Zara pov:
The cab couldn't move fast enough. I sat curled against the door, my arms wrapped tight around myself, as if I could physically hold the pieces of my sanity together. The ghost of his touch was a live wire under my skin, a humiliating echo that made my very nerves feel violated. I could still feel the cold pantry shelves against my spine, the scorching heat of his palm as it slid under the borrowed shirt, the devastating, skilled pressure of his fingers…
No.
I squeezed my eyes shut, but the memories were branded on the backs of my eyelids. The worst part wasn't the fear. It was the traitorous, molten pull low in my belly, the shocking wetness between my thighs that had answered his touch with a language my mind refused to speak. My body had sung for the monster, and the shame of that song was a acid burn in my chest.
Finally, my dorm. The lock clicked, the deadbolt slid home. I sank to the floor, my back against the solid wood, and let the silent, shaking aftershocks roll through me. I cried, but the tears were hot with fury—at him, at myself, at this broken wiring inside me that only seemed to spark for destruction.
My phone buzzed against the hardwood. I flinched, scrambling back. Him. It had to be. A single word. Glow.
But it was my mother's face that glowed on the screen.
The sob that tore from me was pure relief. "Mummy?"
"Zara, nne!" Her voice, warm and layered with that specific, loving worry, was a lifeline. "You have become a ghost in my phone. Are you eating? Sleeping? Talk to me."
I clutched the phone like a talisman. "I'm… managing. School is intense." I took a shuddering breath, grasping for a safe truth. "I made a friend. A good one."
"A friend? This is news I want to hear. Tell me everything."
So I built her a statue of Elio, using only the pure, clean marble. "His name is Elio. He's quiet. Steady. He walks me home. We text about nothing important." I poured all the safety I felt with him into my voice, clinging to it.
"A he friend?" Her tone shifted into playful suspicion. "And his intentions, nne? Is he respectful?"
"Mummy, it's not like that," I said, a real flush warming my cold cheeks. "He's… he feels like family. Like Dafe did." The comparison slipped out, raw and true, and a soft, sad silence settled between us.
"Oh, my heart," she breathed. "A brother for your heart."
"Yes. But… more complicated. He lost his little sister. A long time ago. Cancer." Sharing this piece of him felt sacred, a way to honor the good in him without tainting it with the darkness that surrounded us.
Her sigh was a breeze of shared grief. "A boy who knows loss, then. He trusts you with this pain?"
"Yes."
"Then he is a rare one. And you, my island girl, are letting someone see the shore. This is good." Her voice firmed. "Now, practical matters. Is this sad-eyed brother at least pleasant to look at?"
"Mummy!" The protest was automatic, but a shaky, genuine laugh escaped me. It felt foreign.
She chuckled, the rich sound a blanket around my shoulders. "I am your mother! I am allowed to ask! Good heart or not, I need a face to put with the name. You will bring him home. I will feed him until he cannot move and judge his character properly."
We talked until the tight coil in my chest began to loosen. She was my tether to a world where love was simple and a mother's greatest worry was whether you were eating enough.
"Live a little, nne," she said before we hung up. "Not everything has to be a war you fight alone. Ever since that day you remained closed off."
The silence after was softer. I had a purpose: be a friend. Be normal.
I found Isa in her room, a small, pale figure drowning in a sea of fabric swatches. The air around her vibrated with a tense, silent anxiety.
"Get your coat," I said. "We're going out. Ice cream. Now."
She looked up, her eyes red-rimmed. "I'm not really—"
"Now, Isa."
She came, moving like a sleepwalker. The crisp air outside did little to dispel the cloud around her. I let her talk, the words spilling out in a frantic, hopeless stream about her father's declining numbers, the coldness of the doctors, the crushing weight of being so far away.
"You should go see him," I said gently. "This weekend. Just get on a train and go."
She stopped walking, whirling on me, a sudden, sharp fury in her eyes. "And just leave? Just abandon everything here? Juniper needs— my assignments— you don't understand, Zara! You just drift through everything alone, you don't get it!"
The words were a slap. I took a step back, the ghost of Soren's touch momentarily forgotten in the face of this real, present pain.
Isa's anger crumpled as quickly as it flared. Her face dissolved into misery. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. That was horrible. You're trying to help. I just… I feel so trapped."
"I know," I said softly. "That's why you need to go. To breathe. For you. Not for Juniper, not for your professors. For you."
She hugged her arms around herself, looking young and lost. Finally, she nodded, a single, decisive jerk of her chin. "Okay. Okay, I'll go. In two weeks."
The victory felt hollow but necessary. To cement it, I drove us to the most decadent ice cream parlor I knew, a place of silly glitter and sugar. We ordered towering sundaes, a deliberate act of childish defiance against the adult pain in her life. For a few minutes, we laughed, sticky-fingered and carefree.
My phone buzzed.
Elio: Where are you?
A simple question that sent a different, warmer kind of current through me. I texted him the location, my focus on Isa's fragile smile.
Fifteen minutes later, the bell chimed. He filled the doorway, his presence subtly shifting the room's energy. Dressed in a dark grey henley and jeans, he scanned the pastel tables, his gaze landing on me. The small, private smile that touched his lips was like a key turning in a lock inside my chest. Safe. Solid.
He walked over, his movements easy. "Hey," he said, his voice a low rumble. He nodded to Isa, polite but familiar. "Isa."
"Elio," she replied, her tone respectful, even friendly. There was a history there, a childhood of shared summers and family events, but a polite distance remained. He was Juniper's imposing cousin, a figure from a different tier of their world.
He slid into the booth beside me, his shoulder brushing mine. His attention, however, was fully on me, his eyes searching mine with a quiet intensity that made my breath catch. "Everything alright?" he asked, the question layered.
"Yeah," I said, meaning it more in this moment. "Girls' day. Sugar therapy."
He gave a small, understanding nod, his gaze still holding mine, as if reading the fine print of my soul. Isa watched the silent exchange, her spoon hovering. A faint, complicated look flickered in her eyes—not jealousy of me, perhaps, but of the easy, profound connection she was witnessing, a connection she'd never seen him offer anyone, not even Juniper.
After a few more minutes of stiff politeness, Isa quietly gathered her purse. "I should probably…"
"No," I said, reaching out and gripping her hand on the table. I turned to Elio. "We're having a girls' day. You're crashing."
A faint, amused glint appeared in his eyes. He held up his hands in mock surrender. "Wouldn't dream of interfering with sugar therapy." He stood, his presence momentarily overshadowing the table. He gave me one last, lingering look—a silent I'm here—then turned to go.
He didn't make a show of it. It was just a slight, almost imperceptible slip of black plastic from his fingers as he adjusted his sleeve, landing soundlessly on the seat he'd vacated.
I didn't notice until after he'd left, the bell chiming behind him. I picked up the sleek, black credit card. No name, just a series of raised numbers. My heart did a funny little flip.
I texted him. You left your card.
His reply was almost immediate. I didn't. It's yours for the day. Girls' night. Whatever you need. I'm around.
The simple, unquestioning offer of security wrapped around me tighter than any coat. A genuine smile, free of shadows, touched my lips. For a few blissful minutes, sitting across from Isa with that card on the table between us, I felt incredibly, stupidly happy. And safe.
The bell over the door chimed again.
A familiar, expensive scent hit me first—oud and cold night and something metallic. My spine went rigid. Every nerve ending screamed.
I looked up slowly, the smile dying on my lips.
Soren stood just inside the door, his icy blue eyes scanning the whimsical, sugary paradise with detached amusement. They swept past a group of laughing teens, past a family with a sticky toddler, and landed, with the precision of a laser sight, directly on me.
Of all the places in this entire city.
Why would he be here?
A slow, knowing smile curved his lips, as if he'd followed a scent straight to my door. He began to move, cutting through the pastel happiness with the grace of a predator, his gaze locked on mine, promising silently that the pantry had only been the beginning.