Arka returns
1634 Words
By the second year of addiction, Fabrizio stopped measuring time properly.
Days blurred together strangely in Surabaya.
Morning became evening without meaning much. Weeks disappeared beneath neon lights, dirty apartment ceilings, withdrawal sickness, and temporary highs that never lasted long enough anymore.
Sometimes he forgot what month it was.
Sometimes he forgot conversations entirely.
But he never forgot Arka.
That was the cruel part.
No matter how damaged his mind became, no drug ever erased him completely.
If anything, addiction sharpened the haunting.
Arka existed everywhere now.
In cigarette smoke drifting through alleyways.
In rainwater reflecting neon signs.
In every motorbike engine roaring through the city after midnight.
Sometimes Fabrizio hated him for surviving inside his mind so completely.
Not truly.
Never truly.
But enough to resent how impossible forgetting had become.
One humid evening Fabrizio sat alone outside a convenience store smoking while waiting for Rio to arrive with more drugs.
Rain threatened overhead again.
Always rain in this city.
Traffic lights painted the wet roads red and green while exhausted strangers drifted endlessly past him without eye contact.
Fabrizio looked terrible now.
Even he knew that.
His cheeks had hollowed sharply beneath his skin. Bruises sat beneath exhausted eyes permanently. Tattoos had started appearing across his arms during drunken nights he barely remembered clearly.
The boy from the countryside had nearly vanished completely.
And deep down, Fabrizio believed that was probably for the best.
Because maybe Arka deserved forgetting him.
Maybe the version of Fabrizio that existed now was too broken to love properly anymore.
He took another drag from the cigarette slowly.
Then froze.
A familiar motorbike rolled quietly toward the curb nearby.
His pulse stumbled immediately.
No.
Impossible.
The rider removed the helmet slowly.
Arka.
Real.
Not hallucination.
Not memory.
Real.
Fabrizio physically stopped breathing.
For a second neither moved.
The city noise around them blurred into meaningless static while shock crashed through Fabrizio’s entire body.
Arka looked different.
Older.
Harder.
The tattoo stretched farther across his throat and chest now, dark ink disappearing beneath his black shirt like vines wrapping around him permanently. New scars marked parts of his face and hands. His hair had grown slightly longer. His shoulders carried tension constantly now, like he expected violence every second of his life.
But his eyes—
God.
His eyes still looked exactly the same.
And somehow that nearly destroyed Fabrizio immediately.
Because those eyes belonged to the boy from the fields still.
Buried somewhere beneath all the damage.
Arka stared at him silently for several seconds.
Then finally whispered:
“Jesus Christ.”
Not cruelly.
Heartbroken.
Fabrizio suddenly became painfully aware of how he looked standing there beneath flickering streetlights with shaking hands and exhaustion carved deep into his face.
He tried forcing a smirk.
“Good to see you too.”
But his voice sounded weak.
Even to himself.
Arka climbed off the motorbike slowly without taking his eyes off him.
“What happened to you?”
The question hurt more than anger would have.
Fabrizio laughed softly.
“Lot of things.”
Arka stepped closer.
Close enough now that Fabrizio could smell cigarettes and rainwater on him again.
The familiarity nearly made him collapse emotionally right there.
“You’re using hard now,” Arka said quietly.
Not a question.
A fact.
Fabrizio looked away immediately.
The shame hit harder standing in front of Arka than it ever did alone.
Because this was the only person whose opinion still truly mattered to him.
“I tried stopping,” he muttered.
Arka’s expression cracked instantly hearing that.
For a moment neither spoke.
Traffic moved around them while humid wind carried rain through glowing city streets.
Then suddenly Arka grabbed him.
Not violently.
Desperately.
Pulled him into a crushing hug so fast Fabrizio barely processed it happening.
And just like that—
everything broke.
All the loneliness.
All the anger.
All the grief.
Fabrizio grabbed him back immediately, almost violently, like someone drowning finally reaching air.
For two years he imagined this moment constantly.
Sometimes angrily.
Sometimes romantically.
Sometimes tragically.
But reality felt different.
Smaller somehow.
Sadness sat between them now even while holding each other.
Because love had survived.
But innocence hadn’t.
Arka buried his face briefly against Fabrizio’s shoulder.
“You i***t,” he whispered shakily.
Fabrizio laughed weakly despite tears burning behind his eyes.
“Yeah.”
Neither let go for a long time.
People passed them constantly on the sidewalk without caring.
That felt strange too.
Back in the village, this embrace could have destroyed them socially.
Here in the city, nobody even looked twice.
The realization hurt in a different way.
After everything they lost to fear, strangers in Surabaya barely noticed them at all.
Eventually Arka pulled back enough to look at him again.
“You’re freezing.”
“It’s raining.”
“You need food.”
“I’m fine.”
“You look half-dead.”
Fabrizio smirked tiredly.
“You always were dramatic.”
Arka’s eyes softened immediately hearing that.
Like for one tiny second, the old Fabrizio had returned.
“Come with me,” Arka said quietly.
Fabrizio hesitated.
Part of him wanted to refuse automatically.
Shame.
Fear.
Embarrassment.
But another part—the exhausted, lonely, desperate part—would have followed Arka absolutely anywhere.
So he nodded.
The apartment Arka brought him to sat high above crowded streets inside a crumbling building near the city outskirts. Small. Barely furnished. Cigarette burns marked the kitchen counter while rain tapped softly against narrow windows overlooking endless neon lights.
But somehow it still felt safer than anywhere Fabrizio had slept in years.
Arka handed him a towel first.
Then food.
Then cigarettes.
Small acts of care that nearly broke Fabrizio apart emotionally because he’d forgotten what genuine tenderness felt like.
They sat across from each other quietly while rain filled the silence around them.
Fabrizio struggled eating at first.
His stomach had shrunk badly from drugs and neglect.
Arka noticed immediately.
“You barely eat anymore.”
“I eat.”
“No,” Arka said softly. “You survive.”
The accuracy of the sentence made Fabrizio look away.
Eventually Arka spoke again.
“I looked for you.”
Fabrizio blinked.
“What?”
“After the warehouse.”
Shock moved through him instantly.
“You did?”
Arka nodded slowly.
“But you disappeared before I could find you again.”
Fabrizio laughed bitterly.
“I’ve gotten good at disappearing.”
“Yeah,” Arka whispered sadly. “I noticed.”
Silence settled heavily afterward.
Then finally Fabrizio asked the question sitting inside him for years now.
“Why did you really leave?”
Arka closed his eyes briefly.
The exhaustion on his face suddenly looked ancient.
“Because they threatened you.”
Fabrizio’s chest tightened immediately.
“What?”
“They figured us out faster than I thought.”
Cold fear crawled through him.
“What did they say?”
Arka stared down at his hands.
“They said love makes people weak.”
The sentence landed painfully.
“Then they threatened to hurt you if I kept seeing you.”
Fabrizio stopped breathing for a second.
Arka laughed softly without humor.
“I thought if I pushed you away hard enough, you’d hate me eventually.”
Fabrizio stared at him in disbelief.
“Hate you?”
“I wanted you alive.”
The honesty in his voice shattered something inside Fabrizio completely.
Because suddenly every lonely night looked different now.
Every unanswered message.
Every rejection.
Every painful silence.
Arka hadn’t abandoned him emotionally.
He’d sacrificed them trying to protect him.
And somehow they both ended up destroyed anyway.
Fabrizio rubbed both hands across his face hard.
“You should’ve told me.”
“And done what?” Arka asked quietly. “Ran away with no money? No protection? You think they wouldn’t find us?”
Part of Fabrizio still wanted to say yes.
Wanted to believe love alone could’ve saved them somehow.
But looking at Arka now—the scars, the fear still hiding behind his eyes—he finally understood how real the danger had been.
Neither of them spoke for a while after that.
Rain continued tapping softly against windows while traffic glowed endlessly below the apartment.
Then Arka noticed the inside of Fabrizio’s arm while he reached for cigarettes.
Track marks.
Tiny bruises.
The room went completely silent.
Arka stared at them without breathing properly.
Then whispered:
“No…”
Fabrizio immediately pulled his sleeve down.
But too late.
The devastation on Arka’s face looked unbearable.
“You said you’d never—”
“I know.”
“What happened to you?”
The question came out broken this time.
Not judgmental.
Heartbroken.
And suddenly Fabrizio couldn’t hold the truth back anymore.
“You happened to me.”
The words slipped out harsher than intended.
Arka physically flinched.
Guilt flooded Fabrizio instantly afterward.
“That’s not fair,” Arka whispered.
“I know.”
“But you think I don’t blame myself already?”
Fabrizio looked away immediately.
Because he knew Arka was suffering too.
They both were.
Just differently.
Finally Arka moved closer slowly.
Then sat beside him on the couch.
Close enough for their shoulders to touch.
“I never stopped loving you,” he whispered.
The sentence destroyed whatever remained of Fabrizio emotionally.
Tears filled his eyes instantly.
Because after everything—the violence, the separation, the addiction, the city—they still ended up here.
Still orbiting each other like gravity.
Still ruined by the exact same love.
Fabrizio leaned forward burying his face into shaking hands.
“I don’t know how to be okay anymore.”
Arka wrapped an arm around him carefully.
And for the first time in years, Fabrizio allowed someone to hold him while he fell apart completely.
- Writer
