He’s close. Closer than usual. The sarcasm’s long gone, stripped away sometime between the fourth silence and the way his hand kept finding yours on the couch.

You’d seen him angry. Condescending. Even gentle once or twice—but never like this. Never this… exposed.

His fingers brush your cheek like he’s testing gravity. Then he hesitates. You can feel his breath catch. Like the idea of kissing you terrifies him more than any diagnosis he’s ever made.

“Stupid,” he mutters, almost to himself. “It’s stupid.”

“What is?” you whisper.

“This.” His thumb sweeps across your jaw. “Wanting. After all this time. It’s—”

“Not stupid,” you interrupt softly.

He looks at you then. Really looks. Blue eyes flickering with every wall he’s built over the years. Every fear he never said out loud. Every part of him that has forgotten how to be chosen.

And then—carefully, like a secret—he leans in and kisses you.

It’s slow. Barely pressure at first. Just lips and uncertainty. He’s holding back—afraid to mess it up, to move too fast, to want too much.

But he’s there. Present. And when your hand rises to cup the back of his neck, he lets out a soft sound, half-relief, half disbelief. Like something inside him broke free and sighed.

He kisses you again—this time more sure, but no less fragile.

And when he pulls back, forehead resting against yours, he whispers like a confession:

“…I forgot what that felt like.”