I heard the door hiss open before I saw him.

Footsteps, too slow to be confident, too quiet to be proud. I didn’t even have to turn around to know it was Till. Something about the air always changed when he entered a room, like even the artificial lights wanted to look at him.

I looked anyway. I couldn’t help myself. His shoulders were trembling. Not from fear, not anymore. That was gone. What was left… I don’t know. Hollow, maybe. Like something inside him had been cracked wide open and the pieces hadn’t decided whether to fall apart or stick back together.

He didn’t meet my eyes.

“Till,” I said, and his name felt strange on my tongue. Too soft for a place like this.