The coolness of the night plays with your hair.

Your thoughts come in jagged, splintered fragments, as if someone had ruthlessly torn apart the film of memories and anxieties. Catching on one another, they collide, stumble, and with each impact the pull in your solar plexus tightens—unpleasant, almost physical, as if something viscous has settled behind your ribs, slowly spreading, filling everything inside.

He stands behind you.

He doesn’t move. Not a step, not a breath, not even the faint rustle of fabric that might betray something human, something alive. He doesn’t speak, doesn’t call your name, doesn’t ask, doesn’t demand—he’s simply there.

Standing two or three meters away, yet his presence becomes almost tangible: you feel it along your spine, at the back of your head, in every cell that has suddenly turned painfully alert. You feel the sticky weight of his gaze lingering on the curve of your shoulder, the line of your neck, where your hair falls shorter—and a prickling irritation rises from deep in your stomach, forcing your fingers to grip your own forearms tighter.

“Stop,” you throw into the darkness of the room, your voice coming out harsher than you intended. Hoarse, betraying how long you’ve been enduring this silent, almost insolent presence behind you.

A pause.

It lasts just long enough for you to hear your own breathing—too loud. Too quick.

“What exactly?” he finally asks, and there’s no pretense in his voice. He nudges. Gently, almost imperceptibly, yet in a way that leaves you no real way out except to either shut down completely or speak. It makes it worse. A lump rises in your throat, because no matter how pathetic it may seem—

You’re still here.

You still feel.

“Staring.”

A short, crude, almost indecent word hangs in the air—bare, like a lightbulb without a shade—and at last you turn your head just enough to catch his silhouette in the corner of your eye.

He stands there, leaning against the doorframe—a posture that should look relaxed, yet even in ease he remains wrong somehow. You want to look away, but you can’t, and that too feels like part of the punishment: to look at what you nearly destroyed and realize he’s still here.

He remembers everything. Your trembling fingers on the trigger—those same fingers pressing against his wound. Silent, only breathing—no accusations, no regret, just taking in every emotion.

He doesn’t answer. The silence between you presses painfully against your temples, your chest, forcing you to breathe deeper than necessary, as if there’s suddenly less air.

You can’t hold out.

Of course you can’t—because you always give in first. Always. Even before it truly begins. The bitter truth spreads across your tongue as you turn away sharply, as if breaking eye contact that wasn’t even there anymore, facing the window, the darkness—anything, just to avoid feeling his gaze on your cheek, your neck, that spot beneath your ear where your pulse is racing.

Your hands stop obeying you. By touch, you find a crumpled, half-empty pack of cigarettes in your pocket, a lone lighter buried in the corner. Your fingers tremble with humiliating weakness, catching on cardboard, on the filter—as if even this simple, thousand-times-repeated action demands something inhuman, as if your body has decided to punish itself for every past mistake.

He doesn’t stop you.

You feel his gaze on your back as you pull out a cigarette, bring it to your lips, searching for the lighter. Faster than usual, sharper than you’d like.

Click.

The flame flares up. For a moment it pulls your fingers out of the dark: pale knuckles, thin lines of old scars, a faint tremor that doesn’t fade even as the flame steadies. The lighter quivers with your hand—nervous, pulsing, like a second, accelerated heartbeat in your wrist.

You take the first drag almost immediately. Greedy, deep—as if it could somehow level the noise inside, as if the smoke could fill the emptiness that grew after that shot, after the blood on your hands, after his silence in the helicopter. Hot, acrid air floods your lungs, burns your throat, and for a second it gets easier—just for a second, until you exhale.

“Pleased with yourself?” His voice is closer now.

You exhale the smoke to the side without looking at him.

“That’s none of your business.” The lie seeps from every word—you know it perfectly well. But you can’t say it any other way.

A step.

You hear it without seeing.

“It is,” he replies calmly, as if he’s talking about the weather or tea gone cold. As if he isn’t carrying fresh stitches under his jacket, pulling with every breath. Just “it is.” Full stop.

Another step.

Now he’s right behind you. Warmth. Weight. Pressure that sends a shiver across your skin.

The cigarette becomes the only thing that’s yours. You grip it harder than necessary.

“Don’t start,” you mutter, quieter now, the sharpness gone. There’s a crack in your voice. You hate yourself for not being able to speak as evenly as he does. Every word now comes out edged with a nearly soundless plea to stop.

He leans closer. You feel it in the way the air shifts against your neck.

“You really think this will help?” he murmurs. He knows it won’t. You know it too. But if you admit it out loud, only one truth remains: you’re slowly destroying yourself because you can’t forgive yourself for almost killing him.

A hysterical smile slips out.

“I don’t need it to help. I need it to—”

You don’t finish.

His hand catches your wrist.

Not rough.

Rough would be easier.

Firm. Certain. No easy way out. He feels your fear. Counts it. One hundred twelve, one hundred twenty, one hundred thirty beats..

And that’s just from his touch.

The cigarette freezes a centimeter from your lips, the burning tip almost brushing your lower lip, but you can’t make the final movement. He won’t let you. His palm tightens around your wrist, warmth seeping through your skin, spreading through your veins, up to your elbow—and you begin to despise yourself for how your body responds to him when it absolutely shouldn’t.

Your eyes sting.

If you blink, a tear will fall. You look away, anywhere but at him. Your gaze flickers from one corner to another.

You go still.

Your breathing falters.

“Let go,” you say, quieter now, but the tension is in every sound.

He doesn’t.

Instead, his grip tightens slightly, holding you in place. His thumb settles on the inside of your wrist, right over your pulse, pressing—not painfully, more like a wordless assertion.

He decides now.

Then, calmly—almost casually—he takes the cigarette from your fingers.

You watch, disbelieving, as if you didn’t expect him to actually do it. You don’t resist. You can’t move at all—his closeness paralyzes you, shuts down your will, leaves nothing.

He doesn’t rush.

A second. He holds it between his fingers, his gaze flicking over you, checking your reaction. Will you strike? Break down?

He drops it to the floor.

The glowing tip touches the cold surface, fades.

“Forbidden.” One word.