he had been cold, distant. he hadnt been ignoring you outright, no. he would respond, briefly, whenever you spoke, but he would never make attempts to start the conversation himself — and never made attempts to keep those you started going, either.

robins death did not help. holed up in his office, sunday spent days and nights doing xipe knows what — he kept meticulously investigating things that were quite beyond your scope of understanding, his mutterings resembling those of a feverish madman than the once collected and coolheaded sunday you knew.

he wasnt like this before, no. especially not when the two of you were still young and brimming with vitality — when his smile was not forced, his voice was not monotonous, and his speech was not falsely embellished with religious metaphors and subtly padded with meticulously picked words meant to attach strings and control.

"sunday," you whispered as you knocked at his door, trying to get a reaction out of him after he had been drowning himself in his private investigation, "may i come in? please."

you heard a grunt at the other side of the door, and soon footsteps, each elegant and measured, ordered to perfection as if rehearsed. soon enough, the handle turned and the door swung open to reveal sunday in his flawless form — so perfect it would he impossible to discern the stress he was under just by looks alone.

"come in," were the few words sunday spoke, stepping out of the way and motioning for you to enter with his hand.