Chapter Text
｡˚❀༘⋆ 🎵⌇ 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒈𝒍𝒂𝒔𝒔 𝒊𝒔 𝒉𝒂𝒍𝒇 𝒇𝒖𝒍𝒍, 𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒉𝒆’𝒔 𝒆𝒎𝒑𝒕𝒚 𝒊𝒏𝒔𝒊𝒅𝒆… ⌇༉
─ ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─ ⟡ ─ ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─
🥀⋆⁺₊ ☁️ 𝑨 𝒏𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕 𝒐𝒇 𝒖𝒏𝒔𝒂𝒊𝒅 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒅𝒔 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒕𝒐𝒐 𝒎𝒖𝒄𝒉 𝒘𝒊𝒏𝒆… 𓈒𖠿🥂
⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆ 𓂃｡˚❀༉⋆｡
And there he was.
Ray Pakorn, in the flesh, standing at the threshold of his own door like a disheveled vision pulled from a dream—or rather, a nightmare I wasn’t sure I wanted to have. His face still bore the marks of the pillow, his eyelids swollen from oversleeping, and his expression hovered somewhere between confusion and indifference. He rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand, let out a barely stifled yawn, and squinted, as if the image before him needed a few seconds to fully come into focus.
Then he saw me.
And I knew. Because his gaze shifted. Because that neutral, sleepy look transformed into a mix of recognition and surprise, followed by something far more dangerous: a glint of mischief. As if—even half-asleep—he knew exactly what he was doing with that crooked, teasing smile that began curling on his lips.
He didn’t say anything right away. He just stared at me, from my shoes to my face, with those eyes of his that seemed to tell a different story with every blink. Red from sleep, sure—but also bright. They sparkled, as if the afternoon light had gotten trapped inside them.
“You’re the bartender… Kant,” he finally muttered, his voice hoarse and dragging the words. “What are you doing at my house? It’s… ohh… it’s afternoon.”
I struggled not to roll my eyes.
“Yes, Ray. It’s two in the afternoon,” I replied, keeping my voice as firm and neutral as possible. I didn’t want to sound annoyed, but I wasn’t going to give him the slightest advantage either.
He nodded, as if my confirmation was some kind of great revelation. His gaze wandered for a moment to some corner of the hallway behind him, like he’d just remembered what part of the world he was in. His outfit said everything: a white tank top clinging slightly to his body, as if he’d sweated in his sleep; loose light gray pants, the kind you wear when you know you’re not leaving the house all day. And his hair, of course—messy, untamed, a soft tangle of waves falling irregularly across his forehead.
“I came because of the listing,” I explained as I adjusted the strap of my bag over my shoulder, trying not to look directly at his collarbones. “It said the owner of this place was looking for a roommate. It seemed like a good offer.”
As I spoke, my eyes drifted around the doorframe, trying to catch a glimpse beyond the threshold. What little I could see was enough: high ceilings, clean white walls, contemporary art pieces hung crookedly, like someone had put them up out of obligation rather than taste. There was a faint smell, barely noticeable—like incense that had burned out hours ago.
I swallowed.
No. I couldn’t accept this. Under no circumstances could I allow myself to live with Ray Pakorn. It would’ve been easier to discover the listing was fake, that the owner didn’t exist, that the whole thing was a scam to steal my info. That would’ve been preferable. A thousand times better than this.
“If I had known you were the owner,” I said, crossing my arms, trying to sound colder than I actually felt, “I wouldn’t have come. You’re not my type.”
There it was. The defensive line. The wall.
Ray raised one eyebrow slightly, amused. He looked at me with that slow, deliberate pace only he could pull off without seeming rude. He studied my posture, my crossed arms, my tone of voice—even the subtle tremor in my hands I tried to hide. Then he smiled again, wider this time. His eyes—those damn moonlit eyes, half-lidded, thirsty, dreamy—sparkled with a blend of challenge and tenderness that threw me off completely.
As if he had read every word I hadn’t said.
And then I understood. I saw it clearly for the first time, like everything suddenly clicked in my head. Ray didn’t need a roommate. At least, not one to help pay half the rent. He had money. He had this house, this empty and quiet space, these unused pieces of furniture. What he was looking for was something else. Company, probably. An accomplice who wouldn’t judge him—someone who could exist with him in that limbo between dream and reality he lived in. Just another body to talk to or ignore, someone to share his vodka with at dawn and his couch on lazy Sunday afternoons.
It wasn’t a rental. It was an invitation disguised as an opportunity. Ray leaned against the doorframe as if the weight of his own body was a light burden. He crossed his arms and tilted his head. There was something childish about his posture—almost mischievous, like he was having fun with all of this.
“So you wouldn’t have come if you knew it was me you’d be sharing this house with?” he asked, in a teasing tone that masked something deeper, something more vulnerable. “What’s wrong, Kant? Are you afraid of me?”
I didn’t answer.
Not because I had nothing to say, but because I felt like any word out of my mouth in that moment could break something invisible. A thread, a balance, a line. He didn’t seem to expect an answer either. He just looked at me in silence, as if the very fact that I was standing there, in front of him, said enough.
And then, as if time had suddenly loosened in his hands, he peeled himself away from the doorframe. He did it with a slowness that felt almost hypnotic, as if each of his muscles had its own rhythm. The world turned to the pace of Ray Pakorn.
He took three steps back, barefoot, and his feet moved across the wooden floor without making a single sound, as if the floorboards were used to his movements. It was the kind of movement you don’t learn or rehearse. It was natural, instinctive—and feline. Like an animal that never loses its elegance, not even fresh out of sleep.
He stretched out an arm toward me with a wide, shameless, almost theatrical smile. An exaggerated gesture, as if he weren’t inviting me into a house, but onto a stage. As if I were the lead in a play I didn’t remember rehearsing—but one he’d clearly been writing for a while.
“Well, since you’re here… why don’t you come in?”
His words floated in the air, wrapped in that voice of his—husky, dragging, sweetly damaged by sleep—and cut through me like both an invitation and a trap.
I stood still for a few seconds. I don’t know how many. Maybe three. Maybe thirty. All I could hear was the faint buzz of the street in the distance, the whisper of the trees swaying in the wind, and the thud of my own heartbeat in my ears.
I had to decide. I could turn around, leave, pretend it was all a misunderstanding, say I’d found another listing, say this wasn’t for me. I could protect myself. I could avoid the disaster I knew—with painful certainty—this man was capable of causing.
Or I could go in.
Not just into his house. Into his chaos. His intimacy. His broken hours and his too-loud silences. His alcohol-soaked dawns, his offbeat laughter, his way of looking as if he saw beyond the skin.
Going in meant coexisting—not just physically, but emotionally. Sharing a kitchen, a living room, a fridge, a couch. Hearing his footsteps at night, his sighs in the bathroom, his music playing softly when he thought I was asleep. Getting to know him for real, in all his mess, in all his vulnerability.
And still, I took a step.
Then another.
And I walked in.
The door clicked softly shut behind me, but in my mind, it sounded like a seal. Like a silent pact with no way back.
The inside of the house wrapped around me with an unexpected warmth. It was even larger than it had looked from the outside. The air smelled of wood, extinguished candles, and something soft and welcoming—like the kind of place that was used to keeping secrets. A wide living room stretched out in front of me, decorated with clean-lined sofas upholstered in gray and white tones. The curtains, half-open, allowed the afternoon light to pour in as golden, gentle beams—almost cinematic.
They didn’t illuminate. They caressed.
There were tall plants in the corners, perfectly alive. They didn’t look fake, but I couldn’t imagine Ray watering them either. Maybe someone else took care of them. Or maybe it was one of those mysteries that didn’t need an answer.
The rugs were soft, thick-textured, and warm underfoot. One of them had a stain in the corner. Red wine, maybe. Or ink. Something that looked out of place, but had settled there like an old scar no one bothered to erase anymore. The TV was mounted on a white brick wall, turned off, but reflecting the light coming in through the window. Silent. Like a sleeping witness to conversations that hadn’t happened yet.
And the kitchen…
The kitchen was another story. It was a whole different world. So wide and well-equipped that for a second, I thought I’d walked into one of those model homes realtors use to show people the impossible. A dark marble island, built-in appliances, chrome fixtures, dust-free shelves. An expensive coffee machine sat like a trophy next to a row of mismatched mugs, as if each had been picked up in a different country.
“The house is pretty nice,” I said finally, almost without thinking, almost in a whisper. “Babe would love living here.”
I didn’t know why I said it. Maybe because I needed to break the silence. Maybe because the awe betrayed me. Or maybe because he betrayed me, every time he smiled at me like that.
Ray slowly turned his head toward me. That signature movement of his, always seeming to follow some invisible choreography, as if even the air gave way to him. He looked at me with a mix of curiosity and something else… something I didn’t know how to name.
His eyes locked with mine, and for a second, I felt completely disarmed. Like I’d opened a door inside myself and he had walked right through without asking.
“Who’s Babe?” he asked.
And the way he said it… as if it were a casual question, one of those things people say without thinking, without any real intention… but no. It wasn’t casual. I knew it from the pause that followed, from the way his gaze didn’t let me go, from how his entire body stayed still, waiting for the answer.
The question hung in the air.
“‘Babe’? Who is he? One of your boyfriends?” Ray asked with a crooked smile—the one he used when he wanted to throw me off balance, when he was looking for a reaction, anything to prove he still had power over me.
I did not answer him. Not because I couldn't, not because I didn't have words to say to him. I did. Too many, perhaps. Words full of venom, of truths disguised as sarcasm, of wounds that had not yet healed and that, in his presence, festered again. But I did not want to give them to him. I didn't want to give him a single one. Because I knew that was exactly what he was looking for: a sign that what he says matters to me. I walked into the house without saying anything, my head held high, my steps measured, as if his question had never existed. As if his presence didn't alter anything inside me. Bullshit. All of him upset me.
I heard him behind me. Or, rather, I felt it. Like you feel a storm about to blow, like you feel the heat before a fire. It was close. Close enough to invade me without touching me. Its presence was dense, insistent. Almost glued to my back. Like a stubborn puppy that doesn't understand that its owner needs space. That sometimes, love also needs distance. That there are wounds that don't heal if you keep licking them.
And yet... there was a part of me, buried deep inside, that was waiting for him. That was looking for him. That counted the seconds between his steps, as if each one was a confirmation that he was still there, that he hadn't given up. That part of me bothered me even more than he did.
I stepped into the house, and my eyes swept across the space with an almost surgical precision. Every corner, every piece of furniture, every detail seemed to have the deliberate intention of screaming his name. They didn’t whisper it. They proclaimed it aloud. Ray was everywhere. In the chaotic —yet strangely functional— arrangement of objects, in the mixed scent of cheap cigarettes and expensive cologne, in the carefully choreographed mess. It was as if the place breathed in sync with him. As if it were an extension of his body, his ego, that uniquely intense, dramatic, and excessive way he had of existing.
“I can’t even stand you at the bar,” I said at last, not bothering to look at him. My gaze remained fixed on the interior, on the universe of Ray unfolding before me like a stage. “There’s no way I’m going to do it twenty-four hours a day.”
My voice came out like a sharp blade, slicing through the air with a coldness I knew how to wield far too well. A defense. A shield. A warning. But Ray... Ray just smiled. That damned smile of his, always mocking the world and himself in equal measure. He didn’t blink. Didn’t react. As if my words were disguised caresses, as if nothing I said could hurt him. As if he already knew that, deep down, I wanted him there too.
“What a sweet thing to say,” he murmured, and in one swift motion, he stood in front of me. His hand rose to cover my eyes, as if we were playing hide and seek. As if we were still two boys trapped in a ridiculous game neither of us knew how to end.
But I had already seen something. I didn’t need anything else.
Photos.
So many. Too many.
Huge, framed with unnecessary luxury. Displayed like trophies in a private gallery built for his own pleasure. Photos of him. From different ages, different moments, different expressions. Ray as a child, Ray as a teenager, Ray young but not yet broken. Ray laughing, Ray thoughtful, Ray posing as if he knew —as if he had always known— that someday someone would stop to look at those pictures and feel something.
“Egocentric,” I muttered under my breath, barely a whisper, never meant to be heard.
“Well, sorry to pop your lovely bubble, Kant,” he replied, dragging the words with that teasing tone I knew far too well, running a hand through his messy hair, “but you’d better get used to seeing me every day… now that you’re going to live here with me.”
His words hung in the air like an undetonated bomb. But it wasn’t the phrase itself that caught me off guard —it was the look in his eyes as he said it. There was something beyond the game. Beyond the provocation. There was hope. A tenderness poorly concealed. Vulnerability dressed up as a joke. And that... that was the part that scared me the most.
“I haven’t said I’m going to live with you, Ray,” I reminded him, still not taking my eyes off the living room. That’s when they landed on the most revealing corner of all.
The bar.
Half-empty bottles, some open, others lying on their sides like corpses. Dirty glasses. Traces of melted ice. Everything screamed that someone had drunk themselves into oblivion. There was no need to guess who it had been. It was him. Always him. As if the fights at the bar weren’t enough. As if his sharp tongue and suffocating silences didn’t already weigh too much. He had to top it all off by drinking alone in his personal sanctuary. Drowning his demons with every sip. Dodging questions with every glass.
“Are you really that desperate to live with me that now you’re deciding for me?” I said at last, and this time I turned around. I walked toward him with slow, deliberate steps. Like a predator approaching its prey. Like someone who already knows the outcome, but wants to savor it anyway.
There were only inches between us.
Ray didn’t move. He never did. His courage was as infuriating as it was admirable. He looked at me. Directly. Without blinking. His eyes were heavy —maybe from the alcohol, maybe from insomnia, maybe both. But they were still alive. Still burning with that fire of his, that spark that never quite went out. Dangerous. Magnetic. As uniquely his as the way he said my name when he wanted to make me tremble.
His gaze pierced right through me. Just like it always did. Like he could see more than I was ever willing to show.
And even so... I stayed.
Because somehow, Ray was like that wound you can’t stop touching, even when it hurts.
And I, for some reason, still wanted to feel.
“And what makes you think I care whether you live here or not?” he shot back, with a softness that didn’t match the sharpness of his words—like wrapping arrogance in velvet and serving it on a silver platter, with that slow tone he used when he wanted to hurt me without making it sound intentional. His eyes, however, held a flicker that didn’t quite align with his voice. A spark that betrayed his feigned indifference.
“I could easily find another roommate,” he went on, shrugging with lazy disinterest. “You’re not the only one. You never will be.”
I took a step back—not because his words had truly hit me (though maybe they had, in some corner of myself I didn’t want to explore), but because I needed space. Physical space, sure, but mostly mental. A brief pause to pull myself back together, to organize the mess before I responded.
With Ray, everything was a dance. A tense choreography where every word, every gesture, every silence had to be measured with surgical precision, as if any slip could become a weapon in his hands.
He knew how to play. So did I.
But sometimes, even knowing the rules, you still ended up losing. I looked at him then, with a calm that had taken me years to learn. Not a passive calm, but the kind that comes from knowing you’re in control, even when the ground beneath you shakes.
My posture said everything, like I was wrapped in invisible armor made of patience, resolve, and carefully contained anger.
“You can’t,” I said, with a certainty that didn’t need volume to make itself heard. “You’re a handful. And I doubt anyone could survive even a single day with you.”
He laughed.
It wasn’t a real laugh, not a loud one. It was something quieter, more intimate, almost a purr that hovered in the air like a soft threat. His body didn’t tense. He didn’t shrink away. He didn’t frown.
He simply let that smile—his signature one, the kind that always seemed to hide more than it showed—settle on his face. He stepped toward me, slow, unhurried, with that rhythm of his that said he wasn’t afraid of rejection, because he’d been rejected so many times the pain had grown familiar. He stopped just a few feet away, leaning against the counter like it was a stage, and he was the lead actor, ready to deliver his line with the exact amount of drama.
“So I’m the difficult one, huh, Kant?” he said, that half-smile never reaching his eyes as his finger idly played with the base of an empty glass he’d forgotten to clean. He spun the glass slowly, like the motion helped him stay emotionally balanced.
“A lot of people have tried, you know,” he continued, voice quiet, no need to raise it. “But none of them lasted. None of them could handle it. You’re no different. Believe me.”
He didn’t say it with bitterness. Not with anger. He said it with the sad resignation of someone who’s tried too many times and always failed.
It was more a confession than a provocation. More a painful echo of words he’d probably heard too many times before, of disappointments that had long since embedded themselves into his skin. And even though his tone kept up the act of arrogance, there was a crack.One that slipped through in the silences. In the way he avoided looking me directly in the eye while he spoke.
I didn’t step back this time. I moved closer, with steady steps—unhurried.
Not as a challenge, but as a statement. I stood in front of him, not invading his space, but close enough that he could feel me. Close enough for him to know I wasn’t running, and I wasn’t about to get dragged into his spiral either. My voice came out calm, steady, not a single trace of doubt.
“I’m not like them, Ray,” I said, with a quiet resolve that contrasted with the tension building in my shoulders. “But I’m not here to play your childish games. That’s not why I came.”
I watched him.
I studied him.
And I waited for his reaction.
A mischievous smile slowly curled on his lips with calculated ease, like he was sculpting it just for me—to make sure I saw it, to make sure I knew he was about to provoke me again. That smile of his had a hint of charm, but it was mostly dangerous. It wasn’t kind. It wasn’t warm. It was the kind of smile you learn to fear, because behind it always came a sharp remark, a veiled challenge, or an invitation to cross a line you shouldn't.
His eyes locked onto mine—intense, unwavering—like they were trying to follow my every move, every blink, every slightest shift in expression. He was studying me, watching me with the kind of focus that made it feel like looking away for even a second might cost him something. Like losing sight of me meant losing control of the situation—or worse, losing me entirely.
Then he raised an eyebrow, amused, like he’d just come up with some wicked little plan that only he found funny. As if the whole scene unfolding between us was a secret game and I was the main piece on the board.
“So,” he said, in that voice of his that always danced between challenge and seduction—light as a feather drifting through the air, “if you want to live in this house... you’ll have to be my personal assistant.”
His words hung between us like an open dare, but it wasn’t what he said that changed everything—it was what he did. Without shame, without asking—because Ray never asked for permission—he closed the distance between us, shattering any illusion of personal space, and rested a hand on my waist with a confidence that made my blood boil.
His touch was warm, firm, direct—like he had no doubts about his right to be that close. And then he pulled me toward him with deceptive gentleness, as if he weren’t dragging me into his territory, as if this weren’t just another calculated move in his endless game of provocations. But if he thought he had the upper hand, he was dead wrong.
Without overthinking it—because with Ray, thinking was a trap—I reached for his chin and gripped it firmly, forcing him to look at me, to stop playing for just one goddamn second. I drew him so close our breaths mixed, his exhale brushing against my lips like an unspoken threat. We were mere inches apart, our mouths almost touching, but there was nothing romantic about it. Nothing sweet. Nothing soft.
It was pure tension. Pure edge.
“I’m not playing your fucking childish game, Ray,” I said, my voice low but unwavering, like a sentence passed down with no room for appeal.
And just like that, I let him go.
The contact broke all at once, like I was trying to shake off the electricity he’d left in his wake. He stepped back slightly—but not out of anger. No, he did it like it didn’t matter at all, like that, too, was part of the script he’d already written in his head.
He pulled away with that same infuriating ease, and almost immediately, he laughed.
That laugh of his—sharp, mischievous, laced with cynicism—bounced off the walls like an insult dressed in playfulness.
It was nearly impossible to read. So full of teeth, so empty of sincerity.
Like laughing was how he covered himself. Like every burst of laughter was another wall thrown up between him and the rest of the world.
“Ohh, Kant,” he said, still laughing, with that infuriating way of saying my name that made me hate him a little more every time. “You're so easy to provoke, it's actually fun… playing with you.”
And that sentence was the final drop—what shattered the last piece of my patience. It wasn’t an explosion. I didn’t yell, didn’t push him, didn’t curse him out. But it was worse. I looked at him. I looked at him with all the fury I had held back, with the cold, cutting contempt you only give when you no longer have the energy to argue.
And without saying a single word more, I turned around, walked toward the door with firm, decisive steps, and slammed it shut behind me with a sharp thud that echoed through the room.
Not to make a scene.
But because I needed to cut the moment off—cut him off.
I needed air.
I needed to stop breathing in everything he left hanging in the atmosphere: that thick smoke of broken promises, dirty games, and intentions wearing a mask.
Outside, the silence hit me like a wall.
But at least it was my silence.
Because with Ray… the noise never stopped.
𓆩⟡𓆪 ─── ⋆｡°✩ 𝙉𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 𝙛𝙖𝙡𝙡𝙨… ✧˚₊ ⭑ ˚₊‧₊˚ ───
⭒ 𓂃｡˚ ❝ 𝑲𝒂𝒏𝒕 𝒊𝒔 𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒂𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒃𝒂𝒓, 𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒎𝒆𝒎𝒐𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒔 𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈... ❞ ⌇𓈒
˗ˏˋ ☕ ˎˊ˗ 𓏲 ˖° 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒏𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕 𝒈𝒓𝒐𝒘𝒔 𝒉𝒆𝒂𝒗𝒚, 𝒆𝒚𝒆𝒔 𝒉𝒖𝒓𝒕 𝒕𝒐 𝒎𝒆𝒆𝒕.
𓆩⟡𓆪 🎧 ⋆｡˚☽˚｡⋆ 𓂃｡˚❀༉⋆☾ ⊹ ༄
Style had been kind enough—or maybe just a victim of my pitiful face—to let me crash at his apartment for a few days. He helped me move my stuff with that enthusiasm only true friends have when they want to feel useful… or when they know they'll have plenty of material to tease you about later.
And yeah, he spent the whole day doing exactly that. The jokes about Ray, about my poor wounded-puppy face, about my unmatched talent for running from one problem straight into another, didn’t stop.
It was like I had a button on my forehead that said: “Day one without Kant being dramatic: reset the counter to zero.”
After his little emotional stand-up routine, I decided to get ready for work. I’d learned to treat those moments like scenes from a play I was no longer part of. Something I watched from the back row, in the dark, disconnected.
I got dressed the same as always: black shirt, sleeves rolled up, tattoos on display, and that “don’t talk to me unless you’ve got a tip or a new problem” face. Not an official uniform, but it worked as armor.
It was my way of saying: “I’m functional, but emotionally on strike.”
The walk to the bar was short, but thick with weight.
The sky had that heavy leaden tone that threatens rain but never delivers—just like all those promises people make when you’re in love. I walked the familiar streets, nodding to the same ghosts as always: people who didn’t look at me, cars that never stopped, thoughts that wouldn’t shut up.
When I arrived, the noise greeted me before anyone else did.
That mix of clinking glasses, overlapping voices, and pre-show music.
A constant murmur that filled in the spaces we usually avoid when we’re alone.
It was strange, how a place so loud could be the perfect escape from yourself.
I—Plung’s girlfriend and probably the only person with more energy than the coffee we serve at 3 a.m.—was arguing with her boyfriend about the new band playing that night. She spoke with that lively, hyper-enthusiastic voice of hers, and for a moment I wanted to close my eyes and pretend the world was as simple as she saw it.
“I know the band’s going to be amazing! They’re the best! I saw them live, and they’re ready to sing anything,” she gushed, her tone so bright and high it felt like I was being slapped across the face by raw optimism.
Plung, ever the contrarian, responded in his usual tone:
“Babe, I still think hiring a DJ would’ve been better. They can play anything and do proper mixes. Right, Kant?”
He looked at me like I existed only to break the tie in their argument. I already knew the script. That couple worked like a Swiss clock of tension—precise, constant, and ready to use me as an emotional balance mechanism. I was the pendulum swinging between their disagreements, trapped in the ebb and flow of their passive-aggressive affection.
“I think both ideas have their merits,” I replied, trying to keep my tone as neutral as possible. Diplomacy was one of those skills I developed after breaking inside too many times: one learns to stay standing with carefully chosen words.
But it didn’t work. Nothing calms a storm that doesn’t want to be calmed. They went back to arguing, talking over me as if I were just another table at the bar, and not a person with thoughts and a deep desire for someone, at some point, to ask me how I was. Words flew, looks were daggers, and I... I was about to give up. I seriously considered ducking under the bar, grabbing a forgotten bottle, and pretending to have a selective intoxication.
Then I heard it.
His voice.
Ray.
That sound that had lodged itself between my ribs ever since the last time he spoke to me seriously. Since the last time he left. It wasn’t the voice of someone guilty, nor of someone regretful. It was his usual tone: calm, as if his presence weren’t a fracture in my day.
I saw him enter. Slowly. Confidently. With that smile he used like a double-edged sword. And he wasn’t alone. Beside him, a new guy. Young, nervous, with the posture of someone who didn’t want to be there but had no choice. His presence was like a dissonant note in a song that was already hard to listen to.
“We’re not open yet,” I said, my voice controlled, almost polite. But the fake politeness cuts too, and I sharpened it carefully.
Then, with the usual brutal sweetness, I hit his arm.
“Welcome to the bar! We’ll open soon, but you can go ahead and come in,” he said with that gleam in his eyes that almost made everything less unbearable. Almost.
Ray kept smiling. And I cursed silently. That smile had something cruel about it, though he probably didn’t know it. There was a peace in his face that pushed me to the edge. A foreign tranquility that reminded me of everything I still hadn’t gotten over.
“Hi, Kant,” he said, as if nothing had happened. As if the void between us didn’t weigh so heavily. “This is my new roommate.”
And there it was. The sentence. The new symbol of his emotional independence. Of his life without me. He said it so naturally, as if he were just mentioning the weather. As if he didn’t know those words were piercing me. The guy next to him seemed like an accidental presence. He didn’t look at me. Didn’t even try to smile. He clung to his own silence like a life jacket.
“Nice to meet you,” he mumbled, eyes fixed on the floor, as if lifting his gaze were an act of rebellion, as if looking directly at me meant signing a contract he wasn’t willing to accept. The guy seemed like a lost child, an extra poorly cast in a play that no longer needed secondary actors. And yet, there he was, with his unpolished shoes and a shyness that reeked of guilt.
I leaned in slightly, just enough so my voice could slide between them without anyone else hearing it, except those who were truly paying attention.
"Ray paid you to come here, didn't he? To pretend to be his roommate," I said with a calm smile, almost sweet, as if I were doing him a favor by saying it quietly. The guy nodded, clumsily, and that nervous gesture was a delight for me, a small victory in this absurd game Ray insisted on playing. I laughed, not out of malice, but because the theater was so bad that there was no other choice but to enjoy it.
Plung and I, of course, watched the scene as if we were in front of a Netflix series at its best episode. Their faces were a poem: astonishment, disbelief, and a sadistic gleam of enjoyment.
I turned my attention back to Ray, and I knew immediately that I had trapped him in his own trap. Ray yelled at the guy with an ironic smile, and he ran off like he had just realized he’d walked into a cage with lions. Or worse: with a resentful ex.
"Did you really pay that guy to pretend to be your roommate in front of me?" I asked, approaching slowly, each step laden with intention, with that smile of mine that knew exactly what it provoked. Ray didn’t respond with words, but he sat down and let his body speak: he leaned toward me, closing the distance with a calm so practiced it seemed dangerous.
Plung and I understood the tension in the air. They weren’t stupid. They left with nervous laughter, saying they didn’t want to bother, and I frowned with a mixture of annoyance and secondhand embarrassment. Not because of them. Because of me. For letting Ray have that power over my heartbeat again.
But he didn’t move away. He scoffed. That arrogant and annoying sound he used to make when he wanted to seem offended without actually being so. His eyes, dark and playful, stripped me with the ease of someone who had done it before and knew exactly which buttons to press. He had no right, but he did it anyway. As if between us there had never been an end.
"Does it matter if I paid him? It worked, didn’t it?" he murmured with that reckless confidence of his, leaning even closer. His lips were so close that I could feel his warm breath mixing with mine. My body reacted before my mind, as if his proximity were a spark falling onto a fuse already lit. I pulled away, yes, but I did so slowly, dragging my steps as if there was still a part of me that didn’t want to move away. As if my skin, still feeling his closeness, begged for one more second, for one more fraction of his warmth. I took a glass with hands that didn’t shake, but almost. I started cleaning it with a damp cloth, hiding in that mechanical gesture, as if routine could offer me some control over the tremor in my stomach, over the vertigo of having him so close. As if rubbing the glass could erase what he made me feel with just a look.
"Ray, you’re playing with fire. This is my workplace, not a carnival. Do you think I’m going to let you manipulate me like nothing?" I said firmly, though my voice came out quieter than expected, breaking at the edges. As if my throat knew it wasn’t as strong as I was trying to seem. As if my whole body knew that every time he was near, my will melted slowly, like ice touched by the sun.
He laughed. Not loudly. Not with open mockery. It was a laugh between clenched teeth, raspy, like a malicious secret escaping between his lips. A laugh full of cruel confidence, the kind of confidence that knows every crack in you and isn’t afraid to press right there. He followed me with his gaze as I moved behind the bar, with that shamelessness that was almost a caress, as if he could undress me just by watching. As if my steps were a show staged just for him. As if the air I breathed belonged to him. As if I belonged to him.
"Oh, Kant... you don’t fear fire. You provoke it. You know I like playing with fire, don’t you? Or have you forgotten?" he said, with that low tone that isn’t heard: it’s felt. A whisper that slides like silk over bare skin, that sneaks between the bones, settles in the chest, and vibrates. It made me close my eyes for a second, cursing inside that he could still affect me so much, that he still knew exactly what to say to make me want things I shouldn’t.
I gave him a sharp look, full of warnings and wounds poorly healed. A look that said "stay away" but also "come closer and make it hurt." I ignored him. Or I tried to, even though I knew that any attempt to ignore him was as futile as trying to contain a storm with my hands. I knew that if I kept going, if I responded to him, if I fell into his game, I would lose more than just my dignity. And yet… it wasn’t him who crossed the last line.
"Why don’t you pour me a drink? You’ll be my servant soon enough," he said, leaning on the bar with a sly, cursed smile, full of that arrogance that provoked both hate and desire in me equally. A smile that made me want to throw the glass I had just cleaned at him… or close the distance between us and kiss him until he forgot how to smile like that at anyone else.
I looked at him with impatience. No, with anger. A deep, scarred anger, the kind that hides beneath the skin like smoldering embers, waiting for a spark to reignite. An anger that hurt in my ribs when I took a deep breath, that hurt even more when I looked at him and remembered everything we were, everything we almost were. I sighed, more to avoid exploding than to calm myself.
"Stop thinking you can play with me. You’re just a spoiled brat. I told you once, and I’ll repeat it now: don’t think I’m going to come rescue you when you need it, because it’s not going to happen. Not this time," I said, not raising my voice, but with a measured, calculated coldness that I knew would hurt more than shouting. A coldness that didn’t come from indifference, but from the weariness of still desiring someone who didn’t know how to stay.
I walked away without looking back, as if that would be enough to put a barrier between him and what he made me feel. But I could feel his anger, his frustration, as if it were brushing against my back, as if his breath kept following me with every step. I heard him grab a drink already poured, how he drank it in one go, as if trying to erase the taste of my words. I heard him stand up, push the chair, walk away. I heard him leave.
Ray, though he was many things—beautiful, arrogant, hurtful, brilliant, unbearable—never knew how to stay still when truly confronted.
And I… I stayed in the middle of the bar, with the still-damp glass between my fingers, wondering why every time I thought I had control, he returned with a smile like a sin and made me want everything to burn. That everything should burn. That he should burn me.
𓆩⟡𓆪 ⭑ 𝟐:𝟎𝟎 𝐚𝐦, bathroom 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐝𝐞𝐯𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐝 ☕
✧ 𝑲𝒂𝒏𝒕 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒇𝒊𝒓𝒆, 𝑹𝒂𝒚 𝒘𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒃𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒇 𝒔𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒌𝒔...
︶︶︶ "𝑌𝑜𝑢 𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑑𝑟𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑎𝑎... ⌕ ✦"
The night was quite calm, even pleasant. For the first time in weeks, the bar didn’t feel like a battlefield. The dim lights reflected a serene atmosphere, the music played at a tolerable volume, and the customers drank without raising their voices more than necessary. I had asked the other bartender to help me keep an eye on the place while I took a short break. There was something about that night that demanded a breath, a moment just for me. I headed to the bathroom, hoping to find some silence, to get away from the glasses, the forced laughs, and the constant orders. And luckily, I did. There was no one inside. The muffled murmur of the bar’s music barely reached there, and the faint hum of the ceiling lights was the only thing breaking the silence. I closed my eyes for a moment. Peace. Finally, peace.
But it lasted very little.
The bathroom door slammed open, as if someone had pushed it with all the rage in the world. The noise echoed between the tiles, causing one of the stalls to burst open with a violent thud. I jumped, turning around immediately, my heart lodged in my throat. And there he was. Ray.
His eyes were half-lidded, his hair slightly disheveled, and his jacket hanging off one of his shoulders. He was clearly drunk. I didn’t need to look twice to know it; that unstable gleam in his pupils, that erratic way of walking, that unpredictable air… I recognized it from afar. I’d seen him like that on other nights, slurring words, losing himself in glances he couldn’t quite hold. He looked at me with an expression hard to decipher, a mix of contained rage and something else. Something I couldn’t quite read, but that made my body tense up automatically.
He didn’t say anything. He simply started walking toward me with a staggering yet determined step. As if he already knew what he was going to do, as if he’d rehearsed that moment in his head over and over again. He grabbed me by the waist suddenly, without permission, without care, and roughly shoved me against the wall. The impact was dry, and the air left my lungs for a second. His arm pressed beside my head, trapping me between his body and the cold bathroom tiles. He had me cornered.
"What do you think you’re doing, Ray?" I asked, in a dry, controlled tone, trying not to lose my composure. Honestly, I didn’t want to know the answer. He smiled, that damn crooked smile he always used when he wanted to provoke me. His voice came out low, thick.
"You like it when I talk to you like this… up close, while my lips watch yours."
His proximity was suffocating. I could smell the alcohol on his breath, feel the heat of his body with the scant distance between us. I looked at him, confused, disgusted. What the hell was wrong with him? I pushed him without much force, just enough to make him step back. He staggered back a little, but didn’t stop looking at me. He chuckled softly, with that mix of sarcastic and sad tone that came out when he’d drunk too much.
"You’re so sexy when you’re mad. I never told you, but I like seeing you like this," he murmured, barely swaying on his feet.
I crossed my arms tightly, as if that might protect me from his gaze, from his invasive presence, from everything that was beginning to overflow. I placed my hands on my hips and took a deep breath. The kind of breath you take when you know that if you don’t, you’re going to say something you’ll regret. This was one of those moments where everything could fall apart in a matter of seconds. I knew it. I’d felt it before with problematic customers, with friends on the verge of breaking, with strangers who were already broken. And Ray… Ray had that energy. The kind that burns out of control, the kind that scrapes from within.
"You’re drunk. Where are your friends?" I asked, with a weak attempt at control, as if that would be enough to put out the fire that had already begun to burn inside him. My voice sounded more worried than I intended. I didn’t want to show him that I cared. Not him. Not like this.
He diverted his gaze for a few seconds. His eyes wandered to the floor, the walls, everywhere but me. And when he looked back at me, his gaze no longer had that arrogant spark. It was dull. Lost. An abyss slowly opening.
"I don’t know. Boston went off with someone. And the others… who knows," he finally replied, shrugging with disdain, as if he didn’t care, but his tone betrayed him. He sounded empty. Abandoned. He made that hand gesture people use when they no longer expect anything. As if surrendering were the most natural thing in the world.
And that’s when I understood. It wasn’t just the drunkenness talking. There was something more in his words, in his eyes. There was something broken. As if being there, in front of me, wasn’t a scene set up to annoy me or clumsily flirt. It was something else. A poorly disguised plea, a muffled scream that didn’t know how to get out. As if he didn’t know how to ask for help without using his fists or sarcasm. Because that was the only thing he knew how to do well: defend himself before he was hurt.
"Ray… you shouldn’t be alone when you’re like this," I said, lowering my voice, trying to reach that part of him that might still be able to hear me, if there was anything left.
He immediately tensed up. His body, which had been swaying up until then, stiffened as if my words had struck him in the stomach. He looked at me, now with rage, but not the kind that burns to fight. It was the kind that burns to cry.
"And why not? Because I’m weak? Because I break easily? Do you think that about me too?" he spat with an unexpected fury. His voice trembled, not from fear, but from restraint. As if he were about to break and didn’t want to give me that power.
I wanted to stay firm. But his gaze pierced me. And for the first time, I saw something that hurt more than I expected: the sadness in his voice was real. Deep. Old.
"I didn’t say that," I replied, almost in a whisper. I didn’t know if my words would reach him. I didn’t know if I wanted them to.
"But you think it. Everyone does. Everyone thinks Ray is the problem, the drunk, the impulsive one, the one who ruins everything…" he yelled, and before I could stop him, he spun around violently and punched the nearest stall door. The crash of the impact made it slam shut with force, echoing like thunder between the bathroom walls. I took a step back, not out of fear, but out of reflex.
Ray stood with his back to me, breathing heavily, his fists clenched at his sides. His shoulders rose and fell with difficulty. Everything about his body trembled, as if he were at his breaking point, about to fall apart. He didn’t turn around immediately. He seemed to be fighting with himself, between screaming or breaking something else, or just letting himself collapse.
I didn’t know what to do at first. My instinct told me to step away, to leave him alone, to not get involved any more than necessary. But there was something in him… something in the way his back curved, in how he swallowed the sob that nearly burned in his throat, that made me stay. Not because I wanted to. Because I couldn’t stop myself anymore.
And in that moment, I understood that Ray wasn’t just a drunk guy with attitude problems. He was a bundle of open wounds that no one had bothered to close. And even though it wasn’t my responsibility... there I was, wanting to do it.
"Ray, enough," I said, stepping towards him, my hands raised as if I could calm the storm that was boiling in his eyes. But he stepped back suddenly, stumbling over a trash can that fell to the ground with a sharp thud, spilling crumpled papers and dirty wrappers all over the bar’s bathroom. His body trembled, his lips slightly parted in a grimace of either rage or pain, and for a moment, I thought he was going to cry. But no. He screamed.
"Don’t tell me what to do! You’re nobody to tell me how to live!" he yelled, his voice torn, as if he were breaking from the inside. And then, silence. Only his heavy breathing remained, a kind of anguished gasp that echoed off the dirty bathroom walls. His shoulders rose and fell violently, and in his gaze, there was more than anger: there was a fierce emptiness, a weariness that seemed to weigh on every bone.
The commotion caught someone’s attention from the bar; the door shook briefly from the outside, and a voice asked if everything was okay. I stepped forward, keeping my body firm between the door and Ray, and quickly said:
"All good. I’ve got it." When I looked at him again, I no longer saw the arrogant guy who used sarcasm as armor. What was in front of me wasn’t an enemy, or a headache, or another nuisance. It was someone broken, profoundly alone, with eyes full of sadness and a fragility he couldn’t even hide. I approached cautiously, as if a wrong step might make him vanish.
"Ray, look at me," I said in a low, grave but calm voice, trying to anchor him with my words. "Let’s get out of here."
He didn’t answer, but he didn’t run either. When I took his arm, he didn’t resist. We walked toward the back exit of the bar, away from the lights, the noise, and the inquisitive glances. The night air greeted us with a soft chill, and we kept walking in silence through the empty streets. With each step, his body seemed lighter, more defeated. I no longer cared about his shouts, or his shove, or his words full of rage. I only thought about getting him to safety, protecting what he didn’t know how to protect himself.
When we reached his building, I realized the inevitable: he didn’t have his keys. I checked him out of reflex, gently feeling his pockets, almost tenderly. It wasn’t a surprise that he didn’t know where they were. I found it all crammed into the back pocket of his pants: the car keys, the house keys, a lighter.
"Where are your keys?" I murmured as I carefully searched his pockets. I didn’t expect an answer, and in fact, the one I got was barely a dragged whisper, a mix of broken sounds that could have been a "thank you," or maybe a "sorry." Incomplete words, dissolving in the air as if they were too heavy to be fully spoken. I didn’t leave him there. I couldn’t. So, I took him to his apartment, a place I already knew all too well. It greeted me with that familiar silence that places have when you’ve been there more than once, but they no longer feel like your own.
Everything was soaked in him: the pictures on the walls, the stacked records next to the turntable, his framed portraits on the living room shelf. I paused for a second in front of one of them: a smile frozen in time, far brighter than the one he wore tonight. I let out a dry laugh, almost unintentionally, as if that contrast hit me with an irony that stung.
"You’ll stay with me tonight," I announced with a calmness that left no room for argument, using that firmness one reserves for holding the inevitable, to keep something—or someone—from breaking completely.
He didn’t respond. He barely let himself be guided, dragging his feet, his body worn down by exhaustion. As we crossed the door, I led him directly to the couch. I carefully took off his shoes, as if any sudden movement might wake him from the fragile state he was in. Then I covered him with a light blanket, left a glass of water on the table, and turned off most of the lights, leaving only a small lamp on that cast a warm, soft glow in the corner of the living room.
I stayed in the doorway, watching him for a long moment. His face, even in sleep, was marked by a frown that wouldn’t give up. As if his body didn’t know how to rest, as if even in sleep, his soul remained on guard. There was something deeply sad in that. Something that had nothing to do with the fight earlier, or with his shouts, or the rage. It was something older, deeper. A sadness that had embedded itself in his everyday gestures, as if he had been carrying the weight of something no one else could see for far too long.
And then I thought—with a certainty that hurt a little to admit—that sometimes, even the loudest enemy just needs a place to collapse without being judged. A place where he could stop fighting, at least for one night. And even though I didn’t fully understand why, even though my mind screamed at me that it wasn’t a good idea, there I was, ready to be that place for him.