SIN FOR ME PAPACITO

Morning, Stupid Dog!!

Morning came without warning.

No soft light. No birds. Just grey seeping through the thick windows of the caditel, washing everything in dull, washed-out color.

Diava woke up to pain. Her palm throbbed. Dried blood cracked when she flexed her fingers. She was still on the couch, mouth dry, head heavy. For a second she thought the car scene was a nightmare. Then she smelled it - paint, incense.

She sat up too fast. The room spun.

Every light in the house was off. But daylight cut through the gaps in the curtains, landing on the walls. All four walls.

Black.

Leo had painted them overnight. No white left. The caditel looked like a cage now. The brush sat in a dry drum by the door. Paint stains marked the floor leading to the bathroom. He was done.

Diava’s eyes dragged over the room, searching, She found nothing.

Her brain was too fogged to place it.

She stood. Her legs shook. The bleeding palm made her lightheaded. She pressed it to her dress and stumbled toward the open room, calling his name under her breath.

“Leo.”

No answer. Just the quiet scrape of a brush against something.

She followed the sound to the far end of the caditel. Another room. Bare. One window, one chair, one wall half-covered in fresh black paint.

Leo was there.

He has showered. Cotton pants hung low on his hips. Ash singlet clung to his chest, damp at the collar. The limited edition label sat against his neck like a brand. Hair wet, falling forward. He didn’t look at her. He dipped the brush and dragged it down the wall in one slow, merciless stroke.

The sound filled the silence.

Diava’s throat tightened. She hadn’t planned to beg. She hadn’t planned to be weak. But her palm pulsed, her vision blurred, and the weight of everything hit her at once: disowned, wanted, no phone, no car, no family.

She needed him. God help her, she needed him.

Her knees hit the floor before her brain caught up.

The cold tile bit through her dress. She didn’t care.

“Help me,” she said her voice cracked. “Please. Help me.”

He didn’t stop painting. Didn’t turn. The brush kept moving. Black over white. Prison over prison.

“You’re bleeding,” he said finally.

“I know.” She held her palm out. Blood smeared her skin. “I can’t think with this pain. I can’t run. I can’t - ”

“Can’t what?” He dipped the brush again. “Can’t be a Stupid Dog without someone to hold your leash?”

Diava flinched. “I’m not asking for your pity. I’m asking for your help. Just to clean it. Just to stop it. Then I’ll leave. I swear.”

Lie. They both knew it was a lie. Where would she go?

Leo paused. Brush hovered over the wall. For the first time, he looked at her. Eyes hooded, red at the edges like he hadn’t slept either. He took her in - on her knees, dress wrinkled, hair a mess, blood on her hand.

He didn’t move closer.

“You came into my car,” he said quietly. “You asked for help. You offered yourself for this kill. Now you’re on your knees in my house, asking again. Do you know what that looks like?”

Diava swallowed. “Like desperation.”

“Like ownership.” He set the brush down. Paint dripped on the floor.

He walked to her. Slow. Each step deliberate. He stopped in front of her, close enough that she smelled his soap and heavenly scent and something darker underneath. He didn’t touch her.

He looked at her outstretched hand. Then past it, to her wrist.

The black crotchet wristband was gone. It must’ve fallen off in her sleep. On the couch. In the car. Somewhere she will never find it now. She didn’t notice. Her eyes stayed locked on his face.

Leo noticed. His jaw tightened. Whatever appetite he had for her blood, whatever hunger sparked when he saw red - it ignite again.

He crouched down to her level, just level. So she had to meet his eyes.

“You want my help?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Then admit what you are.”

Diava’s breath shook. The words tasted like glass. “I’m a Pathetic Stupid Dog. I don’t deserve - ”

“Air,” he finished for her. “You don’t deserve the air you breathe. Say it.”

She closed her eyes. “I don’t deserve the air I breathe.”

Silence. Then his hand came up. Not to her throat. Not to her hair. To her bleeding palm. He turned it over, studied the wound like it was art. Blood welled fresh under his thumb.

“You are like adead crotchets,” he murmured. “No breath. No life. Who would pay for that?”

“I’ll learn,” she whispered. “Just help me now.”

Leo stood, he walked to the cabinet without another wordand came back with bandages, antiseptic, a bowl of water. He set them on the floor between her knees.

He didn’t clean her hand. He didn’t bandage it. He left them there.

“Do it yourself,” he said. “If you want to live, Stupid Dog, you start by saving yourself.”

Then he turned back to the wall. Picked up the brush. Resumed painting.

Diava stared at the supplies. At her bleeding hand, to the man who wouldn’t save her, but wouldn’t let her die either.

Outside, a car engine started somewhere But close enough.

Leo’s hand didn’t shake as he paint he looks blink a modulated robot. “They’re looking for you,” he said to the wall. “Cops. Family. Bounty hunters. This caditel is the only place you won’t be found tonight.”

Diava wrapped the bandage around her palm with her teeth. The pain made her eyes water.

“What’s the price?” she asked.

Leo smiled at the black wall. “I haven’t decided yet. But I will.”

The last stroke of paint finished the wall. Four walls.

He dropped the brush,turned and Looked at her on her knees, bleeding, bandaging her own hand like a stray.

“Get up,” he said. “We have work to do.

Diava stood on with shaky legs. The bandage was sloppy. Blood still seeped through the white cotton.

Leo didn’t wait. He walked past her to the door, singlet riding up just enough to show those strange dimples on his lower back again. Four of them. Like claw marks from a god who lost interest.

She followed. The caditel was bigger in daylight, but not better. Every hallway looked the same. Black walls. Old books. Dust that smelled like time. She counted her steps just to stay sane. Thirty. Turn. Forty. Another turn.

They stopped in what looked like a workshop. Easels, canvases, jars of turpentine. The smell hit her nose and burned. In the center sat a table. On it: thread. Needles, Yarn,Crochet hooks,Gun, mask, black Leather cloth and a Tiger head point mark.

Her chest tightened.

Leo picked up a hook. Rolled it between his fingers. “You said you’d learn,” he said. “So learn.”

Diava stared at the tools. Her palm throbbed under the bandage. “I can’t. Not with this hand.”

“You can,” he said. “You will. Or you can bleed on my floor again. Your choice.”

She sat. The chair was hard. The table was cold. Leo stood behind her, close enough that she felt his heat.

He dropped a gun in front of her. “Make something with loose breath,” he said. “Not dead. Not lame. Something that lives.”

Diava swallowed. She threaded the gun with her good hand, teeth helping. The pain in her palm shot up her arm when she pulled too hard. Her eyes watered. She hated him for making her do this. She hated herself more for needing to.

First shoot was ugly. Second was worse.

“Pathetic,” Leo said behind her. “Your shoot have no spine. Like you.”

Diava’s jaw locked. She pulled the yarn tighter. “You think hurting me makes you powerful?”

“No,” he said. “Power is watching you hurt yourself to prove you’re not weak. That’s entertainment.”

She stabbed the gun with her hand. Her palm screamed. She didn’t cry. Not in front of him.

Minutes passed. Or hours. Time in the caditel didn’t move right. The black walls absorbed sound. The only noise was the sound of the gun hitting the wall and Leo’s breathing behind her.

Then he leaned down. His mouth was near her ear,“You smell like fear,” he said. “And something else. That scent from the car. Anathema. Heaven and hell in one. It makes me want to break you just to see what’s inside.”

Diava’s hand shook. The stitch unraveled.

“Don’t,” she whispered. “Don’t make me into your experiment.”

“You already are,” he said. “From the moment you got in my car.”

She slammed the gun down. “Then what? What do you want from me, Leo? Money? Loyalty? My body?”

Leo was quiet. Then he picked the gunup. Placed it back in her good hand. His fingers brushed hers. Brief. Cold.

“I want you to choose,” he said. “Right now. Stay here, learn to make something that lives, and I’ll keep you hidden from them. Or walk out that door, bleeding and wanted, and die on the street before sunset.”

Diava looked at the door. She could run. She probably wouldn’t make it past the gate.

She looked at the gun. Black, like the walls. Like her life right now.

Her palm bled through the bandage again. She hissed and pressed it to her chest.

Leo saw. He said nothing. Just waited.

“I choose to live,” she said finally, voice low. Broken. “But I’m not your dog.”

“You are,” he said simply. “A Stupid Dog who chose her owner. That’s all I needed to hear.”

He stepped back. “Continue.”

Diava picked up the gun. This time she didn’t rush. She breathed. Pulled. The pain was still there, but she worked around it. She hit the seven point,Not perfect. She tried again Eight point

Behind her, Leo watched. His eyes tracked every movement of her hand. When she winced, his jaw tightened. When she got the Eight point ,something in his chest loosened.

“You’re learning,” he said finally. Surprise in his voice, like he didn’t expect her to.

“I’m surviving,” she corrected.

“Same thing,” he said. “In my world.”

The workshop fell quiet again. Outside, the engine sound from earlier moved close and someone entered ,Diava didn’t know. She only knew the weight of Leo’s stare on her back, and the way her palm burned with every shot she pulled.

After a while, Leo moved. He walked to the window and pulled the curtain back an inch. Light cut across his face. He looked older in daylight. Tired. Like the black walls were weighing on him too.

“Come closer,” he said. “ and drop the doc.”

Diava’s hands froze. “Who?”

“ai’nt your bizz.” He let the curtain fall. Darkness again. “Cops want you for questioning. Your husband family wants you in jail, take the documents an fo the job.”

Diava dropped the gun. It clattered on the table. “Then why keep me? Why not hand me over and be done?, what with the job you want me to do”

Leo turned. For the first time, his expression wasn’t blank. Wasn’t cruel. It was something else. Something she couldn’t name.

“Because you got on your knees,” he said. “And you asked. No one asks me for help, Diava. They beg. They threaten. They lie. You asked. Pathetic, but honest.”

He walked to her. Stopped at the edge of the table. Looked down at her bandaged hand, at the small thing she was making.

“Go to that hotel and do your job,” he said. But his voice was softer. “But bring him to the lesson dead he was.”

Diava met his eyes.

Leo stared at her for a long time. Then he walked past her and picked up another hook. A different size. He placed it on his good hand, curling his fingers around it.

“Like this,” he said. His hand guided the year . One movement. Two. The yarn twisted into something new. Something with tension. With pull.

His chest was at her back. His breath at her neck. He didn’t press. Didn’t own. Just guided.

“See?” he said. “ Make it loose breath.”

Diava felt it. The difference,the tension. It could stretch and come back. I

She exhaled. Didn’t realize she’d been holding her breath.

When he stepped back, the space behind her felt colder. Emptier.

Leo went back to the window. “Finish it,” he said. “Then I'll plan your life."

Diava looked down at the gun in her hands. Small. Black. Uneven. She went to the point whole

She kept shooting. Blood stained the wool in her injured palm faintly. She didn’t stop.