—“Still, no use convincing me, John. I’ve tried. Many times. I can’t make myself happy. At all. So… let there be cigarettes. Something small, harmful, but mine.”

The words settled in the silence. He listened as they echoed within him. Then he slowly pulled a thin white cylinder from the pack—not the filter toward you, but carefully, with the tobacco end up, offering it to your hand.

—“Then at least smoke properly. Not this trash from the kiosks. It’ll only make things worse.”

Blinking in surprise, your eyes flicked from his cigarette to his face, searching for a trick but finding none. Your fingers, slightly trembling, still took the cigarette. In your gaze flashed something like gratitude—not for the tobacco itself, unlikely to change much, but for the fact that he had not taken away this small, fragile way of holding on. For understanding that sometimes the point is not solving the problem, but recognizing someone’s right to their own, even mistaken, path to relief.

He clicked the lighter, and the flame illuminated their faces for a moment, casting short shadows. You lit your cigarette from his. Both smoked in silence, each lost in thought, yet united by their troubles. He exhaled to the side, as if shaking off invisible dust of worry, scratched his chin with a habitual gesture when his thoughts tangled, and, striving for the most detached tone, as if speaking of a long-ago acquaintance rather than the person whose name brought an unavoidable shadow, asked:

—“What about Ghost?”

Your shoulders twitched, as if a cold internal wind had pierced to your bones. A slight squint appeared on your face, not from smoke, but from the sudden rush of thoughts and feelings. Your voice remained perfectly even, polished by years of self-control and bitter experience:

—“With Simon, it’s the usual. Hard. It’s never easy with him. And probably never will be.”

You took a third drag, this time gentle, unhurried, exhaling the smoke to the side, watching the gray cloud dissipate. A faint, almost imperceptible smile touched your lips, devoid of any joy:

—“He’s always just out of reach,” you added after a pause, looking past him. “Even when he’s close. You feel his touch, his warmth too, but he’s always behind a wall, invisible but unbreakable.”

The truth was, you desperately wanted more than he—or Riley—could or would give. You needed not just a partner for the night, but meaning in the chaos, genuine closeness, a reliable shoulder, at least a hint that your intense, wild “connection” could one day become real, take a name, a shape, a future. But he had warned from the start, from the first touches, the first breaths: it’s just sex, no obligations, no promises, no tomorrow. And the unbearable weight of coexisting in the same orbit lay in that merciless divide: your heart, stubborn and hungry, demanded warmth and depth, while his… his remained still, impenetrable, with no crack through which even a ray of hope could break.

Listening to the end, he crushed the remaining cigarette into the concrete, not even finishing it, tossing it aside as if discarding not the tobacco but the foreign weight that could hurt you more than words. His face flickered for a moment—was it disappointment, or care hidden beneath his usual sternness?

Then he stood, extended a hand, adding in his usual tone:

—“Come on. I’ll show you where to get good cigarettes.”