The Tearsmith

different ways of thinking page 3

-"Different ways of thinking. Nothing that concerns you." He looked at me as if urging me to leave, but I didn't. I didn't want to. For the first time, I wanted to dare to take a step forward instead of backward. To show him that, despite everything, I was willing to go further. To prove that I was like that. When he pressed the ice cube against his eyebrow and furrowed his forehead in pain, a distant voice echoed within me. "It's about gentleness, Nica. Gentleness, always... Remember that," the voice said sweetly. I felt my legs starting to move. Rigel locked his gaze on me as I entered the kitchen definitively. I approached the sink, grabbed a piece of paper towel, and soaked it in cold water. I was certain that his pupils were pressing on my shoulders. I approached and looked at him innocently as I handed him the paper towel. "The ice is too hard. Put this on the wound." He seemed almost surprised that I hadn't run away. He skeptically observed the paper towel, wary like a wild animal, and when he saw that I didn't take it... in a gesture of goodwill, I tried to apply it myself. But I didn't have time to get close: he glared at me and abruptly moved away. A jet-black lock of hair slipped onto his temple as he looked me up and down, relentless. "Don't do it," he warned me with a fierce gaze. "Don't you dare touch me." "It won't hurt..." I shook my head and extended my fingers a little further, but this time he swatted them away. I brought my hand to my chest, and when I looked into his eyes, I startled: they were scorching me, as if his pupils were pulsating stars emitting a light that, instead of radiating warmth,

"Do not even think about touching me, just like that. Never." I clenched my fists, faced him with that gaze that sought to punish me, and asked him, "Or what...?" A violent sound of the chair. Rigel abruptly straightened up, and caught off guard, I startled. He forced me to step back, and suddenly a thousand alarms started resonating under my skin as I stumbled over his steps and ended up colliding with the kitchen counter. I lifted my chin and, trembling, gripped the edge of the marble with both hands. His eyes imprisoned me like a dark gag. His body, now very close to mine, screamed at me, sending shivers down my spine, and I could barely breathe, completely engulfed by his shadow. Then... Rigel leaned over me. As he brought his face close to my ear, his breath burned like poison. "Or what... I won't stop." When he roughly pushed me aside, the air he displaced ruffled my hair. I heard the sound of the ice falling onto the table, and his footsteps faded away as he left me there, motionless, like a petrified statue against the marble. What had just happened?