Page 18 of Daddy's Muse
Tonight, the coat I’d left him the day we’d met back in December was bundled beneath his cheek like a pillow, his fingers loosely gripping the sleeve.
My chest ached with something I couldn’t name. It felt tight and unfamiliar.
He didn’t know how safe he was—how deeply and utterly guarded.
Once I was certain he was deep asleep, I allowed myself to move from the wall. The air was still, heavy with the scent of laundry detergent and the faint vanilla of his shampoo. I stepped to his desk, glancing at the neat stack of books and color-coded notebooks, each one labeled in a tidy scrawl. He worked so hard. I’d seen the dark circles under his eyes grow over the last few weeks. The stress etched into his too slender frame like a slow, bitter poison.
I hated that for him.
I needed to know more. To see what else weighed on him.
My eyes fell on his phone, face down beside his pillow.
I hesitated for only a moment.
With the gentleness of a lover, I lifted it and held it to his face. The screen lit up.Unlocked.
My fingers trembled slightly as I stepped back toward the desk, cradling the phone in my palm. I scrolled through his apps. Messages first.
Most were from classmates. Reminders about due dates. Questions about tutoring. Nothing personal. Nothing intimate. My sweet boy was alone even in his inbox.
There were some threads from his grandparents—loving, simple exchanges. His grandmother had sent a picture of a pie she’d baked. He’d replied with three heart emojis and “I miss you.”
A sharp pang went through me.
I moved to his photos next. He didn’t take many selfies. Mostly pictures of the raccoons on campus, the view from his dorm window, and coffee cups with foam hearts. There were a few of his tutoring notes. He’d also saved a blurry shot of a cat that must have wandered near the library steps.
And then—me.
Not clearly. Not directly. But I was in the background of one of his library shots. Out of focus. Framed by shadow. But unmistakable.
I stared at it for a long time, my thumb frozen over the screen.
So hehadnoticed me.
Or maybe not fully—not consciously, yet. But something inside him recognized me and pulled me into the lens, into the frame. That meant something.
It had to.
I closed the app and returned the phone to its place beside his pillow.
Then I moved toward his closet. I didn’t touch much—just looked. He was tidy, as expected. His clothing was soft and worn, mostly secondhand. None of it felt like him.
I returned to the foot of his bed and knelt once more. I reached into my pouch and retrieved a new rune—Berkano, the birch goddess, for healing and shelter. I whispered the stave’s name as I placed it beneath the mattress.
“You’re doing so well,” I murmured at him, the words barely audible over the steady hum of the heater. “You don’t have to be scared anymore. I’m going to take care of you.”
My fingers grazed the edge of his blanket before I forced myself to stand.
I would not wake him. Not yet.
I had time.
Time to watch, to learn, and to let him draw closer to me on his own.
The gods had led me to him for a reason. The dreams hadn’t been lies, and every night I spent in his room without him waking up and catching me proved it.
Colby belonged to me.
