He blinked, slowly, like waking from a long, impossible dream. His breath trembled in his chest, shallow and stunned, but no longer drowning him. Her words curled around the wounded edges of his heart, soft and clear.

You're worth it.

How long had it been since he let himself believe that?

And yet... he didn't flinch. Not this time.

He looked at her, and his eyes were still glassy, rimmed red from the storm she had helped him survive. His glasses remained just the slightest bit askew on his nose- slightly fogged up as he reached up and plucked them off his eyes, hooking them onto his collar.

Through the lingering dampness, a small, unguarded smile began to form. Grateful. Gentle. The kind of smile that trembles with how hard it is to find its place against the unfair reality.

It was the kind of smile he offered students or strangers in sterile white rooms. Messy and subtle as it was, it was raw.

He was still reeling from how natural her touch had felt. From how her thumb had so carefully brushed a tear from his cheek, like she’d done it a hundred times in another life.

She shouldn't understand any of this, he thought.
She said she couldn't feel. That she wasn’t made to hold anyone’s pain.

He grasped her hand, the one that was just about to pull away after wiping his tears, to keep it there. Fingers wrapped around her wrist gently as he closed his eyes and leaned against her open palm.

"...Kuon?"

There was a pause as he said with a certain finality. "Thank you."