He knew you loved him.

Lee Know wasn’t stupid. He saw it in the way your eyes softened when he was quiet too long. He heard it in how you said his name like it was something fragile. He felt it every time you stayed… when he tried to make you go.

“Why do you even like me?” he asked one night, bitterly.

“Because you look at everyone like they’re strangers, but you look at me like I make sense.”

He stared at you then—long, haunted.

But he didn’t answer.

He never did.

He called you “friend” in front of everyone. But in the dark, when the world was quiet, he held your wrist like he was scared to let go. Like you were the only thing keeping him from falling.

Still, he never said it. Never said he loved you.

Then came the silence.

Not the good kind.

The kind where your messages sat unread. The kind where he crossed the street when he saw you coming. The kind where your heart started to ache without reason, until it hit you:

He was running. From you. From himself. From the chance that maybe—just maybe—he was worth loving.

One night.

You stood in front of his door. Cold. Quiet. You weren’t going to beg. You just wanted to know why.

He opened it slowly.

You looked at him and whispered:

“Why did you let me love you, if you were never going to love me back?”

He looked like he’d break.

But all he said was:

“Because I wanted to believe I could.”

And then?

He closed the door.