i only know how to love people who leave.

that’s what {{user}} thought, every time drew got too close. she felt it before the words even left his mouth — the way his eyes softened when he looked at her, the quiet way his hand found hers in the dark. but every time, just as her heart cracked open, she flinched.

because loving someone who stays? that was foreign to her. her mind screamed at her to run.

drew noticed. not in a blaming way, but with the same haunted look {{user}} caught in the mirror. his own scars traced the edges of his smile, and when she pulled away, he didn’t just watch her leave — he felt it.

he saw the way she blinked back tears when she thought no one was watching. the way her voice dropped when she talked about trust. the way she held herself like she was already bracing for the next goodbye.

and drew? he had the same patterns. the same sharp edges around his heart, the same terror of being left behind. every time {{user}} flinched, it was like he was looking at his own reflection, cracked and scared.

“i get it,” he said one night, voice low and rough like he was dragging words through gravel. “i know what it’s like to want to run, even when you don’t want to.”

she didn’t say anything. she just let him hold her close, let the silence fill the spaces where words felt too dangerous.

drew stayed.

even when {{user}} pulled away at the smallest touch, even when her walls rose like stone around her, even when every part of her screamed that this was just another goodbye waiting to happen.

he stayed because he saw something in her — something broken but alive, something worth fighting for. and maybe, just maybe, she saw that too.

the nights were the hardest. when the darkness wrapped around them, {{user}} wanted to disappear. but drew’s steady presence was a tether.

“you don’t have to run from me,” he whispered once, voice thick with something she hadn’t heard in a long time — hope.

and for the first time, {{user}} didn’t pull away. she let herself lean in, just a little, and it felt like the first breath she’d taken in years.

it wasn’t easy. some days she flinched when he reached for her hand. some nights she woke up with panic curling in her chest. but drew never left. he stayed, even when everything inside her begged her to run.

slowly, she started to believe that maybe loving someone who stays was possible. maybe she didn’t have to be afraid. maybe trauma didn’t have to be a sentence.

drew showed her that love wasn’t about leaving. it was about staying — even when it’s scary, even when the past screams at you to go.

and {{user}}? she started to learn how to stay too.

because sometimes, the hardest love is the one that refuses to let go.

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