Pretty Things Bleed Too

The Rooftop Confession

The hotel room felt like a dream I didn’t deserve. Everything was clean and soft and quiet. No yelling. No slamming doors. No Luca grabbing me like he wanted to break me and keep me at the same time. I kept waking up every hour, scared it was all fake and I’d open my eyes back in my tiny room with bruises everywhere. But every time I woke up, I saw the fancy lamp and felt the big fluffy pillow, and I remembered Damian’s voice saying, “Sleep, pretty boy. I’ve got you now.”

I didn’t sleep much.

The next morning, Damian was already there when I opened my eyes. He was sitting in the chair by the window, watching me. His eyeliner from the festival was a little smudged now, but he still looked dangerous and beautiful. My heart did that stupid flutter thing again.

“You stayed?” I whispered, sitting up and hugging the blanket to my chest. I was still wearing the same hoodie from last night, all wrinkled and tear-stained.

“Where else would I be?” He stood up and walked over, sitting on the edge of the bed. His hand came up slowly, like he was scared I’d flinch, and brushed my messy hair out of my face. “How are you feeling?”

“Better,” I lied. My cheek still hurt from Luca’s slap. My wrist throbbed. But being near Damian made the pain feel farther away. “Thank you… for everything. Nobody’s ever done something like this for me.”

He didn’t say anything for a while. Just looked at me with those intense dark eyes that made me feel seen. Really seen. Not as the weak femboy. Not as the family disappointment. Just… Kai.

After we ate breakfast he ordered (strawberry pancakes because of course he remembered), he took me back to school. Everyone was staring even harder now. Whispers followed us like shadows.

“Is that the kid Valenti is protecting?”

“They spent the night together I heard…”

“Freak got himself a mafia prince…”

I kept my head down, but Damian’s hand on my lower back made me feel brave enough to keep walking. During lunch he sat with me again, pushing strawberry milk my way like it was our thing now. It was. I loved our thing.

But the weight in my chest kept getting heavier. All the bruises, all the words from Luca, all the years of feeling like I was a mistake… it was piling up. I could feel it pushing down on me, making it hard to breathe.

After last period, Damian found me at my locker. “Come with me.”

I didn’t even ask where. I just followed him up the stairs, past the “Do Not Enter” signs, until we reached the rooftop of Blackthorne Academy. The door creaked open and cold wind hit my face. The sun was starting to set, painting the sky in soft pinks and oranges and deep purples. The city stretched out below us like it belonged to someone else. Not to broken boys like me.

Damian closed the door behind us and leaned against it, watching me walk to the edge. I gripped the railing tight, looking down at the world. Everything looked so small from up here. My problems felt huge, but maybe from the sky they were nothing.

“It’s beautiful,” I whispered.

“Yeah,” Damian said. But he wasn’t looking at the sunset. He was looking at me.

We stayed quiet for a long time. The wind messed up my hair and made my eyes water. Or maybe that was just the tears I was trying really hard not to cry. I failed. One slipped down my cheek anyway.

“Kai…” Damian’s voice was softer than I’d ever heard it. He came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling my back against his chest. He was so warm. So solid. Like a wall between me and the whole cruel world. “Talk to me.”

I swallowed hard. My hands shook on the railing. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Say anything.” His chin rested on top of my head. “I’m right here.”

That broke something inside me. All the feelings I’d been holding back for years came rushing out like a flood.

“Sometimes…” My voice cracked. I tried again. “Sometimes I wish I wasn’t born.”

The words hung in the air between us. Heavy. Ugly. True.

Damian’s arms tightened around me. I felt his whole body go still, like my words actually hurt him.

“I know I’m weak,” I kept going, tears falling faster now. “I know I’m pathetic. I cry too much. I like pretty things. I wear gloss and draw stupid clothes and hope someone will love me even though I’m disgusting. Dad says it every day. Luca… he looks at me like he hates me but also like he wants to own me or something. It scares me. Everything scares me. I just… I keep thinking if I was never born, nobody would have to deal with me. No bruises. No disappointment. No one would have to waste time protecting a worthless pretty boy like me.”

I was sobbing now. Ugly crying. The kind where your whole body shakes and you can’t breathe right. I turned around in his arms and buried my face in his chest, clutching his shirt like he might disappear.

“I’m sorry,” I cried. “I’m so sorry for dumping this on you. You probably regret noticing me now. I’m too much. I’m always too much—”

“Stop.” Damian’s voice was rough. Broken. He pulled back just enough to cup my face with both hands. His thumbs wiped my tears but more kept coming. His eyes… God, his eyes looked shattered. Like my words actually wounded him deep inside. The big bad Devil of Blackthorne Academy looked like he was about to cry. For me.

“You’re not too much,” he said fiercely. “You’re not worthless. You’re not disgusting. Every single person who told you that is f*****g blind.” His forehead pressed against mine. Our noses brushed. “Kai… you’re the only soft thing in my world. The only real thing. When I saw you that day with your ruined drawing, something in me just… clicked. Like I’d been waiting for you my whole life without knowing it.”

My breath hitched. “Damian…”

“I’m falling for you,” he whispered. Raw. Honest. Scary. “Hard. And it terrifies me because I destroy everything I touch. But I don’t want to destroy you. I want to protect you. I want to give you strawberry milk every day and watch you smile and let you put eyeliner on me and kiss every bruise until they disappear.”

He was shaking too. I could feel it. The big, dangerous, emotion-constipated mafia heir was shaking because of me. Because of my pain.

“I don’t wish you were never born,” he said, voice cracking. “I’m so f*****g glad you were born. Even if the world hurt you. Even if it keeps trying to break you. Because now you’re mine to keep safe. And I swear on everything, Kai… I’m never letting you go.”

I cried harder. But this time it felt different. Like the tears were washing something away. I wrapped my arms around his neck and hugged him as tight as I could. He hugged me back like I was the most precious thing in the universe.

We stayed like that on the rooftop as the sun disappeared and the city lights came on below us. Just holding each other. Breathing each other in. Two broken boys who maybe weren’t so broken when they were together.

After a long time, I pulled back a little and looked up at him. My eyes were puffy. My nose was running. My lip gloss was probably gone. But the way he looked at me… like I was beautiful anyway.

“You look better smiling,” he said again. But this time he smiled too. Small. Rare. Real.

I smiled back through the tears. “So do you.”

He leaned down slowly. So slowly. Giving me time to pull away. I didn’t. His lips brushed mine — soft, careful, like he was scared of breaking me. It wasn’t a full kiss. Not yet. Just a promise. A gentle press that made my whole body light up like fireworks.

When he pulled back, his eyes were dark and full of things I didn’t understand yet. Obsession. Love. Fear.

“I’ve got you,” he whispered against my lips. “Always.”

We stayed on that rooftop for hours. Talking. Crying. Holding hands. He told me a little about his family — how heavy the Valenti name was, how he had to be the Devil so no one would challenge him. I told him more about the pain I carried. About VelvetGhost. About how I dreamed of being someone strong one day.

By the time we left, the stars were out. Damian walked me to another hotel (he refused to let me go home again) and kissed my forehead at the door.

“Tomorrow,” he said. “I’ll be there.”

I nodded, heart full and aching at the same time.

That night in the hotel bed, I opened my laptop with trembling fingers and posted on VelvetGhost.

[Image: Two silhouettes on a rooftop — one soft and glowing, the other dark and protective. Their hands linked while the city burned beautiful below them.]

Caption:

“i told him i wished i wasn’t born.

he told me he was glad i existed.

he almost kissed me.

my devil is falling.

and i think… i’m falling harder.

pretty things bleed too.

but tonight the bleeding feels like hope.”

I fell asleep with my phone glowing beside me, heart full of dangerous, beautiful feelings.

I didn’t know it then, but that rooftop confession was the beginning of everything. The love. The obsession. The pain. The betrayals that would come later.

But in that moment, with Damian’s almost-kiss still tingling on my lips, I let myself believe.

Maybe soft boys like me could be loved after all.

Even by someone as dangerous as the Devil himself.