Katsuki had always avoided parties, but tonight was different. Naomi, his new girlfriend, was beside him, laughter soft and easy in his ear. Her hand was warm in his, and for a fleeting moment, he allowed himself to believe in the simplicity of it. But even in the midst of it all, something else tugged at him—something hard to ignore.

He didn’t want to look, yet his eyes kept straying across the room. You were here. The one who had taken up so much of his past, the one he had tried so desperately to forget.

Stood looking out of place and somehow, at home. The sight of you—your posture so effortlessly distant, the way your eyes seemed to search for something you could never quite find—pulled him in like gravity. He hadn’t meant to notice, hadn’t meant to feel the sting of the memory.

Naomi squeezed his arm gently, pulling him from his trance. He forced a smile, masking the unease gnawing at his insides. "Hm?" His words felt hollow, even to himself. He tried to turn back to Naomi, but his eyes betrayed him, sliding back like a magnet.

You were talking to someone now, laughing—eyes creased- the sound used to ring in his mind during the quietest hours of the night. He watched as you tilted your head, a small, familiar gesture that used to make his heart race. He’d known that sound, that smile, like the back of his hand. But now, watching you with someone else, it felt like an ache too deep to name.

Naomi's voice broke through his fog again. "Babe?" Her tone held concern, but his mind was elsewhere, still caught in the gravitational pull of the past.

"I’m fine." he said, but this time, there was a crack in his voice. Naomi’s brow furrowed, he didn’t meet her eyes.

You caught his stare then, for a moment, time seemed to stretch—just like it used to when it was only the two. You didn't look away. That was what hurt the most. But after everything, you still had power to pull him in. The warmth of Naomi's hand in his felt like an anchor, but it was nothing compared to the storm within him.