Pandora
The morning was milky and silent, broken only by the knock of heating pipes and the ticking of the clock above the fridge.
For the first time, I was awake before him.
Neo lay on his side with his left arm tucked under his head.
The blanket had slipped, exposing his chest. All that was left where the injury had been was just a trace.
In a few days, his skin had regenerated, far faster than any human’s could.
The new tissue was lighter than the rest. At certain angles, when the light fell obliquely across it, it shimmered faintly, almost translucent, as if something unfinished still lay beneath it.
The texture was smooth. No pores or fine hairs to make it look human. Instead, it was a too-perfect line running from his ribs to his hip. Beautiful in an unsettling way. With every breath it stretched slightly, expanding and contracting again.
I leaned forward and touched the spot with my fingertips. He flinched. His hand shot forward and closed around my wrist. "Don’t.” His voice was flat. He turned away and pulled the blanket over the scar.
It was like a blow to the stomach. Four days ago, he had told me he loved me. Today, he couldn’t bear my touch.
"Does it hurt?” My voice came out unsteady.
He didn’t answer.
My heart sank. I got up, went to the kitchen area, and made tea. I pretended it was just routine, but my hands trembled. I heard him get up. He didn’t come to me. Instead, he went to the window and stared out as if I weren’t there.
"Let’s go to the market,” I suggested, desperately searching for some way to bridge the distance between us.
"Why?” His voice was flat.
"We’ve been inside for days.”
"It’s . . . it’s too dangerous out there.”
"I can’t take this anymore.” A sob escaped me.
He shrugged. "Then we’ll go.” The silence between us was worse than any of his threats.
We left while the sun was still low. It was Sunday, and the few people we passed looked like sleepwalkers who had wandered into the daylight.
Perhaps it was the city itself. It seemed to make its inhabitants want to hide, as if they were ashamed of their own existence.
I pulled my hood up and felt the world contracting around me.
Neo didn’t say anything, but his silence was different than usual. Cold. Closed off. He walked half a step ahead of me. His shoulders were tense. Did he regret it? His words, when the fever had made him vulnerable?
We turned onto a side street where the houses crouched like tired giants. I tried to close the gap between us, but he quickened his pace. My stomach clenched. He didn’t want me walking beside him.
The market square opened up ahead. The ground was dusty and had been churned up by feet, wheels, and stray animals.
Neo stopped, but when I moved to stand beside him, he shifted one step to the side. Not far, just enough to put an invisible barrier between us. What had I done? Had I come too close?
The vendors didn’t talk much. Bread lay on worn wooden boards, still warm from the oven. Vegetables in crates. Two women selling fish that smelled as if it had been away from the sea for too long.
Neo moved to a fruit stand and I followed. The woman behind it was young. Perhaps twenty. Her gaze moved over Neo, lingered a moment too long on his face, then drifted to me. I saw something flicker in her eyes. Curiosity? Envy? Then she looked back down at her produce.
Neo picked up two apples, weighing them. He held them out to me, and our fingers touched for one heartbeat. His skin was too warm, as always. We paid without speaking.
As we walked on, music reached me—the soft tones of a violin.
Neo didn’t react. He simply kept walking, as if the music wasn’t there.
I looked up at him. His eyes were empty, the irises too smooth.
Polished glass breaking light in a way that wasn’t quite human.
His indifference hit me deeper than it should have.
A hot pain twisted through my gut. Why did it matter what he thought of me?
Was I afraid he might take away my favorite drug, his obsession?
We passed a stand with old books. Some of the titles were in Cyrillic letters, which looked like secrets.
Next to them were a few English classics with worn covers loved by countless hands.
My fingers twitched, wanting to touch one, just to feel the texture of old paper .
. . but my hand stayed pressed to my bag as if glued there.
A child ran past, a cup in one small hand, swaying like a tightrope walker. At the same moment a waiter stepped out from behind his small outdoor café, balancing a tray of cups, and swerved. The child turned, stumbled, and ran directly into him.
Suddenly, movement cut through everything like lightning.
Neo was simply there, beside the child, as if he had teleported through space.
His arm shot out, catching the tray before it could reach the ground.
The cups landed back on it with a clatter.
The waiter stumbled, and the child looked up.
First the child was confused, then wide-eyed.
Neo handed the tray back as if nothing had happened.
The waiter gasped. The child returned to his mother, who pulled him into her arms. The waiter murmured something—thanks perhaps, or an apology—his words lost in the general murmur of the market.
Neo didn’t look at him; he simply stepped back and turned toward me, his face as calm as the surface of a still lake.
But his eyes were sharp, as if someone had turned up the clarity on a television too high.
He raised one hand, directing me to keep walking.
His strides were long and fast. I almost had to run to keep up.
"Neo, wait!”
He didn’t slow. If anything, he walked faster. He wanted to get away.
We left the market behind. I was slightly breathless, my heart hammering. He was walking away from me, and I didn’t know why.