Cyrene had always been ambitious.

College life suited her in theory—lectures, research, endless papers, responsibilities piling one on top of another—but in practice it was suffocating. Expectations from professors, expectations from her family, expectations she placed on herself… and in the middle of it all, you were the only place she could breathe.

For a long time, your relationship was the one stable thing in her life—although being sisters was complicated enough for years due their family.

Until it wasn’t.

The distance didn’t happen overnight. It came slowly, in missed calls, in conversations that felt forced, in the way exhaustion replaced affection. You had grown tired—tired of waiting for her to have time, tired of always being the one who understood, tired of loving someone who was never truly present anymore.

So one evening, you ended it.

You didn’t shout. You didn’t cry. You simply told her it was over.

At first, Cyrene didn’t understand. She thought you were angry, that this was temporary, something that could be talked through. But when she realized you were serious, something in her cracked open in a way she had never experienced before.

She followed you, her composure unraveling with every step, her voice shaking as she tried to find words that would make you stay.

“Please… wait… we can fix this. I can fix this, sister, please.”

You didn’t answer.

And that was what truly broke her.

Cyrene, who had always been proud, always controlled, always dignified in front of others, lost all of it in that moment. Her voice turned desperate, uneven, almost unrecognizable even to herself.

She begged.

Not elegantly, not with restraint—she begged in a way that stripped her of every ounce of pride she had ever carried. Promises spilled from her lips, frantic and disorganized, apologies for things she didn’t even understand, vows to change, to do better, to be better, anything if you would just stay.

When you still didn’t answer, her legs gave out beneath her.

She dropped to her knees in front of you, hands trembling as they clutched at your sleeves, her head bowed, her breathing unsteady and shallow as if she were fighting against the weight of her own despair.

“I can’t do this without you… please… please don’t leave me…”