FRAGMENTED IDENTITY

FIVE

A flicker of something crossed his face. Shame, maybe. Or confusion. Or regret.

“Go back to your room.”

“No.”

The word left her lips without hesitation. Steady. Unyielding.

His brow creased. “Why not?”

Elira stepped closer. “Because just now… you didn’t want to be alone. And maybe… maybe I don’t either.”

Kael stared at her like he didn’t know what to do with that. Like she was something delicate dropped into his hands, and he’d never been taught how to hold anything without breaking it..Still, he said nothing.She sat at the edge of the bed—careful, quiet. She didn’t touch him. Didn’t intrude. Just waited. And to her surprise, he didn’t stop her. He leaned back slowly, shoulders sagging under the invisible weight. His head met the wall with a dull thud, eyes slipping closed, chest still rising too fast.

“It’s always the same,” he said, voice low, brittle. “Blood. Fire. People I couldn’t save. People I didn’t try to save.”

She watched him. Really looked at him. The man behind the danger, behind the press-perfect face and the monster in the alley.

“And me?” she asked quietly. “Where do I fit into your nightmare?”

His eyes opened. Met hers.

His voice cracked, barely audible.

“You die.”

A silence fell between them. Heavy. Final. Elira’s breath caught in her chest. But then—softly, slowly—she reached out. Her fingers brushed his. Tentative. Light. Like a question.
He didn’t pull away. Their hands hovered together, touching just enough to matter. It wasn’t comfort. Wasn’t understanding. But it was something.

“I’m not dead,” she said gently.

He let out a low, broken laugh. “Not yet.”

She squeezed his hand. “Then maybe stop dreaming it.”

He looked down at their hands. At the way their fingers met in the middle of all that wreckage..Something shifted in him. Not redemption. But maybe the first crack in the wall. He blinked, as if battling the weight of exhaustion. “Will you stay?” he asked. “Just for a little while?”

He said it like he didn’t deserve the answer.

Elira nodded. “Just for a little while.”

She slipped under the covers, careful to keep her distance, to respect the lines neither of them had spoken aloud. They lay side by side, staring up at the ceiling, breath gradually syncing into a quiet rhythm. Minutes passed. Or maybe hours. Neither of them moved. And when Kael’s breathing finally slowed, evening into sleep again—this time deeper, steadier—Elira stayed awake.

Not because she was afraid.

But because she wanted to.

Because in the flickering dark, beside the man who had taken her world apart, something had changed.

And maybe… just maybe…

So had she.

When Elira finally drifted into sleep, it was light. Shallow. The kind of rest that left her more tired than before. But it was enough. Enough to blur the weight in her chest, enough to make her limbs go soft under the blankets. Enough to forget, for just a little while, where she was. She woke to warmth at her back. Slow, steady breathing. The unmistakable presence of someone behind her.