The door closed. Slowly.
Feitan didn't move.
He remained there.
Standing.
Staring at the void she had taken with her.
Ayumi.
She had come.
With the kitten in her arms.
With a steady voice.
With eyes... too clear. Too real.
"I think it's yours."
No accusation.
No trembling.
No revenge.
Just a gesture. A moment of contact.
Feitan turned.
Behind him, the kitten was sniffing the floor, circling the table as if trying to put down roots again.
As if nothing had happened.
But inside him...
something had.
Feitan sat.
Hands in his lap.
Eyes fixed on the wall.
His chest was still, but inside...
a dull sound.
Not a heartbeat.
Not a breath.
Something worse:
movement.
Ayumi had come.
Not to ask for forgiveness.
Not to cry.
Not to accuse him.
She had come to return something.
To care.
For something fragile.
For something that belonged to him.
Feitan didn't understand.
It shouldn't have been possible.
After everything he had done.
The pain.
The blood.
The fear.
She was still capable of a gentle gesture.
For him.
Or maybe, damn it...
in spite of him.
He said nothing.
Didn't touch the cat.
Didn't stand.
But his gaze faltered.
Just a little.
Like a blade about to break.
For the first time in his life...
Feitan couldn't name what he was feeling.
It wasn't weakness.
It wasn't rage.
It wasn't even desire.
It was a crack.
A fracture in the silence.
And that crack had a name.
Ayumi.
She didn't love him.
She didn't hate him.
But she had seen him.
And she hadn't run.
Feitan stood.
Walked to the window.
Looked across the street to her house.
She was no longer in sight.
She had gone back inside.
But a light was on.
A window was open.
A possibility.
And he, in the dark, began to want.
Not a life.
Not redemption.
Just...
once more,
her eyes on him.
---Ayumi...---
walked down the stairs with light steps.
She didn't laugh, didn't run, but the way she moved spoke of relief.
That day, she had styled her hair more carefully than usual.
She wore her favorite sweater — soft, pale beige, sleeves just barely grazing her hands.
She was waiting for someone.
A boy.
Yuki.
A classmate.
They had been texting for weeks.
Never a real date — until now.
But today — something inside her had said:
"Go."
When he arrived outside her house, on his bike, with a shy smile and a soft voice, Ayumi did something she hadn't done in a long time:
She smiled.
With her whole face.
With her whole gaze.
She climbed onto the bike and wrapped her arms around his back.
They rode off, slowly.
She didn't look back.
She didn't know someone had seen everything — from afar.
Feitan was motionless.
On a rooftop, binoculars to his eyes.
The wind tousled his hair, but he didn't notice.
That smile.
That light gesture.
The way she had held onto that boy.
A part of him burned.
Not with jealousy — but with exclusion.
With reality.
She was returning to life.
And he... wasn't.
That night, he should have felt triumphant.
It had been a big job.
A warehouse.
Lots of money. Lots of blood.
Exactly the kind of night that usually made him feel "alive."
But not this time.
During the whole operation — the gunfire, the screams, the terrified eyes, the smell of iron — he couldn't shake one image:
Her, looking at him.
Not as a killer.
Not as a victim.
But as a human being.
And then again:
Her, smiling at someone else.
Feitan felt the void open inside him like a thin, silent wound.
Again.
He returned home in the dead of night.
Hands stained, jacket bloody, breath still shallow from the run.
But inside, something was still.
Restless.
Silent.
The kitten slept near the door.
He looked at it. Didn't touch it.
Took off his gloves, his weapons.
Washed his hands — longer than usual.
Then sat at the table.
And stayed there.
Still.
Thinking.
Fighting.
He shouldn't have.
He didn't want to.
But he did.
The second gesture.
Against his nature.
Against everything he had become.
He took pen and paper.
Wrote just a few words.
Rigid words. Awkward.
But honest.
Bare truth.
He folded the paper.
Placed it in a small box.
The same one she had found the photo in.
He went out.
Silently.
Slipped down the path.
Left it at her door.
And vanished again.
---Ayumi…---
It had been a beautiful evening.
She still had sand on her shoes and vanilla on her fingers.
She'd had ice cream.
Laughed out loud at the fair, letting the wind tangle her thoughts.
Walked along the beach beside Yuki, not speaking for long stretches — and yet, it had never felt like silence.
Yuki had been perfect.
Kind.
Discreet.
Present.
He had even kissed her hand at the end.
Not as a sign of love —
But of respect.
And Ayumi, heart full, had thought maybe, yes...
she could really start living again.
Then she looked up.
And she saw it.
The box.
Small. Simple.
Placed carefully at her doorstep.
Exactly like the first time.
Her pupils dilated.
Her mouth went dry.
Her fingers clenched around the strap of her bag.
Cold.
In her heart.
In her chest.
Under her skin.
"No..."
She looked around.
Quickly.
Eyes to the right, to the left. Up. Behind.
No one.
But he was there.
She was sure.
He was always there.
Hiding where her eyes couldn't reach.
She entered the house.
Hands stiff.
Breath short.
"Everything okay, sweetie?"
Her mother's voice from the kitchen.
Ayumi gave a fake smile.
"Yeah… I'm going to my room."
She closed the door behind her.
Placed the box on the bed.
Looked at it like a ticking bomb.
She sat.
Her fingers trembled.
Not from fear.
But from memories.
Slowly, she lifted the lid.
Inside — a folded paper.
Nothing else.
She opened it.
Smoothed it with her fingers.
Her eyes ran over the lines — hungry, unsettled.
The handwriting was stiff.
Precise.
Slightly slanted, like it had been forced to stay inside the lines.
The words were few.
Sharp.
Almost cutting.
"I don't know how.
But I saw it.
I hated it.
I still do.
But it remains.
I don't want you.
But I think of you.
You'll never get from me what you're looking for.
But know this — you stayed. Where no one else enters."
– F.
Her hands trembled.
She placed the letter down.
Folded it slowly.
Put it back in the box — like trying to trap a whole world inside it.
She placed it on her nightstand.
Then… she stood.
Walked to the window.
Pulled the curtains aside.
Looked out.
Nothing.
No one.
But she knew.
She knew.
That somewhere,
in the shadow between roofs and windows,
he was watching her.
Still.
And inside her, something cold and sweet slid down her spine.
Not fear.
Not attraction.
Understanding.
She was alive.
And seen.
And chosen.
By someone who would never know how to love her.
But who, in a twisted way,
was choosing her anyway.
The letter stayed on her nightstand.
But it didn't leave her alone.
The words had carved themselves inside her:
"I don't want you. But I think of you."
It was late at night. The house slept.
Ayumi got up in silence.
Opened her notebook.
A blank page.
Her fingers trembled slightly, but her mind was clear.
She had to answer.
Not for him.
For herself.
She wrote slowly.
Each word weighed like drops in a glass long filled.
"I'm not here to heal you.
I don't want to save you.
But I am real.
And you broke me.
And yet, you think of me.
Why?
I don't hate you. But I don't forgive you.
I just want to know if something inside you still breathes.
I'm not looking for you.
But if you keep hiding...
then I'll stop hiding too."
– Ayumi
She folded the paper.
Sealed it carefully in a plain envelope.
Left the house.
The night was silent, thick.
The streetlights slept. So did the houses.
All but one.
His villa.
A window still lit.
Ayumi placed the envelope on the doorstep.
She didn't knock.
She didn't look up.
She returned home, her heart pounding with confusion.
And fear.
And something ancient, nameless.
---Feitan…---
The light was still on.
Not by accident.
Feitan hadn't been able to turn it off.
Not since he had left that damn letter.
He had written.
He had admitted.
He had felt.
And now his skin burned.
As if every cell had realized the betrayal:
You showed a crack. You needed something.
He hated that crack.
But more than anything...
he hated the thought that she might leave.
Taken.
Stolen.
Lost.
Like everything else.
Feitan stood.
Went to the window.
He saw her.
Ayumi.
In silence.
Stopping at his door.
Leaving something.
She didn't look back.
Didn't hesitate.
Feitan held his breath until she disappeared.
He went down the stairs.
Opened the door.
Picked it up.
A letter.
Folded with care.
Not threatening.
Not pleading.
Just... present.
He read it standing, heart beating slow and deep.
Each word was like a blow to the cage in his chest.
"I don't hate you. But I don't forgive you."
"I just want to know if something inside you still breathes."
Feitan closed his eyes.
He had seen that moment.
Her, as a child, watching from the villa long ago.
Her, not long ago, with the cookies.
The smile.
He should never have despised her.
Not like that.
Not her.
And now...
he wanted her.
Not just as an obsession.
Not just as prey.
He wanted her close.
Alive.
For him.
But inside...
the hate didn't leave.
The void didn't fill.
And yet...
he knew.
That if he didn't move now,
others would take her away.
Yuki.
Life.
Time.
Feitan touched his chest.
There was no pain.
But something far more dangerous:
Desire.
Presence.
Uncertainty.
And for a man like him...
it was almost like dying.