“It is,” he declared calmly.
Something in the way he said it—matter-of-fact, not dismissive—caught me off guard.
“You don’t know what I can sleep on,” I shot back.
His eyes moved over me once, slow enough that I felt it. Not inappropriate. Not crude. Just…aware.
“You’re already exhausted,” he offered. “You won’t sleep on that.”
The words landed softer than they should have. Which was annoying. And worse—true.
I crossed my arms, holding onto the irritation anyway. “And your solution is what, exactly?”
“I’ll stay on my side,” he added, like that fixed anything.
I opened my mouth, then closed it again, because frustratingly, there wasn’t a clean argument left.
He watched me process it, completely unbothered, and that almost made me push harder out of principle alone.
I pressed my fingers briefly to my temple. “This is insane.”
“Yes.” No argument. No attempt to soften it. Just agreement.
And somehow, that made it harder to fight.
By the time we got ready for bed, the conversation had died completely.
He took his shower first. I stood in the kitchen while the water ran, pretending to straighten things that did not need straightening. The hiss of the shower reached me in waves through the then wall, along with the occasional muted shift of movement. I hated that I was aware of every second of it. Hated even more that my own body felt hyper-alert in response, as though the apartment itself had become one exposed nerve.
When he emerged, the sight of him in dark sleep pants and a plain black T-shirt irritated me on principle. He looked too comfortable for a man who had just invaded my life and my apartment in a single evening. Barefoot, damp-haired, broad enough to make my small bedroom look even smaller. He gave me one nod and moved toward the books he’d stacked earlier, selecting one as if this were any other night.
I grabbed my own things and shut myself in the bathroom harder than necessary. By the time I came out, hair damp, oversized sleep shirt brushing my thighs, the bedside lamp was on and he was already in bed, propped slightly against the headboard with one of his books open in his hands. Reading glasses rested low on his nose.
I stopped short.
He looked up.
And for one disorienting second, the image did not match the narrative my nervous system had spent all day constructing. There was something almost scholarly about him like that. More human. A man with a book and tired eyes andglasses sliding down his nose, not just the player from every looped clip and headline.
Then his gaze shifted to my face, and the room snapped back into uncomfortable focus.
“I can leave the light on,” he said. “If you need it.”
The fact that he asked with that same flat, controlled tone made the courtesy feel strange somehow.
“No,” I said. “It’s fine.”
I crossed to the bed and climbed in carefully, keeping as much distance between us as the mattress allowed. The sheets were cool against my legs. The scent of my detergent rose around me—lavender, clean cotton, familiar—and beneath it now was him. Soap. Skin. It made the space feel stolen in a way I could not explain.
Alois closed the book, set it on the nightstand, and switched off the lamp.
Darkness settled instantly. Every sound sharpened.
The rustle of sheets as he shifted once onto his back. The faint creak of the mattress adjusting to his weight. The quiet rhythm of his breathing filling in the silence where mine turned shallow and annoyed. Somewhere under the bed, Bento made a small, indignant sound.
I stared into the dark, eyes open, body rigid.
Beside me, Alois exhaled slowly. Then, after several agonizing minutes, he fell asleep. His breathing deepened. His body settled heavier into the mattress. The tension that had held him so carefully together all evening loosened into something unconscious and unreachable.