The cold didn't leave my skin even after Alex brought me inside.
It clung to me like I had taken winter with me into the house.
I don't remember walking.
Only fragments.
The crunch of gravel under footsteps.
The faint creak of a door opening.
Warm air hitting my face like it didn't belong to me anymore.
And then—stillness.
A room I didn't recognize properly at first. Soft lights. Dark wood. The kind of place that felt lived in, but not mine. Not anymore.
Alex guided me gently to the sofa.
I didn't resist.
I couldn't.
My body had stopped asking permission from my mind a long time ago.
"Luna," he said quietly, like testing whether I was still there.
I blinked once.
Then again.
His face came into focus slowly, like I was surfacing from deep water.
"I'm fine," I lied immediately.
The words sounded wrong even before I finished them.
Alex didn't react the way others did. No disbelief. No pressure. No "you don't look fine."
He just looked at me for a long moment.
Like he was deciding how much of the truth I could survive hearing.
"You're shaking," he said simply.
I looked down.
He was right.
My hands wouldn't stop trembling. Not violently. Just small, constant movements—like my body had forgotten how to be still.
I curled my fingers into my palm.
That didn't help.
"Where am I?" I asked instead, even though I already knew it didn't matter.
"My place," he replied. "You didn't answer your phone. I… figured you shouldn't be alone tonight."
Tonight.
The word hit harder than I expected.
Because it reminded me that time was still moving.
Even if I wasn't.
I swallowed.
My throat burned.
I pressed my head back against the sofa, staring at the ceiling like it might give me instructions on how to exist again.
But there was nothing.
Just silence.
Heavy. Pressing. Alive.
And then it came back.
Not as a memory.
As a flash.
Adrian's hand brushing hair away from her face.
Lily's smile.
That smile.
My stomach twisted violently and I sat forward too fast.
"Don't—" I whispered, then stopped.
Don't think about it?
Don't remember it?
Don't let it exist?
All of it sounded useless.
Alex shifted slightly closer, not touching me yet, just close enough that I knew he was there.
"Do you want water?" he asked.
I shook my head.
A pause.
Then: "Do you want me to call someone?"
That made something in me snap again.
"No," I said quickly.
Too quickly.
My voice cracked at the end.
I lowered my gaze, ashamed of how unstable I sounded.
"I don't want anyone," I added softer.
That part was true.
Because anyone meant questions.
Anyone meant Adrian's name being spoken out loud like it didn't ruin everything it touched.
And I couldn't handle that yet.
Alex didn't argue.
He leaned back slightly, resting his elbows on his knees, watching me carefully.
The silence returned.
But this time it wasn't empty.
It was full of everything I wasn't saying.
Minutes passed.
Or maybe seconds.
My mind couldn't measure anything properly anymore.
Finally, I spoke again—but without meaning to.
"I went there to surprise him," I said quietly.
Alex didn't interrupt.
"I planned it," I continued, voice hollow. "I thought… I thought he'd be happy."
My lips trembled.
"I even brought something," I added, almost laughing but not quite. "Like it mattered."
My fingers curled into my sleeve.
"I was early," I whispered. "I was early, Alex."
That was the part my mind kept circling back to.
If I hadn't been early.
If I had waited.
If I had stayed in Germany one more day.
Would I still be living in ignorance?
Or would it have found me eventually anyway?
Alex's jaw tightened slightly.
Not anger at me.
At something else.
"Luna," he said softly, "what exactly did you see?"
I froze.
The question shouldn't have been hard.
But it was.
Because saying it out loud made it real in a way my mind had been trying to avoid.
My mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
I pressed my lips together again.
My chest tightened.
And then—
"In his room," I said finally, barely audible. "Adrian… and Lily."
I stopped there.
But I didn't need to continue.
Alex didn't move.
Not even a flinch.
That silence—his silence—felt heavier than anything else.
"I see," he said at last.
No shock.
Just understanding.
That somehow hurt more.
I let out a shaky breath.
"I don't understand," I admitted, my voice breaking. "I don't understand how people can look at you every day… and still—"
I couldn't finish.
My throat closed completely.
Alex's gaze softened.
He finally reached out then—but carefully, like I was something fragile that might break further if handled wrong.
His hand rested near mine on the sofa, not gripping, just there.
"I'm not going to pretend I understand him," he said quietly. "But I understand you."
That sentence did something dangerous inside me.
Because it made my eyes burn again.
I turned my face away quickly.
"I feel stupid," I whispered.
"You're not."
"I feel like I was… replaced," I said, the words coming out slower now. Heavier. "Like I didn't even matter while it was happening."
Alex didn't respond immediately.
When he did, his voice was lower.
"You mattered," he said. "Still do."
I almost laughed at that.
Almost.
But instead, my breath shook.
"I don't feel like I matter," I said honestly.
That was the truth underneath everything else.
Not anger.
Not betrayal.
Just that hollow space where something important used to live.
Alex leaned back slightly, exhaling.
For the first time, he looked away—not from discomfort, but like he was holding back something sharp.
"I won't give you fake comfort," he said. "But I will stay."
That made me finally look at him.
Really look.
His face wasn't perfect reassurance. It wasn't easy answers. It wasn't healing in one sentence.
It was just… there.
Solid.
Present.
And somehow, that felt more real than anything I'd had all night.
My shoulders dropped slightly without permission.
"I don't know what I'm supposed to do," I admitted.
"You don't have to know tonight," he said.
Another silence.
This one softer.
Less suffocating.
Outside the window, the night pressed against the glass. Quiet. Indifferent. Like the world hadn't changed at all just because mine had collapsed.
I watched it for a while.
Then I spoke again, almost to myself.
"I think I loved him too much," I said.
Alex didn't answer immediately.
Then, quietly:
"I think you loved him honestly."
That distinction made my chest ache in a different way.
Not sharp this time.
Just… tired.
My body slowly sank back into the sofa.
The fight inside me didn't disappear.
But it stopped screaming for a moment.
And in that moment of silence—
I realized something terrifying.
I wasn't just grieving him.
I was grieving the version of me who believed she would be chosen.
And that loss…
felt even harder to survive.