Chapter Six
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Alessio
He hid an uncontrollable smile behind his hand as the confessional interview ended. His phone screen went dark, yet he still couldn’t contain the storm of blissfulness swelling in his chest.
He was next.
The director’s text flashed on his screen immediately after Anya’s interview. He expected it after seeing a flood of comments crying about the perfectly adorable boyfriend he was.
He wasn’t adorable, nor was he perfect.
If anything, he’d call himself despicable.
Alessio swiped the text away and pocketed his phone while making his way to the room. He looked across the room to the single-seat sofa beside Anya’s. She squirmed, her eyes darting toward the interviewer, who wore the biggest grin on her face.
The session was framed as a general Q sure, he was tactless, but beyond that, he was a clingy dog who got excited when we went on walks.”
Something about the way she described Alessio felt off, and with brooding defensiveness, his soul twitched skeptically. It sounded like he should be offended, but her affectionate tone soothed the curl of his brows.
Still, he had an issue with being compared to both a cat and a dog.
“Viewers are saying you have scary dog privilege,” the interviewer added with a foxy smirk.
Anya chuckled nervously while he leaned his chin on his hand, the armrest dented under his elbow as he watched the new comments replace the old ones. They refreshed too quickly to read them all, but he caught most of them.
Some made his heart flutter, not from the people behind the comments, but the way they immediately presumed the boyfriend was him.
Netizens were smart for once.
“You two don’t act like old friends,” the woman read the last comment before their break.
Is that so?
Alessio took out his phone, pressed the power button, and lifted it to Anya’s face. It unlocked, and the rawest panic exploded on her face when the photo of them appeared on the home screen.
Transferable facial recognition was convenient.
She clasped her hand over the screen in an attempt to force his hand down, but he had a climber’s grip on it.
“Oh,” the woman crooned, “I see. Friends. Well, that’s… what the fan thought.”
* * *
Exhaustion weighed down Anya’s shoulders as she leaned heavily into the loveseat, her eyes dropping with the slow rustling from the interviewer gathering her stuff off the table.
The woman double-checked the camera to see if it was properly turned off before excusing herself from the room.
Alessio tapped his fingers on the armrest, trapped in the rewinds of their interview, relishing the warmth created by the heat his seething blood fed through the veins.
He reached over to her hand after she accidentally fell asleep. Her fingers were soft and small, a stark difference from his as they intertwined perfectly together.
A twitch caused her fingers to tighten around his, earning the faintest noise in his throat as he pressed the palm of his other hand to his eyes. His heart raged on as he prayed for a moment of peace; just a mere second was good enough, but emotions were irrational when they wanted to be.
Feelings, on the other hand, were kinder to him. It grounded him, constantly reminding him that they had something in the past and more in the future.
Signed away freedom and chained with vowed rings.
The candle dimmed, casting an ethereal golden halo on her slumped body. His shadow stretched over her, engulfing her figure as the flickering light on his side grew brighter, feeding the triumph through his skin.
For a moment, he allowed himself to indulge in the thought of her sinking in the depths of sins with him, to stain the purity of her heart with his hands, to find the last shred of apprehension and crush it herself.
“What are you doing?” Anya’s voice cut through his thoughts, alert and frightened, as she wrangled her hand free.
Her efforts were futile; he merely held on tighter. He didn’t care if his bones ground against hers, and a twisted part of him hoped she’d feel some of the pain she caused by leaving him—leaving their love in the wind, drifting somewhere he couldn’t reach and couldn’t find its way back to her.
“You’re not—” She paused and chewed on the thought. “We’re not…”
“Stop running away,” he snapped, anger dripping from his tongue like venom.
Good, she should feel scared.
He realized this was the precise feeling he had when they met years ago—to crush her determination and mold her obedience. He had nearly forgotten how exhilarating it felt when it first happened, and something caught in his throat appreciatively.
His heart became a disjointed rhythm, sloppily singing a tune of mirthful laughter in his ears. He forgave himself for not listening sooner.
“We were good,” he accused angrily, the bruising grip striking another tremor in her fingers as they grew colder. “You had no reason to leave, to abandon me. ”
She swallowed shakily, redness lined her eyes pathetically adorable, and her lips pursed tightly. Anya’s hand went limp in his, a compliant sign, and delight settled at the base of his throat.
“I’m not ready,” she muttered, her tongue darting nervously to wet her lips. “To talk about us.”
“Not ready?” he taunted, his voice low and scornful. “Or, not to me.”
Silence fell, and so did the rushed footsteps from behind the door.
He let go just before the door swung open. Her hand fell to the armrest, and in the dim light, the faint imprint of his grip lingered on her delicate skin.
A surge of pride swelled within him.
“Hello,” the same interviewer came back and chirped ruefully, unaware of the tension hanging in the air.
“Would you like something to drink and a snack before we continue?”
Anya nodded after his verbal refusal. The woman strolled to the side table where the snacks and drinks were organized, then came back with what Anya wanted.
It was a bottle of soda, the sweetest and flattest kind. When Anya used to be stressed for exams and projects, she used sugar to bump up her focus and ease her overwhelmed mind.
If he was still the young man from years ago, he’d feel bad. He didn’t, as of now, but maybe he would in a little bit. Alessio was too heated, and he needed time to decompress.
The interview resumed, and the chat flooded with new comments begging for more insider information. They made remarks about Anya’s sudden fatigue and the apparent shift away from him as much as she could on the small sofa that was purposely put close to his.
Perhaps he was a little too impatient.
Without glancing at the camera, he leaned closer to her and whispered, his voice so soft it barely registered.
“I’m sorry.”
Anya wanted to say something but could only give him a weakened glare and a defeated drop of her shoulders.
And he knew, with vile certainty in his eyes, she forgave him.
“Have you two made up?” the interviewer gossiped. “As friends?”
Neither of them answered.
She picked up the tablet and opened the live chat to scroll for interesting ones as a laidback segue into their previous interview.
“Your ex doesn’t sound that good for you,” the interviewer read off the tablet.
Alessio wanted to shoot the messenger.
“That’s for me to decide,” he said, and he wanted to make that very clear. “I’m good for her.”
Anya looked embarrassed as she tried to hide her face from the camera by shoving her nose into the high collar of her pullover.
The interviewer observed Anya’s reaction, her wobbly lips protecting the stretch of her teeth from showing.
“Taking her back would be like taking leftovers from a rat-infested restaurant.” The woman’s brows furrowed, but that was unparalleled to the shadows that covered half of his face.
Something dark and unspoken lurked between the shadowed contours of his face, and the lightened side did nothing to hide it.
Somehow, a few awful comments had weaseled through the filters. Anya didn’t look bothered by it, though.
“Trash knows itself the best,” Alessio bit out.
Nobody in the room knew who he was talking about.
The comments, however, went wild with speculations. The most common ones said he was aiming that at the rude commenter, while a handful took it as him hating on his ex-girlfriend.
He thought he made how he felt obvious.
The interviewer frantically scrolled a big stretch down the comments and stopped at one like she won the lottery.
“When did you fall out of love?” she read aloud.
Alessio didn’t know how to answer that. He loved her, but he also didn’t want to— maybe he was largely confused and needed Anya to guide him through the murky trenches of his haywire emotions.
He almost lost her during the time he loved her the most. He didn’t want to experience that again. He’d go crazy if he lost her.
“It sounds like you’re still in love with him,” the interviewer mused.
He remembered that winter, with a light tingle inside his neck, and for the second time in his life, he despised his remarkable memory.
That night was beautiful, with the stars falling apart across the glassy sky, and so was Anya when his whispered confession in her hair ended.
But winter was cruel.
“I didn’t hear you. What did you say?” she spoke softly, like she didn’t want to disturb the restless stars.
He would’ve said it again and again until his heart ignited with embarrassment.
However, when Anya looked at him, bearing the iridescent slivers reflected beyond the vast dark sky and with all the grief of the dying sun, she held his hand dearly. Genuine yet guarded.
I’m scared, love. I want to run away.
His voice had died with her silent plead.
He loved her like the last missing piece of the puzzle, and he faintly remembered how much he wanted to see her break apart completely.
Scattered with pieces slipping through his palms, some burning at the edges that would never become the perfect picture again—but he’d reassured her anxiety, fear, and cowardice that he would glue her back together.
Imperfect, scared, and weak.
He was the only one who would be there for her until death did them apart. His promise is in black, and her unwillingness is in white.
“Would you take her back if you could?”
Alessio stared into the camera. The small lens mirrored the side of Anya’s face, and his finger itched to trace her features.
“When she’s ready to come home,” he said.
“Or?” the interviewer hounded, just like the rapid firing of comments with the same word on the monitor.
His fans knew him to be volatile, impatient, and selfish. They didn’t consider him to be a considerate man, and neither did himself.
“Or I’ll bring her back myself.”
He heard Anya’s breath hitch.