I'm just here for the tea

Matt starts going to again church every night in November.

At first you don’t think much of it.

Matt’s relationship with Catholicism has always been complicated in a way that somehow still ends with him kneeling in a pew at two in the morning bleeding through a dress shirt. You learned early on not to question it too hard. Faith, guilt, grief — with Matt they all braid together until they become impossible to separate.

Still.

Something feels wrong.

It starts small.

He gets quieter.

Not distant exactly. Almost the opposite.

Softer.

Like every time he touches you he’s trying to memorize it.

He kisses your forehead more. Holds your hand tighter in public. Pauses in doorways just to listen to you moving around the apartment like the sound itself comforts him.

At first it’s sweet. Then it becomes terrifying. Because Matt Murdock has never behaved like a man planning for a future - he's always just let it happen. But he's absolutely behaving like a man preparing to leave one. You notice other things after that. He starts organizing files at the office nobody asked him to organize. Calling people back immediately. Returning books. Giving away clothes.

One night you find him sitting on the edge of the bed holding his father's old boxing rosary wrapped around his fist so tightly the beads left marks in his palm.

“Matt?” He startles hard enough your stomach drops. That almost never happens. He always hears you come up behind him.

“Sorry,” he says immediately, standing too fast. “Didn’t mean t’wake you.” You glance at the clock.

2:13 AM.

“You haven’t come to bed yet.”

“Lost track of time.” His voice sounds strange. You sit up slowly beneath the blankets, watching him carefully in the dark. Matt can feel it. You know he can. Because his shoulders tense almost imperceptibly beneath his t-shirt.

“You okay, Matty?” you ask quietly.

Too quick: “Yeah, honey.” Lie. You’ve learned the shape of them. Matt crosses the room toward you before you can push further, leaning down automatically to kiss your forehead. His hand lingers against your cheek afterward. Too long. Like goodbye. Your chest tightens.

“You smell like incense,” you murmur. His fingers still. Then:

“Church.”

“At two in the morning?” A pause.

“Couldn’t sleep.” Another lie. You don’t call him on it. Mostly because suddenly — horribly — you realize this isn’t the first night. The incense. The late hours. The exhaustion. Your stomach turns cold. Matt presses one last kiss to your hair before sliding into bed beside you, all careful quiet warmth and familiar muscle beneath soft cotton. But he doesn’t sleep. You can feel it. Even after your breathing evens out he stays awake staring at the ceiling. Listening. Thinking.

Mourning something in advance.

The next night he leaves again at 11:47. You pretend to be asleep. Matt stands near the door for a long moment before leaving. Like he’s struggling to make himself go. The apartment feels wrong the second he’s gone. Too quiet. You lie there for maybe thirty seconds before throwing the blankets off entirely. By the time you get outside, rain has started. Cold November drizzle slicking the sidewalks silver beneath streetlights. Matt is already half a block ahead of you moving fast, cane tapping sharply against concrete. You follow anyway. Guilt gnaws at you immediately.

You hate this.

Hate sneaking after him.

Hate the ugly suspicion curling tighter and tighter in your chest. But something is wrong. Something is deeply, terribly wrong. And Matt won’t tell you what it is. So you trail him through Hell’s Kitchen at nearly midnight while rain dampens your jacket and taxis hiss through puddles beside the curb. Matt never looks back. That’s what scares you most. Usually he notices everything. Usually he notices you. Tonight he’s somewhere else entirely. Lost deep enough in his own head that he misses your footsteps completely. The church appears three blocks later.

Saint Agnes.

Small.

Old.

Mostly empty this late. Matt climbs the front steps slowly. Not hesitant. Resolved. Like a man walking willingly toward judgment. You stay across the street at first watching through rain-streaked darkness as he disappears inside. The church doors close behind him with a heavy groan. And still— Something feels horribly wrong.

You wait maybe five minutes before crossing the street too.

Inside smells like candle wax and old wood and incense burned so deeply into the walls it’s become permanent. The sanctuary is empty except for a few scattered prayer candles flickering red in the dark. At first you don’t see him.

Then— Voices.

Low. Muffled. Confessional. Your pulse stutters. You move carefully down the side aisle before stopping dead near one of the wooden booths. Matt’s voice drifts faintly through the screen. Not loud enough for every word. Just enough.

“…don’t think i'm doing this for the right reasons anymore.” Silence from the priest. Then Matt again. Rawer this time. “If a man knows he’s not comin’ back…” Your entire body goes cold. Inside the booth the priest says something too quiet to hear. Matt answers immediately. “No.” A pause. “No, Father, I made peace with it.” Your heartbeat starts hammering violently now. You grip the edge of the pew beside you hard enough your fingers ache. Matt continues softly: “They’ll never stop unless somebody finishes this.” Another pause.

Then the priest finally says something clear enough to hear:

“Matthew… this sounds less like sacrifice and more like surrender.” Silence. Long enough to become unbearable. And then Matt says quietly:

“Maybe I’m too tired t’know the difference anymore.”

You feel sick. Violently and nauseatingly, sick. You barely realise you're moving until you're outside, gasping for air, backing away from the church like it's poison and not something Holy.

You don’t confront him. Not that night. Not the next one either. Because what are you even supposed to say?

"Hey, I followed you to church and overheard you discussing your own death like it was already decided?"

So instead you do what people do when they’re terrified. You pretend. You pretend everything is normal while your boyfriend quietly plans something catastrophic right in front of you.

And Matt— Matt lets you.

Maybe because he thinks he’s protecting you. Maybe because if he says it aloud, you’ll try to stop him. Maybe because some part of him already knows you would follow him into hell if he asked. So life continues.

Sort of.

Mornings at Nelson, Murdock & Page. Takeout cartons on the coffee table. Matt’s hand finding yours automatically when you cross streets. But underneath it all something awful hums constantly now. Like standing in a building with a gas leak. Invisible. Deadly. Waiting. You start noticing impossible things after that. Matt lingering in doorways longer than necessary. Touching the small of your back every time he passes you. Pausing conversations halfway through just to listen to your heartbeat. One night you wake up at three in the morning and find him sitting beside you listening to you sleep.

Not creepy. Heartbroken. Like he’s trying to memorize the sound of your breathing.

When he realizes you’re awake, he smiles immediately. Too quickly.

“Sorry,” he murmurs. “Didn’t mean t’wake you.” You reach for him instinctively. Matt folds into the touch like he’s starving.

Three nights later he walks into the living room, clearing his throat.

"Foggy just called. Some, uhm, emergency about our case. I gotta go back in to the office."

Your heart drops to your ass. You glance at your phone, the one laying face down beside you on the couch. The one where Karen, just seconds ago, sent you a picture of her and Foggy enjoying a drink at Josie's. Your fingers curl around the edges of your book, trying to school your breathing, your heartbeat- anything Matt could potentially hear.

“Sweetheart.” Matt’s voice gentles immediately. “C’mere.” You almost don’t. That’s the terrible part. Not because you’re afraid of him. Because you’re afraid if he touches you right now you’ll break apart and start screaming at him not to die. But then Matt reaches for you blindly across the small space between you, familiar and warm and achingly human, and your body betrays you immediately. You go. Of course you go. His hands settle at your waist with a tired exhale. For a second he just stands there holding you. Listening to your heartbeat. Then he kisses you.

And something is wrong. Not physically. Emotionally.

There’s desperation in it. A kind of grief. Like he’s trying to pour everything he can’t say into your mouth before it’s too late. Your back hits the kitchen counter softly. Matt’s fingers tighten against your hips. The kiss deepens. Hard enough your breath catches. And suddenly— You feel it. Beneath his clothes. Armor. Your entire body goes rigid instantly. Matt notices.

Of course he notices.

He pulls back slightly, brows pulling together.

“Hey.” His thumb brushes your hip automatically. “What’s wrong?” Nothing.

Everything.

"I promise i'll be back before you wake up." You can feel the ridged plating beneath his dress shirt now where your hands rest against his ribs. The Daredevil suit. Already underneath his clothes. Ready to go. Your pulse starts thundering so hard you’re convinced he can hear it.

Actually— He probably can. Matt stills.

“…Sweetheart?” You force your hands to relax. Force your face not to crack open.

“Heavy jacket,” you lie weakly. Silence. Matt knows immediately you’re lying. You know the exact second it happens too. His expression changes subtly. Not suspicious. Worse. Sad. Because he realizes you noticed something. And because Matt Murdock has always been smart enough to know exactly how much silence can say. His forehead rests briefly against yours. He sounds exhausted when he speaks.

“You should get some sleep. I'll be back soon.” There it is again. That goodbye tone. You hate it so much you could scream. Instead you nod mechanically because if you open your mouth right now, you’re afraid the truth will come pouring out.

I know. I know you’re planning something. I know you think you’re not coming back.

Matt kisses your forehead softly. Lingering. Then steps away. And you stand frozen in the kitchen , watching him walk out of the apartment.

For a long time you don’t move.

You just stand there in the kitchen staring at the closed apartment door while the silence rushes in around you all at once. Your heartbeat is so loud it makes you nauseous. He lied. Not a little white lie. Not a harmless omission. A goodbye lie. You can still feel the shape of the armor beneath his shirt. The way he kissed you like a starving man. The way he lingered afterward like he was trying to memorize the exact height of you against him.

Your knees almost give out.

“No,” you whisper to the empty apartment. Because suddenly every strange thing from the past month rearranges itself into one horrifying shape. The confessions. The sleepless nights. Matt touching you constantly like he was afraid he’d lose the right. The way he’d been softer lately. Sadder. More careful. You press both hands hard over your mouth. He thinks he’s going to die tonight.

And worse— He made peace with it.

A sharp panic surges through you so violently you nearly run for the door immediately. But then another thought hits just as fast:

What if you’re wrong?

What if you follow him and he hears you? What if this really is just work? What if you sound insane?

Your eyes land on the phone still sitting beside your abandoned book. Karen’s picture glows faintly on the screen. Josie’s. Timestamped seven minutes ago. Your stomach twists. You grab your jacket so fast it nearly falls off the hook. By the time you hit the hallway your hands are shaking too hard to zip it properly.

The city feels wrong tonight. Too loud. Too sharp. You stay half a block behind Matt, heart hammering every time he pauses. He moves quickly through Hell’s Kitchen, cane tapping pavement in that familiar rhythm that would almost fool you if you didn’t know better now. But you do know better. Because halfway down West 44th he slips into an alley. And Daredevil comes out. You stop dead at the mouth of the alley just in time to see him pull the mask down over his face. Red armor beneath dark civilian clothes. Batons at his hips. Your chest caves inward so hard it physically hurts.

Matt pauses for half a second before climbing the fire escape. His head tilts slightly. Listening. You flatten yourself against the brick wall instantly, barely breathing.

Please don’t hear me.

Please don’t make me go home.

For one horrible second you think he did catch you.

Then he turns and launches himself onto the next rooftop. Gone. You wait exactly three seconds before following.

It’s pathetic, honestly.

You are not built for rooftop chases. Within ten minutes your lungs are on fire and your shoes have absolutely no traction whatsoever. You nearly eat shit crossing a narrow gap between buildings and have to grab a rusted pipe to keep from plummeting four stories.

“Oh my God,” you gasp to nobody. “How does he do this every night?”

Somewhere ahead of you, faintly— A scream. Then gunfire. Your blood freezes. You run faster.

The warehouse sits near the docks, half abandoned and enormous. Every window shattered. Lights blazing inside. You crouch behind a stack of shipping crates trying not to throw up while voices echo through broken glass. Men yelling. Too many men. And underneath it— Matt.

You can always tell where he is now. Not by sight. By sound.

The brutal rhythm of fighting. The crashes. The impossible violence of him. But tonight there’s something different in it.

Recklessness.

He’s not fighting like someone trying to survive. He’s fighting like someone who already decided not to. Your entire body goes cold. Inside the warehouse another gunshot cracks through the air. Then another. Then a horrible sound— Matt choking on pain. You’re moving before you even consciously decide to.

“Matt!” The second your voice rings through the warehouse everything stops. Everything. Daredevil’s head snaps toward you beneath the red mask. Even from across the room you feel the absolute horror radiate off him.

“No—Baby, no, stay back-” The word tears out of him too late. Because somebody grabs you from behind immediately. A huge arm locks around your throat. A gun presses against your temple.

“Well, well,” a man laughs somewhere to your left. “The Devil brought company.” Matt goes completely still. And somehow that’s worse than the fighting. Because now you can see it clearly— The blood soaking one side of his suit. The way he’s breathing too hard. The dozens of armed men surrounding him. And the look on his face beneath the mask. Not fear for himself. For you. Pure. Animal. Terror.

“Let her go,” Matt says. Quietly. The entire room stills around the sound. The man holding you laughs harder.

“Or what?” Matt takes one step forward. Everybody raises their guns instantly. Your pulse nearly stops.

“Matthew,” the crime boss says almost conversationally, stepping from the shadows. “You really thought you could do this alone?” Matt doesn’t answer. His head tilts slightly toward you instead.

You realize suddenly— He can hear you crying.

“Oh God,” you whisper shakily. Because now you understand the plan.

He never intended to leave here alive. He was going to take all of them down with him. And Matt knows you know it. Even across the warehouse floor you can feel it happening between you. The awful understanding. The betrayal. The fear. Matt’s chest rises sharply beneath the ruined armor.

“Please,” he says. Not to the men. To you. Your breath catches. In all the time you’ve known him—through bruises and blood and impossible fights—you have never heard Matt Murdock sound afraid like this.

“Sweetheart,” he says again, voice roughening around the word. “Listen to me real careful, okay?” The man holding you jerks you tighter against him when you instinctively try to move toward Matt. “Don’t,” Matt snaps instantly. The room stills again.

Jesus Christ.

Even the criminals look unsettled now. Because Daredevil sounds dangerous. Not in the theatrical way they’re used to. Not cold. Not angry. Protective. The kind that turns lethal.

“You shouldn’ta come here,” Matt says, and it’s almost broken. “Why would you follow me?”

“Because you were going to kill yourself, Matty,” The words rip out of you before you can stop them. Silence detonates through the warehouse. The crime boss slowly smiles.

“Well,” he murmurs. “That’s interesting.” Matt goes perfectly still. Not one movement. Not one breath.

And suddenly you realize something horrifying— He never told them who you were. Not really. But now they know. Because you just handed them the one thing Daredevil would burn the city down to protect.

“Shit,” you whisper. Matt’s head dips once like he heard the realization hit you.

“Don’t panic,” he says quietly. "You're going to be just fine, honey."

Your eyes sting instantly. Because he says it the same way he always does. Crossing busy streets. Holding your hand during thunderstorms. Like this is fixable. Like there’s still a world after tonight. The crime boss sighs theatrically.

“You know,” he says, circling slowly, “I was beginning to think the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen didn’t have any real weaknesses.” Matt turns his head toward the voice.

“You touch her,” he says softly, “and I will kill every person in this room.” The certainty in it sends terror skittering down your spine.

Daredevil doesn't kill. But he would for you.

The man holding you laughs nervously, shifting his grip.

Matt hears it instantly. You see the exact second he clocks the gun repositioning near your ribs. His entire body coils.

“No,” he says sharply. Too late.

Everything explodes at once. Matt moves first. Of course he does. One second he’s thirty feet away. The next he’s airborne. Batons flying. Bodies crashing. Gunshots erupt deafeningly through the warehouse. The man holding you curses and jerks backward hard enough to wrench your shoulder painfully. Instinct takes over. You slam your heel down onto his foot and twist violently out of his grip.

“Fuck!” he shouts. You run. Not away. Toward Matt. Toward the red blur tearing through armed men like something divine and furious.

“Matty!” His head snaps toward your voice instantly.

“No, wait—!” Another gunshot cracks through the air. Then six more. Chaos. Screaming. You see Matt trying to get to you. See it in the frantic violence of him. He throws one man hard enough through a crate that wood explodes outward like shrapnel. Another gets dropped instantly with a baton strike to the throat.

“Baby, get down!” Matt roars. You’re almost to him.

Almost.

Then somebody catches your arm from behind. You scream and wrench free blindly— And the world erupts white-hot. For one strange second you don’t understand what happened. There’s just this hard punch against your stomach. A force. Then warmth. Too much warmth. Your legs stop working.

“Oh,” you breathe. The warehouse tilts sideways. You hear shouting. Gunfire.

Matt screaming your name.

Not yelling.

Screaming.

The sound tears through the entire building like something dying. You hit the concrete hard. Pain detonates through you a second later. Blinding. You curl instinctively around it with a strangled sob. Somewhere nearby men are still shooting. Matt is still moving. You can hear him. Can hear bones breaking now. Can hear the horrifying wet sounds of someone no longer holding back. People are screaming. Not you. Them.

“Move!” Matt bellows. Another crash. Another body hitting the floor. Then suddenly he’s there. Hands everywhere at once. Frantic. Shaking.

“Heyheyheyhey— no, no, no, no—” His gloves come away wet instantly. You don’t think you’ve ever heard panic like this before.

“Matt,” you whisper weakly. He tears his mask off, the hard shell clattering to the floor. You can finally see his face, his blind eyes darting all over the place.

“No.” His voice breaks apart completely. “No, sweetheart, stay with me, stay with me—” He presses both hands hard against your stomach. Agony explodes through you. You cry out. “I know, I know, I know,” he gasps desperately. “Baby, m’sorry, I gotta put pressure on it—”

Blood drips from his mouth. From his nose. From cuts split across his jaw. But he doesn’t seem aware of any of it. All he can hear is your heartbeat. And it’s getting weaker.

“Oh God,” he chokes. You’ve never heard Matt cry before. Not really. You hear it now. Raw and helpless and horrified. “This was supposed t’be me,” he whispers brokenly. Your chest tightens painfully. Because that confirms it. He really had planned to die here. His hands are shaking so hard against your stomach you almost don’t recognize them as Matt’s. Matt’s hands are always steady.

Even bloodied. Even exhausted. Even after fights that should’ve killed him. But not now. Now he’s falling apart right in front of you.

“Hey,” you whisper weakly, trying to reach for him. He catches your hand instantly and presses it hard against his chest like he needs proof you’re still moving.

“Don’t,” he chokes out. “Don’t do that voice with me right now.” Your vision blurs around the edges. Everything feels strangely far away already. Gunpowder. Blood. Sirens somewhere in the distance. Matt is still saying your name over and over like a prayer gone wrong.

“You’re okay,” he says frantically. “You’re okay, sweetheart, you hear me? I got you.” You try to laugh because the irony is unbearable. He was supposed to be the one dying tonight.

Not you.

Not because of him.

“You asshole,” you whisper. Matt breaks completely. A horrible sound tears out of him.

“I know,” he gasps immediately. “I know, I know, I know—”

“You lied t’me.” His forehead nearly drops to your chest.

“I’m sorry.” Raw. Destroyed. “God, baby, i'm so sorry.” Another wave of pain crashes through you so violently you cry out. Matt jerks closer instantly. “Heyheyhey— stay with me.” His voice rises sharp with panic. “Stay with me, sweetheart, c’mon, c’mon—” Your fingers fist weakly in the front of his suit.

“You were gonna die.”

“No.” Immediate. Automatic. You stare at him. Even now. Even now he tries to lie.

“Matt.” His face crumples. You’ve never seen him look this young before. Not the Devil. Not the vigilante. Just Matthew.

Just your Matthew.

Terrified.

“I didn’t know how to stop anymore,” he whispers finally. The confession nearly hurts worse than the bullet. Around you the warehouse has gone eerily quiet. The surviving men either fled or are unconscious. Somewhere nearby somebody groans in pain, but Matt doesn’t react to any of it. All his focus is locked onto you. Your heartbeat. Your breathing. The blood soaking through his fingers.

“You were just gonna leave me?” you whisper shakily. Matt makes another wrecked sound.

“No.”

“You said goodbye.”

“I was trying not to.” Tears spill hard down his face now, unchecked. “Christ, sweetheart, every time I looked at you I almost stopped.”

That hurts. God, that hurts.

Because you know he means it.

“I heard you in confession,” you whisper. Matt goes still. Not physically. Soul-deep still.

“You followed me there too?”

“You said maybe you were too tired to know the difference between sacrifice and surrender.” Your voice breaks apart. “How was I supposed t’hear that and not be terrified?” Matt shuts his eyes hard. Tears slip instantly beneath his lashes.

“I never wanted you to carry this,” he whispers.

“Well I do.” His breathing turns ragged. Sirens are louder now. Closer. But Matt doesn’t seem to hear them. “And I’d hate myself for still wanting to stay.” That does it. You start crying all over again. Matt immediately panics. “No, no, baby, please don’t cry—”

“You idiot,” you sob weakly.

“I know.”

“You absolute fucking idiot.”

“I know, sweetheart.” His shoulders are shaking now too. You don’t think either of you have ever been this scared before. Then suddenly Matt jerks violently upright. His head tilts. Listening. You feel it happen instantly. That terrifying shift in him. The Devil returning.

“Ambulance is two blocks out,” he says breathlessly. “Okay? Stay with me that long.” Your stomach twists weakly.

“I’m tired.” Fear detonates across his face so hard it’s almost ugly.

“No.” He grabs your face carefully. “No, you stay awake. Talk to me.” Your eyelids feel heavy. So heavy.

“Matt—”

“Talk to me,” he begs. “Please.” You swallow hard.

“Tell me somethin’ true.” He stares at you for half a second like the request guts him. Then:

“I love you more than God.” Your breath catches. Matt’s forehead drops against yours again. “And that’s the most honest thing I've ever said.” For a second neither of you moves. The warehouse feels suspended outside of time. Blood beneath you. Sirens screaming closer. Matt cradling your face like you’re the most fragile thing God ever made.

And then— A wet sound catches in his throat. Because your heartbeat stutters. You feel it happen too. The strange drifting sensation. The cold creeping slowly into your fingertips. Matt hears all of it. Every weakening beat. Every hitch in your breathing.

“No,” he whispers immediately. Fierce. Terrified. “No, no, stay with me.” You try to smile at him. It comes out crooked.

“Matty.” His entire face collapses at the nickname.

“Oh God.” His voice shakes violently now. “Baby, please.” You’ve never seen him beg before either. Not really. Matt Murdock negotiates. Threatens. Endures.

But begging? Never. Until now.

“I need you to keep talkin’ to me,” he says frantically. “C’mon, sweetheart, yell at me again. Tell me i'm an idiot. Tell me how pissed you are.”

“You are an idiot,” you whisper faintly. A broken laugh-sob escapes him instantly.

“Yeah,” he chokes. “Yeah, that’s my girl.” Your eyes burn. Because he sounds relieved just hearing your voice. Matt presses harder against the wound suddenly and you cry out. “I know, I know, m’sorry.” He’s trembling so hard now his words shake apart. “You gotta stay awake, baby. Stay with me.”

“You sound scared.”

“I am scared.” Immediate. Honest. “I am so fucking scared right now.” That almost undoes you more than the pain. Because Matt never admits fear. Not even when he’s bleeding out. Not even when he’s dying.

But now? Now he’s looking at you like the thought of losing you is the most horrifying thing he’s ever faced.

“You can’t die for me,” he says suddenly. You blink slowly.

“What?” His jaw tightens hard enough to shake.

“You can’t do that.” Tears spill freely down his face. “I can’t survive that.” Your chest aches. Not from the bullet. From him.

“You were gonna make me survive it,” you whisper. Matt flinches like he got hit. Actually flinches.

“I know.” His voice comes apart completely. “Christ, I know.” The sirens are outside now. You can hear tires screeching. Voices shouting. Matt barely reacts. His whole world has narrowed down to the sound your heart is making under his hands.

And it’s getting worse. His panic spikes violently.

“Hey.” He cups your face harder. “Hey, sweetheart, stay with me. Look at me.” You try. God, you try. But your vision keeps blurring.

“You smell like blood,” you mumble weakly. Matt lets out this startled, wrecked laugh through tears.

“Yeah?”

“Gross.”

“Oh, now y’wanna complain?” He brushes shaking fingers through your hair. “Now?”

“You’re still beautiful though.” That absolutely destroys him. Matt bows forward hard enough his forehead knocks against yours. A sob tears straight out of his chest.

“Don’t,” he whispers brokenly. “Please don’t talk like goodbye.” Your throat tightens.

“I don’t wanna leave you.”

“You’re not.” Fierce now. Desperate enough to border on angry. “You hear me? You are not leaving me.” The warehouse doors burst open.

Police. Paramedics. Chaos floods in all at once. But Matt barely notices until someone grabs his shoulder.

“Sir, we need space—”

“No!” Matt snarls so violently the paramedic recoils instantly. You’ve never heard that sound from him before either. Pure terror. “She’s bleeding out!”

“We’re trying to help her!” Matt’s breathing turns ragged. His senses are overloaded now. Too many heartbeats. Too many voices. Too much blood.

And yours— Yours is fading underneath all of it.

“She hates hospitals,” he blurts suddenly to the paramedic like it physically hurts him not to be the one fixing this. “She gets cold easy. She—” His voice breaks. “She was just supposed t’be asleep at home.” Your eyes sting instantly. Matt catches the tiny change in your breathing and snaps back to you immediately.

“Hey. Hey, stay with me.”

“I’m trying.”

“I know.” He kisses your forehead frantically. Your cheeks. Your hairline. Anywhere he can reach. “You’re doin’ so good, sweetheart.” Paramedics finally manage to get him back enough to work. Barely. Matt refuses to let go of your hand.

Even when they load you onto the stretcher.

Even when they wheel you away to surgery.

Matt sits in the surgical waiting room still covered in your blood.

Nobody can get him to leave.

Not the nurses gently suggesting he clean up. Not Karen crying quietly beside him. Not Foggy trying to press a cup of coffee into his shaking hands. Matt just sits there bent forward with his elbows on his knees, staring blindly at the floor while dried blood cracks across his knuckles every time his fingers twitch.

Yours. All yours.

And the worst part—the part that keeps hollowing him out from the inside—is that he can still feel his own body perfectly.

No broken ribs. No knife wounds. No gunshots. Nothing. He went into that warehouse ready to die and walked out untouched while you bled out on concrete because you loved him too much to let him do it alone. The shame of it sits like acid under his skin.

“She’s gonna be okay,” Foggy says again softly, for maybe the fifth time. Matt hears the exhaustion in his voice. The fear he’s trying to hide. “Matt, hey. Look at me.” Matt doesn’t move. Because he can still hear your heartbeat in his head. Weak. Stuttering. Fading every time the ambulance hit a pothole. He should’ve died there. That was the plan.

Not a fully formed suicide wish maybe—Matt’s too Catholic to call it that out loud—but close enough. A surrender disguised as martyrdom. One final impossible fight against men too powerful to stop any other way. He’d told himself it was noble. Necessary. Better him than anybody else. Then you got shot taking a bullet meant for him. And suddenly every justification sounds monstrous now. Matt drags both hands over his face hard enough to hurt.

“Oh God,” he whispers. Karen crouches carefully in front of him.

“Matt.”

“She heard me,” he says hoarsely. Karen stills.

“In confession.” His mouth twists violently. “She knew what I was planning and I still left anyway.” The guilt in his voice is unbearable. Foggy sits down hard beside him.

“Matt, you didn’t know she was gonna follow you.”

“I should’ve.” Immediate. Self-loathing soaked clean through the words. “I know her heartbeat better than my own and I still—” His voice breaks abruptly. Because underneath the antiseptic hospital smell and fluorescent lights and distant footsteps— He hears your heart stop for half a second in surgery. Matt folds instantly. Not dramatically. Not loudly. Just this horrible sharp inhale like somebody shoved a knife directly through his ribs. Karen grabs his shoulder immediately.

“Matt?”

His face has gone white.

No— Please— Then suddenly— Your heartbeat kicks back in.

Weak. But there. Matt nearly collapses from relief right there in the chair.

“Oh thank God,” he chokes. Foggy looks between them in alarm.

“What? What happened?" Matt can’t answer. He’s crying too hard now. Silent tears sliding down his face while his entire body shakes with delayed terror.

Because for one second— One single second— You were gone.

And he realizes with horrifying clarity that if you die because of him, there won’t be enough confessionals in the world to save what’s left of his soul afterward.

Hours later they finally let him see you.The room is dim and painfully quiet except for the steady beep of monitors. Machines breathe softly beside you. Tubes. Bandages. Brues already blooming beneath your skin.

Matt stops dead in the doorway. He can hear your heartbeat now. Stronger than before. Steady.

Alive. Alive.

His knees almost give out from relief. The nurse says something quietly to him before leaving, but he barely hears it. He moves toward your bed slowly instead, like approaching something holy. You look so small like this. Matt’s throat closes immediately.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he whispers. You don’t wake up. Of course you don’t. Surgery took hours. Pain medication still drags heavy through your system. But Matt reaches for your hand anyway, cradling it carefully between both of his like he’s terrified you’ll disappear if he loosens his grip even slightly.

“You scared the hell outta me,” he murmurs shakily. And then he laughs once. A horrible broken sound. Because the sentence is absurd. You should be the one saying it to him. Matt bows his head over your hand.

“I was gonna leave you,” he whispers. The confession slips out ugly and trembling. “I convinced myself it was okay because I thought losin’ me would hurt less than watchin’ me become…” He swallows hard. “Whatever the hell I’ve been turnin’ into.” His thumb strokes weakly across your knuckles.

“But then you got hurt and all I could think was—” His voice snaps completely. “I don’t wanna die.” The words wreck him. Because they’re true.

Not noble. Not heroic. Just honest.

Matt presses your hand against his mouth, shaking hard.

“I don’t wanna leave you,” he whispers brokenly. “I don’t care how tired I am anymore.” For a long time he just sits there listening to your heartbeat. Steady. Alive. Every beat feels like mercy. Eventually, sometime near dawn, your fingers twitch weakly in his hand. Matt jerks upright instantly.

“Sweetheart?” Your eyelids flutter slowly. Painfully. Confused from medication and exhaustion. The second you make a tiny sound of discomfort, Matt is already leaning over you.

“Hey, hey.” His hand cups your face carefully. “Easy. Easy, m’here.” Your gaze struggles to focus on him.

“…Matty?” The nickname almost kills him.

“I’m here.” His voice breaks immediately. “I got you.” Your brows pinch weakly.

“You okay?” Matt actually laughs. A disbelieving, devastated laugh. You’re barely conscious after emergency surgery and you’re asking if he’s okay. His forehead drops against your hand.

“No,” he whispers honestly. “No, sweetheart, I don’t think I will be for a while.” Your brows crease.

“Why?” you whisper. Matt looks at you like he doesn’t even know where to begin.

Because you almost died. Because he heard your heart stop. Because he walked into that warehouse ready to throw his own life away and instead watched yours spill across concrete in his hands. Because the universe handed him back alive while you lay here stitched together because you loved him enough to follow. His throat works hard.

“You got shot,” he says finally, voice wrecked. You blink slowly, like the memory has to swim upward through painkillers and exhaustion first. Then suddenly your face changes.

“Oh.” Yeah. Oh. Matt sees the exact second it comes back to you—the warehouse, the gunfire, him screaming your name—and his grip on your hand tightens instantly.

“Hey,” he says softly. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“Go somewhere else in your head.” His thumb strokes over your knuckles compulsively. “Stay here with me.” Your eyes flick over his face sluggishly. The bruises. The split lip. The dried blood still staining the collar of his shirt.

“…You’re hurt.” Matt almost sounds offended.

“Baby, you got a bullet hole in you.”

“But you’re bleeding.”

“I’m fine.” You stare at him for a long moment through heavy eyelids.

“You say that like a liar.” Despite everything, a tiny broken laugh slips out of him.

“Yeah,” he whispers. “Probably earned that.” Silence settles softly between you after that. Hospital quiet. Monitor beeps. The faint hum of fluorescent lights overhead. Matt can hear every tiny shift in your body. The pain you’re trying not to show him. The exhaustion dragging at your heartbeat. He hates it. He hates all of it. His fingers brush shakily through your hair.

“I’m sorry,” he says suddenly. Raw. Immediate. Your eyes open a little wider.

“Matt—”

“No.” His voice cracks hard enough to stop you. “No, sweetheart, I need you to hear this.” He bows his head for a second, trying and failing to steady himself. “You were right.” You go still. “I was gonna die in that warehouse.” There it is. No hiding now. No careful wording. Just the truth sitting ugly and exposed between you. Matt laughs once under his breath. Miserable. “God.” He rubs hard at his face with his free hand. “Sounds even worse out loud.” Your eyes burn instantly.

“Why?” you whisper.

And that question— That one nearly destroys him. Because there isn’t one clean answer. Too much violence. Too many nights coming home soaked in blood. Too many people slipping through his fingers no matter how hard he fought. Exhaustion curling around his throat for so long he stopped recognizing it as drowning. Matt stares down at your hand in his.

“I got tired,” he admits quietly. “An’ somewhere along the line I stopped carin’ if I survived anymore.” Pain flashes across your face so sharply he hears your heartbeat stutter.

“You were just gonna leave me,” you whisper again, weaker this time. Matt closes his eyes.

“I thought…” His voice frays apart. “I thought maybe you’d hate me less if I died a hero instead’a slowly turnin’ into somebody miserable.” Your face crumples.

“Oh, Matty.” The tenderness in your voice guts him worse than anger would’ve. “You don’t get to decide that for me,” you whisper.

“I know.”

“You don’t get to love me enough to protect me from everyone except yourself.” Matt goes completely still. The monitor beside you speeds up slightly with emotion. He hears it immediately.

“Easy,” he murmurs automatically, thumb stroking your wrist. But his own breathing has gone uneven now too. Because you’re right.

God, you’re right.

You shift weakly against the pillows with a tiny sound of pain. Matt is on his feet instantly.

“Don’t move, baby—”

“I’m okay.”

“You literally got outta surgery six hours ago.”

“And you’re hovering.”

“I’m gonna hover for the rest’a your natural life, so you should probably adjust now.” That startles a tiny laugh out of you. Matt freezes. The sound hits him like sunlight after weeks underground.

“You really scared me,” you admit quietly. Matt’s face folds in on itself.

“I know.”

“No, I mean before.” Your fingers tighten weakly around his. “The last few weeks.” Your voice trembles. “It felt like you were already halfway gone.” Matt can’t breathe for a second after that. Because you noticed. Not just the mission.

Him.

The slow quiet disappearing act he’d been doing right in front of you. He sinks carefully into the chair beside your bed again, bringing your hand to his mouth.

“I’m here now,” he whispers against your skin. Your eyes search his face.

“Are you?” Matt nearly breaks all over again. Because you aren’t asking physically. You’re asking if he’s going to stay. If he’s going to choose it.

Choose you.

Choose himself.

Matt presses his forehead carefully against your hand and answers with terrifying honesty.

“I’m trying to be.”

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“Hey,” you said, bright but not pushy. “You look like you could use one of these.”

Dex stopped. He blinked at you once, recalibrating. 

Oh?

The first thing he noticed was that he thought you were pretty. For a second, he didn’t process anything beyond that. 

Then the details followed: the faint dirt on your hands, the natural way you handled the stems, the open shop behind you breathing out the scent of fresh blooms. You had a bucket of red roses with you, probably giving it to everyone who would stop to listen. You were a florist, obviously. That was your shop, most likely. 

“Do I?” He managed to say. 

“I think so,” you admitted, tilting your head as you looked at him. “You’ve got the whole ‘I’d rather be literally anywhere else’ thing going on.”

Most people didn’t say things like that to him. Not casually. Not with that little hint of amusement in their voice, like you weren’t intimidated at all.

“I don’t celebrate this,” he said, gesturing vaguely at the chaos around you.

“Mm,” you hummed, like that was fair. Then you lifted the flower a little higher, wiggling it slightly between your fingers. “Good news, you don’t have to participate. This one’s free.”

He didn’t take it.

“Why give them away?” he asked instead, eyes narrowing just slightly. “You’re losing money.”

You smiled, wider this time, like you liked the question. “Maybe I am.” Then you continued a little more playful, “Or maybe I just wanted an excuse to talk to cute strangers without it being weird.”

You thought he was cute? 

Dex almost laughed, but then decided that would probably be perceived as mean, regardless of his intentions. “That’s your strategy?”

“Hey, it’s working,” you said easily, nudging the flower a little closer to him. “You’re still here, aren’t you?”

His eyes flicked from the flower back to your face, trying to find the catch, maybe some sign you didn’t mean it, some crack in the tone, but there wasn’t one. You just looked… sincere. 

“Do you say that to everyone?” he asked.

You shrugged, shoulders lifting just slightly. 

For whatever reason, he finally took the flower.

Your fingers brushed his, and you didn’t pull away quickly like most people would. You just let it happen, then eased back to take the next flower for the next person.

“See?” you said, satisfied, like you’d won a county fair grand prize. “Now you’ve got proof today wasn’t a total waste.”

Dex looked down at the flower in his hand, then back at you. “What am I supposed to do with it?”

You laughed, and he thought it was the sweetest sound he had ever heard. “Take care of it,” you said, “Or don’t. It’s yours now.”

He didn’t react. He just awkwardly stood there for a couple of seconds, spinning the rose in his hand. 

“Dex,” he said instead, gesturing to himself like offering his name made sense here, like it belonged in this conversation.

Your expression brightened just a touch at that. “Dex,” you repeated, like you were testing it. “I’m guessing you don’t usually stop for random girls handing out flowers.”

“No.”

“Mm.” You smiled, just a little smug about it now. “Guess I got lucky, then.”

He stared at you for a second too long, because it didn’t feel like luck.

It felt deliberate. Like the world was pointing at you saying this one! This one is yours!

“Yeah,” he said, more to himself than to you. “Something like that.”

“Alright, Dex,” you said, stepping back slightly to let someone pass between you. “Try not to look so miserable, yeah? You’ve got a flower now. That’s a personality upgrade.”

He huffed a small smile.

And when he walked away this time, he didn’t throw the flower out. He held onto it, tighter than he needed to.

See, he’d been empty for a long time. Nothing ever held his attention for more than a passing second anymore. Everything just got reduced to patterns, targets, and white noise. So when his focus caught on you and didn’t immediately let go, it felt wrong, like his world slipped off-pattern.

Behind him, you were already smiling at someone else, giving someone another rose. But that didn’t make it feel less personal. 

It just made him want your attention back.

—

A week later, Dex stepped into your shop like he’d already memorized it, as if he’d been there a hundred times instead of zero. The bell chimed softly overhead, and you glanced up from trimming stems, fingers faintly dusted with green.

“Hi! What can I do for you today?” you asked, like he was any other customer.

For a second, he just looked at you.

“You don’t recognize me?” he said, and it came out more earnest than he intended. He sounded… disappointed.

You blinked, then leaned forward slightly, studying him. There was a moment where he could see your mind working, trying to place him, and then your eyes widened, recognition clicking into place.

“Oh! Dex, right?” you said, a small smile tugging at your mouth. “From Valentine’s Day.”

The panic that had clawed in his chest eased immediately.

You glanced down then, noticing what he was holding in his calloused hands: A small glass vase. Inside it, the rose.

The rose you gave him. 

“How’s it doing?” you asked, going around the counter and stepping closer.

“I put it in water,” he said, watching you instead of the flower. “I did all I could.”

You leaned in slightly, examining it, your fingers hovering just short of touching the petals. “Mm,” you hummed, but you didn’t sound surprised. “It’s wilting.”

“It is,” he agreed, though his tone suggested that wasn’t the point.

You looked up at him then, a little apologetic. “Roses don’t last forever.”

He knew that. You knew he knew that, you weren’t stupid. But he wasn’t the first customer who was upset that a flower had the audacity to die. Living art has a way of turning sentimental to people, beyond logic or reason.

Dex’s grip on the vase tightened just slightly, his thumb brushing absently against the glass. “Can I keep it alive?” he asked.

The question wasn’t naive. Instead it was focused, as if he was asking, what else can we do? Are we exhausting all our options? 

“I mean… not really,” you admitted, “It’s just its time.”

He held your eyes, unwavering.

“I want it to last,” he said, and there was an absolution in the way he said it: stubborn, but not childish. He said it like it mattered more than it should because it was from you.

You, who he’d followed home for the past seven days without a second thought. You, who stopped at the corner supermarket to get your favourite blend of tea, who took the subway just to get coffee just because you liked how it was roasted better. You, who kept a herb garden on your kitchen windowsill meticulous and alive, and hung a suncatcher in your bedroom window so the light would break into colors across your room in the morning. You, who slept with the windows open because you like waking up to natural light. You, who slept in the cutest silk slips that barely leave anything to Dex’s imagination. And you, who had a rooftop garden hidden above your apartment, where you spent hours tending to things that grew because you cared. 

Oh, the garden.

Dex liked it most of all, because he found a high enough perch on a neighboring building to watch you without interruption, to stay still for hours at a time while you knelt among the plants and didn’t once look up, never once realizing your being followed, that your life was being studied by a very, very dangerous man. 

Your eyes flicked between him and the rose again, and then you let out a sigh, shifting closer to the counter. “Okay,” you said, thoughtful now. “I’ve got an idea.”

You reached for the vase and slid the wilting rose free. You handled it carefully, even in its fading state.

Then you turned, plucking a fresh rose from a nearby bundle, and held it out toward him with an encouraging smile. “You can take a new one,” you offered. “If you change the water every other day, it’ll stick around for longer.”

Dex didn’t even glance at it. His attention stayed on the original, now resting lightly in your hand.

“I don’t want a different one,” he said, smaller now, but no less firm.

You hesitated. “You… don’t?”

“I want that one.”

Your brows lifted slightly, a flicker of surprise breaking through. “The dying one?”

“…Yeah.”

There was a certain vulnerability in his eyes that made you pause. Was he… attached?

You looked down at the rose again, then back at him. The lines in your face lowered like you were starting to understand, at least a little.

“Okay,” you murmured, thinking it through. Then, when you got an idea, you said, a bit brighter, “I could press it for you.”

Dex’s eyes shifted back to you.

“It’ll at least preserve it,” you added, gesturing lightly with the stem. “Flatten it, dry it properly. I know it’s exactly the same, but…” you smiled faintly, “it’ll last.”

He didn’t interrupt.

“You could come back to pick it up at a later date,” you continued. “I was already planning to press some gerberas anyway, so it’s not a big deal to add one more.”

Dex was silent for a moment, weighing not the practicality, but also its implication. Then he nodded once.

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, okay.”

You smiled and turned to set the rose aside carefully.

Dex stayed exactly where he was, watching you move, already certain he’d be back long before the wait was over.

—

Twelve days later, Dex stood across the street from your shop for eight full minutes before going in.

He wasn’t pacing, not even fidgeting. He was just standing there, coffee in hand, watching the door like it might open on its own and solve the problem for him.

He had already timed how long you usually stayed behind the counter in the morning, how often you stepped out to rearrange the display, the pattern of customers drifting in and out, and when you disappeared into the back room for exactly three minutes and twenty seconds at a time.

Still, he stood there a second too long, staring through the glass at the familiar arrangement of flowers, the counter, at you.  

The coffee in his hand was still warm. Not hot anymore, but not cold either. He’d made sure of that.

Finally, he crossed the street.

The bell chimed when he pushed the door open.

You looked up and smiled. This time, you recognised him immediately. “Hi, Dex.”

And just like that, you made his day. Maybe his week. 

He stepped closer, more confident than he did before.

“Hi,” he said back. There was a second where he just stood there, looking at you like he’d forgotten why he came in at all.

Then, remembering, he held the coffee out. “This is for you.”

You blinked, surprised, but reached out to take it. “For me?” you echoed, turning the cup slightly in your hand. “You didn’t have to—”

You stopped to turn the cup slightly, reading the label, then glanced back up at him with a small tilt of your head.

“Oh my god,” you said, half-laughing already. “No way.”

Dex’s stomach dropped briefly before your smile widened.

“This is my coffee place,” you said, amused. “Like, my favourite cafe.”

He blinked, just feigning enough surprise to feel real. “Is it?”

“Yes,” you laughed, lifting the cup like evidence before you took a sip. “Dex...”

His shoulders tightened just slightly. “Yeah?”

“You got my order right.” There was a long second before you broke into a grin, bright and delighted. “That’s crazy.”

He let out a small, relieved breath through his nose. “I just guessed.”

“Insane guess,” you corrected, shaking your head as you took another sip, like you were still processing it. “You just nailed my entire personality in a cup.”

“I got lucky,” he said, shoving his hands in his pocket. 

You glanced back up at him, still smiling as you sat the cup down to clean up the leaves from the counter, leftover from conditioning your antirrhinums for an event in a few days. “Well,” you said, “your luck just made my morning significantly better, so...”

“That was the idea.” It slipped out before he could filter it.

Your face shifted from amused to warm, just a touch more focused on him. “Yeah?” 

Dex nodded once, like that was obvious.

A bout of silence settled, but it wasn’t empty. It stretched comfortably as you leaned a little against the counter, still holding the coffee between your hands.

“So,” you said, tilting your head, “what’s the occasion?”

“No occasion,” Dex answered, “Just… thought you’d like it.”

You shifted closer to the counter, resting your elbows there, facing him more fully now. “Do you do this a lot?” you asked. “Or am I just benefiting from a very specific moment of generosity?”

“Not a lot,” he admitted.

“Well,” you said, lifting the cup slightly toward him in appreciation. “I’m not complaining.”

Okay. Dex thought. This was the lull in the conversation he had been waiting for. It was a gap, a narrow, fleeting window, and he could feel it closing even as it formed. If he didn’t do it now, it would slip, reset, become another loop of almost. Ask her out. Now. 

His heartbeat had gotten loud in his ears, his focus narrowing down to you and the space between you, to the way your fingers rested around the coffee he’d brought, to the way your mouth had just barely parted.

If he didn’t ask you out on a date, then he would just be the creep, right? If nothing came of these small visits, then you would just be a florist and he would just be a customer, right?

He had the words in the back of his tongue, he had practiced in the mirror all fucking morning. It was there, just waiting for him to catch up and say it out loud—

“You’re different today,” you said, interrupting his train of thoughts before it derailed.

“I…” he struggled, but then decided to play along. “How?”

“Less intimidating,” you said, smiling. “Last time you had this whole… intense thing going on.”

“I wasn’t trying to be intimidating.”

“But you kind of were anyway.”

He considered that, then nodded once, like he’d accept it.

You watched him for a second, then laughed softly to yourself.

“What?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” you said, shaking your head. “You’re just… not what I expected.”

“What did you expect?”

You glanced at him, smile tilting.

“I thought you’d be the type to take the flower and disappear forever,” you admitted. “Not appear with coffee and—” you gestured lightly toward him, “—actual conversation.”

Dex’s mouth shifted slightly at that.

“That’s a good thing, right?” he asked, almost proud of the achievement you pointed out. 

“It is,” you said. “Because I was hoping that wasn’t just a one-time thing.”

“It’s not,” he said instantly. 

You studied him for a second, then nodded, like you believed him. “Okay,” you said. “Then we should probably keep talking somewhere that isn’t my shop while I’m technically working.”

Oh. Were you asking him out on a date?

Dex’s eyes sharpened instantly. “Yeah,” he said.

You smiled, a little more playful again now that the words were out there. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

You picked up your coffee again, almost absently.

“Dinner?” you suggested, like it was the most natural next step. “That feels like a reasonable escalation from coffee.”

“It does.”

“I’m glad we’re on the same page.” You drank the coffee again, a little ahh when you finished your sip.

“How about Saturday?” you asked. “I’m working a wedding, but I’m free after seven.”

“Yes,” he said, too quickly, too excitedly. “I’ll pick you up if you… uh, text me your address.” 

As if he didn’t already know. 

Your smile widened just slightly, already scribbling your number on the back of a receipt. 

“Saturday it is,” you said, giving the paper to him. 

And just like that, a plan settled into place.

Dex stayed where he was for a second longer, amazed at how everything had worked out in his favour. 

He had planned this differently.

He thought it would take more. He thought he’d have to push it there himself.

But you… you had met him halfway without even making it feel like effort.

—

Saturday arrived quicker than you had expected. 

You just got back from the wedding cocktail hour, and you barely had time to change from your blazer to a flowier dress before the doorbell rang. You checked your reflection one last time before heading downstairs, adjusting your bag just to keep your hands busy. 

It was seven. Exactly seven. 

Not early enough to seem overeager. Definitely not late enough to feel careless. It just felt… precise.

When you opened the door, he was already standing there with his shoulders squared, hands tucked into his jacket pockets, eyes finding you immediately. 

“Hi,” you smiled, closing the door behind you.

“Hi,” he replied. “You look…” he started, then hesitated.

You tilted your head. “What?”

He exhaled faintly through his nose, a ghost of a smile pulling at his mouth. “You look good,” he settled on, like it was the safest word he had to a much stronger reaction.

You laughed lightly. “You clean up pretty well yourself.”

That seemed to catch him off guard. 

“I was thinking we could walk,” he said. “The place I had in mind is just a couple blocks over.”

“Walking’s perfect,” you nodded. “Lead the way.”

He stepped into pace beside you easily, adjusting without thinking so you stayed in sync. Your arms brushed once, then again, and neither of you rushed to create distance.

It was comfortable. 

You pointed out a bakery you liked; he asked a few questions, just enough to keep you talking.

Then you turned the corner… and you froze in your steps. “Oh my god, wait.”

Dex halted immediately, “What?”

You looked up at the small restaurant in front of you, disbelief turning into a smile. “Dex,” you said, half-laughing, “this is my favourite Italian place.”

It was tiny. It had barely ten seats, warm light glowing through the windows. It was the kind of place you only found if someone told you about it or you got lucky wandering.

You looked back at him, still smiling. “How do you even know about this?”

“I’ve heard it’s good,” he simply lied.

He opened the door for you, his hand hovering near your back as you stepped inside.

The cozy warmth hit you immediately, along with the smell of garlic and tomato sauce. 

“Hey! Back again?” the owner called out.

“Of course,” you smiled, glancing back at Dex. “Couldn’t stay away.”

You slid into one of the tiny tables, knees brushing his under the narrow space. He didn’t pull away.

“This is such a good choice,” you said, leaning forward slightly.

Dex watched you for a moment before answering, “I’m glad you like it.”

You met his eyes, and for a second, everything felt like a very happy coincidence.

—

The date went… really well.

Like, unexpectedly well.

You stayed longer than either of you planned, the tiny restaurant slowly emptying around you until it felt like the two of you had the place to yourselves. 

And still, neither of you moved to leave.

You talked in that wandering way that only happens when you’re comfortable, jumping from one thing to another, doubling back, interrupting each other without apology. It didn’t feel like a “first date” anymore. It just felt like time spent together.

All that time, he couldn’t stop looking at you. It wasn’t too obvious, but everything kept circling back to the way your mouth moved when you talked about needing to check on bubbles when you got home or something (whatever that meant), the way your hands followed your thoughts like they couldn’t keep up, the way you leaned in like the space between you didn’t matter.

Dex had spent years studying people, reducing them to patterns, weaknesses, outcomes. You didn’t fit cleanly into any of it. You felt… brighter than that. So whatever you were, he already decided, it was something he wasn’t going to lose.

“Today was insane, by the way,” you said at one point. “The wedding I told you I was working today? Completely unhinged.”

“What was it?” Dex’s attention didn’t waver. “Bad planning?”

“Bad everything,” you huffed a laugh. “The bridesmaid was losing it over nothing, the timeline kept slipping, and the groom—” you paused, rolling your eyes slightly “—the groom was… a lot.”

Dex didn’t care about the groom, not really. He cared about the way your nose scrunched slightly when you said it, the faint irritation in your voice. Even when annoyed, you were still… perfect. It didn’t make sense to him, how consistent it was. Still, he would listen to you simply because it was you. So he tilted his head just slightly, as if telling you to go on.

You hesitated, not like you didn’t want to answer, but like you were deciding how honest to be.

“He was…,” you said finally. “Like, weirdly controlling. Not just with the schedule, but with her.”

“The bride?” he asked, picking up his glass of red, taking another sip. 

“Yeah.” You nodded, your mouth tightening just a fraction. “Everything had to be his way. The food, the layout, even the order people walked in. And if something wasn’t exactly how he wanted it, he’d just…” you made a small, snapping gesture with your hand “… shut it down in front of everyone. His mom was almost worse. She’s just enabling him all the way.”

Dex’s eyes narrowed, though his expression stayed neutral. Then, just as quickly, you shifted the topic.

“But the flowers looked amazing,” you added lightly, leaning back again. “So, you know. At least something went right.”

Dex nodded once, like he understood that more than you meant.

Then, your phone lit up again.

You glanced at it again, for the first time that night. Dex noticed.

“You expecting something?” he asked, casual enough.

You looked up, like you hadn’t realized he’d caught that. “Hm?”

“You’ve checked your phone a couple times.”

You shrugged easily. “I’m looking out for follow-up stuff from the wedding. People always need something after.”

“Even after it’s done?”

You shook you head. “Especially after it’s done.”

He didn’t question you. If anything, his instinct leaned the other way entirely. You had your reasons, you always would. Whatever you did, whatever you said, he trusted without needing to understand. 

A few minutes later, you stood up. “I’m gonna go to the bathroom.” You said, then you added playfully, “don’t disappear.”

“I won’t,” he said. As if he would run out on the love of his life. 

He waited until you were out of sight, before absentmindedly reaching for his phone. He didn’t have much going on, just a police scanner app to track task force, a text thread with Mrs. Smithers in case her cat needed babysitting, and… you. 

So yeah, it was mostly out of habit. He was going to lock it and put it back in his pocket before you came back, but the news app gave him a notification he could ignore: 

Groom Dead at Wedding at The Plaza — Two Hospitalised.

His eyes moved over the words once. Then again, slower.

He looked at the name, the timing, the location. Everything aligned too… cleanly.

His thumb hovered for half a second before locking the screen.

When you came back, you slid into your seat like nothing had shifted.

“Okay,” you said, settling in. “What did I miss?”

Dex didn’t answer that. Instead, he turned his phone toward you. “Have you seen this?”

You leaned in slightly, your shoulder almost brushing the table as your eyes moved over the screen.

He expected you to be horrified. To gasp, to be shaken. But you didn’t react the way most people would.

You just leaned back, eyebrows furrowed.

For a while, Dex couldn’t get a read on you— and that was terrifying. Were you grieving? Were you in shock? There was nothing in your usually animated eyes that gave anything away. 

“Oh,” you said.

Dex watched you closely. “That’s the wedding you worked, right?”

Your fingers found your glass again. You rotated it once, before answering. “Yeah.”

He didn’t look away.

You glanced up at him, then back down, your voice lowering just slightly. 

“He did get sick during cocktail hour,” you said, as if it was a realisation. Your tone didn’t change, though. 

“Food poisoning?” Dex speculated, his mind running through all the possibilities. Somewhere along the lines, he was also relieved that even though you told him you ate the canapés at the wedding, you weren’t taken ill at all.

You shrugged lightly. “That’s what they’ll say.”

Oh. Interesting. 

Not that’s what it is. You said, That’s what they’ll say.

“And you don’t think that’s what it was?” he asked, biting the inside of his cheeks. 

You looked at him then, properly. There was no panic in your expression, fear of saying the wrong thing. 

“I think,” you said, dragging out the words, “that sometimes people end up exactly where they were always heading.”

You picked up your glass again, taking a small sip before continuing, almost as an afterthought. “I mean… She wanted to call it off.”

It was clear that you were talking about the Bride. Dex leaned back slightly in his chair, studying you now with a different kind of focus.

“She wasn’t going to get out on her own,” you continued, “and now…” you gave him the faintest shrug, “…she doesn’t have to.”

—

You saw him again a week later, when he came by the shop.

The bell chimed, and you glanced up out of habit, shears still in hand, a stem caught mid-trim between your fingers.

You didn’t expect it to be him.

But the second realised, your eyes lit up. “Hi, Dex.”

His shoulders eased, just slightly, like he’d been waiting for that reaction. “Hi.”

As he stepped further inside, his eyes moved over the shop. He studied the in the buckets lined along the walls, the arrangements you’d spent hours shaping, the little details most people skipped over entirely.

He was cataloguing it, learning it. Or, at the very least, he was pretending to.

You leaned lightly against the counter, watching him with a gentle smile. “Looking for something specific?”

“Maybe,” he said.

It wasn’t the most helpful thing a customer would say, but you chuckled anyway.

He moved toward a small arrangement near the front, a small spring bouquet you’d put together that morning, filled with yellow and whites and eucalyptus foliage. It wasn’t flashy, but it was balanced. It was thoughtful. 

Dex picked it up, turning it slightly in his hand, ever so carefully, as if it required inspection.

You tilted your head. “That one?”

“It’ll do,” he said.

It’ll do.

You let out a huff of laughter at that, setting your shears down with a clink before stepping around the counter. “Wow. Glowing review. I should put that on a sign.”

He glanced at you, as if to say I didn’t mean it that way. “I need more decorations.”

You didn’t push as you reached for the wrapping paper and cellophane. You didn’t ask why a man who didn’t even know what to do with a rose suddenly cared about daisies and carnations and violet-tinted gypsophilas.

You just nodded and got to work, wrapping the stems neatly, your fingers moving with practiced precision.

He watched the way you tucked the stems in, the way your thumb pressed the fold flat. The tiny, unconscious movements that made everything you did feel trained and deliberate.

You had a feeling he didn’t really get flowers, it was pretty evident after your first date. He didn't seem to know what to do with them. He didn’t seem to care about arrangements or meaning or seasonal choices.

But he kept coming back.

And if flowers were the excuse he used just to see you, then you weren’t complaining. 

The rustle of paper filled the room, followed by the faint drip of water somewhere in the back. When you finished tying it off, you lifted the bouquet and held it out toward him, a flicker of playfulness returning to your voice.

“So,” you said, “is this one going to need preserving too?”

His eyes dropped to the flowers, then back to you.

“Maybe,” he said.

It didn’t sound like a joke. And if it was, he didn’t deliver it like one.

Your smile softened anyway. “Good to know. I’ll start preparing.”

He took the bouquet from you and paid, sliding the money across without looking away for long, then gathered the bouquet carefully, holding it like it mattered more than he’d ever admit out loud.

But he didn’t leave right away.

Before you could say anything, he shifted the bouquet slightly in his hand, and then, almost absently, plucked a single daisy from it.

Your brows lifted, a quiet “hey” forming before you could stop it, maybe to playfully remind him that you worked hard on that arrangement, but you didn’t actually protest.

He stepped closer.

His hand came up to reach over the counter. Gently, he brushed a strand of your hair back behind your ear.

He did it so carefully, as if you were made of a million little crystals and might break at the wrong frequency.

Your breath hitched, only slightly.

Then he tucked the daisy there. His thumb lingered, rubbing a single slow circle under your ear. His hand dropped a little, only to rise again, this time under your chin.

He tilted your face up, just enough to catch the light properly.

His thumb rested lightly against your jaw, his pointer finger locking his hold. His gaze was fixed entirely on you now— on the flower, on your face, on the way both fit together like you’d been sculpted by the gods for his enjoyment, and that alone. 

Then he smiled, lips pulling at the edges of his mouth just enough to draw toward the scar on his cheek. “Beautiful,” he muttered under his breath.

You weren’t sure if he meant you. Or the flower. Or both. You weren’t even sure if he meant to say it out loud, or if he meant for you to hear it.

Your heart did a stupid flip in your chest anyway.

“…thanks,” you said softly, suddenly very aware of the way he was looking at you.

His hand dropped, but not abruptly. He looked… satisfied. 

“We’ll start planning a second date, yeah?” The way he said it wasn’t really a question. It was more like a conclusion he’d already reached, a decision you were simply being informed of.

You should’ve pushed back. Maybe teased him for it, made him work a little harder to get you.

But instead, you just smiled.

Because you didn’t feel the need to argue with it. Not even a little.

—

The second date came on a Friday, and it felt nothing like the first.

There was no careful planning, or buildup inside a restaurant, no structured beginning or end. It just happened.

It started late, later than most people would bother going out, when the city had already begun to be less crowded, less performative. 

You met him with the same familiarity that had been settling between you.

You ended up just walking with no destination in mind; though he did steer you to a less crowded route. Before you knew it, you found yourself by the Hudson River, the air cooler there, touched with that faint edge of water and wind. The city lights stretched across the surface in long, shimmering lines, breaking and reforming with every ripple.

You walked side by side, close enough that you were always aware of him, his pace adjusting subtly to yours.

The conversation came without effort, drifting between small observations and half-finished thoughts, the kind of talking that didn’t need to impress or prove anything. You even talked about your personal life— mostly your flower pressing. You did mention, again, what he now assumed was a pet: “I need to feed Bubbles as soon as I get home!” Which was weird, because he was yet to see any signs of animal life in the apartment. 

Before he could ask, you darted to a different topic. 

But whatever. How could he focus on something so trivial when his girl was right in front of him? 

At some point during the night, he stopped at a street vendor.

You didn’t even realize you were hungry until he came back to you with a sweet and sugary smelling food. 

“Wait, what is this?” you laughed, peeking into the paper tray.

“Churros,” he said simply, then also pointed at the chocolate pot, like an offering. 

You looked up at him, smiling. There was no point really, in telling him you loved churros. He seemed to always know what you were craving and what you wanted, that he was always somehow one step ahead of you. It’s as if he knew you better than you knew yourself. “You’re just making executive decisions now?”

“You didn’t object.”

Of course you didn’t.

You took a bite instead, the crisp sugar coating your mouth. You immediately let out a small, pleased sound before you could stop yourself.

“Good?” he asked.

“Very,” you admitted, already going in for another bite of your favourite dessert. “You’ve set a very high standard for future dates, just so you know.”

“I can keep up,” he said again, like that was the easiest promise in the world.

You walked and ate and talked, and you can’t help but feel like you’d skipped awkward and landed straight into comfortable.

You were out for hours, and it flew by as if it was just minutes. 

By the time you circled back toward your place, the city had lulled even more. There were fewer people, quieter sounds. The only significant noise was the distant hum of traffic and the echo of your footsteps on the pavement.

You slowed as your building came into view.

Dex stopped just short of the door again, like last time, like there was an invisible line he was still choosing not to cross without permission.

You turned toward him, still holding the half-empty paper tray in one hand.

You looked at him, at the way his attention was always so focused when it landed on you, like you were the only thing that mattered in the world. 

Then your eyes dropped, just slightly, to his lips. “You’ve got something there,” you said, you pointed out.

He tilted his head. “Where?”

You stepped closer before he could overthink it.

“Here.” Your fingers brushed lightly against his jaw, guiding his face just enough. Then, before you could think any better of it, you pressed a chaste kiss to the corner of his mouth, tongue brushing his skin just enough to take pry sweet liquid off.

Dex went completely still.

You pulled away just quickly, thumb swiping the little wet patch you’d accidentally left behind, and Dex leaned into your touch without a second thought. 

You smiled a little too casually for what you’d just done.

“Chocolate sauce,” you explained, tapping your own lip like that was the only reason. “Couldn’t just leave it there.”

“I…,” he said finally, almost stumbling over his words. “…right.”

You smiled wider, like you knew he had a soft spot for you, like you knew you would get away with it if you committed hard enough.

“Goodnight, Dex.”

And just like last time, you slipped inside before he could stop you.

—

He stood there for a while, longer than necessary.

His hand lifted briefly, brushing the corner of his mouth where yours had been, like he could still feel it there.

After a few seconds, he forced himself to snap out of it. He had somewhere to be, of course. 

Not home, but it was somewhere he had grown to like more than home.

See, there was only ever one place he could go after a night like this.

He walked across the street, then around the corner, then up the stairwell he already knew too well. His body moved through it like routine, but his mind stayed exactly where you’d left it—

At your door, your lips. At that fleeting kiss that had lasted barely a second and somehow rewired the rest of his night.

See, he knew what you did on Fridays. You would go up to the rooftop and tend to your plants. You would check on them, do some maintenance, and sometimes, you’d even harvest them and put them in a mortar and pestle, crushing and storing them in a little bottle. Herbal remedies, Dex had assumed. It was adorable, how much care you put into your cute little garden.

When you were done with your plants, he would watch you through your naively opened bedroom window as you got ready for bed. 

After your last date, he had even watched you lay there as you ever so slowly reached your fingers under your cotton panties. It wasn’t long before he realised you were touching yourself while mouthing his name. 

If he was lucky, he’d get to witness that again today.  

—

Dex had been watching from his perch for fifteen minutes.

You had changed into a comfortable black hoodie that swallowed your frame— he saw that much through the glow of your bedroom window. 

He leaned forward slightly, elbows resting against the cold concrete.

You always went up to the rooftop after you changed. It was a pretty reliable pattern.

So when you didn’t appear on there, when five minutes stretched past where you should’ve been stepping into the open air, his chest tightened.

Dex didn’t move, but his focus heightened instantly, attention narrowing as he recalibrated. His eyes flicked once more to your window… and then the front door of your building opened.

You stepped out.

The hood was down, your hands tucked briefly into the pocket before you pulled one free, adjusting your sleeve as you moved.

Dex’s head tilted just slightly.

That… wasn’t part of your routine.

You wouldn’t go out at this hour alone. Especially not after a night like this.

“What are you doing?” he murmured under his breath, more observation than question.

He pushed off the ledge, already deciding he would follow. 

After all, he had to keep his girl safe. 

—

Distance was easy to maintain when you understood movement, when you could predict the rhythm of someone’s steps before they took them.

He stayed behind you, offset just enough to disappear into reflections, into shadows, into the gaps people never noticed. Your figure stayed in his line of sight the entire time, framed between streetlights and reflected storefront glass.

You didn’t look back.

You turned down a smaller street, then another, the noise of the city thinning out until it became distant. Your footsteps echoed here.

You were more exposed.

Dex adjusted accordingly, his own steps falling soundlessly into place.

Then you turned into an alley. He slowed down immediately, slipping to the edge before you disappeared fully from view.

When he shifted just enough to see, he realised… you weren’t alone.

A man stood waiting in the shadows, wearing a dark grey jacket. What was more interesting, though, was that he was wearing thick black rubber gloves. 

Dex’s eyes narrowed as you walked straight to this stranger without hesitation.

What the hell?

You reached into your pocket and pulled an envelope out. The man handed you a small and unmarked box in return.

Dex’s mind ran through possibilities fast, each one worse than the last. A deal. This was a deal. A drug deal?

His grip tightened slightly against the brick beside him.

No. No, that didn’t fit. Not you. You weren’t…were you? His girl didn’t deal in things like this.

Did she?

The thought sat wrong in his chest, and he was starting to get irritated. 

You took the box without a word, and left. Dex didn’t follow you this time.

The man was still there, and Dex had questions.

So he watched him from the shadows, counted the seconds, and waited for an opening. 

Stupidly, the man decided to check the cash right then and there.  That was when Dex reached down to a bit of rusted metal (probably fallen off someone’s fire escape).

He prepared for a precise throw… 

And it drove straight into the man’s leg.

The sound that came out of him wasn’t a full scream at first, more like a strangled choke. It was horrifically cut off as his body folded, collapsing hard against the wall. His hands scrambled, one reaching instinctively for the bar buried in his thigh, the other bracing uselessly against the ground.

“What the…fuck—!”

Dex was already on him, closing the distance before panic could turn into a fight or flight response. He crouched just enough to bring himself into view.

“Don’t,” Dex said quietly, nodding once toward the bar when the man’s fingers twitched again. “You’ll make it worse.”

The man froze. “Who the hell are you—” he started, breath hitching.

Dex grabbed his wrist and twisted hard, bones cracking within seconds.

This time, the scream came out full.

It echoed off the brick walls, cut short only when Dex tightened his grip just enough to keep him grounded in it.

“You’re going to tell me about the deal you just made,” Dex said.

The man’s breathing turned ragged, eyes wide, darting like he was trying to find a way out that didn’t exist. “I—I don’t know what you’re talking about—”

Dex tilted his head slightly, then pressed down, just enough on the broken arm.

The man choked on the next sound, panic flooding in properly now. “Okay, okay! Fuck—okay!” he gasped. “I’ll talk, j-just stop—”

Dex eased the pressure. Not out of mercy, but out of efficiency.

“Talk,” he repeated.

“I’m just a courier,” the man rushed, words tripping over each other. “That’s it, I don’t make the deals, I don’t ask questions, I just move shit from point A to point B—”

“A courier,” Dex echoed, unimpressed. His grip didn’t loosen. “For what?”

“I don’t know everything, I-I swear!” The man’s voice cracked, eyes glassy now, pain bleeding into fear. “I just get told where to go, what to hand over—what to pick up—”

Dex didn’t blink as he listened to the man breaking under pressure.

“I think it’s plants, okay?” he blurted. “Restricted ones—imported shit, hard to get, I d-don’t… know! That’s all I know, I don’t grow it, I don’t sell it, I just carry it—please—”

Dex studied him, weighing the truth the way he always did, not through words, but through the way they came out. 

Then, he let go.

The man dropped fully to the ground this time, clutching at his arm, his leg, his whole body curling in on itself like it might hold him together.

Dex stood and looked down at him, unmoved. Whether he bled out or crawled his way to help didn’t matter.

He’d already given Dex what he needed.

—

Even nearly two weeks after that, he had been thinking about the alley more than he cared to admit.

About the man. The deal. The box. But mostly about you.

He had turned it over in his head enough times to sand down the edges. Right, so it was restricted plants, rare imports, probably something you just liked. That tracked. You liked things that grew, things that needed care. It was… harmless. Endearing, even, that you would inconvenience yourself to a fault to satisfy a hobby. 

Cute, That’s what he settled on. Your apparent hobby of collecting rare plants was cute. 

So when your text came—come by the shop after closing?— thoughts shifted immediately, like a switch being flipped.

How could he say no to his girl?

By the time he stepped inside, the lights were already dimmed. It smelled stronger at night, but still faintly distinctly sweet underneath.

You were already there, waiting behind the counter.

“Hi,” you said, softer than usual, like the hour demanded it.

“Hi,” he echoed.

The second thing Dex noticed after you, were the chocolates. 

It was a heart-shaped velvet red box, and it was open, ribbon pushed aside, a couple already missing. 

It was a gift chocolate, not one you would buy for yourself. That alone was enough to get his chest hot with anger or jealousy, maybe both. It didn’t help that you were casually picking one up, inspecting it like it deserved your full attention.

You followed his line of sight, then smiled knowingly. “Oh.” You picked one up, turning it between your fingers. “These?”

“Yes.”

“Mm,” you hummed, popping it into your mouth without breaking eye contact. “They’re actually really good.”

It felt as if a rope had been pulled around his heart.

You chewed thoughtfully, completely unbothered. “Hazelnut, I think.”

Dex stepped closer, slower this time. “Who is it from?”

“From Daniel Harper,” you said, reaching for another one. “He’s the crypto guy who got flowers for Mother’s Day once and wouldn’t stop asking me out. But I think…” you tilted your head carefully, “I think he got the point now.”

“You’re eating them,” he pointed out, the entire world blurring into a haze. All he could think was that another man brought you gifts. Another man wanted you. Another man had the audacity to fucking try.

“I’m not wasting perfectly good chocolate,” you said, like it was obvious. Then you tilted your head, studying him as you unwrapped another. “Fuck, you’re so obvious right now.”

“I’m not.”

“You are,” you smiled, like you were enjoying it. “You hate this.”

“I don’t hate it.” What a fucking lie. 

“You do, a little,” you said, stepping around the counter, closing the distance between you. “Which is funny, because—” you held the chocolate up between your fingers “—you’re the one I invited here.”

Dex’s eyes dropped briefly to your hand then back to you. 

“C’mon,” you said, voice turning playful again, nudging it closer to his mouth. “Spoils of war.”

His brow furrowed slightly. “War?” He echoed. Still, as much as he hated all of this, he couldn’t help but find your attempt to feed him endearing.

“Harper is a man who tried and failed to get me,” you grinned. “You’re benefiting from his loss. You’re welcome.”

He didn’t take it, mostly because he was stubborn— but so were you. You nudged it closer. “C’mon Dex,” you pouted, remembering how much he liked the chocolate sauce on the churros. “I know you like it. Don’t be difficult.”

Dex leaned in slightly, and instead of just taking the chocolate, his mouth closed around your fingers.

Your breath hitched.

His tongue brushed against your skin as he pulled away, like he knew exactly what he was doing.

Then he took the chocolate between his teeth, like nothing had happened.

You stared at him.

“I…,” you said after a beat, a little breathless now despite yourself. “That was—”

He didn’t respond. He watched you, an arrogant grin now playing on his face. If his sweet girl wanted to tease and taunt, he had to show you two can play at that game. 

Your composure came back quickly, but your smile had changed. It was less teasing, more charged.

“Right,” you cleared your throat lightly. “Actually—” You turned, gathering your thoughts and reached under the counter. “I didn’t ask you here just to steal Harper’s dignity,” you added, glancing back at him. “I have something for you.”

You waited until he was close, closer than necessary, before you said, “Close your eyes.”

“Why?”

“Because I said so,” you shot back immediately, “don’t be so suspicious. It’s a flower shop, not a crime scene.”

His mouth twitched. “Is it?

“Dex.”

He sighed, quiet, but obedient, and let his eyes fall shut.

He heard you move closer, the shuffle of your steps, the faint clink of something being set down. There was a pause, like you were checking and adjusting your secret prize.

Then, you said, “Okay. Open.”

He did.

Oh.

It was the rose.

Maybe he had expected just a dried, pressed flower, but definitely not… this. 

It was preserved and framed in a gold-planted wood, intricately carved. The petals were darker now, fragile-looking but perfectly intact, held in place.

Your smile wavered just slightly. “Okay, that silence is… concerning. Say something.”

He blinked once, like he was catching up to the moment.

“You didn’t have to do this,” he said.

“Well,” you huffed a small laugh, folding your arms loosely. “That was kind of the whole point of you leaving it with me.”

“No,” he shook his head once, stepping closer. “You… you didn’t have to do all this for me.”

Your eyes softened at that. He said it as if he truly believed he didn’t deserve it. 

“I wanted to,” you reassured. 

He reached for it slowly, like it might fall apart if he wasn’t careful. His fingers brushed the edge of the frame, then traced it.

“It’s better,” he said simple.

“Better than a fresh one?” you teased, tilting your head.

“Yes.”

“That’s bold.” You raised an eyebrow. “Florists everywhere just felt personally attacked.”

“I don’t care about them.”

You laughed a little, and his chest tightened in a familiar way. It wasn’t entirely jealousy anymore.

“I’m glad,” you said. “Would be awkward if you were secretly seeing other florists behind my back.”

His eyes flicked to yours, as if the implications were laughable. “I’m not.”

“I know,” you grinned. “You don’t seem the type.”

“What type is that?”

“The ‘casually shops around’ type,” you said, gesturing vaguely between him and the shop. “But… you actually like it, right?” you asked at the frame, smaller this time, just to be sure. As if you were anxious that you put so much effort in something he wouldn’t care about.

He didn’t hesitate. “Of course.”

Your smile came back, like that answer meant more than you were letting on.

You were still standing so close.

Dex noticed that neither of you had stepped back from the frame, like the space between you had just… disappeared.

“You’re staring,” you murmured, a smile tugging at your mouth.

“I know.”

That should’ve made you pull away.

Instead, your fingers tapped lightly against the edge of the frame still on the table. “If you break that," you teased. “I’m not making you another one.”

“I won’t break it.”

“You say that,” you said, glancing up at him through your lashes, “but you’ve got kind of a… destructive vibe.”

He frowned. “You think that about me?”

“I think,” you stepped just a fraction closer, “that you get intense about things you like.”

His eyes locked onto yours. And you could tell that hit a lot closer to home than he intended. 

“And you like this,” you added, tapping the frame once more.

“Yes.”

“And you like… flowers?” you pushed, clearly enjoying yourself.

“No.”

You chuckled, almost a sweet giggle. “So it’s just me, then?”

He didn’t answer. That was your answer.

“Good,” you said under your breath.

Your hand slid off the frame, brushing against his fingers on the way down. Your eyes dropped, just briefly, to his mouth.

Dex noticed.

His grip on the frame loosened, setting it aside without looking, his attention already back on you like it had nowhere else to go.

“You’re still staring,” you whispered.

“Yeah.”

Your breath hitched, slightly. Then, before you could think twice, you issued a challenge, “Do something about it, then.”

That was all it took for all pleasantries and manners to fall apart. Not that it ever had any leg to stand on.

Dex closed the distance immediately, his hand finding your waist as his mouth met yours, like he’d already done this a hundred times before.

You didn’t hesitate to kiss him back. 

Your hands were on him, gripping his jacket, pulling him closer as you kissed him back just as hard, just as certain. You were quick to match his intensity, biting a bit of his lip just to drag him back to the real world. You could tell he was spiraling, that he had been all consumed by the gesture. 

When you broke for air, it barely lasted a second. “Dex—”

He kissed you again. 

And this time, it deepened, slower but heavier, like he was learning you in real time and refusing to let go. Like if he could, he would fuse his bones into you. 

You laughed softly into it, breathless. “Okay… okay—”

But you didn’t stop him. Whatever you were about to say got lost when his hands tightened at your waist and he lifted you like it was nothing, setting you back onto the workbench behind you.

The tools rattled softly, a pack of floral tape rolling off to the side, but neither of you cared.

Your legs shifted instinctively, pulling him closer by hooking it around his hips, and the kiss didn’t slow. It only got more insistent, like neither of you had any interest in stopping now that you’d started.

“Still think I’m intense?” he murmured against your mouth.

You smiled against his lips. “A little.”

He kissed you again like that was the wrong answer, and you let him.

When your fingers tangled in his hair, he let a sweet moan against your mouth. Interesting, you thought, as his grip tightened at your waist, pulling you closer, like there wasn’t enough distance in the world to satisfy him.

It was messy and overwhelming in the way neither of you tried to control.

His hand slid up your side, under the hem of your shirt, fingers brushing skin…

….and you snapped out of it.

“Dex—”

He hummed, trailing a kiss down your cheek, latching on your neck….

But then you pulled away softly, slow enough to not be abrupt, but out of place enough that he felt… confused.

What had he done wrong? 

Your breath was uneven when breathed out. Gently, you pushed his hand from under your shirt. You were met with no resistance as his big palms splayed on your lap, kneading anxiously, as if he was itching to touch you again, to kiss you, to take you. 

Then, you gently pressed your forehead to his. “I… we shouldn’t.”

For a second, he didn’t move. He didn’t even breathe. 

“Oh,” he said quietly. His thoughts were spiralling, you could tell. I fucked up, I fucked up, I fucked up, playing over and over again in his head. 

“No, hey, hey,” you rushed, hands coming up to his face, cupping his jaw. “Not like that. Not… not because I don’t want to.”

His eyes flicked back to yours.

“I do want to,” you said, more certain. “I just… I’ve got to work a baby shower early tomorrow, and I still need to finish a couple arrangements tonight, and if we—” you huffed a small, breathless laugh, “—if we keep going, I’m not getting anything done.”

Dex stared at you, processing.

“I…” he started but could not finish, as if he needed to say something, anything, to stop himself from falling off the deep end. 

“I’m sorry,” you smiled sadly, a little apologetic. 

He exhaled slowly, trying to recover, trying to place where you were in his mind.

“I like you, I really do.” Your thumb brushed lightly along his lower lip, where a string of moisture had collected. Dex’s eyes darted away, simply because like was not what he felt for you. What he felt was obsession, devotion, perhaps love that grew in such a short time. Still you reassured him. “I like you. I want you. Just… not right now, not here.”

Dex looked at your lips, almost still in a daze. 

Then you added, a little more playful again, “Come over tomorrow? We can… continue this. Properly.”

And just like that, his brain rearranging itself, making space for a schedule. 

It's okay. It’s okay. It's not the end of the world. She wants you, she still wants you… 

Then, to quiet the storm in his mind, he leaned in again, kissing you once, shorter this time, but just as certain.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” you smiled against him.

“Yeah,” he said, breathless, discreetly wiping a tear from his eyes. “Yeah.”

—

That night, Dex didn’t go straight home. He found himself outside Daniel Harper’s building, hoping he could finish the job for you. 

It wasn’t hard. The door wasn’t even locked. 

Inside, Daniel sprawled on the couch, body slack, mouth parted with a thin line of foam dried at the corner, eyes glassy and gone. 

He was already dead. He had been for a while, by the looks of it. 

Dex stood there for a moment, taking it in: the stillness, the lack of struggle, the timing of it all, and tilted his head slightly, almost thoughtful. 

“Huh,” he murmured to no one, cataloguing what mattered and what didn’t. 

How weird.

—

Dex couldn’t wait for tomorrow. He spent the night thinking about you, and then the morning, and then the entire day in that same tight loop of fixation, until even the idea of distance felt like a grenade swallowed and exploding from the inside. 

It wasn’t just want. It was compulsion, an itch under the skin he couldn’t stop scratching at no matter how much it bled. 

So he did the only thing that still made sense: he went hunting for Task Force from the break of dawn, anything to keep his mind from turning fully toward you. Because when it did, he was just turned into a pathetic little puddle of emotions.

When it came down to going to your apartment, his nerves were practically buzzing off the roof. 

The second you opened the door, he was already moving, one hand bracing the frame as he stepped in, the other finding your waist and then he kissed you, like the space between seeing you and touching you had been unbearable.

You laughed into it, surprised but not resisting, your hands catching on his jacket. “Dex—”

“I missed you,” he said against your mouth, already walking you backward as he nudged the door shut with his foot, his grip tightening just slightly at your side.

“You saw me last night,” you teased, breath catching as his lips found yours again.

“Hmm,” he dismissed, picking you up slightly at your feet.

“Careful—careful!” you suddenly laughed, twisting slightly in his hold.

Dex stopped instantly, setting you down like you’d burned him. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Watch out for Bubbles.” You were still smiling, a little breathless, pointing past him. “Don't wanna wreck her enclosure.”

“Bubbles?” He’s heard you say that name once or twice before. A pet, he assumed. A cat, maybe a small dog? Though he never saw anything through the window, so in the back of his mind, he had chalked it off to being a carnivorous plant.

But when he turned… he saw a small tank he didn’t recognise. After all, he had never been able see this part of your apartment from his perch. 

Dex stepped closer, eyes narrowing slightly.

An… octopus. 

It was small, beige and yellow, though the second it clocked him, it flashed aggressive blue rings. Its limbs curled slowly against the glass. It had a maze in its enclosure, an enrichment of some kind, perhaps? 

“Oh,” he said. That was the last thing he ever expected. 

“She’s cute, right?” you beamed, coming up beside him like this was completely normal. 

Dex watched it for a second longer than necessary. “…yeah.”

It blinked, beady eyes looking straight into his eyes. He blinked back.

“Okay. Come on,” you grabbed his hand, tugging him away with a grin. “I don’t want Bubbles to watch.”

He let himself be pulled, though his eyes flicked once more over his shoulder before following you down the short hall.

You passed a door, and heknew where it must go: the rooftop. Your rooftop— idle and calming. In all its domesticity, you were your happiest there. “Where does this go?” He feigned innocence. 

You didn’t miss a beat. “Junk closet.”

He looked at you, and you smiled too quickly. “…right,” he said.

Why would you lie?

The thought barely had time to settle before you pushed him back onto the bed, climbing over him, straddling his thighs like it was second nature.

That distracted him immediately. He didn’t even have the time to take in the bedroom he had spent so long looking through. 

Your hands found the hem of your shirt, and you pulled it off without hesitation, tossing it somewhere behind you like it didn’t matter.

Dex’s attention snapped back into place like a puzzle piece. Whatever question he had dissolved under his tunnel vision, his focus now on you. 

“You think too much,” you murmured, leaning down, your hands braced on either side of him.

“I don’t.”

“You do,” you smiled, your nose brushing his. “Good thing I know how to fix that.”

His hands came back to your waist like they’d never left.

And this time, neither of you stopped.

—

Dex had been overwhelmed in the best way possible way

Not just by the way you’d pulled him apart piece by piece, with your hands, mouth, all of it; but by how easily you’d met him there. 

How easily you matched him, pushed back. There had been nothing hesitant about you, nothing uncertain; every touch had felt intentional, every sinful sound felt like it belonged to him. The touch of your tongue lingered even now, under his skin. His body still felt too warm, too aware, even as the room cooled down.

He could still feel the faint press of your nails at his shoulders, how you had traced the scar on his back and not even question where it came from. He could still feel the heat of your breath against his throat, where it dragged down to his chest, then his stomach, then between his legs. You’d pulled him closer like you didn’t want even an inch of distance between you. 

When he helped you chase each others’ bliss, it didn't feel casual, or even just physical. It had felt all-consuming, addicting, euphoric. And he would change a thing. 

The shower hadn’t helped the nerves, though.

If anything, it had made it worse. It was your idea to clean up together, your hands sliding over him beneath the water, slower this time, exploratory, like you were learning him just as much as he was memorizing you. The steam had wrapped around both of you, turning everything hazy. Even now, lying beside you, he could still feel it, the imprint of your palm on his bare skin and his on yours. 

Now, you were asleep.

You were curled into him, your leg draped over his like you’d claimed him without thinking. Your breathing was steady, lips slightly parted, completely unaware of the way he was looking at you.

Dex didn’t even try to drift off. He wasn’t sure he even wanted to.

His hand hovered just above your waist, then settled there lightly. His thumb moved once, almost absentmindedly, like he was testing if you were real, making sure you weren’t a fragment of his broken mind it made as a coping mechanism. 

You shifted closer in your sleep.

Mine.

The thought came into his mind uninvited, but he didn’t push it away.

But still… like a weed going through cracks, he couldn’t help but think about the door. 

Junk closet, you said. 

His teeth clenched. No. That wasn’t right.

He knew the building— found the layout and structure long before he ever stepped foot in it. He knew exactly how space worked, how things connected. There wasn’t room for a “junk closet” there. 

Which meant… you lied.  Why would you lie to him?

The thought didn’t sit right. It didn’t settle, didn’t smooth over the way everything else about you seemed to.

You didn’t lie. Not really. Not about things that mattered. So why this?

His back tightened slightly, his thumb pausing where it rested against your waist. His eyes darted, involuntarily, toward the direction of the door again. Junk closet.

No.

His mind ran it again, as if to double and triple check. He could see it clearly, like a blueprint burned into the back of his skull. There was no space for that.

You had lied. You must’ve.

Why? To keep him out? To hide something? From him?

His chest tightened at that, a bitterness threading through his mind previously touched by your warmth.

Check it.

The thought popped up in his mind, clear as day.

Check it.

His eyes dropped back to you immediately. You, still curled into him, your breathing even, your face relaxed. You trusted him enough to sleep like that.

His hand shifted slightly against you, fingers pressing just a fraction deeper, like he could fuse himself to you.

Stay.

That was his next thought. After all, it felt stupid to leave you alone, in bed, defenseless, in favour of a theoretically imaginary junk closet.

Don’t move.

You looked… safe. Happy. Like having him here was enough to solve all his problems.

Check it.

Fuck, that thought came back unannounced, and it came back louder.

Check it. Check it.

His jaw clenched. His eyes squeezed shut for half a second, like he could shut it out.

You lied. Why would you lie? Check it.

His fingers flexed once against your side, restless now.

Check it.

His breathing slowed, but it wasn’t calm. He opened his eyes again, staring down at you like the answer might be written somewhere in the shape of your face. Still, he found nothing.

Check it.

His head tilted slightly, the thought settling in deeper this time: He needed to know.

A quiet sigh left him as he leaned down, pressing a slow, lingering kiss to your cheek. 

You stirred faintly, an adorable little snore slipping from you, but you didn’t wake.

Dex slid out from under you carefully, easing your leg back onto the mattress, making sure you stayed comfortable before he stood. He paused for a second, just watching you again, like it physically hurt to look away.

Then he turned, moving through the apartment soundlessly. As he wandered into the living room, he caught a bit of movement. 

His head snapped toward the motion, and then relaxed when he realised it was just Bubbles, moving in her tank.

The small octopus had shifted the second she saw him, her body tightening, skin rippling. Suddenly, blue rings flashed brightly on her skin again.

Dex could’ve sworn, that for a second, they stared at each other. 

There was something unnerving about the way her eyes locked onto his, unblinking, aware in a way that didn’t feel like an animal should be. Like she knew he was dangerous. Like she perceived him as a threat. 

His head tilted slightly, studying her right back. “Hi, Bubbles,” he murmured under his breath.

Her color pulsed again, blue agitation flickering through her small body. For a second, he saw himself in her. For a second, he wondered if her blue rings were a sign of anger.

Dex’s mouth twitched, almost amused and a little irritated that he let an octopus the size of a golf ball get to him. “Relax,” he said quietly.

She didn’t, but he decided to look away anyway.

He reached for the door, hand resting on the handle. For a second, he didn’t move.

Then…

He opened it.

Part of him hoped he was wrong, that he had simply been mistaken somehow, that you had told him the truth.

But… all he saw was stairs.

Of course.

“Don’t judge me,” he muttered to Bubbles, letting obsessive certainty take over as he moved upward, each step soundless.

The door at the top gave way with barely a push. As he suspected, it was your rooftop.

It was… beautiful.

Bright moonlight spilled across the space, reflected on leaves and petals and glass, turning everything silver-edged and almost ethereal. Rows of plants, carefully arranged, meticulously kept, thrived under your attention. Vines curled where they were meant to. Blooms opened toward the sky. 

Dex stepped forward slowly, eyes scanning, taking it all in with a kind of reverence he didn’t usually allow himself.

You spent time here. You cared about this.

So why?

Why wouldn’t you show him this? Why wouldn’t you tell him? Didn’t you trust him?

He would’ve listened. He would’ve understood— well no, maybe not understood, but he would’ve learned. For you.

You didn’t have to hide things from him. You didn’t have to keep parts of yourself away.

His eyes landed on the workbench to see a box, the same unmarked one he’d seen exchanged in that alley.

So it was that.

Next to it was a small juvenile plant, carefully potted. You had even given a handwritten label to it: Rosary pea.

Dex frowned slightly. He didn’t recognize the name. It sounded… almost gentle. Like everything else here.

Just a plant, right? Just you, collecting things that grew, things that needed care.

That’s all. That’s all it had to be.

He let out a sigh, tension still sitting tight on his shoulders. His eyes drifted again, unfocused now, thoughts spiraling faster.

Why didn’t you trust him? What did he do wrong?

He tried. He did everything right. He showed up. He listened. He gave you what you wanted, what you liked…  Didn’t he?

His breathing slowed, but it wasn’t calm. It was tight.

His attention snagged on something else nearby, this time it was a spire of flowers. The plant was tall and slender, violet bells hanging delicately from thin stems, catching the moonlight like they were almost glowing.

Dex stepped closer without thinking.

His fingers reached out, brushing one of the petals. It was pretty, like you. 

His chest tightened, and nothing could push his thoughts away:Why didn’t you tell him?

It looped, faster now, louder.

Why did you lie?

“Huh…?” he murmured under his breath, voice barely there now, strained.

His fingers lingered against the flower, tracing it absently. But something felt… off. First, he felt as if his fingers, the ones that touched the petals, were going numb.

Then, he felt a strange heaviness in his chest. He frowned slightly as his heart stuttered once, hard enough to make his breath catch.

Dex went still. “…what—”

The word barely formed before his vision shifted. The edges blurred, the rooftop tilting just slightly out of place.

Dex blinked hard, trying to steady it, but it didn’t stop. His breathing hitched, his hand gripping the edge of the workbench.

His heart skipped a beat again.

No. No, no—

His knees weakened without warning, his body suddenly too heavy, too slow to respond.

The world tilted harder this time.

The last thing he saw was your garden, blurring into streaks of green and violet under the moonlight.

—

Dex woke up slowly, like he was being pulled up from the darkest depths of his mind, his body reluctant to follow. The first thing he registered wasn’t the room, or the fading light of dusk bleeding through your windows. Instead, it was you.

Even half-conscious, disoriented, his senses found you first.

Then his eyes opened fully.

Where was he?

He was no longer in your garden. Instead, he saw your coffee table, a TV, and a couple of harmless houseplants. Oh. He was in your living room, on your couch. 

As he got a better look at you, he realised you were slumped in the armchair across from him, unconscious, your head tilted slightly to the side, your arm stretched toward him.

You looked smaller like this, folded in on yourself. It didn’t match the version of you he remembered in his head— the one that laughed behind the counter, that handled petals like they might bruise under the wrong touch. 

That’s when he saw an IV tube connected to a needle in his arm. He followed it… to you. It was a makeshift transfusion.

For a second, he just stared, his brain lagging behind the image, trying to catch up, trying to make sense of why you were connected to him like that, why your blood was in him, why you looked so… still.

His stomach dropped. This was desperate. This was you cutting into yourself, giving a part of yourself away just to keep him breathing.

Why were you so still? 

It felt wrong. His body recognized it before his mind could catch up. Still meant a part of you had gone. And his chest tightened, rejecting the possibility before it could fully form.

“Hey—” his voice came out rough, barely formed.

You stirred awake. 

Your lashes fluttered, eyes opening slowly, and the second they landed on his face, on the fact that he was awake, relief flooded your eyes.

“Oh,” you murmured, voice thick with sleep. “You’re awake.”

Dex moved too fast as adrenaline slammed into him, panic overriding everything else as he ripped the needle from his arm with no hesitation. Blood followed immediately, a thin line down his skin, but he barely noticed. 

After all, he wasn’t thinking. Thinking was slower than fear, and fear had already taken over. All he knew was that something had been done to you—or because of him—and that was unacceptable.

You jolted upright. “Whoa, hey! Relax, relax—”

He was already pushing himself up, unsteady but determined. He needed to make sure you were real, that you were okay.

“What happened?” he demanded, breath uneven, voice tight

You blinked at him once, then twice, grounding yourself before answering. “You went into my rooftop,” you said, almost resigned, save for the hint of affection in your time. “Full of poisonous plants.”

Rooftop.

His jaw twitched at the confirmation that you had hidden it. 

Dex frowned, trying to latch onto the memory. “What—”

“You touched my wolfsbane.”

He blinked, piecing memories together: The garden. The flowers. The dizziness.

You leaned back slightly, already reaching to remove the needle from your own arm, wincing faintly as you pulled it free, wiping the blood away like it didn’t matter.

“I’ve been selectively breeding them for five years,” you continued, almost absently. “That one’s about seven times more lethal than standard wolfsbane. Contact alone is enough.”

Dex stared at you.

“Most of the plants up there can kill you, actually,” you added, gentler this time. “That’s why I told you it was a junk closet.”

You said it so easily, like it hadn’t mattered, like it had just been a small, harmless deflection. But it wasn’t harmless. At least not to him.

“You lied,” he said, but it didn’t come out accusing. It came out… hurt and confused. Like he couldn’t reconcile it with everything else he knew about you.

You didn’t flinch, ambient interrupt. 

“But I’ve seen you,” he pushed, stepping closer without realizing it, drawn in like he always was. “You touch them without gloves. I—I don’t—”

You laughed, but it wasn’t dismissive.

“I should’ve known you were watching me,” you said, glancing at him through your lashes.

And there it was again—that pleasure in your voice. This time it had reason for concern. You weren’t afraid, or disgusted at this newfound knowledge. If anything, you looked… flattered. It was as if you had suspected it, and just like the garden, you had lied through your teeth. 

Dex’s chest tightened.

“If I almost died from touching one,” he said, rubbing his trail of blood away with tissues on your coffee table, “then you—” he choked at the words, as if he couldn’t physically say it. He tried again. “Then you should—“

“I should be dead?” you finished for him, noticing his struggle. 

He swallowed hard. How could you even say it, when he couldn’t even let the idea sit in his mouth?

The image formed in his mind anyway, uninvited: You, collapsed the way he had been. You, unmoving in that chair, permanently gone. His mind rejected it so violently it made his lungs feel like it was collapsing.

Your eyes softened. “I’m… immune.”

“What?”

It didn’t quite make sense to him. It felt disconnected from everything he understood about you. About the girl who laughed behind a counter, who fed him chocolates, who pressed flowers into frames simply because she wanted to.

You shifted in your seat, like this part of you was just… a fact. 

“My dad was a cocaine dealer,” you started, almost casually. “When I was five, I got into his stash. I ingested enough to kill little ol’ me twelve times over.”

Dex’s stomach dropped.

“But I was…,” you continued, “unaffected.”

Your fingers absentmindedly brushed over the velvet fabric of your chair.

“Doctors said I’ve got some kind of mutant gene. Means nothing really sticks in my system. I can’t get drunk. I can’t get high. Toxins don’t work the way they should.”

Dex didn’t look away from you once.

“When I was a teenager, I broke my arm,” you added an example, a faint grimace crossing your face. “They had to put pins in while I was awake. Anesthesia doesn’t work either.” You managed a sarcastic laugh. “That wasn’t fun.”

You said it lightly, like it was nothing, But he could see it anyway a younger you pinned down, awake, forced to feel everything. 

You were different. A mutant, that’s the term you used. You were… oh, fuck.

You were more capable than he ever deemed you to be. 

And that realization didn’t push him away the way it should have. It rooted him deeper. Because if you had always been this untouchable, then what he felt wasn’t built on fragility. You wouldn’t disappear under pressure. And he couldn’t seem to step away from you, no matter how much sense it would make to try.

Dex stepped closer again without thinking, like gravity pulled him there. Even confused, overwhelmed, heart still not fully steady, he needed to be near you.

“I… I didn’t know,” he said, as if he felt stupid for not seeing it sooner. There was even a shame in admitting it. In his mind, he had placed you in a gilded cage, easier to understand, easier to protect. But you had never belonged there at all.

You shrugged, like it didn’t matter.

Across the room, Bubbles shifted in her tank, the faint glow of her skin calm now, her earlier agitation gone now that you were here. Her limbs curled slowly, as if the fact that you were awake meant that there was nothing to worry about.

Dex barely spared her a glance. The room, the hum of life continuing outside these walls all flattened into background noise. His mind had already narrowed its focus down to one fixed point, and it was you. It had been you for longer than he wanted to admit.

“How did I live?” Dex asked, but it didn’t come out demanding. It came out raspy and rough. 

His hand found your wrist without thinking, thumb brushing over the place where the needle had been, where a faint smear of blood still lingered. He wiped it away, almost reverently, like it mattered more than his own safety that you weren’t hurt. 

He didn’t think about it. His hands just… adjusted in a way they never did anywhere else, like he understood, on a level deeper than thought, that you should not be handled carelessly, no matter how strong you turned out to be.

“You have a Cogmium steel spine,” you said, like you were reminding him of the obvious.

His brow furrowed slightly, confusion threading through the lines on his face. “How do you know that?”

Slowly, you smiled, almost shy. 

“Oh, please,” you murmured, leaning back just enough to look at him properly, though your fingers came up to loosely curl in the hem of his shirt like you hadn’t quite decided to let him go either. “I knew who you were since after the second date, Benjamin Poindexter.”

That was… new information. At least to him. 

“My rare plant dealer complained that his courier turned up dead,” you continued, almost idly. “I got curious and looked into it. It wasn’t long till I put two and two together.”

Dex exhaled faintly, a small ah leaving past his lips. It was not quite relief, but acceptance. Because of course you had figured it out. Of course you had seen through him, the way only you could.

And you were still here, as if nothing had changed. You were still looking at him like he hung the moon for you, regardless of how many people he had killed, how many mistakes he had made.

People usually changed the second they understood. He had seen it happen too many times, the mind recalibrating upon the realisation of how dangerous he was. But you… you were still looking at him like nothing in him needed to be feared. Like nothing in him needed to be fixed.

Your hand lifted then, resting lightly against his chest, right over his sternum, where his heart was still finding its rhythm again. “Your spine, I—” you went on, your voice dipping more intimately. “It bonds to you.”

Dex didn’t interrupt. He just watched you like every word mattered simply because it came from you. He didn’t follow every word—not the science, not the mechanics—but he followed you. You spoke about him like he was worth understanding.

“Blood cells are made in the bone marrow,” you said, your fingers tracing absent patterns over his shirt, “That’s your immune system, your oxygen transport, everything. The aconitine would’ve disrupted the entire process.” You tilted your head slightly, studying him like he was one of your raw poisonous plants. “But yours isn’t normal anymore.”

His hand came up to your wrist again, grounding himself in you as you spoke.

“The steel fused with your spine,” you continued, almost fond in the way you explained it. “So the blood you produce now is… stronger.”

Dex’s eyes didn’t waver as he rubbed absentminded circles on your skin. 

“When you touched the wolfsbane, the toxin should’ve shut everything down almost instantly,” you said. “But it didn’t. Your modified cells slowed it down,” you said. “And while you’re not immune, it bought you time.”

Your thumb brushed lightly against his chest, like you were feeling the heart, measuring it.

“I didn’t have an antidote,” you admitted. “So I used what I had.”

His eyes flicked briefly to your arm again, to the faint mark. You shifted closer without thinking, your knees brushing his.

“I hooked us together,” you said, quieter now. “Your blood was slowing down, so I had to pump mine manually for the first couple of hours to keep the flow going.”

Dex’s hand slid from your wrist to your arm, fingers curling there. It was as if he needed to hold onto you to fully understand what you were saying.

“My blood doesn’t process things the way it should,” you continued. “It breaks them down and neutralises them. So once it got into your system…” You gave a small, almost playful shrug. “It did the rest.”

You smiled at him then, pride lighting your face.

“Ta-da,” you said lightly, kissing the corner of his mouth just to make sure his lips had warmed back up, “You’re alive.”

Dex didn’t pull away from you even when he was still processing everything. If anything, he leaned closer. His hands slid upward, as if he needed to map you again now that he understood what you were capable of. What you had done. What you had survived.

And suddenly, all the puzzle pieces started to fall into place— why death seemed to follow you, why you always seemed in control when you looked like you had so little power. 

“The groom?” he asked, not accusing. He was just trying to understand. 

When you nodded, his shoulders softened. That was the strange, almost painful thing about Dex. Every revelation, no matter how dark, only seemed to pull him deeper under your gravity.

“Foxglove tea,” you explained, your voice clinical. “His mother and brother getting sick were… collateral. But the bride came to me the night before, crying. She….” You paused. “She had marks.”

Dex brushed his absently over your skin, like he was grounding himself in your heart. Coming to terms that you were untouchable in ways he couldn’t quite grasp.

“Harper?” he asked next.

You nodded again, and there was the faintest flicker of irritation in your expression. “Oleander cake. He… tried to touch me.”

That set him off. Dex’s brows furrowed in anger, but still wounded and earnest and almost unbearably tender, over the fact that you didn’t go to him for answers. His hands moved to your face then, clumsy and urgent, like he couldn’t stand the distance anymore. His thumbs hovered at your cheeks before pressing in gently, as if you might disappear if he didn’t hold you there.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he said, and an almost boyish hurt threaded through. 

You didn’t flinch under his touch. You leaned into it, your fingers gently circling around his back. “Because I can take care of it,” you said simply. “I did take care of it.”

That answer hurt him more than anything else you’d confessed.

“I know you can,” he said, and there was no doubt in it. His forehead dipped to yours. “But you don’t have to," he added, barely above a whisper.

You could feel the way he held on to control, as if the word letting go didn’t exist for him when it came to you. It was in the way his fingers lingered at your jawline, the way his breath mixed with yours, the way his entire body seemed angled toward you like you were the only point of gravity in the room.

You, who needed no one. And him who needed you, so openly it almost hurt to look at.

His eyes searched yours then, and he wasn’t searching for danger anymore. That part of him had already settled. What he was looking for now was some indication that he still had a place here, that he wasn’t just… incidental to you.

His voice dropped, fragile in a way he never was anywhere else. “Is it because you don’t trust me?”

You sighed, pulling away completely until his fingertips were bare and cold where your skin used to be. 

His chest tightened, a familiar spiral already coiling. Silence had never meant anything good in his life. Silence meant distance. And distance was always the beginning of the end. Before he knew it, everyone would slip just far enough out of reach that he couldn’t pull it back, no matter how tightly he held on.

But you didn’t leave him. You just stood up.

He watched you walk across the room as you approached the tank. The glow of it lit your face in shifting blue, and for a Dex stood up, caught between following you and giving you space.

You reached into the water without hesitation, lifting Bubbles from the tank, water slipping through your fingers as easily as breath.

You turned back to him, and Bubbles curled in your palm, deceptively cute and delicate, until she noticed him.

The second she saw him, the same electric blue rings from last pulsed across her body. 

Dex tilted his head. The warning was immediate, and honest in a way people never were. He wondered, briefly, if that was what he looked like to the rest of the world.

“She feels… threatened by you,” you chuckled, like it was amusing, your lips curving up. “She thinks you’re going to take me away from her.”

Dex stared at the tiny creature, at the warning written so clearly across her skin. And yet, she stayed in your hand. She didn’t flee, nor did she strike.

“But you two are more alike than you think,” you continued, softer now.

You held Bubbles closer, and she curled into you. Dex knew that feeling— the feeling of needing you, the feeling of wanting to be close to you because you felt safe.

“She’s a blue-ringed octopus. One of the most dangerous creatures alive. Their venom has no antidote.” Your fingers shifted slightly, letting the little creature settle against your skin. “I rescued her from a lab. She was… experimented on. They wanted to use her, to extract her as a biochemical weapon. As a result, her venom’s thirty times more potent now. She can thrive out of water for hours. Her species’ average lifespan is 6 months, but she...” you gently rubbed a finger over one of her tentacles as naturally as you would rub the belly of a puppy. That's when he noticed that one tentacle was marked— almost as if acid was poured over it in the quest of making her a living weapon. The poor thing had a scar, one not unlike his own, “…is turning two years old soon.”

Dex swallowed. Everything you said felt too familiar.

“I’m the only handler she didn’t kill. I’m the only handler she has never stung,” you added, almost absently. “Not just because she can’t. But because she trusts me.”

Dex had a feeling you meant more than just her. 

“Just because I can use her venom to kill for me,” you went on, your voice lowering, as you ran your hand through her squishy body, “just because she’s more dangerous than anything I grow upstairs… doesn’t mean I want to use her that way.” You exhaled. “She’s suffered enough.”

Dex watched intently as you leaned forward and returned Bubbles to the tank. She drifted for a moment, then settled against a rock, her colors fading, her body going docile again, simply because you were here.

Dex saw it then: the kinship, the invisible bond, the mirror that he had when he looked at the little creature that you cared so much about. 

Like Bubbles, he was already dangerous before. But now, he could fall off buildings. He could take a hit. He could survive beyond the constraints of his species. 

And like Bubbles, for the better part of the last decade, he had been manipulated, taken advantage of, and used as a weapon for agendas of more powerful men, a solution, a last resort. People didn’t want him. They wanted what he could do, what he could survive, what he could destroy.

You had never asked that of him. You hadn’t handed him your problems like weapons to solve. You had handled them yourself.

That feeling was… foreign and disorienting in all its kindness. It didn’t slot neatly into what he understood. There was no place to file it, no rule to attach it to. It left him… exposed.

Dex stepped towards you before he fully thought about it. He was close again, like he couldn’t stand the distance anymore. His hands found you desperately, one at your waist, the other sliding up your arm like he needed to make sure you were still here.

“You didn’t…” His voice caught. “You didn’t want to use me.”

It wasn’t really a question.

His forehead dipped toward yours again, his breath uneven. Dex had never known what it meant to be wanted without purpose. And it terrified him a little, because if there was no function or role, then there was nothing to hide behind. There was nothing to blame when it inevitably went wrong. He concluded, then, that you didn’t even think this could go wrong. It was the only plausible explanation.

His voice dropped, “you just wanted me.”

Dex stayed close. After all, distance had become unnatural to him where you were concerned. His grip on your waist had changed. It was less desperate now, more certain, like he was learning how to hang on instead of bracing for loss.

He looked at you like he was still catching up. Like every piece of you he uncovered only made him want to understand more, not recoil.

“You still could,” he said, eyes glistening in awe. His thumb moved in slow circles against your side, like he needed repetition. “I still would.”

You knew that. You knew he would burn the world down for you if you just asked. 

You reached for his hand, not to steady it, but to hold. 

Your fingers laced through his, almost disarmingly. His hand tightened around yours in a reflex.

“I don’t want to,” you said.

Dex’s breath stuttered out of him. Of all the things he’d expected, all the ways this could have gone… this was the one thing he didn’t know how to defend against: Care, without cost.

He shifted closer again, until there was no space left between you, your joined hands pressed lightly between your bodies. His forehead found your shoulder this time. He wasn’t collapsing. He wasn’t even breaking. He was just resting, letting himself exist in your orbit, without needing to prove anything.

It was almost shy.

“I don’t… know what to do with that,” he admitted, voice muffled against you, smaller than you’d ever heard it. 

Your free hand came up, and settled at the back of his head. Your fingers threaded lightly through his hair, answering a question he didn’t know how to ask, “You don’t have to do anything.”

But how? 

He had always been something done with. A weapon pointed, used, unleashed. An arrow for a stronger master to wield, and more recently, a servant to his own broken mind, searching for purpose in the world. 

He didn’t know how to simply exist without rules or confines or borders or expectations of how he was supposed to be. 

You, on the other hand, made it look easy. Effortless, even. It's as if that after spending a lifetime being a mutant, you had decided that being violent and gentle were not opposites, but two sides of the same coin.

Dex didn’t know how to do that yet, but he knew, that he wanted to learn.

He turned his head slightly then, not pulling away, just enough that his temple rested against you instead. His fingers shifted in yours, tracing lightly over your knuckles.

“I think I like this better,” he murmured, almost to himself.

And for once, there was no tension in him. No trigger to pull, no violent tendency waiting to be called on.

Maybe you had always been drawn to dangerous things because you could handle them. Or maybe, it was because you were one of them.

Both Dex and Bubbles, in all their blue-ringed, lethal glory, were remade weapons too strange, too deadly for anyone else to hold. But not for you.

They didn’t have to make themselves smaller in your hands. They didn’t have to be hidden or used.

They could just… be.

In Dex’s mind, it couldn’t simply be luck. You were a mutant, you had explained, your body had never had to adapt or learn anything— you were born already ahead of them. You were built to survive them. You were made by the powers that be to endure what should have killed anyone else.

And Dex latched onto that divine intervention with frightening certainty. You were a design, not a coincidence. It was different from the way Bubbles had been remade, different from the way he had been reshaped and reinforced. You hadn’t been altered. In Dex’s mind, you had been made perfect because you were born different.

It was as if the universe had accounted for him and then, carefully, built you around that problem. You were made to love him. It was written in the stars, he was sure of it, as sure as he was that the sky was blue.

It might not be the healthiest way to think, but at least it was his own.

And as if she understood his thoughts unfolding, Bubbles moved closer to the glass, seeing Dex in a new light now. She raised her marred tentacle like a wave, then drifted once more, almost languid now, like a reluctant concession:

You’re fine, I guess.

Maybe you've been crying simply because of everything, but it's not so simple when you don't know what everything is. Too much buried in your chest that needed to be flushed out, you suppose. You miss Dean, though he's shuffling someplace behind the door. With a final swipe to your face, you push it open, and embarrassment wells.

He doesn't embarrass you, just with his teasing that you secretly really like, so it doesn't count. Despite how tangled the concept of emotion is in his head, he works with your emotions nicely, and seems to do better every day. You don't know if it's because he's actively trying or just becoming familiar, only that he cares and loves you lots.

It's vulnerable, is what it is. Why it's daunting to leave the cramped space to seek him out.

The back of his head is pretty. Soft hair at his nape, light tips of his lashes as he tilts.

You sniffle quietly from the doorway, leaning a hip against hard wood, and watch as he moves to pull fraying blankets nicely over your side of the bed, his a permanent mess. But you're nice, he's said he wants you to have nice things, and you've got to swallow down a fresh ball of ache.

He turns. Smile tepid as he tries to register your expression from the distance, and it doesn't blossom into that charmed grin. You look a mess, you're positive. He wouldn't say so. Beautiful whenever, even when hurting, it's a sad sort of prettiness.

"Hey, angel," he calls, natural worry underneath a pillowed disguise.

You shuffle on your feet, socks smoothing against the floor. He's before you quickly, a warm hand on your arm that follows down to the crook as he bends to see your face better, taking in the puffiness and wishing he was so much better at this.

Gentle fingers on your chin. So tender, you could cry again.

"Hi," you whisper. Fingertips picking at the hem of your shirt.

A part of you wants to milk all of the sadness out and wallow in it, but relief rolls over you in slow, lazy waves at his closeness. The pinch to his brows that he tries to stave, though it's futile. You can see. It makes you feel horribly, wonderfully worried about.

"You wanna tell me what's going on?" He asks.

A shrug and a few following beats of silence.

"I don't know," you sigh out. "It just feels… deep."

He nods and lets his hand fall to the dip of your waist, pressing gentle against the fabric there. So close that you can see freckles, so attentive that he barely blinks. You'd like to slump into him, feeling spent and like jelly.

"Okay, baby. What feels deep?"

You think without really needing to. There are coils in your body that loosen and unwind at his cadence, the patience in it. Not so alone anymore and warm as fading honeysuckle sunset kisses you through the blinds behind.

"Something in my chest, I think."

His chest sure feels it now, too. Concern in his eyes chased by something sweeter, sympathetic and soothing as talcum powder. "Can I make it feel lighter? You look worn out, pretty."

"You can try," you allow.

Syrupy kisses bestowed to your cheeks and chin as he coaxes you down the mattress. You're tucked against his body and given water, given the crook of his neck to burrow against, given his assurances.

"Come to me whenever you cry, okay? Don't have to be alone."

As you drift in his arms, you don't feel so alone at all.

❤︎⁠

He presses gauze to the cut, brow furrowed in concentration like he’s performing surgery instead of patching up a hunt gone sideways. A lock of his short hair falls forward on his forehead, and he huffs softly when it won’t stay back. “You look like you’re about to pass out,” he says without looking up.

“I’m fine.” You hum but he doesn't look convinced by that. “You went through a window,” he replies flatly.

You end up shrugging at him, like it's no big-deal. “The ghoul shoved me.”

“What I just said.” You can’t help the small laugh that escapes you, though it turns into a wince when the movement pulls at your ribs. Dean’s head snaps up instantly. “Easy,” he says. The room goes quiet again, save for the faint buzz of the neon sign outside the motel window.

Dean finishes cleaning the wound and starts taping the bandage down. His hands move slower now, more deliberate, like he’s trying not to hurt you. You watch him work, focused on his hands, on his action, on the light undertone of softness in what he does. Yatch the way his jaw tightens when the tape wrinkles and he fixes it, watch the way his thumb brushes the edge of the bandage as if checking that it’s secure.

Or maybe checking that you’re okay.

Without really thinking about it, your hand drifts down to rest lightly against the back of his wrist and Dean freezes. His skin is warm under your fingers. “Does it still hurt?” he asks quietly. Your breath catches for a second. Not because of the injury—but because his thumb starts absentmindedly tracing small circles just below the bandage, careful to avoid the cut itself. The touch is feather-light, almost… comforting.

“Not when you do that,” you say. Dean stills.

For a moment, neither of you moves, then he clears his throat and tries to pull his hand back, but you tighten your grip just enough to stop him. Not hard. Just enough that he notices. His eyes flick up to yours and something soft flickers there—something that usually hides behind sarcasm and cocky smirks.

“You’re supposed to be resting,” he says, though the words have lost most of their bite.

“And you’re supposed to stop hovering,” you reply. He snorts quietly. “Yeah, well. That’s not happening.” You smile faintly, leaning back against the headboard, watching him.

Dean doesn’t move away. He stays right where he is between your knees, one hand still lightly braced against your side like he’s afraid you might disappear if he lets go. “You scared the hell outta me back there,” he admits after a moment. It’s not something Dean says easily.

You can hear it in the rough edge of his voice.

“You’ve seen worse,” you say softly.

“Yeah.” His gaze drops to the bandage again. “Doesn’t mean I like it.” The neon light outside flickers, washing the room in red for half a second before fading back to dim yellow. Dean finally stands, but instead of stepping away, he sits beside you on the bed.

Close, closer than usual.

“You’re lucky that ghoul had bad aim,” he says and you almost want to laugh again.

You lean your head back against the wall, exhaustion finally catching up to you. For a moment, you think Dean might get up, might give you space. Instead, his hand drifts back to your side, resting just below the bandage, his thumb resumes that slow, absentminded circle.

The ache in your ribs dulls again.

And this time, neither of you says anything about it.

your feet shift on the pavement below, shoulder brushing his, which is cloaked in leather but still so warm. you should probably keep your mouth shut, because dean doesn't want to talk right now, you guess. 

“what are you thinkin’ about?” you question anyways, voice a gentle murmur. when you tilt your head up and to the side, you see that his jaw has stilled. you'll wait as long as it takes for an answer. and if he decides to continue using silence as a shield, you think you can talk enough for the both of you.

a soft sigh escapes him, flicking down his cupids bow and bleeding into the cold air. it's something, a start. a crack in his quiet defense. so you lean a little more into him.

“it does,” It's easy to assure him, because you know the truth. you save people, your hearts are good. his heart might be the best, underneath all of the heaviness he guards it with. “it is. it's worth it.”

“nothin’,” he rumbles, his gaze flicking up towards the stars. your chest aches, because there's something new in his expression. vulnerability. “sometimes i just… wonder if it's all worth it, y'know? if it really makes a difference.”

a gruff ‘yeah' leaves his lips under his breath, and this time he shifts. boots scuffing on the ground as he sniffs and stands a little straighter. your arm loops through his like it's second nature, making sure he feels you. 

“you're a good person, de.” his arm stiffens against yours, and you keep your focus straight ahead, on the darkness that stretches beyond. doesn't feel so dark when you're here with him. 

he ducks his head and hesitantly tugs you a little closer. he needs you close, because you're so much more than he deserves and he's selfish. you tell him that he's a good man, when he's not-

“dean,” your voice, a little firmer now, cuts through the voices in his head and you take a willing step, standing stubbornly in front of him with a furrow in your brow and a knowing look in your eye. “stop that.”

he looks at you like a lost puppy, before he regains his bravado and pulls his mask back on, smirking weakly. “not doing anythin', princess.” but you know better than to let this go.

your hands reach for his face before you can stop them, soft palms pressing gently against his cheeks. his pink lips part ever so slightly, before he swallows. you'll get through to him, albeit slowly. you will.

“you save people. you make sure they get to have a life, by killing all those terrible things,” you draw in a breath, thumbs swiping tenderly over his soft skin. “bad people don't give like that. they take. you're good, dean winchester.”

his lashes flutter, green eyes locked onto yours and a bit wide, as if you've done something more than just say a few encouraging words. he swallows, and brings a hand up to wrap around your wrist.

he doesn't try to pull your arm down. he keeps his hand there, warm and insistent. and god help you, you can feel your heart fluttering dangerously. you've nicked a chip into his armor, and it makes something warm bloom inside of you. something hopeful.

“okay,” he manages, voice so quiet that the breeze almost steals it. “alright, sweetheart. i'm good.” his words are half placating, because he really hates to see you worked up over him. but there's an undercurrent of raw realization there, too.

you'll take it. because you know that one day, you're going to scrape all of the darkness out of his stubborn, beautiful brain, and he'll really mean it when he says he's good and worthy and deserving.

but for now, this is enough.