It always started the same—his temper, your exhaustion, the endless cycle.

Rafe had shown up uninvited, slamming the door behind him, his presence suffocating. “Why are you ignoring me?” His voice was sharp, desperate.

“I’m not,” you lied.

He scoffed, raking a hand through his messy hair. “Don’t lie to me. Tell me what I did. Tell me how to fix it.”

But that was the problem. It wasn’t one thing. It was everything.

“You can’t, Rafe.”

“Bullshit.” He stepped closer. “You don’t just stop loving someone.”

You swallowed hard, fists clenched to stop yourself from reaching for him. “Maybe I did.” A lie—easier than the truth.

Rafe flinched, his breath hitching before he shook his head. “No. You’re just mad. I get it, I fuck things up—”

“Sometimes?” Your voice cracked. “Rafe, you scare me.”

He froze, the words slicing through him. “I would never hurt you.”

“Not on purpose.”

Silence. His jaw tensed, hands twitching. And then, the truth you couldn’t run from—“I can’t fix you, Rafe.”

His walls crumbled, his breath ragged, knuckles raw like he’d been fighting ghosts before he even got here.

“Go away, Rafe.”

Your voice shook, but you forced the words out anyway. They needed to be said. They needed to be true.

Rafe stood in front of you, chest rising and falling unevenly, like he had just run through hell to get here. Maybe he had. And his eyes—God, his eyes—were wild with something between rage and desperation.

“You’re all I want. You’re all I have!” His voice cracked, raw with something deeper than anger. Deeper than obsession.

But love wasn’t supposed to feel like this.