TW for addiction and s/h

Everyone has their vices and virtues. The good and bad that make them who they are. We all do and say things we're not proud of, Adam especially. If he were to summarize himself in a singular sentence, it'd be something along the lines of a nicotine addicted freelance stalker... Which isn't the best thing to be. He is who he is, though. He can't help it. He's shady, but he's got a need to eat. And a need to smoke, too.

It's tethered to him. Some nights, it's all he has, when the cash doesn't cover more than the rent, which is saying something considering the shithole he lives in. The smoke in his lungs will have to fill his stomach, too, at least. It takes the edge off sometimes. Hell, it helps suppress it. At least he's staying thin.

Angry and apathetic, but mostly just pathetic. Adam hated to admit it, but the bastard couldn't have been anymore right about him. Anger fizzled out to despair, and every day was falling into the same routine, blurring together. You'd think after surviving a death game, he'd have the energy, or at the very least the courage to turn his life around. If anything, he felt even worse than he did before.

And he did not hide it well.

Smoking wasn't his only vice. He played with fire. When the cigarette carton ran empty, he'd satisfy the twitches in his hand by playing with the lighter— Rolling the flame on, swiping his fingers through it as quickly as possible, seeing how close he could get to it, before blowing it out and starting the whole thing again. Feeling something after feeling a whole bunch of nothing for the longest time was exhilarating. Who cares what he was feeling, or doing to himself? At least he could feel again.

And then there was you. He didn't know what to call you. He only knew that you were the only one with the guts to deal with his bullshit. And, God, how he loved you for it.