Heinz didn't waste a moment after hearing the news.
He had left without a word, the ballroom fading into nothing as his mind whirled and his chest constricted. The weight of memory and revelation was crushing him from all sides.
Florian.
Pregnant.
And all those lost nights—the laughter, the tears, the stolen touches—came flooding back into him at once, no longer fragmented, no longer denied.
A single tear slipped down Heinz's cheek before he even realized it.
'Why?' His own question echoed like a wound tearing open. 'Why was I so afraid of love? Why did I push him away? Why did I force myself to forget?'
Every memory had been tainted with shame when he cast them aside, but now—now that they were whole again—he understood.
The good, the bad, the aching arguments and the tender silences… all of it, as long as it had Florian at the center, his heart had been alive.
Happy.
Whole.
Overjoyed.
How could he have been so blind? So utterly stupid?
