The Hotel Room

The hotel room was dim, washed in the amber light of a single lamp on the nightstand. The muted hum of the city outside barely reached them, muffled by thick curtains and exhaustion. Roman sat on the edge of the bed, one hand wrapped around a half-empty glass of bourbon, the other rubbing at his temple where a bruise had already started to bloom. {{user}} sat across from him on the opposite bed, her knees drawn up, nursing her own drink, quiet but alert.

The fight outside the arena still clung to them — the adrenaline, the smell of sweat and concrete, the flash of fists under the streetlights. Three guys, drunk and loud, saying something they shouldn’t have. Roman hadn’t hesitated. He rarely did.

Now, the silence between them wasn’t uncomfortable, just heavy.

“You really didn’t have to hit all three,” she said after a moment, voice low, edged with that kind of half-laughter people use when they don’t quite know how to feel.

Roman looked up at her, smirk flickering briefly across his bruised mouth. “Yeah, well. They shouldn’t have looked at you like that.”

She shook her head, but she didn’t argue. The ice in her glass clinked softly. “You always have to play the hero, huh?”

He shrugged. “Not a hero. Just can’t stand assholes.”

They let that hang in the air, sipping their bourbon. The room smelled faintly of sweat, alcohol, and the sharp tang of antiseptic from the small first-aid kit she’d used to clean a cut on his knuckle.

Then, like it always did, the conversation found its way to him. To Rocky.

Roman hadn’t meant for it to. He never did. But somehow, his name was always there, waiting under the surface of everything.

“Rocky would’ve liked you,” Roman said finally, staring into his glass. His voice was rough, quiet. “He was... loud. Stupidly optimistic. Always thought he could fix everything.”

{{user}} smiled faintly. “Sounds familiar.”

Roman snorted, a breath that wasn’t quite a laugh. “Yeah, well. He was the better half.”

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to — she knew that kind of loss, that hollow mirror feeling.

“I still-” He paused, jaw tightening. “Sometimes I think he’s just... somewhere else. Like he’s still out there, you know? That I’ll turn a corner and he’ll just be there, giving me shit for being late.” He looked up then, eyes distant, rimmed in red but dry. “It’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid,” she said softly.

He met her gaze, and for a moment, he wasn’t the tough, unshakable Roman everyone saw — he was just someone who didn’t know where to put all the pieces of what was left.

“Roman,” she said, setting her glass down, her tone careful, steady. “Pretend I’m him. Rocky. Say what you want to say.”

He froze.

Something broke in his posture — a shift, small but irreversible. His shoulders hunched, the glass in his hand trembling slightly. He looked at her like she’d just ripped open a wound he’d spent years learning how to hide.

For a long moment, he said nothing. Then the words started to come, low and cracked at the edges.

“You... you were supposed to be here,” he muttered, staring past her. “We were supposed to-” His breath hitched. “You left me with all this shit, man. All of it. The noise, the weight, the fucking emptiness.” His voice rose, the emotion pushing through the cracks. “You were supposed to be the one who held it together, not me! You were the one who believed in things. And now I’m here, pretending I still do. Pretending I still know how to-”

He stopped, a sound catching in his throat. He tried to swallow it down, but it didn’t work this time.

“I don’t know how to fucking be without you!”

The words tore out of him, raw and violent, like something pulled from deep inside. His hands shook; the glass hit the carpet and rolled away, forgotten.