The room felt warm, almost too warm, though neither of us had touched the thermostat. Maybe it was just him. Or me. Or the fact that the distance we had been holding on to for weeks had dissolved like it had never been real to begin with.
He watched me approach, his body tense but unmoving, as if he wasn't sure whether to pull me closer or walk away while he still could. But he didn't walk away. He didn't even try.
"What are you doing?" he asked, barely exhaling the words.
"You told me to say what I want," I replied softly. "I'm showing you instead."
His jaw tightened—not in annoyance, but in something closer to surrender. He looked down for a moment, breathing deeply, fighting something inside him that I couldn't see but could feel in every inch of the air around us.
"You're too young to understand what you're asking for," he murmured.
"Then explain it to me."
He let out a humorless breath. "If I explain it, I'll cross a line I've been trying not to cross."
I met his gaze. "You already crossed it the moment you didn't walk away."
That silence again. Heavy. Electric. Charged with everything we weren't saying.
"I'm trying to protect you," he said quietly.
I shook my head. "No. You're trying to protect yourself."
His eyes flickered—surprised, exposed, almost vulnerable.
"You think this doesn't affect me?" I whispered. "You think I haven't tried to ignore it? To pretend it's nothing?"
He didn't answer.
"Every time you look at me like that," I continued, "I feel like I'm standing on the edge of something I can't step back from."
His breath hitched—so slight I almost missed it.
"And every time you pretend you don't feel anything," I said, "it hurts more than if you pushed me away."
That broke something in him—I saw it. His expression shifted, not dramatically, but enough. Enough to tell me that whatever restraint he had been clinging to was slipping.
He closed his eyes briefly, like he was searching for willpower he didn't have anymore.
"You shouldn't want someone like me," he said, voice rough.
"Maybe not," I answered. "But I do."
When he opened his eyes again, the look in them wasn't something he could hide anymore.
Slowly—so slowly it felt like time was dragging itself forward—he reached out. His hand hovered near my face before he stopped himself, fingers curling slightly as if he was fighting the instinct.
"I shouldn't touch you," he whispered.
"And yet," I said, stepping closer, "you're about to."
He let out a long, shuddering breath.
And his hand finally—finally—touched my cheek.
Not forceful. Not rushed.
Just… honest.
The kind of touch that said everything he'd been trying not to say.
His thumb brushed my skin gently, almost reverently, as if he wasn't sure I was real. As if he'd been imagining this for far longer than he should have.
"This is a mistake," he murmured.
"Then why does it feel right?" I asked.
His eyes softened—dangerously so.
"Because you don't know what comes after," he said. "And I do."
"But you're still not letting go," I said.
He didn't deny it.
Instead, his fingers moved to the side of my neck, slow and careful, his touch warm enough to melt every last piece of distance between us.
"I'm not a good idea," he said.
"You're the only idea I can't forget."
He exhaled sharply, the last thread of restraint breaking.
And in that moment—
under the quiet of the night, the breath between us, the weight of everything unspoken—
he finally stopped pretending.