“Please... no.”

Something wet slid down my cheek.

“Please, listen to me. Mother—”

I woke with a violent gasp.

For a second, I didn't know where I was.

The ceiling above me wasn't mine. Neither were the sheets beneath my fingers, and something freezing cold was pressed against my forehead.

I jerked away.

“Easy.”

Cheng.

He was sitting beside me, one hand holding a damp cloth that must have slipped from my forehead when I moved.

The memories returned slowly.

The restaurant.

The street.

Wine.

His arms around me.

Then nothing.

“You're sure full of mysteries,” Cheng sighed.

I pushed myself upright, immediately wiping the tears from my face.

Great.

Apparently passing out in his arms hadn't been humiliating enough. I'd decided to cry in my sleep too.

I looked around.

A bedroom.

His bedroom, presumably.

Everything was neat. Too neat. Dark furniture, clean surfaces, clothes folded over a chair. Warm light from a bedside lamp softened the room, but it did nothing to settle the panic crawling underneath my skin.

“How long was I asleep?”

“Not long.”

“What happened?”

“You collapsed outside the restaurant. Remember?”

Unfortunately.

I pressed my fingers against my temples.

My head hurt.

It had been months since I'd slept properly. Every time I closed my eyes, something followed me into the dark—voices, faces, memories that never played from beginning to end.

Only fragments.

Enough to wake me.

Never enough to let me forget.

Sleep deprivation had turned me into someone I barely recognised. Irritable. Suspicious. Constantly waiting for something to happen.

There wasn't a place where I felt completely safe anymore.

Not even inside my own head.

“Come on.” Cheng stood. “You should change.”

I looked at him.

“What?”

“Your clothes.”

My body stiffened.

He pointed towards my shirt.

“You've been sweating through them. Take them off and get cleaned up. We have class tomorrow and it's already late.”

“No.”

The answer came too quickly.

Cheng paused.

“I'll keep them on.”

“Chin Mae—”

“I don't have anything else to wear anyway.” I forced a smile. “And you've already done enough. I don't want to take advantage of your kindness.”

His expression hardened.

The smile disappeared from my face.

Before I understood what he intended to do, Cheng crouched in front of me.

His fingers reached for the first button of my shirt.

My breath caught.

“Cheng—”

“You're not taking advantage of anything. You're just pissing me off.”

He undid another button.

Then another.

“Stop.”

“I'm giving you something to wear.”

Another button.

“Cheng, I said—”

He opened the shirt.

And froze.

Completely.

His eyes moved across my exposed skin.

The irritation vanished from his face.

For one horrible second, neither of us moved.

Then I understood what he was seeing.

I pulled the shirt closed.

“Don't.”

My voice barely came out.

His eyes lifted to mine.

I couldn't read his expression anymore.

Shock.

Concern.

Questions.

Too many questions.

“I'm sorry,” I whispered.

I stood too quickly, but the room swayed beneath me.

Cheng caught my arm.

I flinched.

His grip immediately loosened.

“It's okay.”

It wasn't.

Nothing about this was okay.

He'd seen them.

The bruises.

The marks.

The wound beneath my ribs.

Everything I'd been hiding underneath my clothes.

“I'm sorry,” he said quietly. “I shouldn't have done that.”

That stopped me.

I looked at him.

He wasn't asking what happened.

Not yet.

Instead, he gently guided me towards a door opposite the bed.

“Bathroom.”

I stared at him suspiciously.

“Go wash up. I'll find you some clothes.”

His eyes dropped briefly towards my side before returning to my face.

“And we need to take care of that wound when you come out.”

My hand instinctively covered it.

“It's fine.”

“Chin Mae.”

“It's fine.”

His jaw tightened.

I expected another argument.

Instead, he stepped away.

“Okay. Shower first.”

I slipped inside and locked the door behind me.

Only then did I breathe.

I leaned against the door, eyes closed, listening to my own breathing.

You're okay.

The bathroom was warm and immaculate, all pale stone and glass, with a mirror stretching across most of the wall above the sink.

I eventually forced myself to look at it.

I wished I hadn't.

I looked horrible.

Exhausted.

Pale.

My eyes were swollen from crying, my hair a mess from sweat and sleep.

And beneath all of that—

I looked damaged.

I turned away.

The shower was enormous compared to the one at the hostel. I switched it on and waited until steam began clouding the glass before stepping underneath.

Hot water struck my shoulders.

I closed my eyes.

Warm.

That was what I needed.

Warmth.

Enough to chase away the cold that seemed permanently trapped underneath my skin.

I stayed beneath the water until it turned my skin pink.

But even then, I could still feel hands on me.

Not Cheng's.

His.

My stomach twisted.

Days had passed but it didn't matter. My body remembered.

I scrubbed my arms.

My chest.

My stomach.

Harder.

As if enough soap and hot water could remove fingerprints that weren't even there anymore.

Get off me.

I scrubbed harder.

Get off.

My skin burned.

Still, the feeling remained.

Those hands had once been familiar.

Hands I'd trusted.

Hands I'd reached for when everything else felt impossible.

And then—

I stopped.

My breathing had become uneven.

The sponge slipped from my fingers.

“No-”

The word disappeared beneath the water.

I stared at my reddened skin.

What was I doing?

I couldn't wash away something that had already happened.

I couldn't change it.

I couldn't go backwards.

I could only survive what came after.

I rested my forehead against the wet tiles.

You're here now.

Far away.

Alive.

Safe.

You don't need them.

I closed my eyes.

I was enough.

I had to be.

Steam filled the bathroom when I stepped out.

I wrapped a towel around my waist and wiped a hand across the mirror.

Then I saw the red.

A thin line of blood was travelling down my side.

“Oh, come on.”

I looked down.

The wound beneath my right ribcage had opened again.

Blood reached the white towel and bloomed through the cotton.

Of course the towel had to be white.

“Damn it.”

I grabbed a smaller towel and pressed it against the cut.

Pain shot through my side.

I hissed through my teeth.

That was what I got for scrubbing myself like I was trying to remove my own skin.

I'd known the wound was getting worse all day.

I'd ignored it.

Just like I'd ignored almost everything else.

I should've bought a first-aid kit.

Instead, I'd gone to university.

Then to a restaurant.

Then I'd gotten drunk with a stranger. Excellent decision-making, Chin Mae.

Another pulse of pain twisted through my abdomen.

I gripped the sink.

Breathe.

In.

Out.

Again.

I was away from them.

Nobody could touch me here.

Nobody could use me however they wanted.

Nobody owned me.

When the bleeding finally slowed, I cleaned the mess as best I could, splashed cold water over my face and draped another towel around my neck.

I stared at myself one last time.

I'd made it this far. That had to mean something.

Maybe running away wasn't brave.

Maybe it wasn't even the right thing to do.

But I'd done the only thing I knew how to do.

I had survived. For now, that was enough.

I opened the door.

Cheng was sitting on the edge of the bed.

He looked up and went completely still.

His eyes travelled over me before he could stop them.

Not in the way they'd looked at me earlier.

There was no teasing now. No amusement.

His gaze caught on the bruises first.

Then the marks.

Then my hand covering the wound beneath my ribs.

Something darkened behind his eyes.

I suddenly wanted to disappear.

“Um...”

I cleared my throat and rubbed the towel through my wet hair.

“I'm sorry about all of this.”

He said nothing.

“And thank you. For bringing me here. I know this probably isn't how you wanted your night to end.”

Still nothing.

I forced myself to smile.

“I'll leave as soon as—”

Cheng stood.

My heart stumbled.

He started walking towards me.

Every warning inside my head went off at once.

What's he doing?

I stepped backwards.

Is he angry?

Another step.

Does he want me out?

My back touched the wall.

I shouldn't have come here.

Cheng stopped in front of me.

My pulse thundered.

Then he reached for the towel around my neck.

I flinched.

“You'll get sick if you stay like this.”

He lifted it over my head and gently rubbed my wet hair.

For a moment, I was too confused to react.

Then panic won.

I knocked his hands away.

“Don't touch me.”

Cheng froze.

The towel slipped partly from his fingers.

Something flashed across his face.

Hurt.

Real hurt.

It disappeared almost immediately.

His gaze lowered towards my side.

“You're bleeding again.”

“I'm fine.”

“You're obviously not.”

His fingers moved towards my torso.

I backed away.

“I said don't touch me.”

This time he stopped before reaching me.

Silence.

I grabbed the folded clothes lying on the bed and pressed them against my chest like a shield.

I couldn't look at his face.

Instead, I watched his hands.

Relaxed.

Open.

Not fists.

I hated that I was checking.

I hated that I needed to.

After a few seconds, Cheng exhaled.

“I'm going to shower.”

I looked up.

He seemed tired now.

“Don't disappear while I'm gone.”

That was all.

No anger.

No demand for an explanation.

He walked into the bathroom and closed the door.

I stood there listening until I heard the shower turn on.

Only then did my shoulders drop.

The clothes he'd left me were too big.

The shirt hung loosely around my body and the trousers needed tightening just to stay around my waist.

They smelled faintly like him.

Clean.

Warm.

Safe.

Stop.

I needed to leave.

Now.

Before Cheng came back and started asking questions.

I searched the bedroom.

No backpack.

No clothes.

I checked beside the bed.

Nothing.

“Where the hell...?”

He'd probably put them somewhere else.

Of course he had.

I could ask him.

Which meant staying.

I walked into the living room instead.

His apartment was beautiful.

Not enormous, but far too nice for a student. The kitchen opened directly into the living area, all dark counters and polished surfaces. A brown leather sofa faced a television that looked like it cost more than everything I'd brought from Seoul combined.

The front door was only a few metres away.

Tempting me.

If I had my things, I would've run.

Again.

I sank onto the sofa.

The leather gave beneath my weight.

Everything about the apartment made me feel out of place. Like I might stain something simply by existing near it.

Cheng had complained about his family renting it for him. I had judged him for that.

Maybe because I couldn't understand what it felt like to have people give you something simply because they wanted you to be comfortable.

A home.

Money.

Security.

Things I had once thought were ordinary.

Things that no longer felt ordinary at all.

Jealousy burned somewhere inside me.

Ugly and embarrassing.

My fingers drifted towards my side, towards the mark.

The bite.

I scratched around it without thinking. Pain immediately answered and with it came the memory.

His weight on me.

My body went rigid.

A hand pinning me down.

My own voice muffled until I barely recognised it.

Pain.

Teeth.

The desperate struggle to get free.

Stop.

I dug my fingers into the sofa.

I didn't want to remember.

But memories didn't care what I wanted.

His body trapping mine.

The room blurring.

My strength disappearing.

Then darkness.

Days lost afterwards.

I swallowed hard.

The mark still wasn't healing properly.

Sometimes I hated it.

Sometimes I touched it just to remind myself why I'd left.

Why I'd finally done something.

I hadn't confronted him.

I hadn't fixed anything.

I hadn't asked for help.

Maybe someone braver would've done all of those things.

I couldn't.

The situation had become something I no longer knew how to control.

So I had done the only thing left.

I ran.

And I was still alive. That had to count for something.

A shiver travelled through me.

I curled onto my side, pulling my knees closer to my chest.

Cheng's shirt was warm against my skin.

My eyelids grew heavier.

Just for a minute.

The apartment was quiet except for the distant sound of water running through the pipes.

No shouting.

No footsteps approaching.

No locked doors.

Nothing waiting for me in the darkness.

For once, exhaustion was stronger than fear.

My eyes closed.

I'm going to be fine.

The thought was quieter this time.

Less certain. But I repeated it anyway.

I have to be.

And before Cheng returned, sleep took me again.