Page 128 of Inevitable Endings
The rest breaks on a sob I can’t stop. My shoulders quake. My breath comes in pieces. Ugly. Human.
The boy inside of me, who has begged me for a decade to let him free, wins.
He cries, like he has never done before.
He breaks.
Her lashes flutter.
And then her eyes.
God.
Those eyes.
Brown like wild things and soft things and every place wenever got to go. They lock on me with a force that makes it hard to breathe, wide and desperate, glassed over with tears before her lips even move.
She sees me.
And she breaks.
A sob tears from her throat, and her whole body jerks toward me, as close as she can get. Until she’s tucked against the side of the bed, her hair tangling in at the sides, her hands fumbling for my arm like she doesn’t know if I’m real.
Then—barely a breath—
“Aslanov…”
My name breaks from her lips like something sacred. Cracked open. Barely holding together.
She finds my hand, still pinned under the strap, and curls both of hers around it like it’s the only thing in the world that matters. She presses her forehead to my fingers, lets out a sound that sounds more like grief than relief. Her tears spill fast, no hesitation now, no walls. Just open heartbreak.
I’m crying too.
I can’t stop.
She holds my hand like I’m the one who’s dying, and all I can think is how small her grip feels. How thin she is. Her bones under her skin like paper and shadow, and her face—too pale, too hollow.
“I thought I lost you,” she cries, voice trembling against my skin.
My throat is raw. My voice barely scrapes through.
‘‘I’m here,solnyshko.’’
She sobs. Loud, aching, real. Her shoulders shake with it, her ribs pulling tight with every sound. It’s not the kind of crying you can hide. It’s the kind that splits you open.
“I thought I’d never hear your voice again,” she chokes out, broken around the syllables.
“You’re hearing it now,” I rasp, voice shredded from disuse and grief and too many nights spent silent in the dark. I swallow hard.
Her tears fall harder, warm drops hitting my skin like rain. Her forehead presses to our joined hands again, her breath coming fast and uneven.
“Are you…” she swallows, barely able to say it. “Are you in pain?”
I don’t answer right away.
Because how do I explain that it’s not the restraints, or the bruises, or the cold itch of sedation still crawling through my veins?
It’s her.
