Chapter 38: The Shape of Her Absence
The silence didn't come gently.
It came sharp—surgical. The kind of silence that arrives when something sacred has cracked, when words are still bleeding in the air and no one dares to breathe too loudly for fear of slicing what little is left.
The door had closed behind Selene without a slam. But it might as well have been a guillotine.
Aria stood frozen in the middle of the room. Her body still buzzed with power—coiled and raw, like lightning trying to crawl back into the sky. Her breath trembled in her chest, caught between fury and longing, confusion and something too fragile to name.
Selene had left.
But Aria wasn't sure if the room was emptier because of her absence—or because Selene had taken something when she went.
The storm inside Aria hadn't passed. It had only gone quiet, humming beneath her skin, flickering through her fingertips like a warning. Her heart thundered—not from rage, but from something else. Something breathless. Something dangerous.
She had said "get out" and meant it. She had wanted space.
But she hadn't wanted the cold that followed.
Aria exhaled slowly and moved. Not toward the door, but to the mirror above the desk. She looked at herself—and startled.
Her cheeks were flushed.
The color hadn't come from anger. Not entirely.
There had been something in Selene's voice before she left—something dark, edged, commanding. Something that stole the breath from Aria's throat and replaced it with heat. She hated it. She craved it.
"You hesitate," Selene had said. "And hesitation is what will get you killed."
And yet… she hadn't walked away with victory.
She had walked away like it cost her something.
Aria blinked, heat creeping back into her cheeks. She brushed her fingers over her lips without meaning to—remembering how close Selene had come. Close enough for breath. Close enough that if Aria had just leaned forward, the space between them would have collapsed.
She wasn't sure if Selene had stopped herself from kissing her—or if she had stopped Aria from doing it first.
The room was too quiet now.
The kind of quiet that feels watched.
Aria turned sharply, but the room was still. Shadows stretched along the floor, and the rain outside had quieted to a soft drizzle, like the sky had grown tired of weeping. Her pulse beat in her throat. She swore she felt something—Selene's presence lingering like a trace of perfume on a pillow. But it wasn't scent. It was pressure. It was gravity.
It was Selene.
Still here, even in absence.
Aria walked to the bed and sat down slowly, curling her knees beneath her. She didn't want to admit she was listening. Waiting. Hoping the silence would break again. That the door would open—not just because of what Selene knew or what Selene had done—but because she missed her.
The betrayal cut. But the absence cut deeper.
The worst part?
She didn't hate her for it.
Her fingers tightened in the fabric of the blanket. Her mind spun back to that moment—Selene's eyes so unreadable, yet burning. Her voice sharp, but restrained. Her presence wrapping around Aria like silk—and chains. A part of her still trembled from it.
From being seen.
From being owned—even if only for a breath.
That's what Selene did. She didn't touch often, but when she did—physically, or with words—she didn't leave fingerprints.
She left marks.
And Aria hated how her body responded. She hated how her blush deepened now, thinking of Selene's voice in her ear, low and biting: "Then show it."
Had she imagined the flicker of softness that followed? The hesitation in Selene's parting glance? The unspoken want that hovered between them like smoke?
Aria let her head fall back against the headboard. "God, I'm losing my mind."
A soft sound—a whisper, almost a sigh—brushed against the air like breath over the skin.
She froze.
Her heart jumped.
She looked toward the door.
Nothing.
Still—
She stood. Slowly. Walked to the window. Her fingers hovered over the curtain, but she didn't pull it back. Instead, she closed her eyes.
Selene was there.
Not literally. Maybe.
But somewhere in the dark, Aria could feel her. The same way a shore knows the tide is coming before the waves arrive. The same way a body knows it's being watched even when the gaze is invisible.
It wasn't fear. Not exactly.
It was anticipation.
Her breath hitched. Her skin buzzed.
She opened her mouth—and whispered, more to the shadows than herself:
"Don't go far."
She didn't know if it was a warning.
Or a wish.
The room remained still.
But her body didn't. Her blood simmered under her skin, her palms tingled with the desire to reach out, to touch something that wasn't there. Or maybe someone. Someone who could walk into the room right now and unravel her again with just a glance.
And then—
She felt it.
Barely. But undeniably.
A shift in the air. A hum through the floorboards. A pressure on her spine, soft and firm and terribly familiar.
Her breath left her in a whisper.
She turned. Slowly.
No one was there.
But the hairs on her arms rose.
And she flushed again—full, deep, beautiful. A pink that bloomed from her neck to her cheeks like a secret garden blooming in moonlight.
She hated how it gave her away.
She hated how Selene would know.
She backed toward the bed again and sat with more force this time, burying her face in her hands. She could still feel Selene's voice curled around her ribs.
The strange part?
She wanted it back.
Even now.
Even after everything.
Selene hadn't lied.
She hadn't said Aria was alone.
And that truth—quiet and devastating—was worse than anything else. Because now Aria knew that even when Selene wasn't there…
She was.
Haunting her.
Claiming her.
Owning her breath.
And Aria—trembling, flushed, furious—was already preparing for the moment the door opened again.
Because next time, she wasn't going to yell.
She was going to ask.
Or maybe—if she could summon the courage—she was going to take.
And Selene?
Selene would let her.
But not without cost.
Not without a lesson.
Not without teeth.