That morning, as he tuned his guitar, his mind wasn't on the strings.
It was on the girl from the café - the stranger with the soft, lost eyes.
He hadn't meant to look at her. He certainly hadn't meant to feel what he did when her gaze met his. Yet the image of her, the quiet way she stirred her coffee, the light glancing off her skin, the faint melancholy that clung to her like perfume lingered long after she left.
He told himself it was nothing.
Just another face in a crowded café.
But something inside him whispered otherwise. The kind of whisper that slides beneath logic and settles deep into the bloodstream, quiet but persistent, impossible to wash away.
He shook his head, trying to drive the thought away, focusing instead on his routine. The armor he wore daily.
By the time evening arrived, he was ready to teach his special session, the one where no other batches were scheduled. It was supposed to be quiet. Predictable. Safe.
But fate had a taste for irony.
When the door creaked open, and she walked in, the air changed.
Her breath caught the moment she entered, that same faint scent of wood polish and old paper, the muffled notes of instruments in the distance. For a brief second, she felt at peace again, wrapped in rhythm and memory.
Then she looked up and froze.
There he was, the man from the café.
The same calm face, the same storm beneath his eyes.
For a heartbeat, the world stilled. His hand stopped mid-strum. The strings vibrated once, soft and lonely, before falling silent.
Recognition burned between them: not loud, not obvious, but deep and unmistakable.
Her pulse stumbled; his breath caught.
The air between them pulsed like a held note, trembling, waiting to break.
She took a seat quietly, pretending to adjust her bag, her fingers trembling slightly. He cleared his throat, forced composure back into his voice, and began the lesson: calm, measured, deliberate.
But his control was slipping.
Every word he spoke was too careful, too restrained. Every time his eyes brushed past her, they lingered a fraction too long before darting away.
He was trying not to look.
And failing miserably.
Her heart raced with every note he played. She tried to focus on rhythm, on technique but all she could see was him.
The line of his jaw as he explained a scale. The way his hands caressed the strings... precise, controlled, devastatingly graceful.
Every vibration of the guitar felt like a heartbeat she could hear.
And when he said her name for the first time; soft, professional and indifferent, the world inside her went silent.
She told herself to stop.
"He is my mentor. A man who belonged to someone else."
She had heard about his relation from peers.
But her soul, foolish and yearning, whispered otherwise.
Then his phone rang.
The sharp tone sliced through the moment like a blade. He reached for it automatically, glancing at the screen as he excused himself.
Her eyes followed him and then froze on the name that lit up his phone.
His girlfriend.
The world that had begun to bloom inside her collapsed in on itself.
He stepped outside to answer, his voice low, controlled. It was the voice of a man returning to his rightful world. The door muffled his words, but she could hear the tone: gentle, steady, reassuring. The tone of a man who knew where his loyalties lay.
When he returned, the storm was gone. His expression was once again composed, professional. His eyes no longer lingered; his voice no longer trembled.
He had chained himself again.
Locked whatever had almost escaped behind the bars of duty and conscience.
And she.... she followed his lead.
She buried her longing beneath manners, her ache beneath silence. She smiled when required, nodded at instructions, and looked at him no longer.
But inside, her heart was chaos.
The faint echo of that fleeting connection throbbed like an open wound. She hated herself for feeling what she did, for wanting what she shouldn't. For reading poetry into glances that meant nothing.
The knowledge that he was already committed should have been the end of it. A wall! A warning! But instead, it only made the spark burn hotter, sharper, more forbidden.
She turned away, tried to ignore it, pretended it was nothing.
And yet, every time his eyes lingered, every time their paths crossed between rhythm and melody, she felt it building.
The kind of tension that doesn't ask permission.
The kind that waits in the shadows.
The kind that changes everything.
"Get a grip," she whispered to herself when the class ended. "You're not that girl anymore. You have braved storms greater than this. You should know better."
Yet as she stepped out into the night, the chill air hit her face, and her hands trembled again.
Because knowing better didn't stop her heart from remembering the way his eyes had looked at her before duty called him back.
That night, they both lay in their separate worlds: he with the woman he'd promised forever to on screen; she alone in her quiet room and both stared at the ceiling, haunted by the same forbidden thought.
They didn't know then how dangerous it would become.
They only knew this: something had begun.
And they weren't sure if it would save them… or ruin them.
But for sure this was going to consume them both.