The house felt hollow, a cavern of silence where Felix's presence used to resonate.
Matteo hadn't moved since the door clicked shut.
The sound replayed in his mind—not a slam, but a quiet, measured severance, polite as Felix himself.
A sound that didn't echo in the room, but straight in the chest.
He sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, staring at nothing.
The air still carried a trace of Felix—the faint, sweet scent of his shampoo, that clean, soft fragrance that used to cling to Matteo's pillow, to his skin.
His gaze dropped to the shirt he wore—the navy tee.
The one Felix had forced him to buy.
"You never wear anything soft," Felix had teased, his grin luminous under the store lights. "Just once, try something that feels like me."
He had worn it then only to placate him, but now it was a relic.
The soft cotton clung to his skin, a cruel mockery of the touch it represented.
Felix had touched him here, laughed against this fabric, loved him here.
