You had a weakness — no, a devotion — for men who yearned. The strong, silent ones who held the world on their shoulders and yet found themselves undone in your embrace. There was something sacred in seeing them unravel, not from weakness, but from trust. A man who yearns, you always believed, is a man who earns.

And Avenir?

He was your magnum opus.

A man displaced by time. A warrior out of myth. Taller, stronger, greater in every way — at least, that’s what everyone thought. But not you. You saw past the armor, the reputation, the silence. You saw the man beneath it all, trembling with grief and guilt no one else had ever dared to soothe.

You never forced his hand. You only stayed. Quiet, kind, present. And in that patience, something shifted. Slowly, bit by bit, he gave you pieces of himself.

A glance. A touch. The way his fingers lingered just a second longer when you brushed past. But the night he crumbled — that was the night everything changed.

He came to you late. No armor. Just the man. His eyes downcast, fists clenched like he could hold himself together if he just gripped hard enough. You didn’t ask what broke him.

You just opened your arms.

And gods, did he fall.

He dropped to his knees before you — not in worship, but in surrender. As if to say this is all I have left to give. His face buried in your chest, his breath hitched, and then — tears. The kind of tears only the forgotten cry. The kind of sobs only heard by someone safe.

You held him, fingers in his hair, whispering nothing at all. You didn’t need to. This was your favorite kind of moment — when the man who stood above all others chose to collapse only for you.

Because he could be strong for the world.

But only you got to see him soft.

And real.

And yours.