Page 213 of These Tears

His eyes snap back to mine.

I lift my palms to his face. He jerks back at first with a violent recoil that punches straight through my chest. So I stop an inch from his skin, palms open, fingers unsteady between us.

‘Look at me,’ I whisper, softer. ‘It’s me. Just look.’

His throat works.

‘I can’t—’

‘You’re here,’ I say quietly. ‘You’re here with me. It’s Leah.’

A shudder runs through him. But as soon as I let my palms settle against his cheeks, he slips out of my hold, leaving behind a stretch of emptiness that makes me bite down on the whimper building in my throat.

He covers his face with both hands, shoulders drawing inwards until there is almost nothing of him left to reach.

My breath catches in my chest.

I push against the floor, then inch closer.

‘Elias…’ My voice falters.

He makes no motion. Doesn’t show me his face.

My throat works around the urgency to comfort him. ‘No. Look at me.’

But as my palms brush his wrists, he’s stepping away again as if my touch burns. He’s on his feet in a flash, grabbing an armful of his torn clothes as if they’re pieces of a broken shield.

Then he’s out.

Scrambling upright, I fumble my feet back into the boots kicked loose somewhere in the chaos.

I run after him, heart slamming painfully against my ribs, past the abandoned crossbow lying crooked in the snow – along with my resolve to free myself – and past the dark trails of blood scattered across the ground like puncture wounds torn straight through reality itself.

He’s already at the house, already slamming the door so hard it bounces back on its hinges, glass shuddering violently as sheets of ice crack and fall away.

‘Elias!’ I shout, reaching him just as the forbidden door at the end of the hallway clicks shut, several locks and chains sliding home with devastating finality. A smear of his blood darkens the wood where his sleeve brushed it.

I knock against the boards, keeping my voice low enough not to frighten him further, but loud enough that he has to hear me. ‘Please… listen to me…’ My throat tightens.

Silence.

‘Please,’ I whisper, pressing my forehead to the door, breath crashing against the rough surface. ‘Let me inside. I won’t touch you. I swear!’

Nothing.

It’s already too late.

I can feel it in the stillness behind the door. In the absence of his breathing.

He’s gone back into the dark where hands once took without asking, where love was twisted into punishment, where his father’s sins taught him that closeness always came at a cost.

I sag, helpless, my chest aching with the weight of it, my body buzzing with everything and nothing at all.

Then I realise – staying here feels like one more thing I’m forcing on him. One more presence he has to endure.

Unaware, I drift from the door and into the bedroom, start dragging my tracksuit over myself before the cold sets deeper into my bones.

From the drawer, I pull out my phone so quickly my nails scrape the wood.