was doing had been inevitable the moment things turned public.
And yet this quiet refusal to acknowledge him at all, this deliberate redirection, felt sharper than anything else she could have said. It lingered in a way that didn’t make sense.
The kiss didn’t help. If anything, it made it a lot worse because now there was something real sitting underneath everything else, something that hadn’t been meant for anyone but them. Something that hadn’t been controlled, hadn’t been calculated, hadn’t been turned into a narrative.
He doesn’t go looking for her blindly, he already knows where she’ll be.
She always stays at the same place. The most expensive hotel in whatever city she’s in, predictable in a way, consistent in another way that makes her easy to find if you’re paying enough attention.
And he realized he had been paying far more attention than he ever meant to.
The bar is dimly lit, quiet enough to feel private, filled with the kind of people who pretend not to notice anything that doesn’t concern them.
She’s sitting alone at the bar with a drink in her hand, posture relaxed, like nothing in the world is pressing on her, like the last few weeks haven’t existed at all. Like she hasn’t been everywhere and nowhere at the same time.
He stops for a second when he sees her, just long enough to take it in then he walks over. She notices him before he says anything. Her gaze shifts slightly, catching him in the mirror behind the bar, but she doesn’t turn right away. Just takes another sip of her drink, like she’s deciding whether he’s worth acknowledging.
“You’re very predictable,” she said at last, setting her glass down with a soft, deliberate motion.
He exhaled under his breath, quiet and restrained, caught somewhere between irritation and disbelief. His fingers tapped once against the bar before stilling, like he was choosing not to react the way he wanted to.
“Funny, coming from you,” he replied, his tone steady but not soft. “Considering you didn’t show up tonight. Went out with yet another guy instead.”
She turned her head slightly toward him, slow, unbothered on the surface. There was a faint shift in her expression, something almost playful, almost careless.
“Oh,” she said, her mouth curving into a pout that faked sadness. “Miss me too much?”
He watched her for a moment longer than necessary, his gaze fixed on her like he was trying to read past what she was choosing to show him.
“Not exactly,” he says. “Just trying to figure out if you’re avoiding me or just keeping up your new hobby.”
His eyes moved over her, slow and deliberate, not in admiration, not really. More like he was taking note of something, measuring it.
“Although I have to admit, you’ve been very consistent lately.”
She shifted slightly, her attention dropping back to the glass in front of her, fingers brushing the rim like she suddenly had to look elsewhere.
“Just say whatever it is you came here to say,” she muttered, quieter now, like she didn’t have the patience for the buildup.
He leaned against the bar, closing some of the space between them without asking, his presence harder to ignore like that.
“I saw the photo,” he said.
There was a brief pause, just enough to let it settle between them.
“And it didn’t look like your usual act.”
“So everything I do is an act to you now?” she asks.
“Most of it, yeah.”
She let out a small laugh, but there was nothing light about it. It came out flatter than she probably intended.
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know enough,” he mumbled. “Enough to see the difference.”
That got her attention more than anything else. Her gaze sharpened, fully on him now.
“And what difference was that?”
He didn’t look away.
“This one looked real,” he said. “And you skipped the competition for it.”
Her posture straightens just slightly, tension slipping in where there hadn’t been any before.
“You don’t get to question what I do,” she says. “Are you jealous or something?”
He lets out a short, incredulous laugh.
“Is that what you want it to be? Makes it easier, I guess,” he says, jaw tightened, eyes locked on hers. “Because from where I’m standing, it just looks like you’re trying really hard to prove something.”
She goes still at that, something a little worried settling in her expression.
“And what exactly do you think I’m trying to prove?”
He pushes off the bar, stepping even closer, voice dropping. “That it didn’t mean anything.”
They are not being loud enough to cause a scene outright, but it’s not quiet either. Just enough to disturb the rhythm of the room. Conversations nearby begin to falter, voices trailing off mid-sentence as attention drifts in their direction. It happens subtly at first, a glance here, a pause there, but it builds. Curiosity has a way of spreading.
She notices it and when his gaze flicks past her shoulder, catching the shift in the room, he knows she’s aware of it too.
“Stop it,” she says under her breath, the words tight, controlled, meant only for him.
“You first,” he answers immediately, just as low, just as controlled, but edged with something sharper.
Her fingers tighten around her glass, knuckles paling slightly. There’s a flicker of something in her expression now, irritation tipping into something less steady.
“You don’t get to act like you care,” she says.
“And you don’t get to pretend that kiss didn’t happen.”
That is the moment it shifts out of control. A couple of people nearby stop pretending not to listen. A few heads turn more openly now, drawn in by the tension that has become impossible to ignore.
She sets her glass down with more force than necessary, the sharp sound cutting cleanly through the low hum of the bar.
“Not here,” she mutters, her voice thinner now, stretched tight.
This time, he doesn’t push back, doesn’t argue. He just reaches for her wrist. Not rough, not enough to hurt, but firm enough that she feels it, that it leaves no room for hesitation.
For a second, it seems like she might resist but she doesn’t.
And before either of them can say something they cannot take back, he’s already pulling her with him, weaving through the crowd, out of the noise and the watching eyes, into something more difficult to pull away from.
The hallway is quieter, the noise of the bar reduced to a distant hum behind closed doors. Dim lighting pools along the walls, soft and golden, leaving the corners in shadow. No one follows. No one stops them.
He doesn’t slow down. Not until he finds a door, not until he pushes it open and pulls her inside with him.
The space is too nice for what it is. Marble surfaces, polished and cold, the air faintly scented with lilies. Clean. Controlled. Completely at odds with the tension that follows them in.
The door shuts. Then the lock clicks into place.
The sound is small, but it lands heavier than it should, sealing them into the moment with no easy way out.
She turns on him immediately.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” she snaps, yanking her wrist free, the heat in her voice cutting through the stillness.
He barely lets her finish.
“What’s wrong with me?” he shoots back, already stepping toward her again. “You’re the one acting like none of this happened.”
“Because it shouldn’t have,” she fires back, no hesitation, no softness. “It was a mistake.”
“Didn’t feel like one.”
“It was.”
“So that’s it?” he asks, quieter now, but more dangerous for it. “You just go back to pretending there’s nothing here?”
“Yes.”
She doesn’t look away when she says it. Doesn’t flinch. But there’s something underneath it now, something strained, like the certainty costs her more than she lets on.
He sees right through it.
“No,” he says, quieter now, but unyielding. “You won’t.”
“I can do whatever I want,” she snaps, the edge back in full force, like she needs it there to hold the line.
“Not this.”
“Watch me.”
She moves to brush past him, already turning away like she’s done, like she can end it just by refusing to stay in it. But he’s faster. His hand closes around her arm, not harsh, but certain, pulling her back just enough to stop her momentum, to keep her there.
“Stop running from it,” he says.
“I’m not running,” she fires back, but there’s a crack in it now, something thinner beneath the defiance. “I’m ignoring it. There’s a difference.”
“That’s worse.”
Her breath stumbles, barely there, but he catches it.
“Stop acting like kissing you was the best thing that ever happened to me,” she says, quieter this time, the sharpness still there but strained now, like it’s taking effort to keep it steady. “It didn’t mean anything.”
He doesn’t answer, doesn’t argue, just looks at her.
And it’s that, more than anything, that unsettles her. The way he doesn’t let it go, doesn’t fill the silence, just holds her there with it. Close enough now that there’s nowhere to look that isn’t him, nowhere to step that doesn’t close the distance further.
“Say it again,” he says.
Her lips part, the words right there, ready, but they don’t come. Something shifts in her expression instead, something unguarded for half a second too long.
That’s all it takes.
He closes the distance and kisses her, harder this time. Not sudden or accidental, intentional in a way that makes it impossible to ignore.
She reacts immediately.
There’s no hesitation, no recoil. Instead, her hand fists in his shirt again, dragging him closer like she’s decided, in the same breath, to argue and not let him go. Whatever was building between them hasn’t disappeared. It’s still there, hot and unresolved, only now it’s shifted into something harder to separate from everything else.
“This is a mistake,” she says against his mouth, her breath uneven, the words breaking apart as she tries to hold onto them.
“Then stop,” he answers, just as close, just as unsteady.
She doesn’t.
She pushes at him instead, just enough space to look at him properly. Her eyes are sharp, bright with something that looks too much like anger to be anything else.
“You’re ridiculous.”
“And you’re insufferable.”
“Shut up.”
She pulls him back in before he can say anything else.
There’s nothing careful about it this time. No restraint, no attempt to keep it contained. It turns messy, heated, like neither of them is even trying to pretend anymore. The tension that had been building spills over, and it shows in the way they move, in the way neither of them slows down.
His hands find her waist, steady and certain, and before either of them fully registers it, he’s lifting her, setting her against the cold marble of the counter. The contrast pulls a sharp inhale from her, but it doesn’t stop her. If anything, it only makes her hold on tighter.
“Still nothing?” he murmurs, close enough that the words barely have space between them, his breath no steadier than hers now.
“Still a mistake,” she insists, the answer immediate, almost automatic, even as her hands are desperetely reaching to help him take off his shirt before pulling him right back to her.
The words don’t fit what’s happening, and neither one of them bothers trying to make them.
The argument doesn’t end. It twists into something else, something less about winning and more about refusing to let go. Every sharp look he wants to give her turns into a roll of his eyes as she digs her nails on his shoulders, every accusation she thinks to say dissolves the second she hears the small noises he makes close to her ear.
It shifts, gradually and then all at once. Into intimacy that doesn’t leave room for anything else but the heat of that moment.
❅
It doesn’t stay as sharp as it was in the beginning.
They still clash, still move around each other with that same charged tension, like neither of them knows how to exist in the same space without pushing at the edges of it. But something underneath begins to shift, almost imperceptibly at first. The arguments don’t always burn out into silence anymore. Sometimes they slow, unravel into something else. Conversations, if they can even be called that. Brief, unfinished, but real in a way that feels almost vulnerable.
And he starts noticing things he hadn’t allowed himself to before.
Not the obvious ones. Those had always been there, impossible to ignore. The way she walks into a room and draws attention without asking for it, like it’s something built into her. The way people gravitate toward her, curious, cautious, like she’s something they can’t quite place.
It’s the smaller things that catch him off guard.
The way she shows up to junior competitions no one expects her at. No announcement, no front-row presence, just quietly taking a seat somewhere in the stands, half out of sight. Still, people notice. They always do. Especially the kids.
He watches it happen more than once. The hesitation first, the disbelief, and then the excitement that breaks through it. The way they approach her carefully, like she might disappear if they move too fast.
And she lets them.
He sees her talking to a girl who coundn't be older than thirteen. The girl talks too fast, words tumbling over each other as she explains her program, her nerves, everything at once. She listens. Actually listens. Nods along like it matters.
“I like your dress,” she tells her after. “The color worked really well with your music.”
It’s simple. Nothing grand, nothing exaggerated.
But the girl lights up like she’s just been handed something priceless.
And she doesn’t rush away. Stays a moment longer than necessary, smiling in a way that doesn’t look rehearsed, doesn’t look like the version of her people usually talk about.
It doesn’t fit.
That’s what sticks with him.
That, and the other things he starts hearing, always by accident, always framed like gossip. Passed along in lowered voices, like it’s something to dissect.
Someone mentions, almost casually, that a few weeks ago a coach they know had a student who had to quit. Couldn’t afford lessons anymore. Nothing dramatic, no big future on the line, just a kid who liked to skate.
And somehow, she found out.
No announcement, no attention drawn to it. She just paid for it. A full year. Ice time, coaching, everything. Quietly enough that it only comes up because someone else had been there to witness it and talk about it after.
It doesn’t match the image people cling to.
And the more he notices it, the harder it becomes to ignore that maybe he never really knew her the way he thought he did.
So when the next competition comes, and they end up in the same city again, something has already shifted.
It isn’t resolved. Nothing about them ever is but it’s different. Quieter in some ways, heavier in others. Like there’s something sitting between them now that neither of them has tried to define, but neither of them can ignore either.
The knock on his door comes late.
Late enough that he isn’t expecting anyone. Late enough that, for a second, he considers not answering at all.
But he does.
And it’s her.
She doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t ask if she can come in. She walks past him like the decision has already been made somewhere else, sometime earlier, and this is just the follow-through. Her bag drops by the door with a soft thud, forgotten immediately.
He barely has time to process it before she turns back to him and closes the distance.
The kiss is sudden, immediate in a way that feels different from before. It catches him off guard, enough that he doesn’t respond right away. His hands hover for a second, like he’s trying to catch up, trying to understand what’s happening, what changed.
So he pulls back, just slightly, searching her face.
There’s no distance there this time. No practiced control, no careful sharpness. Just urgency. Something unguarded that looked almost unfamiliar to her features.
“Please,” she pleads.
It’s quiet. Not forceful like she had a tendency to be, but something softer, something that doesn’t fit the version of her he’s used to pushing against.
She looks at him, and for once there’s no barrier between them, no wall she put up to keep him out. No challenge at all. Just an opening, something that almost looks like it could break if he pushes too hard.
He hesitates.
“Are you sure?” he asks.
She nods, immediate, certain in a way that doesn’t leave room for further questions, and that’s enough for him.
This time, it doesn’t build the same way. There’s still intensity, still that pull between them that makes them tear each other’s clothes off, but it’s not about the heat of argument anymore. It’s not about proving anything this time. It feels more like finally giving in.
For a while, everything else falls away.
Afterwards, the room slowly comes back into focus.
The quiet settles first, filling the space where everything else had been. The faint hum of the air conditioning, the soft rustle of sheets, the distant noise from outside that had gone unnoticed before. It all returns gradually, like the world easing back in.
She doesn’t rush to leave, which surprises him. Instead, she reaches for his long-sleeved t-shirt, the one she had pulled off him earlier, and slips it on without a word. The fabric hangs loose on her frame, the sleeves falling a little bit past her hands, swallowing her in a way that feels at odds with how she usually carries herself.
At first, she settles back against the headboard beside him, her posture different now. Her back curves slightly, shoulders lowered, her legs drawn in close like she’s trying to take up less space than she normally would. The urgency that brought her here has faded completely, leaving something quieter in its place. Something that seems to be catching up with her now that there’s nothing left to keep it at a distance.
“It’s today,” she says after a while. Her voice is softer, not distant, just stripped of everything she usually layers over it. “The anniversary.”
He shifts slightly, leaning back against the headboard, his attention fixed on her. He doesn’t need to ask which one. He already knows.
She exhales slowly, the breath leaving her like she’s been holding it in for longer than she realized. Her hands rest loosely in her lap, fingers moving against each other in small, absent patterns, like she’s trying to stay anchored to something.
“I thought I’d be better at it by now,” she says. “Every year, it feels like it’s supposed to get easier.”
She pauses, her gaze drifting somewhere unfocused, not quite on anything in the room.
“It doesn’t.”
There’s no break in her voice, no visible collapse. Just a kind of quiet exhaustion, like she’s repeating something she’s had to accept more than once. He doesn’t interrupt or try to fill the space.
“I didn’t want to be alone,” she adds.
This time, her voice is quieter than he’s ever heard it. Not controlled, not sharpened into something deliberate. Just low and unguarded, like whatever strength she usually holds onto has slipped for a moment.
It unsettles him.
There’s something about the way she sits there, swallowed by his shirt, drawn in on herself, that doesn’t match the version of her he’s used to. She looks smaller like this. Not physically, but in a way that feels harder to define. Like if he looked away for too long, she might disappear back into herself entirely.
Before he really thinks it through, he reaches for her.
His hand closes gently around her ankle, the one closest to him, his touch light, almost tentative. His thumb brushes over the bone there, a quiet, grounding motion, like he’s testing whether she’s really there, or maybe trying to keep her from drifting any further away.
He doesn’t say anything.
He just stays like that, his hand resting against her, steady and present in a way that doesn’t ask for anything in return. Something about the gesture and the way he looks at her makes her continue talking.
“I used to think if I could just skate again, it would fix something,” she says, her voice distant, like she’s speaking from somewhere further back than the room they’re in. Her gaze drifts, unfocused, tracing nothing in particular. “I still could, you know? Not like before, but I could do it for fun...”
“Then why don’t you?” he asks, watching her more closely now, like he’s trying to follow something just out of reach.
“My skates are in my car,” she says after a small breath, her fingers stilling for a second before resuming their quiet movement against the fabric. “In the trunk. They’ve been there for years.” She pauses, her shoulders sinking slightly as if the admission carries more weight than she expected. “I keep thinking one day I’ll just go somewhere, lace them up, pretend it’s enough.” Her throat tightens, the words slowing. “But I never do.”
“Why?” he asks, softer this time.
She looks down at her hands, like it’s easier to say it without meeting his eyes. “I think I’m scared it won’t feel the same.”
The room seems to narrow around that. Not because of what she says, but because of what sits underneath it, unspoken but clear.
“I miss it,” she adds, more quietly now, the words slipping out before she can stop them.
There’s a slight break in her voice this time, subtle but there. She turns her head quickly, looking away like she can hide it, like he won’t notice.
He already has.
“I miss her,” she says after a moment.
He moves a little closer. Just enough to close some of the space between them, to be there without making it feel like a question or a demand.
“I built something else because I had to,” she continues, her voice quieter now, steadier in a different way. “Not because I wanted to.”
She lifts her gaze then, finally looking at him again.
He exhales slowly, the sound quiet in the stillness of the room, his gaze lingering on her a moment longer before he speaks.
“You don’t seem like you hate it,” he says, not pushing, just saying what he’s been noticing.
“I don’t hate it,” she replies, her voice softer now, steadier but still carrying that quiet weight. She shifts slightly, her fingers brushing absently over the fabric pooled around her from his shirt. “I just… don’t care about it the way I cared about skating.” She pauses, her eyes dropping for a second. “It’s not the same. It never was.”
He nods, a small movement, but real. Like something about that settles into place for him.
“You’re not what people think you are,” he says after a moment, his voice low, almost thoughtful.
She closes her eyes briefly, and something in her expression loosens, like the effort of holding everything together eases for a second. “I know,” she murmurs. Then, quieter, “don’t tell anyone.”
He shifts slightly beside her after a moment, hesitating only for a second before reaching for her, his hand resting lightly at her arm, guiding her closer. There’s nothing rushed in it, nothing demanding.
She stiffens at first, just barely, like she’s not used to being handled like this, without friction, without resistance.
But she doesn’t pull away.
He leans back, easing them down together, until her head comes to rest against his chest, his skin warm under her cheek. The contact is unfamiliar, almost jarring in its simplicity, in how unguarded it feels.
For a moment, she stays still, like she’s deciding whether to accept it.
Then her hand moves, slow and almost instinctive, finding its way to his, holding on in a way that feels more grounding than anything else.
Something in her begins to ease.
Her shoulders drop, her breathing steadies, and the tension that had been sitting just beneath the surface starts to loosen, piece by piece, until it’s no longer pressing in the same way.
Neither of them says anything.
They just stay there, the quiet settling around them, no longer heavy, just shared.
It changes something between them. In a way that's not easy to name and not in the way either of them would have expected.
Because she said too much.
Not in the sense of oversharing, not recklessly, but in a way that matters more. She let him see something unguarded, something she keeps locked down from everyone else. And once it’s out there, once someone else has seen it, there’s no pulling it back into place like it never happened.
The next time he reaches out, she doesn’t answer.
At first, it’s easy to dismiss. A missed message. A delay that stretches a little longer than usual. The kind of thing that can still be explained away if he wants to. But then it keeps happening. Messages left unread. Calls unanswered. The silence starts to feel intentional.
It becomes clearer after that.
She stops appearing where she usually would. The overlap in their schedules disappears, almost too perfectly to be coincidence. Events where they would have inevitably crossed paths, she’s suddenly absent. If he’s expected somewhere, she isn’t. If she’s there, he hears about it after.
She’s not just busy.
She’s keeping her distance.
And she does it well. Slips back into that version of herself the rest of the world recognizes without question. Composed, controlled, just out of reach. The kind of presence that doesn’t invite anything personal, doesn’t leave space for anyone to get close enough to see past it.
Like that night never happened.
It doesn’t sit right with him so he doesn’t let it go.
He follows her on Instagram.
It’s a small thing, technically. Just a click. But not for them. Not with the way people watch, the way everything they do gets picked apart within minutes. It doesn’t go unnoticed.
He doesn’t stop there.
He starts interacting. Nothing obvious, nothing that can be turned into a headline on its own. A comment here, a reaction there. Subtle enough to pass as casual, but consistent enough to mean something.
Enough to show he’s not pretending she isn’t there.
People notice that too, but it doesn’t change anything.
She still doesn’t respond, doesn’t acknowledge it in any way that can be seen. No replies, no reactions, not even the smallest sign that she’s noticed.
Like he isn’t there at all.
So he tries something else.
On the ice.
At first, it isn’t even a decision. Just small shifts that slip in without him fully noticing. A moment held a fraction longer than it should be. A glance that doesn’t break as quickly. Movements that stretch just past the point of precision, like he’s testing the edges of something he usually keeps tightly contained.
It doesn’t look like much from the outside but it feels different.
Then it becomes intentional.
He starts adjusting pieces of his program. Not enough to change its structure, not enough for it to be called something new, but enough that the rhythm of it shifts. The control is still there, the technical elements still clean, but there’s something else woven through it now. Something less predictable. Less contained.
He allows space for uncertainty.
The commentators pick up on it first, their tone shifting as they try to name what’s changed. They talk about range, about depth, about something evolving in his skating that hadn’t been there before. The language becomes more speculative, more attentive.
The audience reacts differently too.
There are moments where the applause comes faster, louder. Others where the arena goes quiet in a way that feels heavier, more focused. Like they’re watching more closely now, waiting for something they can’t quite define.
From the outside, it looks like progress.
But she’s still not there.
Not in the stands where he can catch her without trying. Not lingering at the edges of the rink, half out of sight but still present enough to matter. If she’s watching at all, she’s made sure he won’t know.
And that absence settles in, quiet but constant.
Weeks pass like that and nothing changes.
So he resorts to desperate measures, because these are desperate times.
“Where are you guys standing?” the interviewer asks, watching him closely now.
He pauses, pondering what he’s about to do.
“She was right,” he says, like it’s simple.
That changes the direction of it immediately.
“She was?” The question is uncertain.
He exhales quietly, his gaze dipping for a second before returning, steadier now.
“About my skating. About how I carry it.” His tone stays even, not defensive, not dismissive. “I didn’t like hearing it. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t true.”
The interviewer leans in slightly, sensing the shift. “And what about what you said about her?”
This time, the pause stretches a little longer. He doesn’t look away.
“I was wrong,” he says. “I didn’t know her.”
There’s no hesitation in it, no attempt to soften or redirect. Just a clear acknowledgment of something he’s already worked through on his own.
“I thought I did,” he continues. “Or I thought I understood what I was seeing.” A small breath, steady, controlled. “I didn’t.”
The room feels quieter now, the conversation no longer sitting on the surface.
“She’s not what people think,” he continues. “She’s kind and she cares. More than most people I’ve met in this sport.”
He stops for a second, like there’s something else there he hasn’t decided whether to give away. Then he does.
“She’s probably the most amazing woman I’ve ever met.”
He doesn’t try to expand on it, doesn’t dress it up into something less than it is because at this point, he’s not really speaking to the interviewer anymore and everyone can see it.
“I shouldn’t have said what I said,” he finishes. “About her. I know that now.”
The silence that follows isn’t awkward. He doesn’t try to fill it, doesn’t backtrack or reframe anything.
He just leaves it there for her to hear.
Now, all he had to do was wait.
Something about what he said and the way he said it tightens in her chest before she can stop it, a reaction she doesn’t like, doesn’t want to sit with long enough to understand. So she doesn’t.
She does what she always does when something gets too close.
She reacts.
He’s exactly where she expects him to be. It’s late, the rink empty, the overhead lights dimmed just like the night they first kissed, leaving parts of the ice in shadow. The sound of his blades cuts cleanly through the quiet, echoing off the walls in a way that makes the space feel larger than it is.
He doesn’t hear her come in. Not until her voice cuts across the rink.
“What the hell were you thinking?”
It breaks through everything. Sharp enough that he falters mid-step, his blade catching for a split second before he recovers, the rhythm gone just like that.
He turns.
She’s already moving toward the boards, her pace quick, controlled only in the sense that she hasn’t started shouting yet. There’s nothing restrained about the way she looks, though. Whatever brought her here, she didn’t bother hiding it.
“You don’t get to do that,” she continues, her voice carrying easily in the empty space. “You don’t get to go on record and what? Rewrite everything now?”
He doesn’t answer right away, just stands there, still in the middle of the ice, still stunned, watching her like he’s trying to read past the anger, past the way she’s holding herself together.
“Say something,” she snaps.
He doesn’t rush his words, doesn’t try to fill the space with explanations or excuses.
“I meant it,” he says.
That only sharpens her fury further.
“Get off the ice,” she commands, her voice tightening. “I don’t want to talk to you like this.”
There’s a brief pause, the kind that usually leads to movement, to him doing what she asked.
But he doesn’t head for the exit.
Instead, he pushes backwards, gliding a little further back across the ice, just enough to put more distance between them.
Her eyes narrow immediately.
“Are you serious?”
“If you want to kill me,” he says, almost too casually for the moment, “you’re going to have to catch me.”
She lets out a sharp, disbelieving laugh, the sound breaking through the empty rink as she looks around like she might actually find something to throw at him. Her hand lands on a guard within reach, and she tosses it in his direction without much aim. It slides uselessly across the ice, falling well short of him.
“Stupid— annoying, stupid— asshole!” she keeps mumbling.
He doesn’t move. He just watches her from where he is, something shifting in his expression, something lighter than before. There’s a hint of amusement there now, subtle but unmistakable.
He finds this funny.
That only makes it worse.
“Unbelievable,” she mutters, turning away abruptly, her hands coming up briefly like she’s trying to shake the frustration out of them.
For a second, it looks like she’s done. Like she’s just going to walk out and leave him there.
She takes a few steps toward the exit.
Then she stops.
Just stands there, still, her back to him.
There’s a pause, long enough to feel like something is happening beneath the surface. He watches it unfold without moving, the shift visible even from a distance. The hesitation. The thought settling in. The decision forming before she fully acts on it.
Then she keeps walking.
Out of the rink.
He frowns slightly, pushing himself closer to the boards, his attention fixed on the doorway she disappeared through. The quiet stretches again, broken only by the faint hum of the building and the residual echo of movement on ice.
A few minutes pass, then the door opens again.
She steps back in, carrying something this time.
Her skates' bag.
He stills almost immediately, the realization settling in without him needing to think it through. It worked. Not in any careful, planned way, but in the simplest one. He had quite literally rage baited her into coming back on the ice.
She doesn’t look at him as she drops onto the bench, already reaching for her shoes. The movements are quick, efficient, but there’s tension in them, something just under the surface. She pulls at the laces with more force than necessary, like the energy has to go somewhere.
“This is your fault,” she says, as if there hadn’t been a break at all, as if the argument has been running continuously in her head. “All of this is your fault.”
He leans against the opposite side barrier now, quieter, his arms resting loosely by his sides as he watches her.
“My fault?” he repeats.
“Yes,” she snaps, tightening one lace sharply before moving to the next. “You just say things like that and expect me to—”
She cuts herself off abruptly, her attention dropping fully to the second skate, hands moving faster now, almost automatic.
“You have no idea what you’re doing,” she adds, her voice lower this time, but no less intense.
“I think I do,” he says.
She looks up at him then, her expression sharp, her hands pulling the final knot tighter than necessary.
“You don’t,” she insists.
But there’s a flicker there now. Something less certain, something that doesn’t hold quite as firmly as everything else she’s been saying.
She stands before it can settle, before she can linger on it too long.
And then she moves toward the ice.
Not slowly, not carefully. Just forward, like if she gives herself even a second to think about it, she won’t go through with it at all.
The blade meets the ice first.
Careful. Tentative.
Then her weight follows, shifting forward almost before she can think better of it, and suddenly she’s there, fully on, the familiar resistance beneath her feet, solid and real in a way she hadn’t let herself feel in years.
Everything else falls away.
The argument, the tension, the noise that had been sitting between them, all of it goes quiet at once, like the rink has swallowed it whole. Even him, standing there watching her, fades into the background for a second.
She doesn’t move.
She just stands there, her gaze fixed downward, like she’s afraid it might disappear if she pushes too far, like this might still be something she can lose if she isn’t careful.
Her chest rises slowly, her breath shallow, controlled.
Then she looks up.
Finds him watching her.
And something in her gives.
A small sound slips out before she can stop it, unsteady, caught between disbelief and something close to a laugh.
“God,” she breathes, like she doesn’t quite know what to do with the feeling rushing in all at once.
He’s smiling.
Not the usual kind, not the one he hides behind when they’re pushing at each other, not something meant to provoke. It’s quieter than that. Softer. Like he’s just… there with her in it.
She pushes off before she can think too much about it.
The movement isn’t perfect. There’s a slight hesitation, a lack of the sharp precision she once had, the dullness of the blades that spent too long without upkeep. But none of it matters because she can still feel it. The rhythm comes back quicker than she expects, her body remembering what her mind has been avoiding. One turn, a little unsteady, then another, stronger, more certain.
She keeps going.
He doesn’t move from where he is. He just watches.
She slows just a bit as she approaches him, her movements grounding, her edges softer now, like she’s holding onto the feeling instead of chasing it. Like she’s letting herself have it without questioning how long it will last.
And when she reaches him, she doesn’t stop the way she should.
There’s no careful slowdown, no measured control.
One second there was space between them, the next she closed it completely, crossing the distance in a single, impulsive movement that sent both of them sliding back slightly on the ice from the force of it. The sudden shift broke whatever stillness had settled around them, replacing it with something warmer, something alive.
He caught her without thinking, his hands steady at her waist as he adjusted his balance, blades scraping softly against the ice until they found their footing again. A smile broke across his face, bright and unguarded.
Her arms came up around his neck, quick and certain, pulling him down just enough as she leaned into him. There was no hesitation in it, no pause to reconsider. Just contact, immediate and real, like she needed to feel it to believe it.
She kissed him before either of them had the chance to think about it.
It isn’t angry this time. She's not trying to bury anything into it either. It's a soft 'thank you'.
There’s still intensity there, still everything they haven’t figured out or said out loud, but it’s different now. Softer in the way it settles, in the way she doesn’t pull away like she’s bracing for impact.
Like something finally loosened.
He kisses her back without hesitation, his hands wrapped around her waist, steadying her instinctively, keeping her balanced more than anything else.
When they part, it’s only by a fraction.
She stays close, her forehead resting briefly against his, her breath uneven, her eyes still slightly glassy, like the moment hasn’t fully caught up with her yet.
“This is still your fault,” she murmurs, quieter now.
He lets out a soft breath that almost turns into a laugh. “Yeah,” he says. “I figured.”
She doesn’t move away, doesn’t loosen her hold.
She just stays there, like she’s not ready to let go of any of it just yet.
They were never meant to fit. Too much ego, too much loss, too many things said at the wrong time. And still, beneath the anger and the arguments, beneath the certainty that they had already figured each other out, they stayed long enough to learn they were wrong. And what they found, in the space where all that noise fell away, was something neither of them had planned for, but neither of them was willing to let go of.
Author’s note: I don't exactly know how I feel about this yet... I think I should've made him a little whiny baby that doesn't fight back and thinks her being mean is the hottest thing on earth... OH WELL... Ideas, ideas...
i’ve been feeling this too with the AI fics. it also kinda sucks because they fill up the tags so fast, and while i’m happy that more people are contributing and making more ilia content, it’s frustrating when you’ve spent so much time and effort on your own works and then they don’t get seen.
I think in this instance it's 100% quality over quantity... I understand wanting more content and people contributing, but some of the stuff I've been seeing is lowkey unreadable 💀
You write the dark tension themes really well if yk what I mean and you said you write with music as a backbone so there’s two songs I wanted to suggest that could maybe like inspire an ilia malinin x fem!reader story
- seven minutes in heaven by mindless self indulgence (there’s a specific part of the song it’s on TikTok if u can’t tell by listening to the full song)
-right here by Chase Atlantic
-( thought of one more while writing this) church by Chase Atlantic
I like where your head’s at fr
I’m not gonna do exactly that, but I’m always down for some Chase Atlantic (love them sm) and I randomly got hit with an idea while I was watching a tiktok with Meddle About playing…
It’s giving enemies to lovers, like heavy tension, the kind where you can feel it every time they’re in the same room. She’s very femme fatale energy, important in some way, and she very much has an issue with him and is not shy about letting everyone know it.
basically… it’s gonna be messy 😭 hope it tickles your interest
i saw you calling out people for AI. are you still seeing that many AI works in Ilia x reader? i feel likr theres more now
Huh…
I haven’t really been reading the tag much lately, mostly bc work’s been a mess, but also bc yeah… I’ve been seeing more stuff that feels very AI heavy...
And just to be clear, I don’t think using AI is WRONG. Like if you use it to help with a plot you’re stuck on or to reword something you can’t quite get right, that’s fine. But it should stay as support. What it feels like now is people getting requests, pasting them into ChatGPT, and just posting whatever comes out as a fic.
And IDK, as someone still kinda starting out, it’s frustrating seeing those fics get numbers when they all feel the same. Same plots, same repetitive dialogue, no meaningful writing at all… it all blends together.
I know my writing style is specific, and I get that third person isn’t everyone’s cup of tea in a world of second person X reader fics, I’m not saying I deserve those numbers, it’s just… yeah, frustrating.
I lowkey think people should try putting a request into ChatGPT at least once, just to see what it spits out, so you can recognize it when you read something that feels off...
I’ve already blocked most of the people I think are doing this so I don’t have to see it, but idk… this stuff kinda hit me weird
Summary: She never meant to like him.
He was everything she had already decided she didn’t like, too talented, too admired, too sure of himself. But one snowy trip, one inconvenient laugh, and one very bad decision later, she finds herself caught in something she doesn’t quite understand.
What starts as a one night stand turns into something softer, deeper, and far more dangerous than either of them planned. Because somewhere between stolen kisses, late-night conversations, and a string of almosts, they build something real, while both quietly convincing themselves it’s nothing at all.
My Masterlist
Warnings: no use of y/n, one-sided enemies to lovers(?), drinking, swearing, mentions of sex, sex is implied, mature themes, very little angst, a lot of drama, she has some really deep commitment-not-feeling-like-she-is-enough issues, SITUATIONSHIP!!! (it's a trigger warning for me), reckless young people, english is not my first language (I DID NOT PROOFREAD THIS AT ALL!!! Also, it had so many words I couldn't fit all the spaces for the time jumps)
Author’s note: GUYS SHE FEELS REALLY NEURODIVERGENT!!! I didn't mean for it, it just happened!!! Also, this is HUGE and it feels a little all over the place, I think I overdid it this time. Tell me what you think. (I think A Couple Minutes is still my favorite child)
17k words. WTF???
The first thing she notices about him is that he laughs with his whole body.
It is deeply inconvenient.
She had already done the work. Thoroughly, efficiently, with the kind of quiet decisiveness she prides herself on. Before this trip, before this cabin, before this very moment where her boots are tracking melting snow across expensive wooden floors, she had formed a complete and perfectly reasonable opinion of him.
She does not like him.
Not hate. She is not a dramatic person. She reserves hate for things like delayed flights and poorly sharpened blades. But she had placed him neatly into a mental folder labeled insufferable in a very specific way.
Talented, obviously. No one could argue that unless they had never seen a pair of skates in their life.
Attractive, which was frankly unnecessary. The talent should have been enough.
And, most importantly, aware of both facts in a way that felt excessive. Indulgent. A little too polished, a little too intentional, like he knew exactly the effect he had and chose not to soften it.
But even that was not the real reason.
The real reason was the spectacle of him.
The nickname, for one. She refused to say it out loud, but she has seen it enough times while mindlessly scrolling that it has burned itself into her consciousness. The kind of name you give yourself when the world is already applauding and you decide to clap along.
And the arrogance. The loud, and obnoxious arrogance. Carried into the ice with him like part of the choreography. The kind of confidence that comes from knowing, not hoping, that you are better than most of the people around you.
Which, to be fair, he is.
Still.
It would not kill him to be a little humble about it. To accept the applause instead of anticipating it. To let the titles exist without turning them into a personality.
Every time she accidentally stumbles across a clip of him online, she rolls her eyes with impressive consistency. Usually at the username, sometimes at the stupid shirts that carry the stupid nickname.
Like, relax, dude. Everyone has seen the quad axel. History has been made. You can rest now.
And yet, here he is.
Ilia Malinin.
Leaning against the banister of a staircase so grand it feels mildly offensive, like the house itself is showing off. He looks entirely at ease in it, which somehow makes it worse. One shoulder against the polished wood, one foot slightly crossed over the other, as if he has always belonged in places like this.
She drops her duffel a little harder than necessary, fingers already working at the zipper of her coat, her expression settling into something that could generously be described as unimpressed.
The cold still clings to her, sharp in her lungs, her cheeks tingling from the sudden shift in temperature. For a moment, she focuses on that instead of him. It feels safer.
“Finally you’re here!”
Alysa appears like a burst of sunlight, all warmth and movement and immediate affection. It is impossible not to soften in response. She barely has time to brace herself before she is being pulled into a hug.
“It was a bitch to get here,” she says, smiling despite herself. “But here I am.”
But her attention drifts, traitorously, back to the staircase.
He is still there, still in the middle of a conversation with two other people, his posture relaxed in a way that suggests he has nowhere else to be. Someone says his name. He looks up.
Not at her, which is almost worse. Just up, reacting to something said.
And then he laughs.
It catches her off guard in a way she does not appreciate because it is not the laugh she expected.
It is not controlled or calculated or performed. It is bright, immediate, unguarded. It spills out of him like he forgot, just for a second, that he is someone people watch. His shoulders move with it, his head tipping back slightly, the sound carrying just enough to reach her even though she cannot hear the joke.
It is careless.
It is also genuine.
It does not match the version of him she has so carefully constructed.
And that is, frankly, very annoying.
She narrows her eyes at him, as if that might fix it. As if she can will him back into the category he belongs in. He does not cooperate.
Inconvenient.
The cabin is too large for any group of people to feel truly contained.
It is the kind of large that borders on unreasonable. The kind that makes you slightly suspicious of the person who owns it. There are nearly as many rooms as there are people, and they are expecting to be 14 by nightfall, which feels excessive in both directions. The couples have already claimed their spaces with quiet efficiency, the rest of them scattering across the remaining rooms like it is some sort of unspoken game. No one beside the couples had to share. That’s how absurdly huge the place was.
She does not remember whose house it is. Someone mentioned it in passing, something about a family place, something about “we barely use it anyway,” which is the sort of sentence that can only be said by someone with an alarming amount of money. It was their “winter house,” which quietly implied the existence of a summer one, a spring one, and, somehow, an autumn one too.
She could get lost here.
Not metaphorically. Physically. She is almost certain there are hallways she has not seen yet, corners of the house that exist independently from the rest of it, like small, forgotten worlds.
Sound behaves strangely in a place like this. Voices echo just enough to blur together. Music travels in odd directions, louder in some rooms than others for no logical reason. There is always movement somewhere. Someone in the kitchen opening and closing cabinets like it is a hobby. Someone stretched across the couch, half-listening to a conversation happening three feet away. Someone by the window, watching the snow fall with the kind of quiet focus usually reserved for important decisions.
It feels alive. Restless.
She drifts in the middle of it.
It is, without question, her strongest skill.
Not skating. Not anything that could be measured or scored. This. The art of existing in spaces without ever being fully claimed by them. She moves from conversation to conversation with practiced ease, offering just enough to be included, never enough to be pinned down. A well-timed comment, a carefully placed joke, something clever enough to earn a laugh and light enough to leave no residue.
People like her, which is useful.
She is not competition for any of them. Not really. Most of them live in a world where every movement is analyzed, compared, ranked. She exists just outside of that. Close enough to belong, distant enough to be harmless.
She skates because she loves it. Because there is something quietly satisfying about landing something clean, about feeling her body align with the movement in a way that makes sense.
No one is watching her here. Not in the way that matters.
Until…
“You have a way of slipping out of conversations unnoticed.”
She startles, only slightly, turning her head to find Ilia standing beside her like he had always been there.
She had been in the middle of a conversation she did not ask to join, something about jump technique that had quickly spiraled into a detailed breakdown she had no intention of following. She had already begun her exit strategy, inching backward, nodding at appropriate intervals, preparing to vanish.
And somehow, he noticed.
She studies him for a second, weighing her options. She could be polite. She could be dismissive. She could ignore him entirely.
She settles, as she often does, on humor.
“It’s a talent,” she says.
His mouth tilts slightly, amused. “I imagine it takes a lot of effort.”
“It does.”
She delivers it simply, taking a sip of her drink as if that concludes the interaction. It should. It is a perfectly reasonable stopping point.
It is not enough for him.
He keeps looking at her. Not intensely, not in a way that feels invasive, but expectant. Like he has asked a question she has not fully answered.
Which, technically, she has not.
She exhales, just slightly, already annoyed that she is about to indulge this.
“You have to be subtle about it,” she continues. “You can’t just leave. That’s obvious. People notice obvious things.”
“Of course.”
“So you start by slowly distancing yourself. Half a step at a time. Maintain eye contact, nod occasionally, contribute just enough to stay relevant.”
He is watching her like this is the most interesting thing anyone has said all day.
“And then,” she says, lowering her voice slightly as if she is revealing something classified, “you identify a shared interest between two people in the group. Something specific enough to hook them. You point it out, casually. Let them take it from there.”
“And while they’re distracted…” she continues.
“You disappear.” He finished.
There is a beat before he grins at her like her explanation satisfied him deeply.
There it is again. That same unguarded, full-bodied expression that makes something in her chest tighten in a way she does not appreciate.
“Smart,” he says.
“It took me years to perfect,” she replies, lifting her glass again, deliberately avoiding his eyes this time.
Because if she looks at him too long, she might start noticing things she has already decided not to notice.
And she is trying, very hard, to remain a reasonable person.
The first days pass in bright, careless fragments that refuse to sit still long enough to be examined.
Cold air that bites just enough to feel exhilarating. Laughter that comes easier, louder, sharper in the thin mountain air. Mornings where the snow reflects so much light it feels almost aggressive, like the world is insisting they wake up and participate. Afternoons that blur into one another, everyone splitting into clusters that rearrange constantly. Someone always has an idea. Someone always falls. Someone is always filming, because of course they are.
At some point, they go skiing.
A group of figure skaters attempting skiing is, objectively, one of the funniest things she has ever witnessed.
There is an immediate, unspoken overconfidence that spreads through them, as if proficiency on ice should naturally translate to competence on anything even vaguely slippery. It does not. Not even slightly. There is a lot of falling. A lot of very confident starts that end in deeply humbling finishes. She spends most of the time laughing, occasionally participating, mostly observing with the quiet satisfaction of someone who did not expect excellence and is therefore not disappointed.
Later, in smaller groups, they go on walks that turn into wandering. Someone finds a frozen lake, perfectly smooth, impossibly inviting, like it has been waiting for them specifically.
And, mysteriously, despite this being a trip supposedly dedicated to rest and relaxation, every single one of them has brought skates.
Of course they have.
It would be more surprising if they had not.
Skating there feels different. Lighter. Like something essential has been removed. No judges. No scores. No coaches. No choreography. No one watching with a critical eye, waiting for mistakes.
She knows this feeling well. It is the only way she has ever known skating. For most of them, it is new so they become a little unhinged about it.
There is something reckless in the way they move, testing things they should never attempt in a rink, let alone on a frozen lake in the middle of nowhere. Banned moves. Ill-advised combinations. Laughing through near-falls, encouraging each other into decisions that would absolutely get them scolded anywhere else.
It is, undeniably, fun.
They are young. There is no one to stop them.
Every night folds into something that feels like a party, even when it is not trying to be. Music playing from somewhere. The fireplace always lit, always drawing people in. Conversations overlapping, shifting, dissolving into new ones. And when they are just drunk enough, someone inevitably decides that dancing is a good idea.
It rarely is, but that does not stop them.
Ilia exists within all of it in a way she cannot quite pin down.
Everywhere and nowhere at the same time.
She notices him in pieces, like her brain has decided to collect details without asking for permission. The way he ties his laces twice. Always twice, never once, never three times, like there is a rule there she is not aware of. The way he leans forward when someone speaks, like he is physically pulled toward their words, like listening is an active thing for him. The way he does not interrupt.
That one unsettles her the most.
It dismantles her theory in a way that feels almost personal.
Because she is good at reading people. Very good. It is one of the few things she trusts about herself without hesitation. She categorizes, assesses, understands. It makes the world easier to navigate.
And people like him, people who are constantly watched and praised and known, tend to behave in predictable ways. They take up space. They fill silences. They expect attention and, more often than not, receive it.
He does not.
He makes space.
Which is already confusing but it is made worse by the realisation that he seems to make space for her.
No. She corrects herself almost immediately.
Especially for her.
It starts small enough that she can pretend it is nothing. A question directed at her when it could have been directed at anyone else. A comment that follows something she said, not in a way that overtakes it, but builds on it. A glance across the room that lingers just a second too long to be accidental.
She tells herself she is imagining it. She tells herself a lot of things.
There is one night, in particular, that refuses to be dismissed so easily.
She ends up pulled into a conversation with a small group, six people standing in a loose circle, drinks in hand, the topic shifting every few minutes as conversations like that tend to do. He is part of it, of course. He often is. It is a good conversation. Easy. She participates, contributes, lets herself relax into it without thinking too much.
She does not notice the shift immediately.
“Oh right,” he says suddenly, turning to the tall brunette guy on his right. “You and Alex spent that summer in Rome, didn’t you? Jeremy was just there last week.”
His attention moves smoothly, effortlessly, to the guy on his left as he brings him into it.
“It’s such an amazing city.”
Alex lights up immediately, turning toward Jeremy. “It really is. There’s this—”
And just like that, the conversation redirects. She catches on instantly.
“Amazing,” Jeremy agrees, already fully engaged. “There was this little restaurant outside of the hotel that had the best pizza—”
The circle shifts. Closes slightly. The focus narrows between the two of them, the rest of the group naturally leaning in.
And him… He takes a step back. Subtle. Practiced.
Her technique.
She watches it happen with a mix of disbelief and something dangerously close to admiration. The way he disengages without disrupting anything, the way the conversation continues seamlessly without him, like he was never essential to it in the first place.
His eyes find hers. There is a small smile on his lips, something quiet and amused, like he is asking a question without saying it.
‘Are you seeing this?’
She is. She absolutely is.
She steps back too, mirroring him without thinking, leaving the circle to collapse in on itself as they slip out of it. No one stops them. No one notices.
They move toward the balcony, the cold air meeting them as soon as the door opens. Outside, another small group is gathered around the fire pit, their voices distant enough to blend into background noise.
It is quieter here.
“Did I do good?” he asks, turning to her with a grin, beer still in his hand, his arms slightly apart like he is presenting something.
She looks at him for a moment, really looks this time, and feels something shift again, something she is starting to recognize as trouble.
“I must say,” she replies, thoughtful in a way that is only slightly exaggerated, “the student has become the master.”
He reacts immediately, closing his fist and pulling it down in a small, dramatic celebration that is so unnecessarily enthusiastic it catches her off guard.
She laughs.
And this time, it comes easily.
They settle by the railing without really deciding to.
It just happens, the way most things between them seem to. One second they are standing near the door, the next they are leaning forward slightly, elbows resting against the cold wood, the night opening up in front of them like something carefully staged.
The forest stretches out below, frozen into stillness, every branch traced in pale silver. The snow reflects the starlight just enough to make everything visible without fully revealing it. Above them, the sky is clear, scattered with stars that look almost deliberate, like someone placed them there for effect.
It is quiet in a way that feels complete. The kind of quiet that does not ask to be filled.
Still, they fill it.
It is very cold. Cold enough that it lingers at the edges of their awareness. Enough that standing just a little too close makes sense. Enough that when their arms brush, neither of them moves away.
“So,” he says, glancing at her, “how do you end up in a trip like this?”
She huffs a quiet laugh, tucking her chin slightly into the collar of her sweater. “Excellent question. I ask myself that at least twice a day here.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I,” she replies. “This is very much a ‘how did I end up here’ situation.”
He waits, patient in a way she is starting to recognize as entirely genuine.
She sighs, softening just a little. “Alysa, mostly.”
“That makes sense,” he says. “How do you know her?”
She shifts her weight, watching her breath fade into the air as she speaks. “We ended up at the same rink for a while. Years ago. I don’t actually remember how I got there in the first place.”
“And you just… stayed friends?”
“Yeah,” she says, a small smile pulling at her lips. “She’s kind of hard to get rid of. She decided we were friends almost immediately, I didn’t really get a say in it.”
He laughs softly.
“She just has that energy,” she adds. “You either go along with it or you get dragged anyway. It’s easier to cooperate.”
“And now you’re here.”
“And now I’m here,” she echoes, gesturing vaguely toward the massive cabin behind them.
He studies her for a moment, then asks, almost casually, “You ever thought about competing?”
The question settles between them, heavier than the conversation has been so far.
She looks back out at the forest, her fingers tightening slightly against the railing.
“I mean,” she starts, then stops, then tries again, lighter this time, “you’re asking that like it was ever a real option.”
“It could have been.”
She shakes her head, quick and certain. “No. Not really.”
There is no self-pity in it. Just fact, delivered plainly. But there is something else underneath, something quieter, something she does not dress up or explain.
“I was never…” She hesitates, searching for the right word, then settles on the simplest one. “Good enough.”
He does not respond immediately.
She shrugs, like she can physically shake the weight of it off. “I liked it. I still do. But there’s a difference between liking something and… you know, being built for it.”
He turns toward her fully now, his expression shifting into something more serious than she has seen before.
“I think you’re wrong.”
She almost smiles at that. Almost.
“That’s very nice of you.”
“I’m not being nice.”
“That’s even nicer,” she replies, deflecting easily, but he does not let it go.
“I’ve watched you,” he insists.
That makes her glance at him again, sharper this time.
“Not in a weird way,” he adds quickly, a hint of a smile returning. “Just… you don’t skate like someone who’s just passing time.”
She looks away again, suddenly very aware of the space between them, of how little there actually is.
“You move like you enjoy it,” he continues. “Like you’re not trying to prove anything.”
She exhales, slow, controlled. “That’s because I’m not trying to prove anything.”
“Exactly.”
She shakes her head again, but it is softer now, less certain. “That’s not enough.”
“It could be,” he says, simply.
There is something in his voice that makes it difficult to dismiss. Not forceful. Not insistent. Just… sure.
“You’re good. Actually good, I’m not just saying it.”
For a moment, she genuinely does not know what to do with that. She lets out a small laugh, shaking her head as she looks back out at the trees, as if they might offer a more manageable topic.
“Well,” she says, after a second, “it’s a bit late now anyway.”
“For what?”
“For suddenly discovering hidden potential and launching a competitive career,” she replies. “I think that window has… closed. Firmly.”
He leans slightly closer, resting more of his weight against the railing. “You’re not that old.”
“I am, in skating years,” she says. “Which are unfortunately very real and deeply unfair.”
He huffs a quiet laugh.
“But that doesn’t mean you couldn’t…”
“It does,” she cuts in, though not unkindly. “And that’s okay.”
She turns her head slightly, just enough to look at him again, her expression softer now, steadier.
“I like it this way,” she says. “I get to enjoy it. No pressure, no expectations. Just… skating.”
There is a quiet certainty in that. Not defensive. Not regretful.
Just true.
He watches her for a moment, then nods slowly. “Okay.”
She smiles, small but real. “Okay.”
They fall into a comfortable silence for a second, before he felt the need to speak again.
“For what is worth, I think you are a beautiful skater.”
The words are different this time, his tone is deeper, rougher in his throat. Lower. Like he is admitting to a secret.
When she looks at him, really looks, he is already looking at her. Not past her, not around her. At her. Focused in a way that makes everything else feel distant.
He is close.
Closer than he should be. Close enough that she can see the exact moment he means what he says. And something in her shifts. A quiet, irreversible tilt, like something falling into place before she has time to question it.
She does not think.
Which is unusual for her.
She just… closes the space.
The kiss is small. Careful in a way she did not expect from herself. Like a question she only realizes she has been carrying once it is already being asked.
She does not reach for him. He does not pull her closer. Their hands stay where they are, anchored to themselves, as if touching any more than this might tip the moment into something heavier than it is ready to be.
So it is just their lips. Just contact.
Warmth, startling against the cold that had settled into her skin. The faint, indistinct taste of whatever they had been drinking, something soft and lingering. The kind of closeness that feels suspended, like it exists outside of time, separate from everything that came before it and everything that will come after.
Then they pull back.
Not far.
Just enough to see each other.
Her eyes open slowly, like she is not entirely sure what she is going to find, and for a brief, irrational moment she considers the possibility that she imagined it. That she somehow constructed the entire thing out of the way he looked at her, the way he said those words, the way the night felt too still to be ordinary.
But he is there.
Close.
Looking at her in a way that feels just as real as the kiss did.
There is something different in his expression now. Not surprise, not confusion. Something steadier. Like he is processing it, yes, but not questioning it.
She becomes abruptly aware of everything at once.
The cold. The silence. The exact distance between them. The fact that her heart is beating in a way that feels excessive for someone who prides herself on composure.
She wonders, briefly, if she should say something.
She does not.
Because anything she could say would feel smaller than what just happened.
So she just looks at him and waits.
There is a split second where she is absolutely certain he is going to kiss her again.
She sees it before it happens, or almost happens. The slight shift in his posture, the way his gaze drops briefly to her lips and then back to her eyes, like he is checking if the moment still belongs to them. Like he is asking, silently this time, if he is allowed.
He leans in, just enough to make it obvious and she does not move away.
If anything, she thinks she might be leaning in too. Just slightly. Just enough to meet him halfway, like they have already agreed on this without needing to say it out loud.
It feels inevitable.
But before it can happen the door swings open behind them.
“There you are—”
Alysa’s voice cuts through the moment, bright and immediate, completely out of sync with everything that had just been happening. The warmth of it, the normalcy, the sheer volume of it compared to the quiet they had been standing in.
They jump apart.
Not gracefully at all. It is immediate and obvious, like two people who absolutely should not have been doing whatever they were just doing.
Which, to be fair, feels accurate.
She steps back too quickly, nearly hitting the railing behind her, her hand flying out to steady herself as if that will somehow make the situation less incriminating. He clears his throat, looking away for half a second before composing himself in a way that is just slightly too deliberate.
“I’ve been looking for you everywhere,” Alysa continues, stepping fully onto the balcony, blissfully unaware of the exact timing of her entrance. “We’re starting a game inside and…”
She stops mid-sentence. Her eyes flick between them, quick, observant in that way that means she has already understood far more than either of them would prefer. There is a pause, just long enough to become unbearable.
She feels heat rush to her face again, immediate and unhelpful.
There is absolutely no way this looks normal. There is absolutely no explanation that would make this look normal.
There is a beat.
Then Alysa smiles. Not wide, not teasing, not yet. Just… knowing. The kind of expression that says she has already pieced everything together and is currently deciding how much trouble she wants to cause with that information.
“Oh,” Alysa says.
And then she says nothing else. Which makes it, somehow, significantly worse.
The silence stretches for half a second too long, filled with implications she does not have the emotional bandwidth to unpack in front of an audience. She exhales sharply, lifting a hand to pinch the bridge of her nose as if she can physically press the situation into something manageable.
Of course this is how it happens.
Of course.
“Shut up,” she mutters, already moving, not waiting for Alysa to actually say anything. She places both hands on the girl’s shoulders and steers her back inside with more urgency than necessary, guiding her through the doorway like she is handling a situation that could escalate at any moment.
Alysa lets herself be pushed, which is suspicious in itself.
“I didn’t even—” she starts, already laughing.
“You were about to,” she cuts in, ushering her further into the room. “I could feel it.”
“That’s unfair, I was going to be very respectful.”
“Absolutely not. I know you.”
She nudges the door shut behind her, the soft click feeling louder than it should, like the moment outside is being sealed off, contained on the other side of the glass.
But before she fully turns away, she glances back.
She does not mean to. It just happens.
And he is still there.
Standing where she left him, one hand resting against the railing, looking at her through the glass like the interruption did not quite land for him the way it did for her. Like the moment is still lingering, unfinished.
Their eyes meet again.
There is something unspoken in it. For a second, the noise inside fades, the warmth of the room and Alysa’s presence and the inevitable questions waiting for her all slipping into the background.
It is just that look.
Then someone calls her name from deeper in the house, loud and impatient, and the moment breaks properly this time.
She turns away but the feeling does not.
She avoids him after that.
She doesn’t try to be subtle, she does it with intention, with strategy, with the kind of commitment she usually reserves for things that actually matter.
Again, he is being deeply annoying.
It is deeply annoying that she fell for something as simple, as ridiculous, as “you’re a beautiful skater.” She’s heard compliments before. Plenty. Most exaggerated, some polite, all easy to brush off.
That one wasn’t.
That one landed somewhere inconvenient and stayed.
Maybe because the compliments she’s used to come from friends, or from her sixty-five-year-old coach who knows she’s just happy to be there, not chasing anything bigger. They’re kind, but they don’t carry weight.
His did.
Figure skating royalty saying it like it meant something was entirely different.
Of course Alysa had told her her spins were beautiful once or twice. And she had believed her, in the easy, uncomplicated way you believe a friend who wants you to feel good. It had been kind, sincere, but light. Something that settled on the surface and stayed there.
But this was different.
He had looked at her like he was seeing something worth noticing, worth saying out loud. Not out of encouragement, not out of habit, but because he actually meant it. And that tone, quiet and certain, gave the words a weight they had no right to carry. It didn’t help that it was him saying it. Him, with those bright blue eyes and that effortless way of holding her attention without even trying. That part mattered more than she would like to admit.
So no, it didn’t land the same.
And, somehow, the worst part is how much she wants to kiss him again.
Which is, frankly, unacceptable.
And even worse than that is how it happened. The way he got her to that point. Slowly, patiently, without trying too hard or too obviously. She had arrived here with a fully formed opinion of him, one she had trusted, one she had defended internally with impressive consistency.
And now… Now she cannot stand too close to him without feeling like her brain is short-circuiting.
It makes her want to hit her head against a wall. Not metaphorically. Literally. Just to see if maybe it would reset something. Restore her to a version of herself that made sense.
It would not.
So she adapts.
If he is in the kitchen, she suddenly has no need for food. If he mentions going to the lake, she develops a very convincing headache. If there is even a slight chance of ending up alone with him, she positions herself strategically next to Alysa, who, while many things, is not subtle and therefore an excellent buffer.
It works.
Objectively, she is doing an excellent job.
Avoiding him with precision. Keeping things light. Acting like nothing happened.
Her body disagrees.
Her brain is even worse, replaying that moment with a persistence that feels almost deliberate. The way he looked at her, the way it felt, the way it could feel if she stopped interrupting it halfway through. It loops at the most inconvenient times, making her wonder what it would be like to actually let it happen. Properly.
Still, in practice, she keeps her distance with impressive consistency.
Mostly.
Because every now and then, she catches him looking at her. Not obviously. Not in a way that would draw attention or invite comment.
But she notices.
Small, quiet glances. Something almost hesitant in them. Not quite confusion, not quite frustration. Just something that looks almost a little sad.
Which is another thing she categorizes as annoying.
Because it pulls at something in her she would rather keep under control. The part of her that wants to step forward instead of back, to meet him halfway instead of dodging every moment that might become something real.
But that part doesn’t get to decide.
Her logical side is louder. More practiced. It steps in immediately, reins everything back in, reminds her why distance is safer, why keeping things contained is the smarter choice.
So she keeps avoiding him.
Even when every other part of her wants to do the exact opposite.
And then there is that night.
The group spills outside again, like it has become a ritual they did not formally agree on.
There is a fire pit at the end of a long dock behind the house, the wood dark against the snow that surrounds it. The space is open, but covered, shielding them from the falling snow while doing absolutely nothing to block the cold. Large outdoor couches and chairs are arranged around the fire, layered with blankets that everyone fights over in a way that is only half-serious.
Someone insists, once again, that it is “cozy.” Someone else is already opening a second bottle of wine.
The sky is pale with moonlight, the forest beyond them quiet in that particular, heavy way snow seems to enforce.
She is careful at first. She chooses a seat with intention. Keeps a reasonable distance. Engages in conversations that do not involve him.
It works until it doesn’t.
Because at some point, after a few glasses of wine, the edges of her careful planning soften. Her awareness blurs just enough that when he sits beside her, she does not immediately register it.
And by the time she does it feels too late to make it obvious.
So she stays.
Soon enough people start leaving. Slowly, in pairs and small groups, voices fading as they retreat back into the warmth of the cabin. The fire burns lower. The conversations thin out.
“Okay, okay…” Alysa says, laughing loudly, still trying to catch her breath as she pushes herself up from her chair. “That’s enough for me for tonight.”
The three of them had been stuck in the same ridiculous loop for the past five minutes, arguing over something completely insignificant that had somehow escalated into full dramatics. He had been insisting he was right with far too much confidence, she had been dismantling his argument point by point with exaggerated seriousness, and Alysa had been losing it at both of them, contributing absolutely nothing except laughter.
It had been easy.
Too easy.
She watches as Alysa stretches, already half-turned toward the house, clearly done with the cold and the conversation.
She should go too. She knows she should.
“I’m going to bed,” Alysa continues, then pauses, her eyes flicking between them in a way that immediately makes an implication. There’s a look there. Not subtle. Not innocent.
Entirely too aware.
“And the two of you…” she adds, lifting a finger in mock warning, her smile widening just slightly, “behave.”
She doesn’t wait for a response, just turns and heads inside.
The door closes behind her with a soft but definitive click.
And suddenly… it’s quiet. The kind of quiet that feels different from before. Heavier. More noticeable.
Alysa’s words settle slowly for her.
The two of you.
She looks around, almost instinctively, like she might have miscounted, like someone else might still be lingering nearby, just out of sight.
There isn’t.
The fire crackles softly. The cold presses in. The space that had felt full just moments ago now feels… open.
Empty, except for him.
Except for them.
And the realization lands properly this time, sinking in with uncomfortable clarity.
They are alone.
Completely.
Oh no.
“One more?” he asks casually, already leaning forward to reach for the bottle.
She watches him for a second.
This is a bad idea. A very obvious, very avoidable bad idea.
Which, unfortunately, makes it slightly more appealing.
She exhales.
“Sure,” she says. “I’m making excellent decisions tonight.”
“Good,” he replies, smiling lightly. “I’d hate to drink alone.”
“Happy to be of service.”
She lifts her glass slightly in his direction, her other arm still tucked securely beneath the blanket. The cold is persistent, creeping through layers, made bearable only by the fire and the shared warmth of fabric and proximity.
He settles back beside her.
Close. Not touching. Not quite. But close enough.
She glances at him, and this time she does not look away immediately.
He looks… unfair.
Not just attractive in a general, obvious way, but specifically right for this exact moment, as if the whole night had been arranged around him. The beanie sits low on his head, making the loose blond strands escaping from underneath it look softer somehow, like something that happened by mistake. His cheeks and nose are pink from the cold, the kind of thing that makes her want to stare longer than is socially acceptable, and his lips are faintly stained purple from the wine, which is a detail she absolutely does not need to be noticing and yet cannot stop noticing.
Even his eyes seem different in that situation. The fire catches in them and turns that impossible blue into something warmer, quieter, less sharp. Less like the version of him the world gets and more like something private she was never supposed to see.
It annoys her, how much that does to her.
Because it is not just that he looks good. It is that he looks good in a way that feels personal, like the night has conspired to make him specifically her problem. All soft winter colors and flushed skin and quiet eyes, sitting beside her like this is normal, like he has any right to look that devastating while doing absolutely nothing.
If winter, as a season, ever needed to sell itself as something good, it could use him. That’s what he looked like right now, the posterboy for winter itself.
And she would buy the hell out of anything he was selling.
“You’re staring,” he says, pointing it out without hesitation.
She does not even attempt to deny it.
Alcohol does that to her. It softens the edges of her restraint, makes things slip out easier than they should, makes honesty feel less like a risk and more like an inevitability. So instead of deflecting, instead of pretending she hadn’t been very obviously looking at him like he was something worth studying, she just smiles.
“Sorry,” she murmurs, her voice softer than usual, a little slower too. “I’m getting drunker and my head’s getting louder.”
He tilts his head slightly, studying her. “Anything I could know?”
She lets out a quiet breath, looking down into her glass like the answer might be somewhere in it.
“Many things you shouldn’t,” she says, a small smile pulling at her lips, but there’s not much humor in it.
He doesn’t push.
And that, somehow, is the worst part.
Because he could make it easy for her. He could laugh it off, say something light, give her an exit back into the version of herself that keeps things controlled and uncomplicated. He could meet her halfway in the deflection. But he doesn’t. He just looks at her, steady and patient, like he is willing to wait and see what she does with what she just said.
Which is dangerous.
Because her head is, in fact, loud. Too many thoughts lining up all at once, none of them particularly sensible, all of them circling back to the same thing.
Him.
She exhales slowly, watching her breath appear between them for a second before it fades.
“You’re very…” she starts, then stops, her brows pulling together slightly as she reconsiders the sentence entirely. “Inconvenient.”
His mouth twitches, amused. “That’s a first.”
“I’m not usually like this,” she says quickly, a little too quick, like she needs to clarify before he draws the wrong conclusion.
“Like what?”
She gestures vaguely between them, the blanket shifting with the movement, her hand lingering in the space like she could define it if she tried hard enough.
“This. Whatever this is.”
He glances down at the space she indicated, then back up at her, completely unfazed. “Sitting by a fire?”
“Don’t pretend you don’t know exactly what I mean,” she says immediately.
“I don’t,” he says, but there’s a hint of a smile there that makes it clear he absolutely does.
She huffs, looking away for a second, pressing her lips together like she’s trying to decide how much she’s willing to say.
Then she looks back at him.
Decided.
“I don’t get distracted like this,” she says. “Not like this. I don’t… spiral.”
“That sounds fake.”
“It’s not fake,” she insists, though the alcohol in her system is making her sound slightly less authoritative than she would prefer. “It’s just… I have a system.”
“A system,” he repeats, like he’s testing the word.
“Yes.”
“And I’ve disrupted it?”
She points at him with her glass and more emphasis to her tone. “Yes!”
“I’ll try to be less disruptive.”
“That would be deeply appreciated,” she says softly.
The fire cracks softly beside them, filling the space just enough that the silence feels chosen, not empty.
She does not notice how close they have gotten until it is already… a lot.
At some point, without marking when, she has turned fully towards him. Her body angled in, drawn in by the conversation, by him. Her legs, once neatly tucked beneath her, have shifted, now leaning in his direction, knees bent, feet resting on the couch. The blanket still drapes between them, a thin, fragile line of separation that feels more symbolic than real.
If she moved just a little closer, she could rest her legs over his.
She is very aware of that.
“There you go again,” he says, watching her with quiet amusement as she zones out again mid-conversation. “I’m starting to feel like I’m bad company.”
She huffs softly, blinking back into the moment. “You’re not,” she admits, her voice quieter now. “We’re just… really close.”
It sounds obvious when she says it. It does not feel obvious.
“Yeah, well…” he glances down briefly, then back at her, a hint of something almost sheepish in his expression. “I kind of did it on purpose.”
Her mind stutters for a second, trying to catch up, to process the simplicity of that statement and everything it implies. The way he says it like it is nothing, like it is the most natural thing in the world to want to be close to her.
The possibility is right there, impossible to ignore now.
Dangling.
She looks at him, really looks, and there is something in his expression that softens her completely. Something open. Unguarded in a way that feels almost on purpose.
One more kiss, she thinks to herself.
The thought comes fully formed, clear and undeniable, and just like before, she doesn’t give herself time to question it. If she does, she knows she’ll stop. And she doesn’t want to stop.
So she doesn’t hesitate.
She closes the distance easily, like it had been waiting to happen, like all the space between them was just temporary. Her gloved hand lifts, her thumb brushing lightly against his chin, just enough to guide his face toward hers. It’s a small touch, barely there, but it draws something out of him instantly. His lips part slightly, a quiet, uneven breath escaping like he wasn’t expecting it to affect him that much.
Her lips meet his again.
Immediately warm against the cold that still lingers around them.
For a fraction of a second, it’s soft. Careful. Like they’re both aware of how easily this could slip away again.
Then it isn’t.
Something shifts in him, quick and instinctive, like he’s not willing to risk losing it twice. His hand comes up to the side of her neck, fingers firm but not rough, grounding, certain. He pulls her closer without hesitation, closing whatever distance she left, like he’s making sure there’s no room for interruption this time.
The kiss deepens, not hesitant anymore.
It is messy in the way that real things are. A little uncoordinated, a little urgent, like neither of them planned for it to feel like this and now neither of them wants to stop. The cold disappears entirely, replaced by something that almost burns, something that makes everything else feel distant and irrelevant.
She leans into him without thinking, the world narrowing down to this one point of contact, this one moment that feels too full to hold.
It tastes like wine, like warmth, like something fleeting and dangerous and entirely worth it.
Fine, she tells herself, somewhere in the back of her mind that is still capable of forming words. I’ll let myself have this.
Just tonight.
Just.Tonight.
He pulls back, but only slightly, their foreheads still resting together, breath mingling in the cold air that has quietly returned around them.
Her eyes stay closed for a second longer before she opens them, just enough to meet his.
“It’s late,” he says, his voice barely above a whisper.
She looks at him. Really looks at him.
There is nothing guarded about her expression now. No clever remark waiting to soften the moment, no distance left to maintain. Her eyes are wide, a little unfocused from everything that has just passed between them, but there is something unmistakable in them.
Something close to pleading.
It catches him completely off guard.
Because she reaches for him at the same time, fingers clutching lightly at the fabric of his hoodie like she needs something to hold onto, like she is grounding herself in him. The gesture is small, but it sends something through him, quick and disorienting.
“I don’t want to go to sleep yet.”
She says it so softly it almost doesn’t register at first, like the words barely made it out of her before settling between them.
And for a second, he just… looks at her.
Completely still.
Like time stalls around that sentence, like everything narrows down to the way she’s looking at him and what she’s actually asking without saying it outright.
Something in his expression shifts. Not dramatic, not obvious, but definite. A decision forming, settling.
Then he moves.
Too quickly to be casual, too deliberately to be uncertain. He stands, like if he waits even a moment longer she might take it back, might retreat into something safer.
He holds out his hand.
No explanation. No question.
She takes it immediately.
Getting upstairs is… not smooth.
Not even close.
She tries, at first, to lead. There is a vague intention there, something resembling direction, but it dissolves almost immediately the second he pulls her back toward him again. His hand finds her waist, steady and insistent, and suddenly they are not walking anymore.
They are kissing.
Again.
The hallway stretches longer than it should, or maybe they just make it that way. Every few steps interrupted. Every attempt at moving forward derailed by another kiss, another laugh, another quiet, breathless comment that neither of them will remember properly later.
It is messy in the best way. Uncoordinated. A little ridiculous. Completely inevitable.
It takes longer than it should but neither of them seems to mind.
Inside her room, it is worse.
Or better.
Depends on how you look at it.
Layers become a problem. Too many of them, suddenly. Scarves, sweaters, gloves, jackets, everything that had been necessary minutes ago now feels excessive, inconvenient. They get in the way, and the process of getting rid of them turns into something clumsy and distracted.
There is laughter. There are half-finished attempts. Someone almost trips. Someone says something that doesn’t make sense and neither of them cares enough to correct it.
It is light.
Until it isn’t.
Because at some point, the space between them changes. The last layer disappears, and suddenly there is nothing buffering it anymore.
Skin against skin.
Warmth, immediate and undeniable.
The laughter fades without either of them deciding it should. It just… slips away, replaced by something quieter. Something more focused.
Real.
She feels it first in the way his hand tightens slightly at her waist, in the way his touch lingers instead of rushing. The way his lips move from hers to her neck, slower now, more deliberate, like he is paying attention in a different way.
Her breath catches, not from surprise this time, but from the sudden shift in everything.
She had been cold minutes ago.
Now she feels like she might actually combust.
It is overwhelming in a way she did not prepare for. Not chaotic, not out of control. Just intense. Present. Like every sense has decided to wake up all at once.
And she lets it happen.
After, the quiet returns.
But it isn’t the same quiet as before.
It settles differently, softer but heavier at the same time, like the room is holding onto what just happened instead of letting it fade. The air feels warmer, closer, charged with something that hasn’t quite found a place to land yet.
She lies there, staring up at the ceiling, her breathing slowly evening out while her mind does the exact opposite. It races to catch up, to organize something that refuses to be neatly understood. The whole thing feels slightly unreal, like a moment she stepped into without fully registering it and now has to revisit, piece by piece, just to believe it actually happened.
She knows she will replay it later.
More than once.
She is shocked.
Not in a dramatic way. Not in a way that demands reaction or expression.
Just… quietly stunned.
That it happened.
That she let it happen.
That it felt like that.
But even that isn’t what unsettles her most.
What truly throws her off is what comes after.
Because he doesn’t move away.
There’s no shift, no subtle creation of space that would signal the moment is over, that things are returning to something more neutral, more expected. He doesn’t turn it into something fleeting or easy to compartmentalize.
Instead, he reaches for the blanket.
The movement is casual, almost absent-minded, like it’s instinct rather than decision. He pulls it over both of them without looking, like it’s the most obvious next step, like there was never a question of whether he would stay.
And then he pulls her closer.
Not carefully. Not hesitantly.
Naturally.
Like they’ve done this before.
Like they do this all the time.
Like this, her pressed against him, his arm settling around her, the warmth of his body replacing the cold that had been clinging to her skin, is normal.
That’s what unsettles her.
The ease of it.
He settles into the bed, adjusting slightly until he’s comfortable, his arm still around her, his hand resting in a way that feels unintentional but secure. Within moments, his breathing starts to slow, steady and even, like sleep is already pulling at him.
Like this is simple.
Like this didn’t just rearrange something fundamental for her.
Her heart, which had just started to calm, picks up again, faster now, louder in the quiet of the room.
Because she didn’t expect this.
Not even a little.
She doesn’t know exactly what she expected. Something less… permanent, maybe. Something easier to dismiss once the moment passed.
But not this.
Not the quiet intimacy of being held like it means nothing and everything at the same time.
Still, after everything, after the initial shock of him staying, he leaves at dawn.
Of course he does.
She watches it happen through a sort of quiet detachment, like she had already prepared herself for it at some point during the night and is now simply observing the inevitable unfold. If anything, the surprise is that he stayed as long as he did. That he slept. That he held her like it was nothing unusual.
That had been the anomaly.
This… this is what makes sense.
There is something almost poetic about it, she thinks, as pale morning light filters through the curtains, soft and diffused, turning everything in the room into something gentler, something slightly removed from reality. It feels like the kind of light meant for endings.
“I’ll see you later,” he says, pulling on a shirt and, in the process, committing what she considers a minor but very real offense.
She watches, expression flattening just slightly, like his clothes have personally inconvenienced her.
“Yeah,” she replies, aiming for casual and landing somewhere suspiciously close to unimpressed.
He smiles like he knows exactly what she’s thinking.
Then he’s gone.
The door closes softly behind him, and just like that, the room feels bigger. Colder, somehow, even under the blanket.
She stays where she is, staring at the ceiling.
Letting the night replay itself in fragments that feel too vivid to be something that already belongs to the past. The way it unfolded, piece by piece, still too immediate, too present in her body to be filed away properly.
That’s the problem, she doesn’t know where to put it.
Her brain likes things organized. Categorized. Labeled in ways that make them easier to understand, easier to manage.
This does not fit anywhere.
She turns her head slightly, staring at the space beside her where he had been, like it might offer some kind of explanation.
It doesn’t.
She doesn’t really do this. Actually, she never has.
A one night stand.
The phrase itself feels foreign, like something that belongs to other people, to stories she has heard but never stepped into. Her body reacts to it instinctively, a small, involuntary shiver like it is trying to reject the idea entirely.
Was that what this was?
She replays it again, slower this time.
The conversation. The way he looked at her. The way he kept finding her in rooms, like it was intentional. The way everything between them built, quietly, until it wasn’t quiet at all.
Did it just… end because they crossed that line?
Because it was good, so there was no need for anything else?
Would there even have been more if it was bad?
She exhales, frustrated now, dragging a hand over her face.
She doesn’t know. That’s the truth of it. She doesn’t know how to navigate this.
Men, specifically.
She knows what it’s like to be wanted. That part has never been confusing. Interest is easy to recognize. Easy to receive.
But love… That’s different. That’s something she has never quite managed to hold onto long enough to understand.
Her history is a collection of almosts. Of guys who were interested but unavailable, present but distant, close but never fully there. Long, complicated situationships that never quite became anything definable.
She knows how to exist in that space, what she doesn’t know is what happens outside of it. So no part of her, not even the most optimistic, irrational part, assumes this will be different.
Not with him. Not after this.
She stares back at the ceiling, the morning light shifting slowly across it, and tries to convince herself that she is fine. That this is fine. That she will pack it away, neatly, eventually. Even if, right now, it feels like something that refuses to stay contained.
The first time she sees him again is later that morning.
The fact that she manages to make it downstairs without running into him feels like a small, hard-earned victory. She had woken up for the second time that morning far too aware of everything. Of the bed, of the space beside her, of the memory of his warmth that lingered just enough to be inconvenient. Getting dressed had taken longer than it should have, not because of any real difficulty, but because her brain insisted on replaying things at the worst possible moments.
By the time she reaches the kitchen, she has decided, very firmly, that she is going to behave like a normal person.
Which she is very capable of.
She is mid-conversation with Alysa, leaning casually against the counter, holding a mug she has not actually taken a sip from in several minutes. She is nodding at the right times, adding comments that are just sharp enough to keep things moving, presenting a version of herself that slept perfectly fine and absolutely did not spend the early hours of the morning staring at the ceiling questioning every life decision that led her here.
It is going well. Convincingly well.
“There you are.”
The words cut through the room with an ease that feels almost intentional.
She freezes for half a second before she turns. A little slower than necessary, like she is giving herself time to prepare for whatever expression he might be wearing, for whatever version of him she is about to be faced with.
He’s standing in the doorway of the kitchen.
And he looks… normal.
Like he did not just completely rearrange her insides just a few hours ago. Like he woke up in his room, got dressed in his room, and walked down here without a single change to his routine.
There is a small smile on his face like he has been looking for her and finally found her.
Which…
No, she stops herself. She is not going to assume that.
Except he doesn’t hesitate. He doesn’t hover or second guess or pretend he is here for some other reason. He just walks over to them, direct and easy, like this is the most natural thing in the world, like there is no version of reality where he would avoid her.
Which is deeply inconvenient for her current strategy.
“Morning,” he says.
Normal. Easy.
Too easy.
“Morning,” she replies, matching it just well enough, though her brows lift slightly in a way she cannot quite control.
There is a pause.
Something flickers between them, quick and quiet but impossible to miss. It is not awkward, not exactly. It is recognition. Of the night, of the shift, of something that now exists whether they acknowledge it or not.
Then Alysa clears her throat.
Loudly.
The kind of throat clearing that is not about needing to speak, but about announcing that she is observing something highly interesting.
“Were you…” she starts, then pauses, recalibrating mid-sentence as awareness creeps in. Alysa is right there. Watching. Listening. Enjoying this far too much. She adjusts her tone, casual where it had almost been something else. “Were you looking for me?”
He blinks, the question catching him just slightly off guard. “Sorry?”
“You said ‘there you are’ like you were looking for me” she explains, gesturing lightly with her mug.
Alysa makes a small sound beside her, something dangerously close to a laugh she’s trying very hard to suppress.
He glances at her for half a second, just enough to acknowledge the audience, before looking back at the girl in front of him. His expression shifts, softening into something faintly amused.
“I just hadn’t seen you yet,” he says, like it’s simple. Like it doesn’t mean anything more than that. “I felt like I had said good morning to everyone in the house but you.”
It’s a very clean explanation.
Almost convincing.
If she didn’t know better.
Because he had said good morning to her. Very specifically. At exactly 6:03 in the morning, when he had woken up beside her, still half-asleep, and leaned down to press a quiet kiss to her shoulder before getting up.
She remembers it vividly.
So she just stares at him for a second.
“Huh… so polite,” she says flatly, her eyes narrowing slightly as she looks at him like she’s trying to decide whether to call him out or let him have this.
Alysa, who has been watching the entire exchange with growing interest, finally steps in.
“So,” she says, far too innocently, her gaze flicking between them, “did everyone sleep well?”
From that point on, he doesn’t let distance happen. Not completely.
He doesn’t isolate her. Doesn’t pull her away from the group in a way that would draw attention. But wherever she is, he finds a way to exist in the same space. Sitting beside her at meals. Standing just a little too close during conversations. Handing her things before she even asks, like he’s been paying attention longer than she realized.
It’s subtle, but it’s consistent.
And it catches her off guard again because she had prepared herself for the opposite. For distance. For awkwardness. For the quiet understanding that whatever happened had stayed in that room and would not follow them out.
Instead, it follows her everywhere.
In the way his hand brushes hers and doesn’t immediately pull away. In the way he looks at her like there is still something unfinished between them. In the way he smiles at her like he knows something no one else does.
It is impossible to ignore.
The next night, their last night in the cabin before everyone scattered back into their separate lives, he walks into her room like it belongs to him.
Like it belongs to both of them.
There is no hesitation. No knock. No careful pause at the door as if asking for permission. He just… enters, like this is routine, like he has done it a hundred times before and expects to do it a hundred more.
It startles her more than anything else.
She is sitting on her bed, back against the headboard, legs stretched out beneath the blankets, a book open in her hands. The room is dim, warm, quiet in contrast to the noise downstairs that hums faintly through the walls. Laughter, music, voices overlapping. The ‘last night’ kind of energy.
She had escaped it on purpose. She can only take so much of people, even people she likes, before she starts to feel like she is dissolving into the noise. So she had retreated, chosen solitude, chosen the simple comfort of a story that asks nothing from her.
And then he walks in. Groaning, loudly enough to announce his presence before anything else does.
He doesn’t pause at the door, doesn’t ask if it’s a good time. He just steps inside like it’s already been decided for him, already understood. Gloves come off first, tossed somewhere on the floor, followed quickly by his jacket, which lands in a less than graceful heap on the floor.
He keeps moving as he talks… or complains, more accurately, but it is constant in a way that makes it clear he hasn’t decided to be here so much as arrived without thinking about it.
He is saying something about the guys, about an activity that sounded like a terrible idea from the start and somehow became worse in execution. There’s a lot of emphasis on how unnecessary it all was, how no one needed to prove anything, how he is now paying the price for someone else’s ego from how sore he feels.
She catches fragments, but not the full story because only part of her is listening, nodding at the right moments, making small sounds of acknowledgment.
And the other part of her is… somewhere else. Trying, very seriously, to understand why he is here.
Why tonight? Why like this?
Her brain moves quickly, unhelpfully.
Did he come here for sex?
Her brows lift slightly at the thought, then she shakes her head, almost immediately dismissing it.
No.
Then she tilts her head slightly, too caught up in her own thoughts to stop herself.
Maybe.
She doesn’t really know.
He hasn’t said anything. Not all day. Not even hinted at it. He hasn’t even properly looked at her yet, too busy pulling off another layer, rolling his shoulders like he’s trying to physically shake off the exhaustion.
“You have no idea,” he continues, running a hand through his hair. “At some point it just stopped being fun and turned into a competition of who could make it worse for everyone else.”
“Boys will be boys,” she murmurs, though her tone is slightly delayed, her attention split.
He huffs a quiet laugh, already moving again.
“I need a shower,” he says, more to himself than to her, glancing toward the bathroom like it’s the most obvious next step.
And then he just… goes. No hesitation. No question.
The bathroom door stays half open. Water starts running a second later.
She blinks slowly.
Still sitting on the bed. Still holding her book. Still very much not processing any of this correctly.
He keeps talking from the bathroom. His voice slightly muffled now, but just as present, continuing the story like nothing about this situation is unusual. Like he didn’t just walk into her room, start undressing, and disappear into her shower without so much as a second thought.
“…and then he says, ‘one more round,’ like we hadn’t already been out there for…”
The sound of water cuts him off briefly before he resumes.
“...I swear, if I had stayed any longer I would’ve…”
She is not listening anymore. Not really. Her brain has fully abandoned the conversation in favor of trying to understand the situation she is currently in.
He’s… in her shower. Talking to her. Like this is a normal occurrence in their lives.
Her eyes drift toward the bathroom door, not fully open, not fully closed, steam already starting to gather faintly inside the small space.
Did he come here for sex?
The question returns, louder this time.
But if that were the case, wouldn’t he…
No. If this was about sex, it would look different. It would feel different. More like the night before. He would’ve said something suggestive or done something that left no questions in her mind…
Right?
“…are you even listening?” his voice calls out, sharper now, pulling her back.
She blinks, straightening slightly.
“Of course I am,” she lies smoothly, eyes moving in every direction as she tries to remember what the hell he was saying.
“What did I just say?”
Then, without missing a beat, “That it was a terrible idea and you suffered greatly.”
There’s a short silence.
“Okay, fair.”
She exhales quietly, dropping her gaze back to her book even though she’s not reading it. Her mind is still stuck on the same question. Still trying to place this. Still failing. Because whatever this is it doesn’t fit anywhere she understands.
He steps out of the bathroom a few minutes later, and the shift in the room is immediate.
His hair is still damp, darker now, small droplets tracing slow paths down his neck. A towel hangs loosely around his waist, careless in a way that suggests he didn’t think twice about it, like modesty simply didn’t register as necessary here. He stops at the foot of the bed, like he’s just arrived somewhere familiar rather than intruded into something that should require explanation.
“You okay?”
The question lands gently, but it still startles her.
She blinks, caught in the middle of a thought she hadn’t even fully formed yet. “Yeah, I’m…” Her voice trails as she searches for something believable, something that doesn’t immediately reveal that she has spent the last several minutes mentally unraveling the situation. “Just thinking about my book.”
He nods, accepting it without question, like it makes perfect sense.
“Is it good?”
The normalcy of it throws her off again. He says it so casually, like this is just another night, like he didn’t just walk into her space, take a shower, and now stand there dripping and half-dressed as if this is routine.
She watches him move toward the chair by her desk, and only then does she notice the clothes.
He brought clothes. Of course he did.
The realization doesn’t hit all at once. It settles slowly, piece by piece, as she watches him move around her room with a familiarity that suddenly feels less accidental. The extra shirt, the sweatpants, the quiet certainty in the way he came in, in the way he didn’t ask.
He planned this.
Not in any deliberate, overthought way. Nothing calculated, nothing schemed. It’s softer than that, almost instinctive. Like he didn’t sit down and decide it, but somewhere along the way he just… knew.
Knew he’d end up here.
Knew this is where the night would land.
The thought lingers, heavier than it should be, because it reframes everything. The way he walked in, the way he moved through her space like it already belonged to him in some small, unspoken way. None of it was hesitant. None of it was unsure.
And she hadn’t noticed.
Too busy trying to analyze something that was never meant to be taken apart like this. Too focused on fitting it into logic, into patterns she understands, into explanations that make it easier to control.
“I like it so far,” she says, but it comes out softer than she intended.
Because her eyes have also betrayed her. They follow him. Unapologetically as the towel drops with a casualness that feels almost intentional in how unintentional it is, and he steps into his boxers without a second thought, like she isn’t sitting right there watching, like there isn’t something about this that feels… charged.
Her brain, unhelpfully, goes quiet.
He pulls on his sweatpants next, slow, unhurried, then reaches for his shirt. By the time he’s pulling it over his head, she’s blinking, slow and deliberate, like she’s trying to reset something that isn’t cooperating.
He notices. Pauses for a second, watching her, his eyes narrowing just slightly as he tries to place what exactly is off.
“You’re weird tonight,” he says finally.
She opens her mouth to argue, to defend herself in some way that sounds reasonable and not at all like she’s been spiraling internally for the past ten minutes.
Nothing comes out.
Because she doesn’t have anything. And he doesn’t wait for her to find it.
He just moves. Crosses the room with an ease that feels practiced, like he already knows the layout, like he’s been here before in ways that extend beyond the obvious. He doesn’t hesitate as he approaches the bed, doesn’t ask, doesn’t check.
He just slides in like there’s already a place for him there.
His side.
Despite the fact that this is entirely her space. At least for the duration of this trip.
And he had his!
The mattress dips under his weight, the movement immediate, tangible. She feels it before she fully registers it, the shift pulling her attention away from everything else.
And then… the warmth. It hits her just a second later. The lingering heat from the shower, the faint scent of her almond body wash clinging to his skin in a way that feels strangely intimate. It wraps around her before she can process it, fills the space between them without asking.
Her book is still open in her hands. Unread. Completely forgotten.
He settles onto his stomach, close enough that the distance between them feels almost nonexistent, and then his arm moves. Slow. Absent-minded. It slides around her waist like it belongs there, like it’s something his body decided without consulting him, without needing permission.
“Night,” he murmurs, already softer now, his voice slipping toward sleep like he’s been waiting for it.
She just… stares at him.
So… no. No expectations. No continuation of whatever she thought this might be. No confirmation of any of the theories her brain had been so busy constructing.
Just this.
He came here, complained about his night, used her shower, stole her body wash, took up half her bed… and fell asleep.
That’s it.
Her face actually scrunches, confusion settling in deeper now, more layered, more complex than before.
“Night,” she echoes, quieter, almost automatic.
He doesn’t respond. His breathing evens out too quickly, too naturally, like this was always the plan. Like he walked in already knowing this is where he would end up.
She lowers her book slowly, not even attempting to keep reading. There is no point.
Her mind is still moving a little too fast for her liking, trying to assign meaning to something that refuses to be categorized in any way that makes sense.
Every few seconds, she looks at him. At how at ease he seems. At how comfortable he looks, like this is effortless for him, like this doesn’t require any thought or second-guessing.
Like being here, with her, like this… is simple. And every time she looks, something in her softens.
And that’s dangerous because she wants this. Not just the moments they’ve been stealing, not just the tension or the almosts or the things they don’t say.
This.
The quiet. The ease. The way he showed up without asking, without overthinking, like being here was obvious.
She wants that.
Which is exactly why she doesn’t trust it. Her brain moves quickly to fix it, to reshape it into something smaller, something safer, something that won’t leave her exposed.
Of course he’s here. They crossed a line. Things changed. It would be strange not to follow through on that, at least while they’re still here, while everything exists in this contained, temporary version of reality.
He probably just didn’t want to be alone tonight.
That’s all.
Because outside of this, outside of the cabin and the snow and whatever this version of them is… he has options. Plenty. People who fit better into his world, into his life.
So she lets herself have this for just another tonight.
A quieter version of him. A softer one. One that exists only here, only now.
She shifts slightly, careful not to wake him, settling more comfortably into the space he’s created around her. His arm tightens just a fraction in response.
And despite everything, despite the questions still circling, despite the quiet ache of knowing this might not last… she relaxes.
Sleep comes easier than she expects.
The last day feels like a blur.
Not in a poetic, reflective way. In a chaotic, slightly aggressive way. The kind of morning where everyone is moving too fast and thinking too little, where bags that somehow held everything perfectly fine on the way in now refuse to cooperate on the way out. Zippers won’t close. Things go missing. Someone is always yelling from another room asking if anyone has seen something very specific that no one else remembers existing.
There is a constant sense of almost being late.
Voices overlap. Doors open and close too loudly. The house, which had felt expansive and calm just days ago, now feels crowded and impatient, like it is ready to be emptied.
She moves through it all in a daze.
Participating, technically. Folding things, stuffing them into her bag, double-checking she hasn’t left anything behind. But her mind keeps drifting elsewhere, catching on moments instead of tasks.
Like breakfast.
They had all gathered around the table, some more awake than others, everyone running on too little sleep and too much leftover energy from the night before. She had gone downstairs early, woken up by the noise of movement and unable to fall back asleep after.
She had been halfway through her coffee when he walked in.
Hair a mess. Eyes still heavy with sleep. Looking unfairly soft for someone who had spent the last few days being deeply inconvenient to her peace of mind.
He had barely hesitated. Just walked over, leaned down, and pressed a small kiss to her temple, before stealing some grapes from her plate, like it was the most natural greeting in the world.
Her reaction had been immediate. Eyes wide, head snapping slightly to the side as she looked around, scanning the room like she had just witnessed something illegal and needed to confirm whether anyone else had seen it.
No one seemed particularly concerned except… Alysa. Who made a noise. A very distinct, very high-pitched noise.
She had looked back at him then, sharply, like he had personally betrayed her by doing that in public, like this was somehow his fault.
He had just smiled and then continued on with his morning like he hadn’t just completely derailed hers.
He helps her with her bags without asking, without announcing it, just appearing beside her at the right moment and lifting them before she can protest. It is efficient.
She doesn’t comment on it.
And just like that it’s over.
Bags packed. Cars waiting. People gathering outside in that loose, disorganized way that always turns into a series of overlapping goodbyes. Hugs that last just long enough to feel real but not long enough to linger. Promises to meet again that everyone means in the moment.
She finds herself standing just slightly apart from the center of it, close enough to still be included, far enough that no one is really paying attention.
And he’s there too, looking at her like he always does now. Easy. Steady. Like there is something understood between them that no one else can see.
Which would be comforting.
If she understood it too…
“I’ll text you,” he says.
Simple. Casual. Like it’s obvious.
She smiles at him, soft and polite in a way that feels practiced, like she’s already decided how this is supposed to go.
“You don’t have to.”
It lands wrong immediately.
She sees it in the way his expression shifts, subtle but unmistakable. Confusion, first. Quick, sharp, like he’s trying to understand if he heard her correctly.
“I want to,” he says, just as simply. Then, after a beat, “Don’t you?”
The question catches her off guard more than it should.
Because the answer is obvious.
Yes. Of course she does.
But that’s not what comes out.
“It’s just…” she starts, already backtracking, already trying to smooth it over before it becomes something bigger than she can manage. “You don’t have to worry about it.”
She says it lightly, as if she’s doing him a favor. As if she’s lifting an obligation that was never really there to begin with, keeping things simple, contained, without expectation. Letting him off the hook.
As if his offer is just politeness.
As if she doesn’t expect him to mean it.
He looks at her like she just said something in a language he almost understands but not quite. His head tilts slightly, brows pulling together, the expression so openly puzzled it almost makes her falter.
“But I do,” he says, slower now, more deliberate. There’s something firmer in his tone, something just shy of irritation. “So I will text you.”
There’s no room for interpretation in that. No room for her to redirect it into something smaller. He doesn’t wait for her to respond. Doesn’t give her the chance to fix what she just implied or take it back or explain herself properly. He just turns and walks away.
No hug. No lingering glance. No soft ending to balance out the sharpness of it.
Just gone like he was a 100% sure he didn’t need to do any of those things because he knew he’d see her again.
Well.
They did live in the same city.
The truth of it is, things didn’t get complicated because of him.
They got complicated because of her.
Which is deeply ironic, considering how much of her personality is built around avoiding exactly that. She prides herself on being easy. On smoothing things over before they turn into something heavy, something demanding, something that requires effort from other people.
She makes things light. It is a skill she has practiced for years, though she has never really stopped to question why. If she does, the answer is uncomfortably simple: she is afraid of being too much.
Afraid of asking for something and watching someone hesitate. Afraid of needing more than someone is willing to give and seeing that moment where they decide it is not worth it. So she learned, very early on, to make herself smaller in the ways that matter. To take up less emotional space. To never be the reason something becomes difficult.
To never be the burden.
And that kind of thinking shapes things.
It shapes the way she exists with people. The way she lets things happen instead of defining them. The way she accepts almosts and maybes and in-betweens because at least those don’t require her to ask for certainty.
It is how she ended up in so many situations that never quite became anything real.
She never pushed. Never demanded. Never said this is what I want, and I won’t settle for less.
She just… adapted. Made it easier for everyone else, even when it cost her something.
So of course it happens again. Of course, with him, with something that actually had the potential to be simple in the best way, she finds a way to make it complicated in the worst one.
Because every time he reaches for something real, she flinches.
Enough that it registers. Enough that it leaves room for interpretation.
He steps closer, and she reacts like she didn’t expect it, like it caught her off guard, like she’s still deciding if she wants it and he reads that.
Of course he does.
He sees the widened eyes, the brief hesitation, the way she jokes or deflects right after something genuine happens, and he does what anyone would do when faced with uncertainty.
He adjusts. He pulls back just enough to match her because the last thing he wants is to push her into something she doesn’t want.
So what she intends as caution, as self-preservation, as an attempt to not make things heavy too quickly he understands as discomfort. As disinterest. As a sign to keep things light.
Casual.
And just like that, without either of them meaning to, they build something slightly misaligned. Close, but not quite right. Something that could have been simple, if either of them had just said what they actually meant.
But she doesn’t.
Because she doesn’t know how to do that without risking too much.
And he doesn’t.
Because he thinks he already has his answer.
And that’s how it follows them home.
Not as something clear. Not as something they ever define or even properly acknowledge. It lingers instead, quiet and persistent, slipping into the spaces between their days like it belongs there.
When he texts her, it is simple.
Did you get back okay?
She stares at it longer than necessary.
It is a normal text. A polite text. The kind of message anyone would send after a trip like that. There is nothing in it that suggests anything deeper, nothing that commits him to anything beyond basic human decency.
She turns her phone over.
Then back again.
Opens the message.
Closes it.
Then finally…
Barely. I think I lost three toes to frostbite.
She sends it before she can overthink it into something else.
He replies immediately like he was waiting.
Tragic. You’ll have to retire.
She smiles despite herself.
Finally, an excuse.
The conversation unfolds from there with an ease that feels suspicious.
Too smooth. Too natural. Like no time has passed at all, like they didn’t leave something unfinished sitting between them. They fall into it quickly, jokes slipping into small updates, small updates into longer replies, longer replies into something that stretches without either of them trying too hard.
And somewhere in the middle of it, without a clear turning point…they decide to see each other again.
I still have your hoodie, by the way
She types at some point, staring at the screen like she is aware this might mean something.
There is a slightly longer pause.
That sounds like a serious problem.
She huffs a quiet laugh.
It is. It’s very comfortable. I might keep it.
I could come get it.
There it is.
Simple.
Not quite a question, not quite a statement.
She stares at it for a second. This is where something could be clarified. This is where someone could say, what are we doing?
She does not.
Bold of you to assume I’ll give it back.
I’m willing to negotiate.
She hesitates for another second.
Fine. But only because I’m a generous person.
Sure you are. When?
She types, deletes, types again.
I’m home tonight.
Another pause.
Shorter this time.
I’ll come by.
No emojis. No elaboration. No attempt to frame it as anything more than it is. Which makes it very easy to pretend it is nothing.
When he shows up, it feels… familiar.
Too familiar.
He stands at her door like he belongs there too, like this is just a natural continuation of something that never really stopped. There’s no awkwardness, no hesitation. He steps inside, glances around briefly like he’s taking it in, but not in a way that feels new.
“Nice place,” he says.
“Thanks. I pay for it, so I’d hope so.”
He smiles at that.
It is easy.
Everything about this is easy.
There is no formal structure to it. No date, no expectations, no clear intention beyond being in the same space again. They talk, they move around each other comfortably, like they are picking up a conversation that was only briefly paused.
At some point, they end up on her couch.
At some point, she ends up closer than necessary.
At some point, the hoodie stops the pretense.
As a matter of fact she never returns it. It becomes a constant part of her wardrobe. And he never asks for it back either.
She tries not to overthink it.
She really does.
She tells herself this is fine. That she knows how this goes. That she has done this before and survived it just fine.
Here we go again, she thinks, almost amused, almost resigned. Let’s casually entangle ourselves with another man we end up falling for. No big deal.
And so they meet again. Then again.
And then it becomes something that no longer needs to be planned too carefully. A message here, a “what are you doing tonight” there, both of them pretending it’s spontaneous when, in reality, it’s becoming a pattern.
Each time, she tells herself the same thing.
This is temporary. Something she can step out of whenever she decides it’s time to be sensible again.
But still, each time, it becomes something slightly more.
Not in big, obvious ways. Nothing that demands acknowledgment. Just small shifts that accumulate quietly until they start to feel significant.
He stays a little longer. Talks a little more. Stops pretending he has somewhere else to be.
Sometimes they don’t even do anything particularly noteworthy. They just sit, talk, exist in the same space in a way that feels too easy for something that is supposed to be casual.
Still, to her this is what it is. This is all it is. He hasn’t said otherwise. He hasn’t asked for more. So why would she? Why would she risk turning something that works into something that might not?
She stays quiet and keeps things light. Keeps things exactly where they are, even as they slowly shift into something that feels harder and harder to define.
And he does the same for different reasons, even if the result is identical.
Because from his side, this already feels like something that matters more than it should. It’s not casual to him, not really. It stopped being that very night he stepped into her room like it was theirs.
But she never says anything. Never asks. Never pushes.
If anything, she does the opposite. She downplays, deflects, keeps things just distant enough that he can’t quite tell if stepping closer would be welcome or not.
So he doesn’t risk it, he tells himself he’s reading her right. That she likes this, exactly like this. That she doesn’t want it to become heavier, more complicated, more defined.
Somewhere along the line the sex starts to feel like a pretense. The quiet understanding of what’s expected when the door opens and they’re standing too close, too quickly.
And it does start there most times.
In the doorway. In the hallway. Somewhere between arriving and actually settling. Like neither of them wants to waste time pretending they don’t want each other in that way.
But it never stays there, never ends there.
Because afterwards, something always shifts. The energy softens, settles into something warmer, something less urgent and more… comfortable. Like they both exhale at the same time without realizing it.
They stop leaving.
It’s never a decision, never something they talk about. It just happens. A quiet “stay” here, an easy “okay” there, until nights stretch longer than planned and neither of them feels the need to break them apart. They end up tangled on her couch with a movie neither of them is watching, shifting closer without noticing, his arm around her, her head on his shoulder like it’s always belonged there. Takeout becomes routine, too much food, easy teasing, conversations that start light and slowly drift into something else.
Because they always do.
Late enough, quiet enough, when there’s nothing left to hide behind, she starts sharing pieces of herself she usually keeps tucked away. Not all at once, not dramatically, just enough to matter. And he listens, really listens, in a way that makes it easier to keep going. Then he gives something back, carefully at first, then more openly, until somehow they’ve crossed into something deeper than either of them ever meant to reach, and neither of them knows how to step back.
There’s one night that sticks out more than the others.
Not because it’s loud or intense or even particularly eventful on the surface, but because something in it shifts too much to ignore.
They had planned it the same way they always do. A simple message, a casual agreement, nothing that suggests anything beyond what they’ve been doing all along.
He shows up later than usual and the moment she opens the door, she knows something is off.
He’s not falling apart, not visibly upset. But there’s a heaviness to him, something quieter, more contained. His usual ease is missing, replaced by something tighter, like he’s holding himself together just enough to get through the interaction.
“Hey,” he says flatter than usual, stepping inside.
“Hey.”
She watches him carefully as he moves past her, setting his things down, running a hand through his hair in a way that feels more tired than casual.
“You okay?” she asks.
“Yeah,” he says immediately, almost too quickly.
He doesn’t elaborate. Doesn’t offer anything else. Just turns to her, steps closer, like he’s about to follow the script they’ve both been pretending doesn’t exist.
His hands come up to cradle her face, steadying her there as if he needs something solid to hold onto. The kiss he gives her is simple, almost restrained, but it feels different this time. Like he’s anchoring himself to the moment through her, like without it he might come undone.
So she pulls away softly, just enough to look at him and he barely even opens his eyes.
“Hey,” she murmurs, her hands coming up to his wrists, stilling them. “You don’t have to do that.”
He frowns slightly, confused. “Do what?”
“This,” she says softly, searching his face. “Force yourself into something you don’t quite feel like.”
There’s a pause. A longer one this time. Something in him falters, just for a second.
“I’m fine,” he insists, but there’s less conviction now. He drops his hands at the sight of her worried face.
She tilts her head, studying him, and then says gently. “You’re not.”
He exhales, a quiet, defeated sound, like he doesn’t have the energy to argue properly.
“Bad day?” she asks.
He nods, just once.
That’s all it takes.
“Okay,” she says simply. “What do you need?”
Her hand lifts without thinking, coming to rest against his cheek. He leans into it almost immediately, like he was waiting for something like that, his hand coming up to keep hers there.
“I don’t know…” he admits, his voice softer now, stripped of anything guarded. He turns his face slightly, pressing a small, lingering kiss to her palm. “You…”
A shiver runs through her, but it’s not the kind she’s grown used to with him.
Not the ones that come easy, tied to proximity and heat and the quiet language of bodies learning each other. Not the kind that belong to dim lights and tangled sheets and breath catching for simpler reasons.
This one is different.
It settles deeper, slower, like it’s reaching somewhere she hasn’t quite accessed before. It comes from the weight of the moment, from the way he’s looking at her without defenses, from the way he said you like it wasn’t casual, like it wasn’t replaceable.
Like it mattered.
She’s never felt this before. Not like this. Not this seen, this chosen, this quietly needed in a way that doesn’t ask for anything in return but still gives everything.
It feels unfamiliar and strangely, it also feels exactly like what she always imagined love would feel like.
That’s how they end up back in her bed again, but this time it is very different.
There’s no urgency, no underlying expectation. Just the quiet continuation of what started in the bathroom. He lies on his side this time, closer than before, his head resting against her chest like he’s run out of energy to hold himself up any other way.
That’s how they end up back in her bed again.
This time it is very different from the others in the way it starts.
There’s no urgency, no underlying expectation. Just the quiet continuation of what started in the bathroom. He lies on his side this time, closer than before, his head resting against her chest like he’s run out of energy to hold himself up any other way.
He leans back before he even realizes he’s doing it, his head resting against her chest, his body settling into hers like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
She doesn’t comment on it.
Her fingers move slowly through his hair, absentminded at first, then more deliberate when she feels the way he relaxes under the touch.
“Do you want to tell me about it?” She asks,
There’s a pause.
Then, “Not really.”
“Okay.”
No push. No insistence.
But after a while, it’s like he convinces himself he needs to. He doesn’t give her details. Not really. Just fragments. Complaints about practice, about pressure, about expectations that feel heavier than usual. Nothing fully formed, nothing that requires a response.
She listens anyway. Soft hums, quiet acknowledgments, her hand never leaving his hair.
At some point, he stops talking. Not because he’s done, but because he doesn’t need to keep going. The silence feels enough.
“You’re okay,” she murmurs as her hand traces small, absent patterns against his scalp, steady and grounding.
Just… a statement. He shifts slightly at the sound of it, his arm tightening around her waist.
For a while, neither of them speaks. His breathing slows. His body settles fully into hers, the last of that earlier tension slipping away.
And then, somewhere between awake and asleep, in that quiet, unguarded space where thoughts stop being filtered… he says it. Softly.
“I never felt like this with anyone else before.”
It’s barely above a whisper, but it reaches her. She stills for a second.
Because that… that is not casual.
Not even close.
Her fingers resume their movement after a moment, slower now, more deliberate. She doesn’t respond. Not because she doesn’t want to, but because she doesn’t trust herself to say the right thing.
It’s a morning like any other.
Which is a very big part of the problem.
The night before had stretched into something slow and easy, the way they all do now. No clear start, no clear end. Just time folding into itself until suddenly it was too late to leave and too early to call it anything else.
Now the room is quiet. Golden light spills through the curtains, soft and warm, settling over everything like it belongs there. It catches on the edges of the sheets, the floor, the small details she never pays attention to during the day.
And him. He’s still half asleep, sprawled across her bed like he has claimed it without ever asking. Hair a mess against her pillows, skin warm under the morning light, one arm thrown lazily over his face like he’s trying to block it out.
It makes him look softer. Less guarded.
She sits beside him with her knees pulled in, absentmindedly tracing the edge of the sheet with her fingers as she watches him, letting the quiet stretch a little longer than it should. There’s something about this moment that feels too still, too clear, like everything they’ve been carefully stepping around has finally caught up to them and decided not to be ignored anymore.
Neither of them has brought up that night.
Not what he said, not what she did. Not the way it changed something, even if they both felt it. They’ve moved around it instead, continued forward like nothing shifted, like nothing deepened.
But it did.
And it’s here now, settled between them in the silence, quiet but impossible to ignore.
He stirs slightly, the movement small but enough to break it. His arm falls away from his face, his eyes blinking open slowly as he adjusts to the light. It takes him a second to notice her, but when he does, he smiles. Soft, unthinking, like it comes naturally.
“Why are you staring at me like that?” he mumbles, his voice still rough with sleep.
She lets out a quiet breath that almost turns into a laugh, glancing away for a moment before looking back at him.
“I’m thinking,” she says.
He hums, stretching a little before settling again, like getting up isn’t even a consideration. Like staying here, in this, is easier.
There’s a pause, heavier now.
She studies him for a second longer before speaking, her tone lighter than what she’s actually about to say. “We should probably talk about it.”
That gets his attention.
He looks at her properly this time, the softness in his expression sharpening just slightly. “About what?” he asks, though there’s already an understanding there, something in the way his voice shifts that gives him away.
She hesitates, not because she doesn’t know what she means, but because saying it out loud feels like crossing a line they’ve both been avoiding.
“I don’t think this is…” she starts, then exhales softly, searching for the right word. “Casual.”
He lets out a breath, something close to a quiet laugh but without humor.
“Yeah,” he says, almost to himself. “I figured that out.”
She watches him carefully, something cautious settling into her expression. “Then why didn’t you say anything?”
He looks at her like the answer is obvious, like it’s been sitting there the whole time.
“Because I thought that’s what you wanted.”
She blinks, the words catching her completely off guard. “What?”
“You kept pulling back,” he says, more clearly now, sitting up slightly as he gestures between them. “Every time things got close to… something real, you’d joke or change the subject or act like it didn’t matter.”
There’s no accusation in it, just confusion. Frustration, maybe.
She stares at him, disbelief settling in slowly. “I did that because I thought you wanted it to stay casual.”
That lands.
He straightens a little more, looking at her like he’s trying to understand how they got here.
“Why would I want that?”
“Why would I want that?” she shoots back, equally confused.
And then they both stop.
Because suddenly it’s obvious.
Painfully, almost embarrassingly obvious.
They’ve been having the same conversation in their heads for weeks, just from opposite sides.
He lets out a short, incredulous laugh, running a hand through his already messy hair. “I thought you didn’t want anything serious. I thought if I pushed, you’d just… leave.”
She shakes her head, a small, disbelieving smile forming. “I thought if I asked for more, you’d leave.”
They look at each other for a moment, the weight of it settling, and then he laughs and she does too, a second later, the tension breaking in the most ridiculous way possible.
“That makes no sense.”
She shakes her head, her laughter softening as it fades, the silence that follows no longer heavy, just… clearer.
“So,” she says after a moment, quieter now, “what do you want?”
He doesn’t hesitate.
“You,” he says it like he did that night. “I told you.”
Her breath catches slightly, something in her chest tightening in a way that feels both terrifying and right.
“Yeah?” she asks, softer.
He nods, “yeah.”
She looks at him for a second longer, like she’s making sure this is real. Like she’s checking for any sign that this might disappear if she reaches for it.
“Okay,” she says.
A small smile forms on his face. “Okay?”
“Okay.”
There’s a pause before she blurts it out like she can’t help herself.
“I think I’m in love with you.”
He doesn’t even blink.
“Yeah,” he says. “I know.”
She narrows her eyes. “That’s a very bold response.”
“I think I’m in love with you too,” he adds, like he forgot to say the most important part.
“Better.”
He smiles, reaching for her, pulling her down beside him like there’s no question about where she belongs now.
And for the first time since all of this started nothing feels uncertain.
Not the way he looks at her. Not the way she stays. Not the space between them.
Because what they had been building, piece by piece, misunderstanding by misunderstanding, was never something casual pretending to be more.
It was always something real pretending to be less.
Author’s note: GUYS SHE FEELS REALLY NEURODIVERGENT!!! I didn't mean for it, it just happened!!! Also, this is HUGE and it feels a little all over the place, I think I overdid it this time. Tell me what you think. (I think A Couple Minutes is still my favorite child)
I’ve been writing my next story way faster than usual because I’m actually obsessed with it, and it was SUPPOSED to be a short one… and now it’s absolutely MASSIVE. Like??? WHY is it HUGE??? Why am I like this??? Why can’t I just write something short and sweet for once??????????
Anyway, I needed to vent. It'll probably be ready tomorrow. Thanks for coming to my TED talk.
Summary: They’ve spent their entire lives side by side. Best friends, constant companions, always finding their way back to each other no matter where life takes them. He has a plan, a career built on discipline and control. She has the freedom to drift and the choice to stay, and she always chooses him. It works. It’s easy. Until the lines between them start to blur and what once felt enough suddenly isn’t.
When feelings neither of them know how to handle turn everything fragile, he does the one thing he never thought he would… he hurts her. What follows is distance, regret, and the slow realization that some things can’t be ignored forever.
Warnings: no use of y/n, best friends to lovers, drinking, mentions of underage drinking, swearing, he is MEAN to her in a fight, they are judgy little bitches, reader is rich rich, angst, a lot of drama, english is not my first language (I didn't proofread this as I usually do so excuse any huge mistakes or silly repetitions)
Author’s note: This took me a little more time to write than it usually takes me, but it's finally here. I don't love it, but there you go...
The first time she had the vague, quiet understanding that there was nothing in this world she would not do for him, she was seven years old.
It was raining outside.
Not the kind of storm that made you run to the windows or count seconds between lightning and thunder. It was steady, patient rain. The kind that settled in and stayed, tapping softly against the glass like it had nowhere else to be. It made the whole house feel smaller somehow, more contained. The world outside reduced to a blur of water and shadows, while everything inside felt warmer, dimmer, closer.
The windows rattled every now and then, not enough to be frightening, just enough to remind you that something existed beyond the soft glow of the bedroom lamp.
They had a bet going.
A stupid one, in hindsight. The kind that only mattered when you were seven and being the last one awake felt like a victory worthy of a trophy. They had decided, with the kind of seriousness only children can muster, that whoever fell asleep first lost. No clear prize had been established. That was not the point.
It was already 2 in the morning.
Under normal circumstances, they would have been asleep hours ago. Teeth brushed, lights out, no negotiations. But their parents were downstairs, voices drifting faintly up the stairs along with the clink of glasses and the soft hum of laughter. They were drinking wine, telling stories, existing in that easy, distracted way that made them believe their children were sound asleep.
They had checked once.
His mother had opened the door just enough to peek in, the hallway light spilling briefly across the room. Two small bodies, still and convincing. She had smiled, whispered something about angels, and closed the door again.
They had waited exactly ten seconds before opening their eyes again.
Now, she sat cross-legged on his bed, wrapped tightly in a blanket that smelled like clean laundry and something else underneath it, something sharper, colder. That faint, almost metallic scent of the ice rink that seemed to follow him everywhere, woven into his clothes, his sheets, the air around him. Or maybe it was just how he smelled, but she had associated it with the ice long ago.
Her hair was still damp from the shower their mothers had insisted on after a full day of running wild, through the house, the yard, the street, coming back with grass stains and flushed cheeks and absolutely no intention of slowing down.
He was on the pullout bed beneath hers.
He had insisted on it earlier, puffing up slightly as he explained to his mother that it was the gentlemanly thing to do. That had earned him a round of laughter from the adults that he had pretended not to enjoy, even as his ears turned pink.
It would not be the last time he said something like that.
It would also be one of those things their parents always remembered when they were all together.
“3 a.m.,” she said suddenly, her voice quieter now, but certain in a way that made it sound important. “That’s when it happens.”
She had been trying not to think about it.
That had been the plan. Stay awake, win the bet, do not let your brain wander into the dark corners it liked to visit when everything else went quiet. But the longer the night stretched, the more the thoughts crept in. The rain did not help. The shadows did not help.
And if she had to sit there feeling it, then he was going to feel it with her.
He did not look up immediately. His eyes were heavy, blinking slower than usual, fighting a losing battle against sleep.
“What happens?” he asked, voice thick with it.
“The witching hour.”
She said it like it was obvious. Like it was a fact of life, something everyone knew and quietly respected.
That got his attention.
He frowned, finally looking up at her. “That’s not a real thing.”
She pulled the blanket tighter around herself, shoulders hunching slightly. “It is. My cousin told me.”
Her cousin was twelve, which in their world made her a reliable source of information on nearly everything.
“That’s when…” She hesitated, and that hesitation made it worse. “That’s when things can get in.”
He watched her more closely then.
Not because he believed her, not really. But because she was not someone who got scared easily. She climbed things she should not climb, jumped from heights she should not jump from, argued with adults like she had a point to prove.
If she was afraid of something, there had to be a reason.
“What things?” he asked.
She opened her mouth, then closed it again.
“…Just things.”
The rain filled the silence that followed, louder now somehow, like it had leaned in to listen.
He looked away first, his gaze landing on the clock sitting on the nightstand above him. The glowing numbers read 2:42.
His jaw tightened slightly.
It was a small shift. Subtle. The kind of thing most people would miss. But it was there, even then. That quiet, stubborn determination settling in. The instinct to fix something simply because it had been presented as a problem.
Even if it was not fixable.
Even if it did not make sense.
He reached up without saying anything and turned the dial.
The numbers flickered.
2:42 became 11:42.
She blinked, the movement so quick it almost looked like a flinch. “What are you doing?”
He did not hesitate. “If it never gets to 3,” he said, already pushing himself up and climbing onto the bed beside her, “then nothing can happen.”
She stared at him. Really looked at him, like she was trying to catch the moment he would break and smile and admit it was a joke.
But he did not. There was no trace of humor in his face. No smugness. No teasing.
Just certainty.
Simple, unwavering certainty.
And something about that, about how easily he had decided that her fear was worth rearranging reality for, made the tight knot in her chest loosen in a way she could not quite explain.
She did not have the language for it yet.
She would not have it for years.
But something settled in her then, quietly and completely: the understanding that all she had to do was ask, he would not question whether it made sense. He would just… fix it.
Or at least try.
Later, much later, when people would ask her why him, why she trusted him the way she did, why her loyalty to him seemed so absolute it bordered on unreasonable, her mind would always circle back to this.
Not the big moments.
Not the obvious ones.
This.
A dimly lit bedroom. Rain against the windows. A boy turning back time like it was the simplest solution in the world because she had told him she was scared.
He shifted beside her, settling in like it was the most natural thing to do.
That mattered too.
The way he closed the distance without even asking. The way his shoulder pressed lightly against hers, grounding, warm. They had always been like that. Close in ways no one had ever questioned, mostly because the adults around them had never made it something to question. Sleepovers that blurred into mornings. Afternoons that ended with them tangled together on couches or sprawled out in the grass, limbs overlapping, boundaries undefined and unexamined.
They had grown up like that. Side by side. Always within reach.
She crossed her arms over her chest underneath the blanket, still a little caught up in her thoughts. The night light his mother had left on cast soft, scattered stars across the deep blue walls, faint, uneven and yellowish.
“…You can’t just turn back time,” she mumbled, her voice already softer now.
“I just did.”
“That’s not how it works.”
He shrugged, the movement brushing his shoulder against hers again. “It does here.”
She turned her head slightly. “Why?”
He did not even pause. “It’s my house.”
It was such a simple answer. Such ridiculous logic. And completely impossible to argue with.
She huffed quietly, more out of habit than disagreement, and let her eyes close.
The rain kept falling.
The clock never reached 3 while they could see it. At some point, without either of them noticing exactly when, sleep came.
She slept deeply.
Not once did her mind drift back to the witching hour, or the things that could get in, or the shadows stretching along the walls.
Because he was there.
And even at seven years old, some part of her had already decided that as long as he was, nothing could ever be so frightening that she would have to face it alone.
At twenty, his life had a shape to it.
Not just a vague direction or a hopeful outline, but something solid. Defined. Measurable.
His days began before most people even considered waking up. The world still quiet, the sky undecided between night and day. He would step into the rink and feel it immediately, that familiar bite of cold that slipped under his clothes and settled into his skin like it belonged there.
His father stood by the boards, stopwatch in hand, posture straight, expression unreadable in that practiced way. He did not shout much. He did not need to. A glance was enough.
There was a plan. There had always been a plan.
Olympics. Titles. Records. Each one less of a dream and more of an inevitability.
And he followed it.
By twenty one, he was already standing in places people spent their entire lives trying to reach. Podiums had lost their shine in a way that felt almost ungrateful. They no longer felt like endings. They felt like checkpoints. Brief pauses before the next thing demanded his attention.
His name carried weight now. Not just within the sport, but outside of it. Commentators said it with a certain tone. Analysts slowed down his routines, frame by frame, picking apart movements that had taken years to perfect as if they could be understood in minutes.
People who had never met him spoke about him like they knew him.
Everything was working. Everything was, objectively, exactly as it should be.
And still, there were moments, quiet ones, usually in between things, where something restless stirred beneath all that certainty. Not loud enough to disrupt anything. Not strong enough to name.
Just there.
“God, this is getting boring.”
Her voice cut through his thoughts with perfect timing, like it always did.
He did not need to look up to know exactly how she had just sat down. He could picture it. The casual drop into the chair, the careless kind of confidence that made it seem like the entire airport lounge existed for her convenience. Sunglasses still resting against her nose even though they were very much indoors.
He kept his eyes on his phone. “I just won.”
“I know,” she said easily. “I was there. Front row. Again. You’re welcome.”
There was something about the way she said it that made it sound like she had personally contributed to the victory.
“You didn’t have to come.”
It was automatic. The same line he always used. The same line he never meant.
She leaned forward, resting her chin in her hand, studying him with exaggerated patience. “Please. You would fall apart if I wasn’t here.”
That made him glance up. She was smiling, completely unapologetic. Like the idea was not even up for debate.
“Gotta embrace my privilege,” she added, as if that explained everything.
It did, in a way.
Her family had the kind of money that made decisions optional. The kind that turned what should have been complicated into something simple. She had left college with the same ease most people changed majors, announced she would be traveling for a while, and then simply… never stopped.
Airports, hotels, competitions. A life built on movement, orbiting his in a way that should have felt strange but never did.
“You’ve been embracing it for three years,” he said, his tone flat but not unkind. There was no real criticism in it. If anything, there was something close to amusement.
“And I’m getting really good at it.” She wiggled her brows, pleased with herself.
He huffed softly, shaking his head, but the corner of his mouth betrayed him.
Because the truth was, she had been everywhere.
Not metaphorically. Literally. Every rink. Every hotel. Every city that blurred into the next until they all started to feel the same. She existed in all of them, constant in a life that moved too fast.
Always just there.
Like she had always been, like she always would be.
It was an agreement they had.
Not something written down or formally acknowledged, just a promise she had made when they were ten, spoken with the kind of certainty you only have when you are ten. He had a competition coming up, one of his first real ones, and it had terrified him in a way he did not quite know how to admit. She had seen it anyway, like she always did, and instead of making it smaller or brushing it off, she had simply said she would be there.
She had said she would always be there, actually.
And then she had been.
From ten to twenty, she had barely missed a single performance. It became something so constant it stopped feeling remarkable and started feeling expected, like it was part of the routine itself. The ice, the music, the crowd, and somewhere in it, her. Sometimes in the stands, sometimes leaning against the boards during training, sometimes half paying attention and half lost in her own world, but always close enough that he could find her without really trying.
He never had to wonder if she would show up.
She just did.
For a brief and slightly misguided period of time, she had tried to step into his world.
It had looked promising at first. Skates laced up with determination, alarms set far earlier than any reasonable person should tolerate, a level of commitment that impressed exactly everyone for about a week. She threw herself into it with the same energy she approached most things, confident that enthusiasm alone might carry her through.
It did not.
The problem, as it turned out, was not the difficulty. Not really. It was the falling.
Not the embarrassment, which she could have handled just fine, but the feeling itself. The sharp, immediate sting of cold against skin, the way the ice seemed to burn just enough to feel personal. It was unpleasant in a way she found entirely unnecessary, and she saw no reason to continue subjecting herself to it.
Ilia always suspected her issue with skating wasn’t entirely physical. In his mind, it had less to do with the cold bite of the ice and more to do with the fact that she wasn’t immediately good at it. She had stepped onto the rink at eight years old with the quiet expectation that things would simply… click. That she would glide, spin, maybe even impress him a little.
That was not what happened. She stepped, she wobbled, she fell.
She complained.
A lot.
About the cold, about the impact, about how the ice had absolutely no reason to be that hard. He listened, half amused, half unconvinced, watching her rub at her side or her hip like she had just survived something deeply unfair.
But he knew her… or at least, he thought he did. The way she huffed, the way her frustration showed up a second too quickly, a little too sharp, made him think it wasn’t just the fall bothering her.
It was the fact that she had fallen at all.
He never said it out loud, but he was fairly certain it hurt her ego a lot more than it hurt her bum.
In another life, it might have been perfect.
Her parents certainly would have liked that version of events. They loved the sport in a way that bordered on sentimental. It was how they had met his parents, after all. Years later, it was how they had ended up funding a good portion of his career. Officially, it was the company. Unofficially, it was them, invested in every jump, every win, every medal like it belonged to them too.
They would have adored having their daughter out there on the ice.
Instead, they got the next best thing.
Ilia.
And to his credit, they never seemed disappointed by that trade. They loved him easily, openly, like he had always been meant to fit into their lives that way. He gave them everything they had hoped for from the sport. Success, visibility, something to be proud of that extended beyond themselves. But what mattered more, though they would never say it quite so plainly, was what he gave her. Something steady, real.
He had roots, his life was structure, discipline, a sense of direction that didn’t waver. And somehow, by simply existing the way he did, he pulled her into that orbit. Grounded her in ways nothing else had managed to do.
Because she could have gone in a hundred different directions.
The kind of wealth she grew up around didn’t exactly encourage restraint. It opened doors to things that burned bright and fast and left very little behind. Parties, drugs, the kind of chaos that looked exciting until it wasn’t.
But instead, she spent her time with him.
Sitting cross-legged on the carpet of his bedroom, surrounded by mundane things. Picking apart his outfits with unnecessary criticism, making sharp, amused comments about underrotated spins like she had any real authority on the matter. Existing in a space that was ordinary in a way her life rarely was.
Still, like most things in her life, figure skating became another phase she could afford to walk away from without consequence. Another expensive hobby that had entertained her briefly before losing its appeal.
The difference was, she never walked away from him.
She left the ice behind without leaving his side, which, to him, had always mattered more than whether she stayed on it. He could not remember a version of his life that did not include her. Not a clear one, anyway. Any attempt to imagine it felt incomplete, like trying to recall a memory with something essential missing.
“Besides,” she continued, nudging his foot lightly under the table, pulling him back into the moment, “someone has to keep you humble.”
“I’m very humble,” he replied, already looking back down at his phone, as if this conversation was nothing more than background noise.
She let out a short laugh. “No one who calls himself the quad god is humble.”
“Someone had to do it.”
“Of course they did,” she said dryly. “And naturally, it had to be you.”
“It fit.”
“It’s embarrassing.”
“It’s accurate.”
She stared at him for a second, then shook her head, a smile tugging at her mouth despite herself. “You’re insufferable.”
He would never tell her. That much, at least, was certain.
Some things could be managed. Controlled. Filed away neatly in the same part of his mind where he kept everything else that did not fit into the plan. This felt like one of those things. It had to be. And yet, he could feel it. Like something shifting beneath the surface of water, subtle enough that you might miss it if you were not paying attention.
Something was changing. Not around them. Not in the obvious ways.
Between them.
For so long, what they had felt complete in a way he had never questioned. It was enough. More than enough, actually. It had never occurred to him to want anything different because there had never been a gap where something else could exist.
Until there was.
And once he noticed it, he could not seem to stop.
Nothing about her changed in any way that could be pointed to. She still stole his hoodies without asking, as if they belonged to her more than they did to him. Still fell asleep halfway through movies, her head in his lap, trusting in that effortless, unspoken way that had always defined them. Still dragged him out of his room when he would have preferred to stay in, insisting that life existed outside of training schedules and recovery routines.
She still walked into his space like it was hers, talking without pause about whatever had caught her attention that day, expecting him to listen, and somehow always getting exactly that.
On the surface, everything was the same… but there were moments. Small ones. Almost insignificant on their own.
He noticed the way her hand would stay for just a second longer than necessary when she passed him something, the brief, accidental contact that suddenly did not feel accidental at all. He noticed how his eyes searched for her without thinking when he entered a room, scanning automatically until he found her, like something in him refused to settle otherwise.
Even her name, something he had said a thousand times without thought, felt different in his mouth. It carried weight now. A strange, quiet pull that he could not quite define but could not ignore either.
He noticed things.
That was the problem.
He had not meant to. He had not wanted to. Awareness came with complications, and complications did not fit into the life he had built so carefully.
But he noticed. He noticed how people looked at her. That had always been there, of course. She had always drawn attention without trying, something effortless in the way she moved through spaces, like she belonged in all of them. Boys, men, whoever happened to be nearby, they gravitated toward her like it was instinct.
It had never bothered him.
Not before.
Now, it did something else entirely.
Because he noticed her too.
In ways he had not allowed himself to before. In ways that felt inconvenient at best and deeply problematic at worst. The way certain clothes fit differently now, how a pair of shorts might sit just a little higher than they used to, how the neckline of a shirt might dip just enough to make him look away and then immediately resent the fact that he had to.
“Come on,” she said, already halfway into his room like she owned it. “We’re going out.”
He was under the covers, lights off, the kind of stillness that came from a body that had been pushed to its limit all week and he was finally home. In his bed. Surrounded by his things. His eyes were already closed, his mind halfway to sleep, so all she got was a muffled, unimpressed, “No.”
“Yes.”
“I have training in the morning,” he added, voice dragging slightly, followed by a groan that made it clear just how serious he was about not moving.
“You always have training in the morning.”
“That’s because I train,” he shot back, sitting up more abruptly than he meant to, like the argument alone had forced him awake.
She rolled her eyes before her gaze flicked around once before landing on his jacket draped over the chair. Without hesitation, she grabbed it and tossed it at him.
It hit him square in the face.
“Live a little,” she said, completely unfazed. “For once.”
He dragged the jacket down slowly, giving her a look that was meant to be intimidating and landed somewhere closer to tired annoyance. “I do live.”
“You exist efficiently,” she corrected, folding her arms. “It’s different.”
“I just won.”
“Exactly,” she said, as if that proved her entire point. “Celebrate.”
“I did.”
She stared at him for a second, then let out a short, incredulous laugh. “You gave me one half-assed hug and then immediately went to your hotel room to watch interviews of yourself.”
“I was analyzing.”
“You were admiring.”
He opened his mouth to argue, then closed it again, because unfortunately, that was not entirely inaccurate.
For a moment, he just sat there, running a hand over his face, already feeling the pull of exhaustion battling against the very predictable outcome of this situation. Which was that she would not leave. She never did when she decided something.
And worse, a part of him already knew he was going to give in.
He let out a long breath, somewhere between a sigh and a quiet surrender, and pushed the covers back. “One hour.”
Her entire face lit up instantly, like she had not doubted him for a second.
“That’s all I need,” she said, already turning toward the door again, victory secured before he had even fully stood up.
The bar was loud in all the wrong ways.
Music just slightly too insistent, bass heavy enough to settle in his chest. Lights too dim in a way that felt intentional, like everything in the place had been carefully designed to blur edges, to make bad decisions feel softer, easier to justify.
They had been doing this for years, long before they were supposed to, back when fake IDs were easily attainable and consequences felt like something that happened to other people. Money had made most rules feel negotiable. Youth had done the rest, stretching that sense of invincibility just enough for them to believe they could move through the world untouched.
He knew better now.
At least, he told himself he did.
Still, it never seemed to matter when she looked at him like that.
“Okay,” she said, leaning into him slightly as she scanned the room, her elbows resting against the bar like she belonged there more than anyone else did. She did not even try to hide the fact that she was people watching, her gaze sharp, amused, entirely uninterested in subtlety. “Game.”
Of course.
He turned his head just enough to look at her, already knowing exactly where this was going. There was a familiarity to it that made something in him relax despite himself, a small smile tugging at his mouth before he could stop it.
It was ridiculous. They were too old for this.
They were absolutely going to do it anyway.
She pointed, subtle in movement but not in intention. “That one.”
He followed her gaze, letting his eyes settle across the room until they landed where she had directed them.
The girl was impossible to miss.
Not because there was anything particularly striking about her, but because she made sure no one could ignore her. Her laugh cut sharply through the music, louder than it needed to be, spilling over conversations that had nothing to do with her. She leaned into every person she spoke to, touching arms, tossing her hair back, her attention bouncing from one guy to the next like she was casting a wide net and waiting to see what came back.
For a second, she glanced in his direction and smiled a little too knowingly, like she had already decided something about him.
He looked away almost immediately.
“You must want me dead in secret,” he said flatly, not even bothering to lower his voice.
She turned to him slowly, eyebrows lifting like she genuinely could not believe what she was hearing. “It’s just some harmless fun…”
He gave her a look at that, but it did not land. It never did when she was in this mood.
“I mean,” he added, gesturing vaguely toward the girl across the room, “really?”
She followed his gaze again, this time actually paying attention. The girl laughed, loud and sharp, cutting through the music like she was competing with it. Her hand slid up someone’s arm in a way that felt practiced, deliberate. A second later, she was already turning to someone else, smile resetting, energy unwavering.
“She does look like she’d clap when the plane lands,” she said finally, like she had reached a very reasonable conclusion.
He let out a quiet breath of laughter, shaking his head slightly. “No one actually does that.”
“They do,” she insisted. “And she’s one of them.”
He glanced back once more, watching the way the girl shifted again, already onto someone new, already performing like the room was a stage and she was determined to stay in the spotlight. There was nothing subtle about it. Nothing that made him want to look twice with any other intention than to await the catastrophe about to unravel.
“Well, the game is the game.” she said after a moment, still watching. “You’ve done a lot worse.”
He winced immediately, like the words had physically hit him.
“Ugh… don’t remind me,” he muttered, taking a long sip of his drink, as if that could wash away the memories of previous games like this one.
It did not.
She smiled to herself, clearly pleased with the reaction, before finally turning back to him, attention shifting easily.
“My turn,” she said, eyes locking onto his with expectation.
There it was. The part he never quite prepared for, even though he knew it was coming. He scanned the room again, slower this time, more deliberate, already trying to find the worst possible option.
Someone entirely wrong for her.
Someone that would make her laugh about it later.
Someone that would not matter.
His gaze moved from one person to the next, dismissing quickly, until it landed on a guy near the edge of the bar. Well dressed, a little too polished, the kind of posture that suggested he cared a bit too much about being perceived a certain way.
He looked like he would talk at you, not to you.
He looked like he would say something about investments within five minutes.
He looked like a terrible idea.
He tilted his head slightly in that direction. “That one.”
She followed his gaze, squinting slightly as she took him in.
“Oh,” she said, slow and thoughtful. “That is bad.”
“I know.”
She let out a small, delighted laugh, already straightening slightly. “You’re evil.”
She glanced back at him once, something playful flickering in her expression, then looked toward the guy again.
“Alright,” she said, already moving. “Don’t wait up.”
He watched her go with a sigh before moving towards the girl that seemed too pleased to see him approaching.
The goal of the game had never been to actually kiss anyone or go home with them. That was never the point.
It was about the stories.
About coming back to each other afterward, half laughing, half horrified, comparing notes like they had just survived something together. And over the years, the game had given them plenty of material. Enough to fill entire nights with retellings that somehow got funnier every time.
There was that one time in Montreal when his pick for her had spent twenty minutes explaining cryptocurrency like it was a personality trait, only to admit he did not actually own any. Or the girl she had chosen for him in that other time who had tried to guess his zodiac sign with unsettling intensity and then actually cried when she guessed wrong 3 times.
It was always like that.
Ridiculous. Harmless. Temporary.
Safe.
But as he stood there now, listening to the sharp, almost piercing pitch of the girl’s laughter beside him, feeling her hands settle on his arm like she had decided that was where they belonged, something in him felt off.
He found himself drinking more than he meant to.
One sip turning into another, less about enjoying it and more about giving himself something to do. Something to focus on that was not the conversation he was barely listening to or the way her touch lingered just a little too long.
Or the fact that, every so often, his eyes drifted back across the room.
To her.
To the guy he had picked.
And the problem was, she did not look like she was having a terrible time.
She was smiling.
Not politely. Not in that distant, detached way she used when she was enduring something. It looked… real enough to bother him.
That sat poorly in his chest.
After a while, the conversation beside him became too much. Too loud, too repetitive, too uninteresting to justify staying. He excused himself with a vague comment and made his way back to the bar, the noise fading into something more manageable as he put space between himself and it.
She only made her way back about 20 minutes later, slipping onto the stool beside him with the same ease she always had, like the time apart hadn’t happened at all. Their shoulders brushed lightly as she settled in, a small, familiar contact that shouldn’t have meant anything and yet felt a little more noticeable now.
In those twenty minutes, he had made a series of decisions he was already beginning to regret.
Namely, ordering a couple more beers than necessary.
“That was actually not horrible,” she said, almost surprised by it.
He let out a short breath through his nose, lifting his beer slightly before taking another sip. “Speak for yourself. I had to chug two of these just to survive ten minutes.”
She watched him as he drank.
Her eyes lingered, just a fraction longer than they should have. Noticing things she had never paid attention to before. The shape of his mouth, the way his lips pressed against the glass, pink and plump, softer than she had ever noticed.
He did not notice her staring… or if he did, the alcohol blurred it enough that he did not react.
“So I won then,” she said, her voice dipping slightly, something quieter threading through it now. “I picked the worst.”
He turned toward her fully this time, shifting on the stool so his body faced hers. His expression changed, something thoughtful settling in, though not entirely clear. His eyes narrowed slightly, like he was trying to piece something together that did not quite want to come into focus.
For a second, it looked like he might just let it pass.
He did not.
“It’s very safe, isn’t it?” he said.
The words came out slower than usual. Not slurred, but softened. His usual precision dulled just enough to make it noticeable.
She blinked, caught off guard. “What?”
“This,” he continued, holding her gaze now in a way that felt different. Steadier. More deliberate. “This game.”
He let out a quiet breath, almost like a laugh, but there was no humor in it.
“There’s no risk,” he went on. “We already know how it ends. We pick the worst ones on purpose, so nothing ever happens.”
She frowned slightly, trying to follow where he was going.
“I’m not going to meet someone here,” he said, a little more plainly now. “Not really. Not when you’re choosing for me.”
His eyes flickered over her face, searching for something he could not quite name.
“And I make sure you don’t either,” he added, quieter. “I pick someone you’d never actually want. So I don’t have to…”
He stopped himself.
So I don’t have to watch you leave with someone else.
He swallowed, looking away briefly before back at her, like he was trying to decide if he had already said too much.
“It’s safe,” he repeated, softer now. “We never actually have to… deal with anything real.”
The noise of the bar rushed back in around them, but it felt distant somehow.
She didn’t answer right away.
For a second, she just looked at him, like she was trying to figure out if this was still part of the joke or if he had taken a turn somewhere she hadn’t followed. The noise of the bar carried on around them, loud and careless, but it felt oddly distant now. Like they were sitting slightly outside of it.
“What the fuck are you on about, Lily?” she asked, a small smile tugging at her mouth, not quite taking him seriously yet. The nickname she only used to piss him off further making it quite clear.
He let out a quiet breath, shaking his head like he didn’t have a good answer for that. “I don’t know.”
That was the truth of it. He didn’t know when it had started feeling different. Just that it had.
She watched him for a moment longer, studying him in that quiet, knowing way she had, like she was piecing something together he hadn’t said yet. Then she tilted her head slightly.
“You’re drunk.”
“Not that drunk,” he replied immediately, which, in itself, was already suspicious.
“You’re having thoughts,” she said, amused now, like that alone explained everything.
He huffed softly, dragging a hand over his face. “I always have thoughts.”
She reached over without hesitation, her hand coming up to the side of his face, fingers slipping lightly into his hair like it was the most natural thing in the world. “That little head of yours was not built for deep thinking, Lily,” her tone soft and entirely unbothered. “It’s there to look pretty.”
He squinted at her like she had just personally insulted his entire lineage. If he had been sober, or at least slightly more in control of his own brain, he might have gotten distracted by the way her fingers rested in his hair, the absentminded ease of it, the kind of touch he had never questioned before.
But in his current state, his mind latched onto exactly one thing.
She thought he was pretty.
And, apparently, stupid.
“Did you just call me dumb?” he asked, narrowing his eyes further, like he was genuinely trying to process the offense..
She broke into a laugh. Softening just a little as her hand dropped to his shoulder, thumb brushing absentmindedly like she was smoothing something over. Her tone became a smidge more serious. “I just mean… you don’t usually say your thoughts out loud like that.”
That landed. It landed because she was right. He didn’t do this. He didn’t sit around poking at things that worked perfectly fine as they were. He followed the plan. He kept things simple.
Except nothing felt simple right now.
He shifted slightly on the stool, turning more toward her, his knee brushing hers without him pulling away this time.
“People already think we’re dating, you know that?” he said.
She blinked once, then dragged her hand down her face, covering her eyes as she let out a long, dramatic groan. “Oh my god.”
Of course.
She knew this version of him. The slightly too tipsy version that latched onto one thought and refused to let it go. If she entertained it for even a second, he would circle it all night, picking at it until it turned into something bigger than either of them wanted to deal with.
And she really, really did not want to have this conversation. In a way, she was running from it with the same intensity he was thinking about it.
The feelings, the tension, what it meant…
“I’m serious,” he insisted, his voice quieter but more grounded now, like this part at least he knew for sure. “Every interview, every article. They all say the same thing. That we’re just… hiding it.”
“That’s because people are bored,” she said easily, trying to wave it off.
“It’s not just that,” he continued, watching her more closely now. “No one else does this. No one else has their best friend at every single competition. It’s not normal.”
She smiled kindly, like he had just said something mildly ridiculous. “We’ve established we’re not normal.”
“I’m serious,” he repeated, a little more insistently this time.
“And I’m listening,” she said, holding up her hands in surrender.
He held her gaze, something steadier in his expression now, something that hadn’t been there before.
“They’re not completely wrong,” he said.
That made her pause.
Just for a second.
Then she let out a soft, disbelieving laugh, shaking her head. “Okay, you are drunk.”
“I’m not—”
“You are,” she cut him off, still smiling, but gentler now, like she was trying to soften whatever this was before it could grow legs and a mind of its own. “You just won, you’re tired, you’ve had like 3 beers more than you should have and now you’re… spiraling.”
“I’m not spiraling.”
“You are a little bit spiraling,” she insisted, beginning to stand up and coax him to do the same. “It’s fine. It happens.”
He exhaled, frustration flickering briefly across his face, but it didn’t fully settle. It had no room to settle with the way she was looking at him.
She slid off the stool before he could say anything else, grabbing his sleeve lightly.
“Come on,” she said, tone softer now, but firm in that way that usually got him to follow without question. “Let’s go home.”
He hesitated for half a second.
Then he stood.
Because despite everything, that part hadn’t changed.
He followed her. He would always follow her.
They ended up back at his place like they always did.
It had become something unspoken over the years, a quiet agreement neither of them had ever felt the need to question. No matter how the night went, no matter where they ended up, they would eventually circle back here. It was neutral ground in a way that nothing else ever was. Familiar. Safe. Predictable in a way the rest of their lives rarely allowed.
Even tonight.
Even after he had said too much, stumbled over words he usually kept locked away, let something slip that neither of them seemed ready to look at directly.
Still, habit was stronger than discomfort.
She pushed him toward his bathroom with practiced ease, barely giving him time to protest. “Go. You smell like beer and bad decisions.”
He let out a tired huff but didn’t argue, disappearing inside while she made her way to the guest bathroom like she belonged there.
Because she did.
There were things in there that were hers. Things that accumulated over time. Her favorite soap sitting neatly beside his spare one, a bottle of perfume she had forgotten once and never taken back, makeup wipes tucked into the drawer. A clean towel was always there, like it had been placed with her in mind without anyone ever saying so out loud.
It was small, but it wasn’t nothing.
Their showers were quick. Neither of them lingered. Just enough to wash off the night, the faint stickiness of the bar, the smell of alcohol and other people. Enough to feel like themselves again.
The made her way back to his room, the shorts she kept there felt soft from too many washes, paired with one of his old video game shirts that hung loosely on her frame. It wasn’t the most flattering thing she owned, but that had never been the point.
She liked the way it smelled.
She had never said it out loud, never felt the need to explain something that felt so instinctive, but there was something about it that settled her. Maybe it was the familiarity, the years of association, or maybe it was something else entirely. The laundry detergent his mom had always used, the faint trace of his cologne lingering in the fabric, and something underneath it all that was just… him.
She couldn’t quite name it. She didn’t really need to.
He was already on the bed when she walked in, sprawled across it like he had given up halfway through the act of getting comfortable. One arm thrown over his eyes, the other resting loosely at his side.
“Your dad will kill me if you have a hangover tomorrow,” she murmured, moving toward the bed and nudging him lightly so she could pull the covers back.
“Oh, he’ll kill you,” he corrected, voice muffled but certain. “I can already feel it coming.”
She let out a quiet breath of laughter as she slipped under the covers, the sheets cool against her skin. After a second, he shifted, finally cooperating, sliding in beside her without complaint.
It was automatic. The kind of familiarity that didn’t require thought.
She moved closer without really deciding to, her head finding its usual place against his chest like it had been guided there. He adjusted instinctively, his arm coming around her shoulders, pulling her in just enough.
Their breathing settled gradually, syncing in that quiet, unconscious way that came from years of doing this exact thing.
“You’re weird tonight,” she murmured, her voice softer now, edged with something she didn’t quite unpack.
“So are you,” he replied.
“I’m always weird.”
He huffed lightly, the sound vibrating faintly beneath her cheek. “That’s true.”
They had a routine of sorts.
Not one they had ever sat down and defined, not something either of them would have been able to explain if asked, but it existed all the same. It lived in the in-between moments, in the way their days kept circling back to each other no matter how different they looked on the surface.
Because they were different.
Her life moved slowly, comfortably. Pilates classes in bright studios that smelled faintly of eucalyptus, long afternoons spent wandering through stores she never needed anything from, driving a car that turned heads without her even noticing anymore. There was no urgency to it. No real pressure. She moved through her days like she had time to spare.
He didn’t.
His world was structured down to the minute. Ice, repetition, impact. The sharp discipline of it, the constant demand to be better, faster, cleaner. His body always just a little sore, his mind always calculating the next move before he had even finished the last.
And still, somehow, they fit.
She would show up without announcing it, usually right around the time she knew he would be finishing. A hot drink in hand, always something different, like she had made a game out of guessing what he would want that day. Sometimes she barely looked at him at first, too busy scrolling through her phone or launching into a conversation with his dad like she had been there all along.
His dad loved her.
That part had never been subtle. The way he smiled a little easier when she walked in, the way conversations seemed to stretch when she was around. She brought something lighter into a space that was usually all discipline and expectation.
And for a long time, that had been enough.
They didn’t talk about that night.
Not really.
It hovered there, unspoken, like something both of them were aware of but quietly agreed to step around. Because addressing it would mean explaining things neither of them fully understood. It would mean asking questions that did not have easy answers.
And neither of them wanted to risk breaking something that had always worked.
So they didn’t. They did what they always did: Dinner sometimes. Nothing fancy, just whatever place they felt like that day. Sitting on the floor of his room other nights, controllers in hand, arguing over games he always took too seriously and she never did enough. Falling into old rhythms that required no effort, no thought.
It was easy.
It had always been easy.
It was just that lately she felt like something had shifted.
Not in anything obvious, not in anything she could point to and name, but in the way he carried himself around her now. In the slight hesitation where there had never been any before. In the way his presence felt… tighter somehow.
Like he was holding something in and whatever it was, it had everything to do with her.
For him, it felt worse.
It was not a single thought, not something clear and logical he could work through. It was constant. Low and persistent, like a pressure he could not relieve. Her voice, her laugh, the way her perfume lingered in spaces long after she had left, the softness of her hands when they reached for him in a playful manner.
Things that had always been there that suddenly refused to feel harmless.
It was exhausting.
He started pulling back without meaning to.
Sitting just a little farther away than usual, enough that it could be dismissed as nothing. Looking away when she smiled at him, like holding her gaze for too long might give something away he was not ready to admit.
Small things that added up. And the absence of what used to be there felt louder than anything else.
After a while, the distance stopped feeling controlled and it started to itch.
Like he was denying himself something he had never even realized he depended on. A week without letting her fix his hair absentmindedly, without her hand hooking around his arm as they walked, and suddenly everything felt off. Wrong in a way he could not explain.
The frustration didn’t arrive all at once.
It settled in slowly, almost quietly, in ways that were easy to dismiss at first. A shorter answer than usual. A tone that carried just a little too much edge. Moments that felt off in a way that didn’t make sense at the time, but lingered afterward longer than they should have.
She noticed.
She always noticed.
At first, she chose not to read into it. He is tired, she told herself. Training had been heavier, expectations higher, everything in his world moving a little faster than usual. There were plenty of reasonable explanations, and she held onto them, because the alternative felt unbelievable.
But it didn’t pass.
If anything, it grew. The edges sharpened. His patience wore thinner. What used to feel like nothing began to feel like something she couldn’t quite ignore anymore.
The fight didn’t start in a moment. It built, piece by piece, until it had nowhere else to go.
The night began in a way that should have been harmless.
She let herself in like she always did, barely knocking before stepping inside, already talking before the door had fully closed behind her. Her voice carried easily through the room, light and animated as she told him about a café she had found earlier that day, something about the coffee being so good it had changed her outlook on life, something he needed to try because clearly his standards were too low.
It was normal.
A routine of sorts.
The kind of conversation that usually pulled him out of whatever he was doing without effort.
But he didn’t turn around.
He was sitting at his desk, computer on, the same performance playing again and again. She recognized it immediately. Of course she did. She had watched it live, watched it again with him, listened to him pick it apart in ways no one else would ever notice.
“Are you seriously watching that again?” she asked, walking further into the room, her bag dropping carelessly onto the chair as she leaned slightly to look at the screen. “You already watched it twice this morning.”
“I missed something,” he said in a mumble, not looking away from the screen.
“You didn’t miss anything,” she replied easily. “You landed everything.”
“I underrotated the quad.”
“Just barely, no one really noticed.”
“I noticed.”
She rolled her eyes, a small smile tugging at her mouth. “You’re exhausting.”
It should have ended there.
On any other day, it would have. He would have made a comment, she would have teased him, and eventually she would have dragged him away from the screen because she always did. But something about the way she said it, or maybe something already unsettled in him before she even walked in, made it land differently.
He turned to her then.
“Then why are you here?”
The question came out too quickly, too flat, stripped of anything that could have softened it.
She paused, her expression shifting slightly as she tried to place where that had come from. “What?”
“If I’m so exhausting,” he continued, more deliberate now, “why do you keep coming back?”
The room felt different all of a sudden.vcNot loud, not tense in any obvious way, but something had shifted. Something subtle but undeniable.
She straightened, confusion settling in more clearly now. “Because you’re my best friend?”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“Then what are you asking?” she replied, her tone still light, but no longer careless.
“You’re just always here,” he said.
The words hung there.
She stared at him for a second, then let out a small, incredulous laugh. “Yeah. I’ve always been.”
“Yeah! Like… Always.” He emphasized.
“Why is it suddenly a problem?” Her brows pressed together.
He pushed himself up from the chair so abruptly it scraped against the floor, the sharp sound cutting through the room and settling heavily between them. Sitting still was no longer an option. There was too much under his skin, too much he couldn’t seem to contain, and it showed in the way he moved, pacing a few steps like he was trying to burn it off.
Then he stopped right in front of her.
They had stood this close a thousand times before, careless with it, never thinking twice about the space between them. But now, for the first time, she noticed it differently. The slight difference in their height, the way he seemed bigger standing like that, shoulders tense, presence filling the space in a way that felt unfamiliar. He was almost scary, but she did not go there.
“Because it’s suffocating, okay?”
The word landed heavier than he expected.
She didn’t react right away. Just stood there, looking at him like she hadn’t heard him correctly, like her brain needed a second to catch up with what had just been said. “Suffocating?”
“Yes.”
There was a pause, brief but loaded, and in that space something in her shifted. Not hurt, not yet. Something sharper, something that met his frustration head on instead of stepping back from it.
“That’s funny,” she said, looking up at him now, taking him in properly, arms crossing over her chest as she squared herself in front of him. She didn’t step back, didn’t soften, if anything she leaned into it, closing the distance just enough that they were nearly nose to nose.
“Because last time I checked,” she added, voice steady despite everything, “you’re the one who asks me to come.”
“I don’t ask—”
“You do,” she cut in, her voice rising just enough to cut through whatever he was about to say. “Every time I don’t show up for a day or two, you start texting me like something’s wrong. ‘Where are you? Are you coming?’”
Her tone shifted as she mimicked him, exaggerating it just enough to sting. “‘Are you alive? Did you forget I exist?’” she added, pitching her voice slightly, turning it into something embarrassingly needy.
“That’s not—”
“That is exactly what you do,” she continued, stepping closer now, the frustration she had been holding in finally surfacing. Her voice got low and dangerous for a moment. “So don’t stand there and act like I’m forcing myself into your life when you’re the one who keeps pulling me back into it.”
He clenched his jaw, something in him snapping under the pressure of it all, the contradiction of it, the fact that she wasn’t wrong.
“I don’t need you there all the time,” he said simply.
There was no heat behind it. No real attempt to argue his point or explain himself. If anything, it felt flat. Deliberate.
She noticed it immediately, the way the words didn’t come from a place of defense, but from somewhere colder. Like he wasn’t trying to be understood, he was trying to land a hit.
Like his only goal was to push her.
To piss her off.
To hurt her.
“Then stop asking me to be there.”
“I’m not asking—”
“You are,” she insisted, louder now, the words hitting harder because they were true. “You fucking know you are.”
Silence hit for half a second.
And then he said it.
The thing he shouldn’t have.
“Maybe if you had something better to do with your life,” he snapped, the words coming faster than he could stop them, sharper than he meant, “you wouldn’t be around all the time in the first place.”
She froze completely at the words
It was immediate, the way it landed. Like everything in her just… stopped. And still, he didn’t. Because now that it had started, it wouldn’t hold back.
“You just… what? Follow me around the world, spend daddy’s money, pretend that’s enough?” he went on, his voice cutting now, each word worse than the last. “You don’t actually do anything.”
The second it left his mouth, something in him recoiled. He knew he had crossed a line he couldn’t uncross.
But it was too late now.
Her expression changed in a way he had never seen before. Not anger. Not even disbelief.
Hurt.
Deeply, immediately, undeniably hurt. Like he had reached into something delicate and broken it with every intention of doing so.
“That’s what you think?” she asked, her voice quieter now, smaller, but somehow that made it worse.
He didn’t answer.
He couldn’t.
The words were there somewhere, he could feel them, crowded and useless at the back of his mind, but they refused to come out. Because the moment he saw her eyes fill, everything else stopped mattering.
It happened so quickly.
One second she was standing there, holding her ground, and the next there was something fragile breaking through, something she was clearly trying to hold back. She blinked, once, then again, a little too fast, like she could stop it if she just didn’t let it settle.
And that… that did something to him.
It wasn’t guilt, not at first. It was something that hit sharper and deeper. Like something inside him had cracked open the second he realized what he had done.
In all the years they had known each other, he had never been the reason she cried.
Not once.
If anything, he had always been the solution. The one she turned to when things hurt, when something felt too big or too overwhelming. He had built himself around that role without even realizing it, around the quiet certainty that if she was upset about something… anything, he would fix it.
He improvised jokes when she cried over movies, stupid ones that barely made sense but somehow got her to laugh through it. He distracted her when she fell and scraped her knee, turning it into something dramatic enough that she forgot about the sting. When a boy broke her heart for the first time, he had sat with her for hours, telling increasingly ridiculous stories just to pull her out of that quiet, aching place she had fallen into.
He had never known what to say exactly, but he had always known what to do.
He would do anything, absolutely anything, just to not see her cry.
And now… now he was standing there, completely still, watching it happen because of him.
It felt wrong in a way he couldn’t explain. Like the world had shifted slightly off its axis and he was the one who had pushed it.
She had cried when he won before, but that was for him. Happy tears, bright and overwhelming, her face lighting up in a way that made everything else feel secondary.
This was nothing like that. This was because of him. And the worst part was, he had never meant to hurt her.
Not like this.
Not ever.
He had always believed that, somewhere deep down, like it was a rule that couldn’t be broken.
And yet, here he was.
Standing there.
Watching it happen.
Knowing there was nothing he could say in that moment that would undo it.
She let out a shaky breath, the kind that caught halfway through like it didn’t quite know how to come out. Her head shook slightly, disbelief written all over her face, like she was trying to piece together how they had even gotten here in the first place.
“Wow,” she whispered.
It wasn’t loud.
It didn’t need to be.
Then she turned away from him.
“I’m done, Ilia. I mean it.”
Her voice came out sharper now, but it trembled underneath, like she was holding it together by force. She wiped at her tears quickly, almost angrily, like she resented the fact that he had managed to get this out of her.
“You want honesty? Fine.” She let out a breath that sounded more like a break. “You’re incredible on the ice, yeah. But off of it? You actually are exhausting. You walk around like the world owes you something just because you can land a jump, and half the time you sound like a kid who never got told no.”
The words didn’t slow.
“If you keep acting like this, like you’re untouchable, like nothing and no one matters unless it fits into your plan, you’re going to end up alone. And honestly?” Her voice tightened, eyes locking onto his for a second longer than necessary. “That won’t be a surprise to anyone but you.”
Every word landed.
Not because they were harsh, and they certainly were, but because they were hers.
She didn’t look at him again as she moved around the room, grabbing her things with quick, controlled movements that only made it more obvious how much effort it was taking to keep herself together. There was no hesitation in it, no pause, like if she stopped for even a second, she might not leave at all.
He still didn’t move.
Didn’t speak.
It was like his body had gone completely still, stuck somewhere between what had just happened and what he should have done to stop it. His mind was loud, frantic, already trying to take it back, to undo it, to say something, anything, but none of it reached his voice.
She made it to the door.
Opened it.
And for a second, he thought that was it. That she would just walk out and take everything with her.
But she didn’t.
She stopped.
Her hand stayed on the handle, her back still to him, shoulders tense in a way that made it clear she was holding onto something.
Then, without turning around, without looking at him…
“Your head is so far up your ass you didn’t even realize I’ve actually been writing.”
The words were quieter this time, but they cut deeper than anything else she had said.
And then she was gone.
The door closed behind her, soft, almost gentle, like it didn’t match the way everything inside him felt.
It hit him then.
The cafés.
The way she had been spending more time in them lately, lingering longer than usual, always with her laptop. The way she had started bringing it to the rink, sitting off to the side, not watching him as closely as she used to, not commenting on every jump, every mistake. The way he had noticed it, vaguely, and then dismissed it just as quickly.
Because he had been too busy. Too caught up in himself and in what he was feeling. In what he didn’t understand. In trying to outrun something that had nothing to do with her and somehow had everything to do with her at the same time.
And in all of that, he had stopped paying attention.
He let out a slow breath, staring at the door like it might open again if he just waited long enough.
It didn’t.
Writing had always been her thing.
Not in the way skating was his, not structured, not disciplined, but something more casual, something she carried quietly. She had talked about it for years, half joking, half serious, about wanting to write something big one day. An epic love story, she used to say, like it was both a dream and something slightly out of reach.
She always followed it with the same line, that she didn’t have the idea yet.
So she wrote smaller things instead.
Short stories about strangers. People she saw in passing, building entire lives for them in her head, filling in the gaps no one else would notice. It was why she loved their stupid bar game so much. The watching, the guessing, the brief, meaningless connections with people they would never see again.
And somehow, somewhere along the way, she had stopped just talking about it.
She had started doing it.
And he hadn’t noticed.
He let his head drop slightly, his hand dragging over his face as the weight of it settled properly.
Maybe she was right. Maybe his head had been too far up his own ass.
Maybe he had been so consumed by everything he felt for her, by the confusion and the frustration and the way it refused to leave him alone, that he had forgotten the one thing that had always mattered most.
Her.
Not just what she meant to him now, not just the complicated mess of feelings he didn’t know how to handle.
Her.
The person. The girl who had been there since the beginning. The one who knew him in ways he didn’t even know himself. The one who had stood by him through everything without ever asking for anything in return.
Their friendship.
That quiet, unspoken understanding that had always existed between them. The way they moved around each other like it was second nature. The way they took care of each other without thinking about it.
Somewhere in his spiraling, he had lost sight of that.
And now… now he wasn’t sure if he had lost her too.
They didn’t speak for weeks.
For the first time in forever, she wasn’t there.
No familiar figure in the front row, legs crossed, attention split between him and whatever else caught her interest. No voice cutting through the noise of the rink when everything else blurred together. No easy presence waiting for him when he stepped off the ice, like she had always been part of the routine without ever being written into it.
She was just… gone. And it was his fault.
At first, he told himself it was fine.
Maybe even easier.
Quieter, at least. No distractions. No unnecessary conversations. No lingering tension sitting just beneath everything they said. He could focus. Fully. Exactly the way he was supposed to.
And he did.
He trained. He competed. He won.
Of course he did.
Nothing about that part changed. His body still moved the way it always had, precise and controlled, every jump landing clean, every program executed exactly as it was meant to be. Judges still gave him the scores he expected. Commentators still said the same things they always did.
Perfect. Consistent. Untouchable.
Everything went exactly the way it was supposed to.
But it felt off.
She wasn’t there.
And the worst part was, there was no one to blame but himself.
He had followed the plan perfectly. And still, somehow, ended up somewhere wrong.
At first, he thought it would pass. That whatever this was, this constant sense of something missing, would settle the same way everything else in his life did. With time. With discipline. With enough repetition that it stopped feeling unfamiliar.
It didn’t.
If anything, it got worse.
Because the more he moved through his days without her, the more obvious it became just how much of those days had always, quietly, revolved around her being there. Not in a way that interfered, not in a way that disrupted anything, but in the spaces in between. The pauses. The moments after.
The parts no one else saw.
At first, he told himself he would give her space. That she deserved that much after everything he had said. But “space” quickly started to feel a lot like cowardice.
Because he didn’t just disappear.
He tried.
Badly.
Messages typed and erased. Apologies that sounded wrong the second he read them back. Voice notes he never sent. Once, he even stood outside her building for a full ten minutes before turning around like an idiot who had forgotten how to knock on a door.
For the first time in a long time, he felt… stuck.
Not in the way he did on the ice, where problems had solutions, where mistakes could be corrected with enough practice.
This was different.
There was no clear next step.
No plan.
Just silence.
And the growing, undeniable realization that he had broken something he didn’t know how to fix. And that this thing he broke was probably one of the most important things in his life.
It wasn’t anything dramatic that brought them back into the same space.
No grand gesture. No carefully orchestrated moment where everything aligned just right. Not even his mother’s increasingly obvious attempts to force a “family dinner like old times,” which they had both, very skillfully, avoided every single time.
Just coincidence.
Or something close enough to it.
It was a small event, the kind he wouldn’t normally stay long at. A sponsor thing, low lights, polite conversations, people pretending they weren’t watching each other too closely. He had already decided he would show his face, say what was expected of him, and leave.
And then he saw her across the room.
She looked… different.
Her hair was shorter. Not drastically, just enough. Styled differently, softer around her face, maybe a little lighter on the tips.
Like she had needed a change.
Like people did after breakups.
The thought hit him harder than it should have.
Because that’s exactly what this had been, even if neither of them had said it out loud. A breakup of something that had never technically started.
There was something more contained about her now. Like she had pulled something back, tucked it away somewhere he couldn’t reach anymore. She was talking to someone, nodding along, smiling politely, but it didn’t look like the kind of smile he knew.
It didn’t look like the ones that belonged to him.
That did something uncomfortable to his chest.
For a second, he considered leaving, pretending he hadn’t seen her.
But his body had already decided otherwise.
By the time she noticed him, he was already there.
Too close. Too sudden.
Her smile faltered mid-laugh, the conversation she’d been having cutting off awkwardly as her eyes landed on him. For a second, she just blinked, like she needed to make sure he was actually real and not something her brain had decided to conjure up at the worst possible moment.
He didn’t give her time to recover.
“I missed you,” he said, the words coming out low and immediate, like they had been sitting in his throat for weeks.
It knocked the air out of whatever she had been about to say.
And before she could find it again, before she could even decide how to react, his hand was already around her wrist. Not rough, not hesitant either. Just certain.
“Ilia—” she started, glancing back briefly at the people she had been talking to.
He didn’t let go.
“Come on,” he said, already pulling her with him, not waiting for permission, not waiting for her to agree.
She stumbled half a step before falling into pace beside him, more out of instinct than anything else, her heart picking up in a way that felt annoyingly immediate.
“Can you—” she tried again, but he was already guiding them through the crowd, weaving between people like he had done it a hundred times before.
He didn’t stop until they reached the terrace doors.
Pushed them open.
And only then did he let go.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” she snapped, the shock still fresh in her voice as she set her champagne flute down on the nearest surface with less care than she usually would.
In any other situation, she would have noticed the terrace. The soft glow of the lights, the small flowers lining the edges, the view stretching out into the garden with its ridiculous fountain, all of it framed under a sky that looked almost too perfect to be real.
She didn’t see any of it.
She was too busy being angry.
“We have to talk about it,” he said, firm, like this wasn’t optional.
She stared at him, disbelief written all over her face. “So you just kidnap me in the middle of a conversation?”
“If I had asked,” he shot back, slipping his hands into his pockets like he was trying to contain himself, “would you have come?”
She opened her mouth.
Closed it.
Because she knew the answer.
And she hated that he did too.
“So what,” she said, her tone sharper now, like she had been holding it back inside and didn’t feel the need to anymore. “You ran out of people to suffocate you?”
There it was.
He almost smiled.
Almost.
“I deserved that,” he admitted.
“Yeah, you do.”
She didn’t soften. Didn’t look away.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
The words felt small the second they left his mouth.
She let out a short laugh, shaking her head. “That’s it?”
“No,” he shook his head. “It’s not.”
“Because it better not be,” she shot back, stepping closer now, anger slipping through more clearly. “You don’t get to disappear for weeks after saying something like that and then just… what? Show up and say sorry?”
“I didn’t disappear,” he said, quieter now. “I tried.”
“Oh, right,” she corrected quickly. “You just didn’t call. Or text. Or acknowledge that I exist.”
“I didn’t know what to say… or how to say it”
“Well, you should’ve figured it out,” she snapped. “You don’t get to hurt me and then hide behind not knowing how to fix it.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” she pressed, stepping closer now, her eyes locking onto his like she needed something from him and refused to look away until she got it. “Because it didn’t just sound like you were annoyed, Ilia.”
Her voice wavered, but she didn’t stop.
“It sounded like you didn’t respect me,” she continued, quieter now, but sharper for it. “Like I was just… there. Easy when you wanted me, in the way when you didn’t.”
She let out a small, disbelieving breath.
“Like I went from being your best friend to being a problem overnight.”
“That’s not what you are.”
“Then what am I?” she snapped and didn’t stop. “Because you act like I’m too much, like I’m forcing myself into your life, like I’m suffocating you, but the second I’m not there you lose your mind. You make a fool out of yourself in front of important people, and I come anyway because I…”
The words hung there.
Because I—
“Because you what?” he asked, stepping closer.
It wasn’t aggressive.
But it wasn’t soft either.
She stepped back instinctively, the movement small but immediate, until her back met the door behind her with a quiet, final thud. There was nowhere else to go.
Her eyes darted for a second, like she was looking for an escape, for anything she could say to redirect this, to undo what had almost slipped out.
Nothing came.
Not when he was this close. Not when she could feel him before she even touched him, when he smelled like something familiar and dangerous all at once, when he looked at her like that.
Her brain stalled.
Completely.
“Because you what?” he asked again, firmer now.
“Because I’m an idiot who loves you.” She blurts it out.
Her eyes widened slightly, like she had just heard herself.
He didn’t give her time to take it back. His hand found her waist, firm, certain, pulling her into him before she could retreat into whatever defense she was already building.
And he kissed her.
Actually kissed her in the lips.
Not the absent, familiar kind of kiss he had given her a hundred times before. Not the quick presses to her cheek when they were younger, not the careless affection he used to pretend didn’t matter, not the quiet kiss to her temple when she fell asleep on his chest.
This was very much real.
It felt like everything he had been holding back finally breaking through at once. Every word he hadn’t said, every moment he had replayed, every bit of guilt and longing that had been sitting heavy in his chest for weeks, all of it pouring into something he didn’t have to explain.
She froze for half a second before kissing him back.
His lips were soft, just like she had always imagined, but warmer, closer, more certain. His hand steadied at her waist, grounding her in a way that made everything else fade out. It sent something through her, a quiet rush that made her feel like she was both floating and completely held at the same time.
It didn’t feel new.
It felt inevitable.
Like something that had been waiting for them for years.
When they pulled apart, it wasn’t far.
Just enough to breathe.
Just enough to look at each other.
“I’m in love with you,” he said, the words steady now, even if everything else in him wasn’t. “That’s why I said all of that. Not because I meant it. Because I didn’t know how to deal with it.”
Her breath caught.
“I couldn’t stand it,” he continued, softer now. “You being there all the time, and me… wanting more from it. Not knowing if you did. Watching you talk about other people, go on dates, laugh with them like it didn’t mean anything, and pretending it didn’t get to me. Like I didn’t care.”
He swallowed.
“It drove me insane,” he admitted. “And instead of saying that, I pushed you away. I said the worst possible thing I could think of.”
His hand tightened slightly at her waist, like he was grounding himself.
“I was an asshole,” he said plainly. “And I’m sorry. Not just because I hurt you. Because I made you feel like you weren’t enough when you’ve always been… everything.”
The word sat there.
“And I should’ve tried harder,” he added, quieter now, like the words were heavier the second time around. “To fix it. To come find you.”
He swallowed, gaze dropping for a moment before lifting back to hers.
“I just… I didn’t know how to do that without making it worse. What I said—” he exhaled softly, shaking his head, “there’s no excuse for it. And I knew that.”
A pause.
“I wasn’t ready to hear you say you didn’t forgive me,” he admitted, more vulnerable now than she had ever seen him. “I wasn’t ready to face the fact that I might’ve actually lost you.”
His voice softened even more.
“And I think that scared me more than anything else.”
Silence followed.
But for the first time in weeks, he didn’t feel lost.
He just waited for her.
For a moment, she didn’t say anything. She just looked at him, like she was trying to match this version of him with the one that had hurt her. Like she was deciding if both could exist at the same time.
Her eyes dropped briefly to his lips, then back up again.
“You’re really bad at handling feelings,” she said quietly.
He let out a small, breathless laugh. “I’m aware.”
A beat.
Then her expression softened, just enough.
“You’re also an asshole.”
“I know.”
Another pause.
And then, softer, almost like she hadn’t meant to say it out loud, “I’m in love with you too.”
It settled between them easily. No resistance. No surprise.
Just… right.
He smiled then, properly this time, something in him finally unclenching after weeks of tension.
“Good,” he mu
rmured.
She rolled her eyes, but there was no bite to it. “That’s all you have to say?”
He pulled her closer by the waist, not giving her the space to argue.
“I can say more later,” he said, brushing his lips against hers again, slower this time. “Kinda busy right now”
She huffed softly, but didn’t pull away.
For once, neither of them did.
Because after everything, after all the years of almosts and missed timing and words left unsaid, they had finally stopped running in circles around each other and chosen the same moment at the same time.
AN: Thank you so much for reading! If you enjoyed this, you might also like my 6 part story To Someone From A Warm Climate. I also have another one shot (my favorite) out if you don't feel like commiting, A Couple Minutes.
Check out what's coming soon in my masterlist post.
