4 years later

The city never slept, but I did too much.
 Sometimes I woke to the sound of buses, headlights painting lines across my ceiling like ghosts tracing their way home. Other nights, I didn’t wake at all.

It had been four years since I left that town, but its silence still lived under my skin. You can run from a place; you can’t run from what it taught you to fear.

My name tag at the office read Kai Blake – Junior Designer.
 It looked fine. Clean. Forgettable.
 That’s what I wanted to be: someone who could disappear into blank screens and quiet corridors.

I worked in a small design firm where no one asked too many questions. My coworkers smiled politely and spoke about deadlines, colors, and clients. They never asked about family. I liked them for that.

Then Felix Gosh happened.

The first time I saw him in my therapy session, he was there with his mom. My first impression of him is that he is a lot like an extroverted king; I should stay away from him.

He joined the company as an HR intern, the kind of person who carried sunshine in his pockets and pretended not to notice when people flinched from it. He laughed too easily, spoke too fast, and wore clothes like armor, always crisp, always clean, always in control.

I didn’t like him at first. People like him were dangerous too bright, too alive.
 But he kept showing up.

He started with small things:
 “Hey, designer boy, you skipped lunch again.”
 “Your sketchbook looks intense. What do you draw?”
 “You look like you haven’t slept in days. You good?”

Even if I wasn’t. I said, “Yeah.”

He didn’t believe me.

One evening, I stayed late at the office. The rain outside hit the glass like static. My screen blurred; my mind wandered to that old town, to that night, to a promise that still hurt when I breathed too deeply.

I didn’t notice Felix until he spoke.
 “You always look like you’re waiting for something,” he said softly.

I turned, startled. “What?”

He leaned against my desk, eyes unreadable. “Like you’re sitting in the middle of a story that forgot to finish.”

I didn’t answer. I just stared at the rain.

“Want coffee?” he asked.
 I nodded, even though I hated coffee.

He made two cups in the break room. I sipped it anyway. Bitter fit me.

He told me about his mother the hospital visits, the way she smiled even when her medication made her forget what day it was. He laughed as he said it, but his eyes didn’t match.

I didn’t say much. Just listened. He liked that.

After that night, he started showing up more sometimes at my desk, sometimes in my messages, sometimes just sitting near me, pretending to scroll his phone.

He was the first person who didn’t look at me like I was fragile. He didn’t ask why I froze when people mentioned family or church. He didn’t ask why my hands sometimes shook when someone raised their voice. He just existed steady, loud, alive.

And somehow, that made the silence inside me less violent.

.

There was one night I don’t know what triggered it, but the world cracked open again. I had come home late, the smell of rain still clinging to my jacket. My chest felt tight, too small for air. My vision blurred. The sound of my heartbeat turned sharp and cruel.

I remember sitting on the floor, knees to my chest, trying to breathe through the panic. My phone buzzed. I ignored it. Then again and again.

Felix.

I don’t remember answering. I just remember his voice through the static. “Kai? Hey…hey, breathe. You there?”

I couldn’t speak. He didn’t hang up. He kept talking. “Listen to me, yeah? In through your nose, out through your mouth. Just breathe. You’re okay. You’re safe.”

He said it again and again until the room stopped spinning.

When I woke the next morning, he was sitting on my couch, half-asleep, coffee cup in hand. I didn’t remember letting him in.

“You’re a heavy sleeper,” he said, smiling faintly.

I wanted to tell him he shouldn’t have come, that I didn’t want anyone to see me like that. Instead, I said, “Thanks.”

He shrugged. “Don’t thank me. I didn’t do anything heroic. Just… didn’t hang up.”

That was how it started.

We didn’t call it friendship, it felt too simple. It was something between survival and silence. He’d text me when he couldn’t sleep. I’d reply when I could. Sometimes we’d talk about work. Sometimes about nothing.

He was chaos; I was quiet. But we fit.

Weeks turned into months. The walls in my apartment filled with sketches again, some of faces I’d never met, some of the moments I missed. Felix noticed once. “You draw emotions,” he said. “Not people.”

“Maybe they’re the same,” I said.

He smiled like he understood.

We never talked about love. But I think he loved me, in the way someone loves a fragile song they don’t want to break. And maybe I loved him too not like I loved Rylan, not like fire, but like the first sunlight after a long storm.

I started laughing again. Just once in a while. He made it sound easy.

One night, we sat on my balcony, looking at the city lights. He said quietly, “You ever think about going back? To wherever you came from?”

I thought of Rylan. Remind me of the church bell, my mother’s trembling hands.

“No,” I said. “Some places don’t let you go back unless you die there.”

Felix didn’t press. He just leaned back, letting the city hum fill the silence.

That night, he fell asleep on my couch again.
 I covered him with a blanket. He looked peaceful, for once.
 And for the first time in years, I didn’t dream of running.

Maybe, I thought, this is what healing sounds like
 not loud, not bright,
 but the quiet rhythm of two people breathing in the same darkness,
 Alive.

Later he asked me to move in with him, after lot of convincing from him.

I accept.