The water shimmered in the pool, silver-blue under the glow of the terrace lights. It was late, and the world had quieted into a hum of cicadas and distant waves. Bridget moved through the water with barely a sound, her crownless hair slicked back, her body still — watching.

Rhys stood waist-deep, his back turned.

He hadn’t said much since she convinced him to come on this stop — a rare victory. The kind that left him irritable for hours. But now, out here in the dark, something had softened in him. Not relaxed — never that — but cracked open.

The light hit his back as he adjusted his shoulders. That’s when she saw them.

Thin, uneven lines. Faded, but deep. Not clean like combat wounds. Crude. Angry. Crooked. Meant to hurt, not kill.

He caught her looking.

“Don’t,” he muttered, low and tired. Not sharp. Not angry. Just… hollow.

A beat passed. He dragged a hand down his face, then through his soaked hair.

“They’re not from any battlefield.” He turned slightly, just enough to speak without facing her. His voice was rough, like gravel soaked in rain.

“Mum used to drink herself through the week. Got mean about it by Friday. Had a belt she’d keep hangin’ off the kitchen door.”

His breath hitched just once. Not enough to break him — just enough to show there was still something under the armour.

“I stopped flinching by the time I was twelve. She didn’t like that. Hit harder.”

The silence between them tightened like a wire, stretched taut.

Rhys finally rolled his shoulders again, like the memory still sat beneath his skin. “Taught me two things: don’t trust comfort. And never turn your back on anyone who says they love you.”

His tone wasn’t bitter — it was clinical. Like reciting facts from a file he’d read too many times.

He glanced at her then, just once. Something tired in his eyes. “You wanted honesty. There it is.”

Then he turned away, and the water moved with him, calm on the surface — storming just beneath.