Jax continued. "But there is a harsh truth that nothing ever goes as planned in this accursed world. There are always things that will slap you awake if you become too greedy. And I am lying right in between that."
He looked at the melting ice cream in his bowl as if the answer to everything was drowning in vanilla.
"Look, Astrid. My world is really small. It has very limited people in it. And it's not because people don't try to enter. It's not because they're scared."
He paused.
"It's because I don't let them. I push them away."
His fingers tapped the table once. Twice.
"Because I'm scared."
There was sadness behind his voice. And pain. The kind that doesn't come from wounds but from years of choosing to carry things alone and getting too used to the weight.
"I wasn't raised with love or anything close to it. I don't know what a parent's love looks like. I grew up in a world where you either have no weakness or the world swallows you whole."
