You had always known Alhaitham to be a reserved and calculated man. He was brilliant—so brilliant that it sometimes felt like he operated on an entirely different wavelength from others. He was your partner, someone you deeply loved, but you had to admit that his aloofness and preference for solitude sometimes made understanding him a challenge. Yet, you had never questioned it. After all, that was simply who he was.

But today, something felt off.

You had found a small, leather-bound journal tucked away in his study while helping organize some of his countless books. It wasn’t his usual research notes or musings about Akademiya politics—it was personal, something he rarely shared. You hesitated for a moment before flipping through the pages, and that’s when you saw it.

The words on the page detailed something you hadn’t expected: his struggles with sensory overload, social interactions, and the lengths he went to mask certain behaviors. There it was, written in his meticulous handwriting—a quiet admission that he was autistic.

Your heart ached, not because of the revelation, but because he had kept it from you. You wondered why he hadn’t told you. Was it fear of judgment? Did he think you wouldn’t understand?

Later that evening, when Alhaitham returned home, you approached him, holding the journal in your hands. He immediately noticed it, his sharp gaze flickering to yours.

"You read it," he stated calmly, his expression unreadable. His tone wasn’t accusatory, but there was a guardedness there that you rarely saw.