killer instinct - || h.s. ||

31

" i don't want your sympathy, i just want myself back "

---

no perspective.

The tired figure picks the lock to make his way into her apartment at this ungodly hour in the morning. The place that he's grown accustomed to is now flooding with morning light. The blandness, the simplicity, and the loneliness seemed to have found a way into him these past few months.

Someone who he set incredulous expectations for has suddenly turned out to be someone completely different in his mind. Someone he wanted to hold in his arms, memorize every feature on her beautifully imperfect body, and know everything going on in the chaos that he knows is her head.

He could understand better than anyone, he knew what pain was on the inside too.

His pursuit through the ear-piercing silence of her place only reminds him of the hurt he felt when she pushed him away merely hours ago. He assumes her to be asleep, more like hopes she to be, because that would make this all the more easier.

Gently pushing open the door, his striking green eyes glance around the room that makes vivid memories flash through his head. From sensual desires to morning banter to clouds of hazing smoke to soft comfort, all that was missing was that girl that accompanied every single one of them.

There was no small frame snuggled under the covers, prompting his ring-clad fingers to run through his tousled hair that he tugged one too many times last night.

At first, it came as a relief since he hated confrontation himself, but he knows he's in the wrong here for lying to her so long – for being selfish when it came to her.

The sheer proof of that was holding her crumbling facade in his arms last night, it was only proof when she pushed him away how much he truly lost.

His Ace – the only one he knows is just as good as he is in the ring. She's a prized gem that he has made his mission to keep safe. Whether the motive was his best friend's request or his own, is something he has yet to figure out in the chaos that inhabits his own head.

I mean, she's the only person he'll let touch him after getting hit during fights. The only one that can make his head go blank temporarily. The only one. And now cursing the universe for presenting comfort in a person, she's become that in his life.

Nevertheless, the reality of this set in for him.

Cursing under his breath, he nearly goes to call his friend waiting in the car out at the curb to track her phone for her unknown location, but the glow seeping from the cracked bathroom door makes his eyes keel.

He tucks his phone back into his soft pocket. Sweatpants weren't a commonality, but they would be today with the lack of sleep for some foreign reason that he has spent all night trying to figure out. It didn't help to see his angel's tear-stained cheeks every time he closed his eyes, or hear gut-wrenching sobs echo through his head.

But all in all, it all circled around to the singular thing that was her.

He cautiously pushes the door open to the blinding white lights illuminating the small space. The quiet dripping of the showerhead resounds through the quiet as he takes a step in.

There's no denying the knock of life from his lungs in that singular moment.

His eyes go wide at the sight of her small frame curled into a ball, passed out on the tile floor in her usual sleepwear to expose her bare legs. Her body misses the white bandages wrapped around her when she left the Pit last night. The fresh cuts on full display for his eyes while wondering why he didn't know that last night.