What He Did
876 Words
I thought about the door all night.
The black door.
The room Damien refused to open.
The secret he said was a piece of who he used to be.
By morning, I had convinced myself to stop asking.
That lasted exactly three hours.
I found Damien in his study.
He stood beside the fireplace, reading something in his hands.
“You’re hiding something from me.”
He looked up.
“I know.”
I frowned.
“You’re supposed to deny it.”
“I don’t lie to you.”
I walked closer.
“What is behind the door?”
His eyes stayed on mine.
“You really want to know?”
“Yes.”
“Even if the answer changes the way you see me?”
“Yes.”
He slowly placed the paper on his desk.
“Then come with me.”
My heart stopped.
He walked past me.
I followed.
Up the stairs.
Down the hallway.
Until we stood in front of the black door.
Damien reached into his pocket.
A key appeared between his fingers.
For a moment, he simply held it.
Then he unlocked the door.
The sound of the lock turning seemed impossibly loud.
He opened it.
I stepped inside.
And stopped breathing.
Photographs covered the walls.
Hundreds of them.
Maybe more.
My face was everywhere.
Me leaving the bookstore.
Me sitting by the window.
Me drinking coffee.
Me walking through the rain.
Me laughing.
Me crying.
Me alone.
My hands began to shake.
I turned toward him.
“You took these?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
He didn’t answer immediately.
“How long, Damien?”
“Eight months.”
My chest tightened.
“Eight months?”
“I saw you before we ever met.”
I stared at the photographs.
“Where?”
He stepped into the room.
“Outside a hospital.”
I looked at him.
“You were crying.”
I remembered.
Barely.
Eight months earlier, I had stood outside a hospital in the rain after receiving news I didn’t want to remember.
I had thought nobody had seen me.
But he had.
“I wanted to come to you,” Damien said.
“Then why didn’t you?”
“Because you looked like someone who needed space.”
I looked back at the photographs.
“You followed me instead.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
His answer was quiet.
“Because I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”
I swallowed.
“That isn’t love.”
“I know.”
He didn’t defend himself.
“Not then.”
I turned toward him.
“Then what was it?”
“Obsession.”
The word hung between us.
He didn’t try to soften it.
“I watched you because I wanted to understand you. I learned your routines. Your favorite places. The things that made you smile.”
His eyes moved over the photographs.
“And the more I learned, the harder it became to stay away.”
I felt tears forming.
“You could have scared me.”
“I know.”
“You did scare me.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you telling me?”
“Because you asked for the truth.”
I walked toward one photograph.
It was me sitting alone in the bookstore.
I looked peaceful.
Unaware.
“Did you ever touch anything?”
“No.”
“Did you ever come into my apartment?”
His silence answered before his words did.
“Once.”
I turned.
“When?”
“The night you couldn’t sleep.”
My heart pounded.
“You were there?”
“Yes.”
“What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
His eyes met mine.
“I sat in the chair by your window until you fell asleep.”
I stared at him.
“You could have hurt me.”
“I could have.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
He stepped closer.
“I never wanted to hurt you.”
I looked around the room again.
All those photographs.
All those moments I thought belonged only to me.
“You made a room about me.”
“Yes.”
“That’s terrifying.”
“I know.”
I looked at him.
“And strangely…”
I stopped.
“What?”
I didn’t know how to explain it.
The truth was frightening.
But there was something else beneath the fear.
Something I didn’t want to admit.
“I understand now.”
His expression softened.
“What?”
“Why you looked at me like you already knew me.”
He came closer.
“I did know you.”
“You knew pieces of me.”
“Then let me learn the rest.”
I looked into his eyes.
For the first time, I understood that the locked room hadn’t been hiding another woman.
It had been hiding his obsession with me.
And somehow, knowing the truth didn’t make me want to run.
It made me want to know what else he had been hiding.
Damien reached for my hand.
I let him take it.
“You can leave,” he whispered.
I looked at the doorway.
Then back at him.
“I know.”
And I stayed.
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