Something that remains

[Chance] POV:---

The apartment is... quiet.Not silent.Not threatening.Just quiet.

The hallway is narrow, but clean. The walls bear the marks of bygone years-small dents, yellowed wallpaper, but nothing unpleasant. Rather... human. Authenticity in cracks and wrinkles.

The guest room is simpler than expected. A bed. An old wardrobe. A window with a view of nothing.But it's warm.And it doesn't smell of alleyways and loneliness.

I take off my jacket, throw myself onto the bed, and stare at the ceiling.The rain has stopped.But the thoughts continue to drip in my head.

Why did he do this?Why is he helping me?What is he hoping to achieve?Or is this just... pity?

---

Mafioso POV:

I lean against the kitchen doorframe, watching Red glide his hands over the edge of the table.He hasn't eaten enough.His gaze keeps wandering into space, but sometimes it lingers on me-not long enough to ask a question, but long enough to think it.

I say nothing.Sometimes silence is easier.Sometimes it's more honest.

Instead, I place a cup of tea in front of him.Not because I think he wants it.But because I can right now.

"Is this your attempt to be nice?" Red asks suddenly."Maybe. Or my attempt to keep you quiet."

A tiny grin twitches across his lips.The first one I've seen in days.Not genuine, but a start.

"I thought you were the type to pour whiskey into glasses rather than tea into cups.""I am. But whiskey only gets people talking if they're going to regret it."

Red takes the cup, but he doesn't drink. He just holds it, as if the warmth in his hands is the only thing keeping it from falling apart.

"Thanks," he murmurs."No problem."

And then-silence. Again.

But this time it's not a silence filled with pressure. Not an oppressive nothingness.It's a silence where you can breathe. Where things can grow if you let them.

[Chance] POV:

I look at him as he sinks into his chair. The shadows on his face no longer seem like masks, but like old scars. I wonder if Chance has seen that side too.

"Have you ever...loved him?"The words are out before I can stop them.It's stupid. Inappropriate.But I want to know.

Mafia doesn't flinch. He just looks at me, with that slow, scrutinizing gaze I've almost learned to interpret by now.

"I don't know," he says honestly."But it felt like I'd lost something bigger than myself."

I don't say anything. I don't have to.Because suddenly I feel that I'm not alone in this tangle of memories, questions, and everything that stands between us.

Maybe Chance was the beginning.

But what's happening now belongs to us.

---

They're small things.Really small.How Mafia turns on the kettle every time I sit in the living room for more than two minutes.How he doesn't offer me tea, but simply sets it down without comment. Always with two spoonfuls of sugar, even though I never said how I take it.

Or how, in the evening, when I go into the guest room, he lingers at the kitchen door for a second longer, as if he needs to make sure I'm really still there.Not out of mistrust.But out of something else.Something soft he doesn't want to name.And neither do I.

---

Mafioso POV:

Red sneaks at night.Not loudly, not panicked-just restless.I hear his footsteps groping through the hallway, sometimes lingering in the kitchen, then back into the room, sometimes past my door.

I say nothing. I pretend to be asleep.

But sometimes......I leave my door ajar.A sign. Maybe.

He never enters. But he looks.And I wonder what he's looking for.Maybe the same thing I lost.

---

[Chance] POV

What frightens me more than his proximity is how natural it feels.How normal it is that I'm standing in the kitchen, turning on the kettle - and he's standing next to me, wordless, just there.No threat. No game.Just two people who've lost too much to bear alone.

And then... it happens.

---

[Scene - Fragment at the window]

It's night.I can't sleep. Again.The city isn't asleep, but it's silent.A mafioso is standing at the window. Shirtsleeves rolled up, cigarette in hand, but it's not lit yet. He just stares out.

"You don't smoke," I say quietly.

He doesn't turn around.

"Not anymore."

"Then why the cigarette?""Because it reminds me how it feels to need it. But not to do it."

I come closer. Not because I want to. But because I have to.Something about this moment... pulls.

"You miss him," I finally say."Chance."

He exhales slowly.

"I don't know if I miss him. Or just what I thought I was with him."

Then he looks at me.Long. Searching.Like someone clinging to a photograph that's almost faded.

"But you're here," he says quietly."And sometimes... it feels like something of him is still there."

I want to say: I'm not a chance.But it doesn't come out of my mouth.Because maybe...maybe I'm both.

---

To be continued...