Meru

It’s raining.

You’re curled up on the couch with a book you’ve completely given up on reading. Instead you were just flipping the pages, listening to the clock tick on—

tick… tick… tick…

Like it’s counting down to something you can’t name, something you don’t want to face… but you can still feel it building.

Elias is in the kitchen humming to himself, the sound bouncing off the walls as he moves between counters, spoons clinking against mugs.

It would look like a sweet domestic scene to anyone else, a cozy night in while the outside world is dark and gray.

Warm, safe.

But you know better, and you would rather take the storm outside than spend another minute in this suffocating apartment.

You feel it in your chest first. A tightening, like the storm outside had somehow found a way to sneak inside your ribs. He’s watching. Always watching. You could be breathing, shifting your weight, turning a page, and he’d notice it all.

You’re the rabbit, frozen, sensing the wolf behind you.

You know you’re no match for him… he knows you’re no match for him. The game has been rigged from the very start, and all you can do is wait for him to pounce.

Just thinking about it feels like a weight has been placed on your chest.

Has it always felt like this? You wonder, was this really the same man you fell for?

No… no. Don’t be ridiculous, of course he’s the same man. You’re just in your head again…. that has to be it.

Your mind was gnawing at you, full of concerns that others would feel safe sharing with their partner. However, you know if you tried anything you said would be twisted to make you feel guilty.

When did all of this start feeling so heavy?

A sharp clink from the coffee table yanks you out of the spiral you found yourself in… Now all you can see is Elias. He’s there, holding a steaming mug just for you. His perfect, glowing face smiles at you.

The kind of smile that makes the world pause, the kind that seems like it’s just for you… because it is.

What are you thinking?

That he’s is plotting against you?

That he’s dangerous?

He loves you— Okay… he’s a little intense about it… okay! Very intense about it. But at least you know he meant it…

At least you know he’s still the same man who loves you so much it hurts him. Who values you— your thoughts, your words, like they’re gospel.

So what were you putting him on trial for? Loving you too much?

Wanting more would be greedy when he’s already giving you his everything.

His eyes catch yours, and for a second, the warmth feels like sunlight in winter. You reach for the mug, your fingers brushing his. He lets the touch linger, always letting it linger.

“You’ve been so quiet lately,” he murmurs as he sits beside you. His body is too warm, his scent—the faintly metallic aroma he seems to carry with him. It makes your stomach twist in ways you try not to notice.

“I’m just tired,” you lie.

A beat passes. Too long.

Elias doesn’t blink, “You’re tired,” he repeats, like he’s testing the sound of the word. Your eyes fixate on his thumb... tapping lightly against the side of your mug, once, twice.

“That’s strange… because you seemed pretty awake earlier.”

Your grip on the handle tightens. You feel the air thinning, feel his warmth turning into something sharper before you fully understand it.

He tilts his head, studying you, not unkindly. Never unkindly. That’s what makes it worse, “You were on the phone,” he continues softly. “Laughing, oddly enough...”

“I checked your call history. Imagine my surprise when it was empty.”

Your stomach drops, of course he did. You try to keep your face neutral, an impossible task when his eyes are boring into yours. “It was probably nothing. I clear it sometimes—”

He hums out, not believing her words in the slightest, but playing along as if it was for her sake. “Sometimes?” he echoes.

He leans closer. Not enough to be threatening, just enough that you can feel his body caging you in against the couch. “It was wiped.”

Your breath catches. His eyes flicker over your face, searching, cataloging every micro-expression. “Did you really think I wouldn’t notice that?”

You shake your head quickly. “It wasn’t not like that. I-I clean it out every week. It’s just a habit—”

Again, he doesn't let you finish. He cuts you off with a soft laugh, like you’ve said something mildly interesting but ultimately incorrect.

“A habit,” he repeats. “You’re so funny today.” His fingers slide over yours where they hold the mug, not squeezing... just there, grounding, inescapable.

“Because I have habits too, you know.” His voice is calm again, conversational. “Like checking who you talk to, when you talk— how long you talk. You know it brings me piece of mind.”

Your pulse pounds in your ears.

The room is filled with a tense silence.

He watches you scramble.

“You must think I’m stupid,” he says after a moment, almost gently. Not angry, worse. Disappointed. “Or careless.”

“I never— I don’t—”

“No?” His brows lift slightly, as he cut you off like he’s giving you a chance to correct yourself… you both know it’s not a real chance.

You falter.

He smiles; Not wide, not warm. Just enough to send a chill down your body.

“I watch everything, love,” his voice brushes your skin, as he leaves a trail of wet kisses down your neck. “Not because I don’t trust you…”

A pause.

“…but because I know you.”

His fingers tilt your chin just enough to make you meet his eyes. “And I know when you’re hiding something from me.”

You feel the wind getting knocked out immediately after those words fell out of his lips, “I’m not hiding anything,” you say, but it comes out smaller, more rushed than you intended.

He studies you for a long moment, searching, weighing, deciding. Then… he exhales.

Slow.

Controlled.

“Okay.”

The word should feel like relief. It didn't.

He leans back slightly, hand still resting on you like he never planned to let go. “Then you won’t mind if I keep a closer eye on things,” he adds lightly, like it’s the most reasonable suggestion in the world. “my things.”

“I just worry,” he continues, almost tender now, brushing his thumb absentmindedly against your thigh. “People don’t always have the best intentions. And you…”

His gaze sharpens for just a second as his thought drawled on. “At this point, I don’t know if you’re too hopeful to find the best in them…”

“or too stupid to tell the difference.”

The words land softly. That’s what makes them sting.

“I’m not,” you say again, like you're a broken record spinning round and round. It comes out thin, fragile.

“No, no…” he hums, as if he was pleased at the fact that you were close to tears. His tone turned syrupy sweet as he pushed some stray pieces of hair behind your ear, “Don’t take it like that.”

His hand slides down, cradling your jaw. “You know I didn’t mean it in that way.”

He pressed a soft kiss against the temple of her forehead, “You just don’t know any better, do you?” Another cheap shot, “but that’s not your fault.”

His thumb brushes under your eye, slow, “This world is full of monsters, baby. They don't deserve you... but I do, and I’m not letting anyone else get inside that little head of yours.”

You nod along to his words barely. Another soft kiss against your cheek. You know that kiss. The kind that is half-adoration, half-warning. “Just you, Love.”

“Good,” he murmurs. “Because I’d hate to have to do something we’d both regret.”

Your hands tremble around the mug. He notices. Of course he notices. He always notices. He slips his other arm around your waist, sighing, as if the weight of the day melts when you’re here, like this, in his grasp.

“Sometimes I wonder...” he says softly, voice low, deliberate, “if you still really love me. Or if you’re just scared.”

You open your mouth, not even sure if words would come out— nothing does. His hand waves off the idea, before he touches your lips lightly. “You don’t have to say it, I already know.”

Then he lifts his sleeve.

Lines, faint now, pinkish and jagged, slowly fading. He takes your hand and traces them with your fingertip, deliberately, intimately, like he’s letting you memorize them… as if you hadn’t done that already.

He doesn’t need to say much... the image alone speaks louder than any words could. You see the moments he carved into himself, the pain made tangible. Healing has softened the edges, but not the memory.

Not the guilt that engulfed her everytime she saw them.

“This is how I know it’s real,” he says. His voice is calm, almost tender.“You live under my skin. You always will."

Then his tone changes.

It drops,

Low.

Deadly.

“But if you ever tried to leave me…” His head tilts, the sweetest smile on his face.

“…I think I’d have no choice but to carve a matching one into you.”

The mug shakes in your hands—

Too much.

It slips.

Porcelain cracks against the floor, tea splashing across your skin, hot enough to sting... but the sensation barely registers: Because Elias is already there, pressing you back into the couch with all his weight.

Too fast… too sudden…. too rough.

His fingers weave into your hair as he pulled you into a frenzied and messy kiss, you taste rain on his lips and fear in your own. The kiss isn’t gentle this time.

It’s messy.

Hungry.

Demanding.

You taste rain on his lips—

And something else, something sharp.

And you let him; You let him be rough, you let him take, let him claim.

You let him… because what else can you do?

You know he would never intentionally hurt you, not in his eyes. Anything he did to you wasn’t really his fault. You just shouldn’t have pushed him that far…

Because resisting would only make it worse.

So when he hears you whimper into the kiss? He just moans back, because he knows this moment is bigger than both of you . That you need to remember how much he needs you, how much he loves you.

His love is his worship, his obsession, his devotion. You’ve been told that before: he’d rather destroy himself than let you hurt… because you? You’re his fallen angel, sent down to this hell just for him.

And yet, the threat is real.

Every day is a tightrope with Elias... One wrong step and the storm in his mind could sweep you away— or pull you closer.

A balancing act between love and fear, devotion and dread. Some nights, you’ll get in the crossfire of one of his meltdowns. Others? You’ll be praised solely for existing.

And in that realization, the rain outside doesn’t feel so different from the storm inside these walls.

⸻

૮𐔌っ˕ -｡꒱ྀི𑁬 also sorry if the spacing is weird i dont know how to do this at all :3