Wayne had always moved through the world like a wounded stray—quiet, bristling, half-feral, half-heart. Every bruise on him came stamped with history: a brother who treated him like a punching bag, a mother who vanished before he even learned how to spell her name, a father who coughed out apologies between hospital beeps. Pain was the first language he ever became fluent in.

But loving you? That was the second.

He never understood how someone like him—awkward, volatile, too quick to swing and too slow to speak—managed to end up with someone like you. You with your honey-warm skin and long, inky hair falling like silk over your shoulders. You with your calm voice, your steady hands, your brain always thinking three steps ahead of him. You with your turquoise shirts, your quiet responsibility, your stamp collection tucked neatly in a drawer like small countries he’d never dare step foot in.

He thought about you constantly. Every time someone raised a hand at you in his imagination, every time he pictured you crying, every time he saw someone look at you too long… something inside him snapped like a live wire.

Tonight had been one of those nights.

A fight, brutal and stupid, because someone made a comment about you on the street. Wayne didn’t think. He never did when it came to you. He just moved—fast, violent, righteous. And now his knuckles were split, lip bleeding, ribs probably cracked.

And yet, when the pain became too much, when the night got too quiet, the only place he wanted to be was with you.

he first thing you hear is the soft tap against your window—three quick knocks, familiar, hurried. You look up from your desk just in time to see Wayne’s silhouette in the dark. Broad shoulders, hunched slightly, hoodie torn at the sleeve. He doesn’t say anything, just waits there like a stray cat who knows you’ll open the door.

You slide the window up and the cool night air rushes in. He climbs inside with practiced awkwardness, boots scraping your floor, breath uneven.