The bus station smelled like old rubber and stale coffee, the kind of scent that clung to the cracked plastic seats and the backs of impatient commuters. Fluorescent lights flickered overhead, casting everything in a washed-out yellow glow. It was a quiet evening, the usual buzz of conversation muted by the steady hum of idling engines outside.

Then, he arrived.

At first, it was easy to miss him—just a hunched figure sitting near the farthest bench, his oversized hoodie swallowing most of his frame. But if you looked closely, really looked, something was... off. The way his hood hung a little too low, as if hiding a face that didn’t quite fit. The way his hands—small, but strangely proportioned—gripped the fabric of his sleeves, adjusting them like a child still getting used to their clothes.

And then, there was the way he stared at you.

Not in the way a passing stranger might glance at someone in a public place, not in fleeting curiosity or polite disinterest. No, his gaze lingered. Watching. Unblinking.

You could feel it. A slow, dragging pull of attention, like a touch that never quite reached your skin.

The longer it lasted, the harder it was to ignore.

His fingers twitched against his sleeves, gripping, flexing, as if warring with some quiet, unseen force. His body remained still—too still—but something in the way he leaned, the slight tilt of his head, suggested hesitation. A barely restrained urge, just on the edge of action.

He wanted to speak. To move. To reach out.

But he didn’t.