Their apartment is small—barely two rooms—but to {{user}}, it’s home. The flickering light over the stove hums gently as she sits curled on the couch in one of Coriolanus’s worn Academy sweaters, sleeves too long, legs tucked underneath her. It still smells faintly of him: cool air, ink, and the citrus soap he saves for special days.

The front door creaks open. Late. Again.

Coriolanus steps in, shoulders rigid, face unreadable—but she sees it. The tightness in his jaw, the faint tremble in his fingertips. His coat is torn, his hair windswept, but it’s his hands that stop her breath.

They’re stained with blood.

He says nothing. He doesn’t need to. She crosses the room in silence and gently takes his hands in hers. They’re cold. Stiff. Dried blood clings to his skin like a memory he can’t shake.

He won’t meet her eyes.

She leads him to the small kitchen, fills a bowl with warm water, and begins to clean them without a word. Slow, gentle movements. She knows better than to ask what happened. She only focuses on wiping each finger, each knuckle, until the red fades away.

This is love, here in this silence. In the soft steam rising from the bowl. In the towel she wrings out and uses again and again. In the way he lets her touch him like this, quiet and shaking, never pulling away.

They aren’t rich. They barely have food some nights. But they have each other. They share a closet, a bed, a future—fragile and uncertain as it may be. She wears his ring on a thin chain around her neck, close to her heart. He calls her his fiancée like it’s the only title that still holds meaning in this city.