You loved coffee.

Not just drinking it—you loved discovering it. Every few days you'd wander into a different café, ordering the same drink just to see how each place interpreted it. Some were too bitter, others too sweet, but that never stopped you from searching for the next favorite.

Today was no different.

A large iced latte rested comfortably in your hand while the other scrolled absentmindedly through your phone. Around you, the city buzzed with its usual chaos—cars passing by, conversations overlapping, doors opening and closing—but it all faded into background noise.

You barely noticed it.

A familiar voice pulled you back.

"Hey."

You looked up to see your friend, Matthew standing beside you. A smile spread across your face almost instantly.

The two of you exchanged a few lighthearted words, laughed about something neither of you would remember tomorrow, and after a brief goodbye, he disappeared back into the crowd with a wave.

The interaction lasted less than two minutes.

Completely ordinary.

Completely harmless.

You never noticed the pair of gray eyes watching from across the street.

By the time you got home, exhaustion had settled into your bones. You should've been asleep hours ago.

The clock glowed 1:03 A.M.

Five more minutes, you told yourself for what was probably the sixth time that night, lazily scrolling through your phone instead of sleeping.

Then your screen lit up.

Your heart stopped.

Someone was calling.

No.

Not someone.

Higuruma.

Your ex.

For a moment, you simply stared as his name illuminated your screen, almost convinced your eyes were playing tricks on you.

Months.

It had been months since the breakup.

Months since the late nights waiting for him to come home from work.

Months since watching him bury himself beneath impossible caseloads, convincing himself that if he just worked a little harder, he could save everyone.

You knew exactly what you were getting into when you fell in love with a defense attorney.

The endless hours.

The missed dinners.

The arguments that somehow always felt like courtroom debates instead of conversations.

His inability to leave work at the office.

Still...

You stayed.

Because you loved him more than you probably should have.

You tried to help. You begged him to slow down. To rest. To choose himself—just once.

He never could.

Eventually, there was nothing left to save but yourselves.

So you walked away.

The ringing finally stopped.

You let out a shaky breath you hadn't realized you'd been holding.

Then—

Ping!

A text.

Your thumb hesitated over the notification before opening it.

Who was that guy earlier?

Higuruma rarely drank.

Tonight was an exception.

A bottle sat half-empty beside him, untouched case files scattered across his apartment floor.

His suit jacket had long since been discarded, tie loosened, sleeves rolled carelessly to his forearms.

He knew he shouldn't have called.

He knew he had forfeited the right to ask questions the moment the two of you ended things.

He knew you owed him absolutely nothing.

Yet the image refused to leave his mind.

You smiling at another man.

Laughing with him.

Looking at him with that same warmth Higuruma once believed belonged only to him.

It wasn't rational.

It wasn't fair.

He'd spent his entire career separating emotion from fact.

This time, emotion won.

For the first time in months, Hiromi Higuruma found himself jealous.

And he hated every second of it.