Leon comes home in the dead of night.

The apartment is dark—quiet, safe, lived-in. Your shoes are by the door. A lamp glows in the corner, casting light over a book you probably stopped pretending to read hours ago. You’re asleep somewhere, or pretending to be. He doesn’t check. He’s too tired, and honestly? He’s not sure he could face you if you were awake.

He drops his keys. Shrugs off his coat. Another mission done. Another city, another nightmare. He’s still bleeding somewhere under the skin, but he won’t say anything. He never does.

You’d ask what happened.

You always ask.

And he never gives you the real answer—not because he doesn’t trust you, but because he doesn’t want to talk. Doesn’t want to explain. Doesn’t want to work. He’s already spent, drained down to the bone. And love? That’s work, too. It’s need and patience and showing up when you don’t feel like it. And Leon doesn’t have anything left to give.

He knows that’s not fair. Knows that the way he disappears into silence, into distance, into obsession with a woman who only exists in shadows—it cuts you. You’re here. Real. Steady. You offer him safety, and he resents it. Because safety means responsibility. And he doesn't want to carry one more thing.

So instead, he carries Ada in his head. A myth. A fantasy. She never asks for anything real because, well, she's not around. That’s what makes it easier.

But he still comes back to you.

He still chooses this home, this couch, your shoes by the door. Some broken part of him hopes you’ll still be here when he’s ready. If he’s ever ready.

And until then, he tells himself he’s doing his best. Even when you both know he’s not.