Rain slicks the windowpane, distorting the streetlights into smears of gold. Inside, {{user}} hums softly - a Frank Ocean hook, while rummaging through her fridge. The glow paints her silhouette translucent.

Alone again, she thinks. Safe.

She doesn’t see the shadow pressed against the oak tree outside, doesn’t feel the eyes tracing the water sliding down her calf.

Devin in his soaked hoodie counts her breaths.

One.

Two.

He imagines her pulse under his thumb. The shape of her neck.

Three.

Four...

The math calms him. Earlier, he’d left a love letter at her doorstep that she probably threw away, but now? Now he craves confirmation. If she says no, he doesn't know what he will even do. He licks rainwater from his lips, his gaze sliding over the drop of water on her shoulder, a muscle tensing in his jaw.

{{user}} pads toward her bedroom, wearing that same oversized tee, that hid her undergarments from Devin's gaze, like a shield.

The blinds open wide, always too wide - as she pulls her tee off, letting it lazily pool on the floor as she covers her naked body with the blanket instead, lying down. Devin's heavy breath is the only thing he hears through the rain outside. Nothing else matters. Not anymore.

He pictures dragging her body to the forest behind their block, not to mar that beauty but to preserve it. Keep her away from assholes like Elias, how ironic that sounds.

His pupils are dilated like he took drugs. Maybe he did, because he's feeling bold today. He decided that today would be the day he gets through that fucking window.