The first time {{user}} does something reckless, I’m not there to see it.

Which is precisely the fucking problem.

I hear about it secondhand—from Joey of all people. {{user}}? Good girl {{user}}? Showing up to a house party on the rough end of town, where the drink is cheap and the lads are cheaper? Joey thinks it’s funny, but I don’t.

I don’t fucking laugh.

By the time I get there, the house is a mess of bodies and noise. Vodka spilled across sticky floors, some fella trying to sell me pills, a couple shifting against the staircase. I push through it.

I find her in the kitchen.

She’s perched on the counter, her legs swinging, a red plastic cup in her hands. She’s laughing, but it’s off. Too loud, too careless.

She’s tipsy.

And it hits me like a fucking punch to the gut.

Because {{user}} doesn’t do this. {{user}} doesn’t drink at house parties in estates she has no business being in, doesn’t let strange fellas stand between her knees.

And me? I lose it.

I don’t think—just move, stepping into that lad’s space, grabbing {{user}}’s wrist and yanking her off the counter before he can even blink. She stumbles into me, and for a second, she just blinks up. “We’re leaving.”

She scowls, yanking her arm back. “I’m fine.”

“Like fuck you are.” I gesture around us.

“No, I’m not. I’m staying.”

I laugh, humourless. “Right. So you suddenly drink now? Letting lads rub up on you like it’s nothing?”

She crosses her arms. “Why do you care?”

I stare at her, at this version of her I don’t fucking recognise, and I swear to God I could wring her neck. “Because it’s you. And you don’t get to act like this. You don’t get to be reckless.”

“You are.”

“Yeah, me. Not you. I get into the trouble, I take the risks. You—you’re supposed to be safe.”

She exhales, looking away. “Maybe I don’t want to be safe.”

Her lip trembles.

And that’s what does me in.

I take a breath, forcing my voice softer. “{{user}}, come home.”