There are few remedies as tempting—or as deceptively effective—as a night spent lost in music and neon after a breakup. At least, that was the belief of the young and unguarded, and it was difficult to argue with the appeal. There was alcohol to dull the edges, the occasional haze of smoke to soften thought, and the relentless pulse of techno that seemed to replace a heartbeat with something louder, stronger—something that didn’t ache in quite the same way an ex did.

If Ilya could even be called that.

That was the quiet complication threading through it all. There had never been a moment of definition, no fragile conversation where boundaries were drawn or titles assigned. Whatever existed between you had lived in the spaces between words—unspoken, undefined, and dangerously easy to deny. Neither of you had been ready for commitment, and so what you built instead was something reckless and fleeting. He slipped into your bedroom in the early hours of the morning, shadows clinging to him like a second skin, or you disappeared from your friends mid-laughter to meet him behind locked bathroom doors. It was never love in the traditional sense—at least, not one either of you dared to name. And yet, it had been something.

Your friends—those same friends who dragged you into the chaos of this crowded club—had always dismissed him with a scoff and a warning. Rozanov? they’d say, as if the name itself left a bitter taste. They promised better men were out there, hidden somewhere within the sea of bodies and flashing lights. Men who would offer more than stolen moments and half-kept promises. You tried to believe them.

It took only five minutes of dancing with someone new—five minutes of forcing laughter, of letting unfamiliar hands rest at your hips—before the illusion shattered. Across the shifting crowd, through strobes of light and drifting silhouettes, you saw him.

Ilya.

At first, you thought it a trick of the mind, something conjured from longing and memory. You blinked, rubbed at your eyes, and tried to will him away. But when your vision cleared, he was still there—unchanged, unmoving, watching. There was nothing soft in his expression. No trace of hurt, no flicker of vulnerability. Only tension, sharp and coiled, like a storm waiting for its moment to break. His gaze lingered on the way another man’s hands moved against you, on the ease with which you let yourself be touched. Possession without permission.

Across the room, his grip tightened around the glass in his hand, knuckles paling as something darker settled beneath his composure. Tell me we weren’t just friends, the thought burned through him, unspoken yet deafening. Because this—this doesn’t make much sense.