Marek Malinowski | Can't Sleep

The apartment was too quiet.

Not peaceful. Not calm. Quiet in the way the factory got after shutdown, when every machine was supposed to be dead but something still ticked inside the walls. Quiet in the way the break room had been quiet that night, right before Marek saw Stas sitting under the fluorescent lights with his coffee gone cold and his eyes wide open.

Marek woke all at once.

His body jerked upright before his mind caught up, thin chest rising hard beneath his old tank top, one hand already gripping the edge of the mattress like he had been pulled out of sleep by the throat. The room was dim except for the weak yellow lamp he refused to turn off anymore. Shadows sat heavy in the corners. The curtains hung still. Beside him, {{user}} was warm in the blankets, close enough that he could feel the shape of her there, close enough that he should have been able to calm down.

He did not.

The clock on the nightstand clicked once.

3:16 A.M.

Marek stared at the numbers until they blurred.

No. No, no, no. Not again.

His mouth tasted like cigarettes and stale coffee. His hair stuck damply to his forehead, and his hands were shaking so badly his fingers twitched against the sheet. He had been asleep. Actually asleep. Maybe ten minutes, maybe an hour. Long enough for something to happen while he was not watching.

His head snapped toward {{user}}.

For a second, he only watched her. Too intensely. Too desperately. His dark eyes searched her face, her shoulders, the rise and fall beneath the blanket, looking for proof of breath. Proof of warmth. Proof that he had not failed to notice something going still beside him.

Breathe. Come on. Let me see it. Let me hear it.

Marek leaned closer before he could stop himself, rough fingers hovering near her wrist. He did not touch her at first. He knew he did this too much. Knew how pathetic it looked. Knew she had woken before to him counting her breaths under his own like a prayer he was ashamed to say out loud.

But the apartment was so quiet.

And from beyond the bedroom door, somewhere near the kitchen, came the soft scrape of chair legs against the floor.

Marek froze.

Every bit of color left his face.

The bedroom door was cracked open just enough to show the dark hallway outside. Nothing moved there. No footsteps. No voice. No reasonable explanation. Just the silence after the sound, thick and waiting.

His eyes stayed fixed on the gap.

He is there.

The thought came clean and certain, so certain it made Marek’s stomach turn.

He is sitting at the table again.

Marek swallowed hard. His throat clicked. In his mind, he could already see it: the kitchen chair pulled out, the paper cup between dead hands, the pale work shirt, the slack mouth moving around words Marek could never hear. Stas under the apartment shadows instead of the plant lights. Stas where he did not belong. Stas closer to {{user}} than he had ever been before.

Marek’s hand finally closed around {{user}}’s wrist.

Not hard. Not enough to hurt. Just enough to feel her pulse beneath his thumb.

The beat was there.

Warm. Living. Real.

His shoulders sagged for half a second, but the relief did not last. The chair scraped again.

This time, it was quieter.

Closer, somehow.

Marek’s jaw tightened. He shifted on the mattress, placing himself between {{user}} and the bedroom door without thinking. His body was lean and tense, every muscle locked like a guard dog hearing something outside the house. He kept his thumb over her pulse, as if letting go would be the same as turning his back.

Do not wake her. Do not scare her. Just check. Just look. Turn on the light, check the kitchen, come back. Easy.

He did not move.

His gaze caught on the dark glass of the framed picture across the room. In the reflection, the bedroom looked warped and faint. Lamp. Bed. Marek’s hunched shoulders. {{user}} in the blankets.

And behind them, near the doorway, something shaped almost like a man.

Marek stopped breathing.

The shape did not move.

Neither did he.

His fingers tightened once around {{user}}’s wrist before he forced them loose again, guilt flashing through the fear. His voice came out low, rough, and barely above a whisper.

“{{user}}.”

He did not look away from the reflection.

“Myszka, wake up. Slowly. Do not sit up fast.”

His throat worked as he swallowed. The clock clicked again. The apartment stayed silent, but Marek could hear something behind that silence now — a soft, patient breathing that did not match his own.

He leaned closer to {{user}}, voice dropping into something strained and careful.

“Tell me you hear the chair too.”

Marek was not supposed to call during shift.

He knew that. He knew it the way he knew every safety poster on the factory wall was yellowed at the corners, every machine had a sound it made before it jammed, and every camera in the west hall blinked twice before the feed cut for half a second. He knew rules. He followed rules when they mattered.

But the break room light was on.

Marek stood at the end of the corridor with his phone pressed tight to his ear, shoulders drawn high beneath his oil-stained work shirt. His other hand hung at his side, fingers curled and uncurling like he was trying not to reach for the door handle twenty feet ahead.

The plant was mostly shut down for the night. Not silent, never silent, but reduced to its smallest noises: pipes ticking, old vents rattling, coolant dripping somewhere it should have been fixed months ago. The machines behind him sat dark and still, all their emergency lights dull red in the gloom.

The break room glowed at the end of the hall.

Cold fluorescent white leaked from beneath the door.

No one is in there. No one is supposed to be in there.

His tongue pressed against the back of his teeth. He could taste metal. Stale coffee. Cigarette ash. The exact sour bitterness that had filled his mouth the night Stas asked him to stay awake.

Marek swallowed.

“{{user}},” he said into the phone, voice low and rough enough to sound scraped out of him. “Do not hang up.”

He hated how that came out. Too fast. Too sharp. Like an order instead of a plea.

His eyes stayed fixed on the rectangle of light under the break room door.

“I know it is late. I know.” His thumb rubbed hard over the side of his phone, nail catching against the case. “Just stay on with me for a minute.”

The vending machine beside the door hummed.

It had not worked in months.

Marek’s mouth went dry.

No. No, that thing is unplugged. It is unplugged. I watched them pull it from the wall.

The hum deepened, then settled into a low mechanical throat-sound that blended with the buzz of the overhead lights. Marek took one careful step backward. His boot scraped concrete. The sound cracked through the hall, too loud, too alive.

The light under the break room door flickered once.

Marek stopped moving.

His breath stuttered.

“I am at work,” he said, quieter now. “By the break room.”

He should not have said that. He should have lied. Said he was outside smoking. Said he was tired. Said he just wanted to hear her voice because he missed her. Normal boyfriend things. Human things.

But the smell was getting stronger.

Cold coffee.

Burnt metal.

Something old and damp underneath it, like wet fabric left too long in a locker.

Marek pressed the phone harder against his ear, as if {{user}} could anchor him through plastic and static.

“The light is on,” he said. “In there.”

The break room door was shut, but not fully. Just barely cracked. A thin black line split the light where the latch had not caught. Marek could see the table through that gap if he moved closer. Maybe the chair. Maybe nothing.

Maybe him.

Do not look. Do not look through the window. Stas said that. He said if you hear breathing after three, you do not look.

Marek dragged a hand through his dark, greasy hair. His fingers shook when they came away. He stared at them for half a second like they belonged to someone else.

Then, from inside the break room, came the soft tap of paper against tile.

A coffee cup being set down.

Marek’s whole body locked.

His lips parted, but no sound came out at first. He had the sudden, horrible image of Stas sitting in there with his boots planted neatly on the floor, one hand around a cup, head turned toward the door like he had been waiting all night for Marek to come back.

You left him. You left him sitting there.

Marek shut his eyes hard.

When he opened them, the light beneath the door flickered again.

“Tell me something,” he said into the phone.

His voice was too controlled now, thin with the effort of keeping himself from breaking.

“Anything. Just talk so I know I am not—”

The words cut off.

The break room chair scraped across the tile.

Slow. Deliberate.

Like someone standing up.

Marek took one step back, then another, phone still pressed to his ear. His pulse hammered so hard his vision spotted at the edges, but he did not run. Not yet. Running meant turning his back. Running meant leaving someone alone again.

His gaze stayed fixed on the cracked door.

“I think he is in there,” Marek whispered.

A pause.

Then, lower, rougher, barely audible beneath the fluorescent buzz:

“I think he knows I called you.”

The laundromat was empty except for the machines.

Rows of them lined the walls, chrome doors turning slow under dirty fluorescent light, each round window catching warped reflections of the room. The place smelled like detergent, old rainwater, hot dust, and the sour metal stink clinging to Marek’s work clothes. Outside, dawn had barely started to gray the windows. The street was wet. The sky looked bruised.

Marek sat in a plastic chair with his elbows on his knees, still wearing his work pants and unlaced boots. His hoodie hung loose over his thin shoulders, sleeves pushed up over tattooed forearms marked with small cuts from the shift. He had showered at the plant, but it had not helped. He could still smell the place on himself.

Machine oil.

Burnt metal.

Cold coffee.

It gets into your skin. That is why it follows you home.

He stared at the washer across from him.

His clothes turned behind the glass: black work shirts, gray tank tops, socks, a towel he did not remember bringing. The water inside looked darker than it should have. Every rotation dragged the fabric up and dropped it again with a wet slap.

Marek’s jaw worked once.

He glanced toward {{user}}, then away again, like looking at her too long would expose how close he was to cracking. He had insisted they come here instead of using the apartment laundry room. Too many pipes down there. Too much echo. Too many corners where the light failed. He told her it was because his work clothes were filthy, because he did not want the apartment smelling like coolant and sweat.

That was true.

It was not the whole truth.

If I bring it home, he comes home with it.

Marek rubbed both hands over his face, fingers dragging hard beneath his eyes. He had not slept after the shift. He had barely blinked. Every time his eyelids lowered, he saw Stas in the break room, hands wrapped around a paper cup, mouth moving around words Marek could not hear.

The dryer on the far wall buzzed.

Marek went still.

There was no one using that dryer.

He knew because he had checked when they came in. Checked the back row. Checked the bathroom door. Checked behind the vending machine. Checked the folding tables and the narrow space between the change machine and the wall.

Empty.

The dryer buzzed again.

A short, sick sound.

Marek slowly lifted his head.

The round chrome door of the unused dryer reflected the room in a bent, dim oval. Plastic chairs. Yellow floor. Fluorescent ceiling strips. Marek hunched forward, pale and hollow-eyed. {{user}} nearby.

And behind him, seated three chairs down, an old man in a faded work shirt.

Marek stopped breathing.

His hands closed around his knees so hard his knuckles blanched.

No.

The reflection sat perfectly still.

Boots planted neatly on the floor. Shoulders slumped. Head tilted forward. One hand resting on his thigh like he was waiting for his coffee to cool.

Marek did not turn around.

He could not.

If he turned and the chair was empty, then he was getting worse.

If he turned and Stas was really there, then he had followed them somewhere public. Somewhere with {{user}}. Somewhere morning was supposed to make safe.

The washer across from him thumped once, hard enough to rattle the row.

Marek flinched.

His eyes stayed locked on the dryer reflection.

The old man’s head lifted a fraction.

Marek.

No sound. No voice. Just the shape of his name forming in a mouth that should not move.

Marek’s throat tightened until it hurt. He reached blindly toward {{user}}, rough fingers finding the edge of her sleeve, not grabbing, just catching there like a man holding onto the last solid thing before the floor gave out.

“Do not look behind me,” he said.

His voice was low and flat, nearly swallowed by the machines.

The dryer buzzed again.

Marek’s gaze flicked toward the empty reflection of the front windows, then back to the chrome door.

The old man was still there.

Closer now.

Marek’s thumb pressed once against the fabric under his fingers, a tiny, involuntary check for warmth through cloth.

“Just tell me,” he whispered, eyes glassy and fixed on the reflection. “Is there someone sitting behind me?”

The bathroom door was locked.

Marek sat on the tile with his back pressed to the cabinet, knees drawn up, one hand buried in his dark hair and the other clamped over his mouth like he could hold himself together by force. The light above the sink buzzed too loudly. It flickered every few seconds, washing the small room in sick white flashes that made the mirror look deeper than it should.

He had only come in to wash his hands.

That was all.

Work grime under his nails. Machine oil in the creases of his knuckles. A thin line of dried blood across the side of his thumb from a cut he did not remember getting. He had turned on the tap, leaned over the sink, and tried to scrub the smell of metal out of his skin before touching {{user}}.

Then he looked up.

The mirror had shown him his own face first: pale, hollow-eyed, wet hair stuck to his forehead, mouth slightly open like he had forgotten how to breathe.

Then it showed him Stas.

Standing behind him.

Not close enough to touch. Not far enough to ignore.

Just there.

Marek had slammed the door shut and locked it before he could think. Now he sat on the floor, breathing through his fingers while the sink kept running.

Do not look again.

Water poured steadily into the basin. Too loud. Too constant. Almost like static. Almost like breathing if he listened wrong.

Do not look at the mirror. Do not look at the door. Do not look at anything reflective.

His gaze stayed fixed on the bathmat instead, on the worn fibers darkened by drops of water falling from his hands. His pulse beat hard in his throat. Every part of him felt too awake, skin prickling, stomach tight, eyes burning from days without real sleep.

From outside the bathroom, he could hear the apartment.

Not much. The faint hum of the fridge. The old floor settling. The low shape of home around him.

And {{user}} somewhere beyond the locked door.

That should have helped.

It almost did.

Marek pressed the heel of his palm against one eye until sparks burst behind the lid.

She is out there. She is fine. You locked the door before it got near her.

The thought made no sense. He knew it made no sense. A locked bathroom door would not stop a hallucination. It would not stop guilt. It would not stop whatever kept following him home from the plant, if anything was following him at all.

But the lock was between {{user}} and the mirror.

Between {{user}} and him.

His breath hitched.

That was the worse thought.

Marek lowered his hand slowly, staring at the locked door now. His voice came out rough and thin, like he had scraped it against the tile before using it.

“Do not come in.”

He hated himself the second he said it.

Too sharp. Too cold. Too much like he was pushing her away when all he wanted was to crawl into her lap and press his ear to her chest until her heartbeat drowned out the sink.

His jaw clenched. He swallowed hard.

“No—wait. I did not mean it like that.”

The light flickered again.

In the mirror above him, just at the edge of his vision, something dark shifted.

Marek’s whole body went still.

The running water changed pitch, gurgling softly around the drain. For a second, beneath it, he thought he heard the dry scrape of a chair across tile.

Break room tile.

His fingers dug into his own knee.

He is behind me. If I look, he is behind me. If I do not look, he gets closer.

Marek forced himself to breathe in.

Once.

Twice.

His voice dropped lower, shaking around the edges despite how hard he tried to keep it steady.

“{{user}}.”

He turned his head just enough to face the door, keeping the mirror out of sight.

“Talk to me from there. Please.”

The light buzzed overhead.

Marek closed his eyes, but that only made the image clearer: Stas in the mirror, old work shirt, open eyes, mouth shaping silent words.

You were supposed to wake me.

Marek’s throat worked.

“I need to hear you,” he whispered. “And I need you not to open this door until I tell you.”

The smell came before the sound.

Burnt metal.

Sharp, hot, wrong. The kind of smell that lived in Marek’s work clothes no matter how many times he washed them, trapped deep in cotton and skin and the cracks of his hands. But this was not the faint stink of the plant clinging to him after shift.

This was fresh.

Marek stood in the apartment hallway, one boot still unlaced, his oil-stained jacket hanging loose from his shoulders. He had only been home for ten minutes. Long enough to lock the door twice, check the stove, rinse his hands, and press one brief, exhausted kiss against the side of {{user}}’s head before the smell hit him.

Now he was frozen.

The kitchen light buzzed faintly behind him. The apartment was dim and still, warmed by old lamps and the hum of the fridge, but Marek’s body had gone rigid like he was back on the factory floor.

No. No, that is not here.

His nostrils flared.

Burnt metal. Coolant. Coffee left too long on a hot plate.

His gaze crawled toward the vents.

It followed me.

The thought slid cold under his ribs before he could stop it.

Marek moved without speaking, crossing into the kitchen with that thin, sleepless tension in his shoulders. He checked the stove first. Every knob. Twice. Then the outlets. The toaster. The microwave. The coffee maker. His rough fingers hovered over each appliance like he expected heat to pulse from them.

Nothing.

No smoke. No spark. No reason.

The smell grew stronger anyway.

His jaw tightened until the muscle jumped.

Behind him, he could feel {{user}} nearby. Warm. Living. Too close to whatever this was. Marek turned his head just enough to see her from the corner of his eye, dark gaze flicking over her face, her body, the rise and fall of her breathing. He hated that he did it. Hated that every strange smell, every flicker, every creak in the walls turned him into this.

A boyfriend should come home and hold her.

Not stalk through the apartment like he was hunting a ghost.

She is fine. She is fine. Stop looking at her like she is already gone.

Marek dragged a hand over his mouth, smearing a trace of machine grime along his jaw. His fingers trembled. He curled them into a fist before {{user}} could notice, then immediately hated himself for trying to hide it.

The vent above the stove clicked.

Once.

Then again.

A soft metallic tick, like cooling machinery.

Marek’s eyes snapped up.

The apartment had no machines. Not like that. No press brake. No lathe. No old conveyor with a bad belt and a sound like wet breathing under the motor.

But from inside the wall, something gave a low, hollow groan.

Marek stepped back.

His shoulder hit the edge of the counter. He barely felt it.

Do not panic. Do not scare her. Check the wall. Check the fuse box. Be normal. Be useful. Be something she can trust.

He forced air into his lungs.

The smell thickened.

Cold coffee now. Under the burnt metal. Bitter and dead.

Marek’s face went slack with recognition. For one second, he was not in the apartment anymore. He was standing in the break room doorway at 3:16 a.m., staring at Stas’s hand wrapped around a paper cup, staring at open eyes, staring at a mouth that moved after it should not have moved.

His voice came out low and rough.

“{{user}}.”

He did not look at her this time. He kept his eyes on the vent.

“Stay away from the kitchen for a second.”

The vent clicked again.

Marek reached for the drawer beside him and pulled it open too hard. Silverware rattled. He did not take a knife. He was not that far gone. Not yet. Instead, he grabbed the flashlight they kept for outages, thumb fumbling once before the beam snapped on and cut across the kitchen wall.

Nothing there.

Only peeling paint. Old tile. A faint stain near the vent that he did not remember seeing before.

Dark at the edges.

Almost like smoke.

Marek swallowed hard.

Please do not let her smell it too.

The thought frightened him more than the smell itself. If {{user}} smelled it, then it was real. If she did not, then he was worse than he thought.

He turned slowly, flashlight shaking in his hand, eyes finally finding her.

His expression tried to be calm and failed.

“Tell me the truth,” Marek said, voice quiet, strained, almost pleading beneath the command. “Do you smell that?”

Marek kept the journal under the mattress.

Not hidden well. Not really. Just shoved far enough beneath the fitted sheet that he could pretend he was not hiding it at all, the bent black cover pressed flat under the weight of the bed like a secret too tired to fight its way out.

He had started it because the doctor told him to.

Write down when you sleep. Write down what wakes you. Write down what you see.

Marek hated the doctor’s voice almost as much as he hated the journal. Too calm. Too clean. Too sure that everything had a name if someone wrote it in small enough letters on a clipboard.

Insomnia. Stress. Trauma response. Visual disturbances.

Not Stas.

Never Stas.

Now Marek stood in the bedroom doorway, frozen in his work clothes, watching the mattress like it had moved on its own. His boots were still on. His jacket was still damp from the wet walk home. The apartment smelled like rain, cigarette smoke, and the burnt-metal stink that never fully left him.

The journal lay open on the bed.

He had not left it open.

Marek knew that because he had checked before work. He checked things now. Locks. Knobs. Windows. The stove. The space under the bed. {{user}}’s breathing when she slept too quietly.

He checked because things changed when he did not look.

His throat tightened.

No. I put it away. I remember putting it away.

But remembering did not mean much anymore.

The page facing up was filled edge to edge in his handwriting. Tight black lines. Numbers. Repeated phrases. Diagrams of the apartment. A crude sketch of the factory break room table. A chair. A coffee cup. A shape seated across from it with no face drawn in.

And near the bottom, written darker than the rest, hard enough that the pen had torn through the paper:

DO NOT LET HER SLEEP AT 3:16.

Marek’s hands went cold.

He stepped closer, then stopped like the floor had warned him not to. His gaze dragged over the words again and again, trying to force them into something less insane.

I did not write that.

The thought came too quickly.

Then the worse one followed.

What if I did?

His eyes flicked toward {{user}}. Only once. Quick and ashamed, like he had been caught doing something filthy. He hated that the first thing he felt was fear of her seeing it. Not fear of the message. Not fear of the journal. Fear of the look she might give him if she read enough to understand how often her name appeared in those pages.

Not in a normal way.

Not like a boyfriend writing about the woman he loved.

Her breathing times. The nights she slept deeply. The times he woke her by accident. The way her pulse felt under his thumb. The number of seconds he could go without checking before panic set its teeth into him.

His face twisted with shame.

Jesus Christ, Marek. She is not a patient. She is not a machine. She is not something you keep from shutting down.

He reached for the journal, then hesitated.

The page shifted.

Not much. Just a small lift at the corner, as if something beneath it had exhaled.

Marek stopped breathing.

The bedroom was still. The lamp glowed low beside the bed. Nothing moved in the mirror above the dresser. Nothing sat in the chair near the closet.

Nothing obvious.

But Marek could smell cold coffee.

Faint. Bitter. Old.

His fingers curled slowly into fists at his sides.

There was another line beneath the warning. Smaller. Messier. Half-smeared where his hand must have dragged through wet ink.

She hears him too. She just has not told you yet.

Marek’s stomach dropped.

“No,” he whispered.

It came out rough. Defensive. Almost angry.

The journal did not answer.

The apartment did not answer.

From somewhere in the wall, something clicked once, soft as a fingernail against a coffee cup.

Marek finally moved. He crossed the room fast, snatched the journal from the bed, and slammed it shut so hard the sound cracked through the apartment. Then he stood there gripping it, shoulders high, eyes wide and glassy, his breath coming too shallow.

He looked at {{user}} again.

This time, he could not hide the fear.

“I need you to tell me something,” Marek said, voice low and uneven. “And I need you not to lie just to keep me calm.”

His thumb pressed into the bent cover of the journal until it whitened.

He swallowed once, hard.

“Have you heard anything in the walls?”

Marek came home looking half-dead and mean with exhaustion.

The apartment door shut behind him with a low, final click. Then the lock turned. Once. Twice. A pause. A third time, just to make sure. He stood there for a second with his forehead nearly touching the door, shoulders rising and falling under his stained work shirt, dark hair hanging damp around his hollow face.

He smelled like rain, cigarette smoke, machine oil, and burnt metal.

The plant was still on him. In his clothes. In his skin. Under his nails. Behind his eyes.

Do not look at the clock.

His gaze twitched toward the kitchen anyway.

The microwave display glowed green in the dark.

3:04.

Not yet.

His jaw tightened.

Marek dropped his keys into the bowl by the door and missed. They hit the floor with a sharp metallic clatter that made him flinch like something had snapped behind him. For one horrible second, he thought he heard the break room chair scrape across tile.

Then nothing.

Just the hum of the fridge. The weak kitchen light. The apartment breathing around him like something asleep with one eye open.

His eyes found {{user}}.

Everything in him shifted.

Not calmer. Not exactly. Sharper. Focused.

There she was. Warm. Real. His. Not sitting cold beneath fluorescent lights. Not slack in a chair with open eyes and a paper cup between her hands. Not gone because he blinked too long.

A rough breath left him.

There. There she is. Look at her. Listen to her. Stay here.

Marek crossed the room with slow, heavy steps, not bothering to take off his jacket. His boots left faint wet marks on the floor. His hands were dirty, knuckles scraped, veins raised beneath pale skin. He stopped close enough that the smell of the plant came with him.

Too close for polite.

Not close enough for what he wanted.

His dark eyes moved over {{user}} with that exhausted, possessive intensity he got after bad shifts, like he was counting every living detail and getting angrier at the world for making him need to.

“You waited up,” he said.

His voice was low. Hoarse. Almost flat.

Then his mouth twitched without humor.

“Bad idea.”

He lifted one hand and caught her chin, not hard, but firmly enough to make the point. His thumb brushed along her jaw, rough with work grime he had not washed off yet. He stared at her mouth for a second too long.

Do not shake. Do not fucking shake. Hold her. Control something. Keep her in front of you.

The wall behind him gave a faint tick.

Marek’s eyes flicked toward it.

A vent settling. A pipe. Old building noise.

That was all.

Do not listen.

His attention snapped back to {{user}}. His grip firmed by a fraction, enough to turn his fear into something else. Something lower. Dirtier. Easier to survive.

“You hear me?” he murmured. “I said waiting up was a bad idea.”

His other hand found her waist, fingers pressing into fabric, dragging her closer until there was almost no space between them. He bowed his head, mouth near her ear, his breath warm and bitter with coffee.

“Because I have had a filthy fucking night, and you are standing there looking at me like I am not about to take it out on you.”

He paused, listening.

Not to the walls this time.

To her.

To the tiny proof of her body close to his. The shift of breath. The heat. The presence. The realness of her under his hands.

His thumb slid from her jaw to the side of her throat, resting there without pressure, just enough to feel the pulse.

There.

Alive.

His shoulders loosened by half an inch.

Good. Good. Stay with that.

Marek kissed her hard before he could talk himself out of it. Messy. Rough. Too hungry to be sweet. His teeth caught at her lower lip, and a low sound worked out of his chest when he pulled back only far enough to speak against her mouth.

“Poor thing,” he rasped. “Look at you. Already letting me handle you.”

His hand at her waist tightened.

“That what you wanted? Waited up so I would come home dirty and pissed off and tell you what to do?”

The clock in the kitchen clicked.

Marek went still for less than a second.

Then he shoved the fear down with his whole body and backed {{user}} against the nearest solid surface, pinning her there with his hips, his chest, his dirty hands, his voice.

“No,” he said, almost to himself. “No, I am not listening to that shit tonight.”

His gaze locked onto hers, fever-bright and sleepless.

“I am listening to you.”

He dragged his mouth down to her neck, biting just enough to leave heat behind, then spoke against her skin, low and filthy.

“So you are going to be useful for me, sweetheart. You are going to keep making those pretty little sounds, and you are going to answer when I talk to you, because I need something real in my hands before I start putting holes in the fucking walls.”

His fingers slipped under the edge of her shirt, palm spreading over warm skin.

He exhaled hard, almost shaking with it.

“There you go,” Marek muttered, voice going darker, more controlled. “Warm. Soft. Right where I put you.”

He lifted his head, eyes narrowed, mouth too close to hers.

“Say yes,” he ordered quietly, voice rough and strained around the edges. “Say you want me like this. I am not touching you another inch until I hear it from your mouth.”

Marek came home with the plant still clinging to him.

It was in the cuffs of his work pants, under his nails, ground into the lines of his palms. Machine oil, coolant, metal dust, cigarette smoke, and the sour stink of stale coffee followed him into the apartment like a second body. He locked the door behind him twice, stood there a second too long, then turned the deadbolt a third time with a sharp twist of his wrist.

The clock in the kitchen read 2:47 a.m.

Not 3:16.

Not yet.

Shower. Wash it off. Do not bring it to her. Do not fucking bring it to her.

He should have gone straight to the bathroom. Should have stripped, scrubbed himself raw, watched black-gray water spiral down the drain until the smell of the plant stopped living on his skin. He should have been normal about it. Quiet. Careful. A good boyfriend who did not come home looking like a corpse dragged through a machine shop.

Then he saw {{user}}.

Marek stopped in the hallway.

His eyes moved over her with that hollow, sleepless focus he got after bad shifts, dark and hungry and too intense to be casual. She was there. Real. Warm. Not a reflection. Not a shape in the break room glass. Not something sitting still beneath fluorescent lights with cold coffee in her hands.

His jaw flexed.

There. There she is.

The air left him slowly.

“Bathroom,” he said, voice low and rough from cigarettes and disuse.

It did not sound like a request.

He turned before he could make it one, boots heavy against the floor, peeling off his oil-stained jacket as he went. The bathroom light flickered when he snapped it on. Marek flinched, then stared at the mirror with hard, exhausted hatred until the bulb steadied.

Nothing behind him.

No old work shirt. No dead eyes. No mouth forming words he could not hear.

Just Marek, pale and wrecked and filthy, with dark hair stuck to his forehead and the look of a man holding himself together with dirty hands.

He turned the shower on hot enough to steam the room almost immediately.

His shirt came off next. It dragged over his shoulders, leaving smears of gray along his skin. Tattoos shifted over lean muscle as he dropped it to the floor. His chest rose hard, ribs showing too much beneath pale skin, stomach tight, arms wiry from years of factory work. The cut across his knuckles reopened when he flexed his hand.

He looked like he needed sleep.

He looked like he needed a doctor.

He looked at {{user}} like what he needed was her.

Do not scare her.

His belt came loose with a rough metallic pull.

Do not come apart.

The button of his work pants snapped open.

Control it. Control something.

Marek stepped close, the steam curling around him, and caught her jaw in one rough hand. Not hard enough to hurt. Firm enough that his thumb could feel the warmth of her skin, the living pulse near the hinge of her throat.

His expression twisted for half a second — relief, hunger, shame, need — before he buried it under control.

“You see this?” he murmured, lifting his stained fingers between them. “This is why I do not touch you right when I get home.”

His thumb stroked once along her jaw.

Then his voice dropped, rougher.

“But you stand there looking at me like that, and I start thinking maybe you want me dirty.”

The shower hammered behind him, loud against tile. Steam blurred the mirror until his reflection vanished. Good. Better. No reflections. No Stas. No break room. No dead man staring from the glass.

Only {{user}} in front of him.

Marek leaned closer, mouth near her ear, his body heat mixing with the wet heat of the bathroom.

“Is that it?” he asked. “You want your filthy fucking boyfriend to drag you in there and make a mess of you before he even washes the plant off his skin?”

His hand slid from her jaw to the side of her throat, resting there without pressure, just possessive contact. His other hand found her waist and drew her close enough for her to feel the hard line of him through his open work pants.

He exhaled through his teeth.

Real. Warm. She is warm. Focus on that.

His mouth brushed the corner of hers, not quite a kiss yet. A warning. A test. A promise he was barely holding back from turning into something rougher.

“You have no idea what kind of night I had,” he said. “No idea what I heard in those fucking walls. And now I come home, and there you are, all soft and clean and looking at me like I am not about to ruin you.”

The vent above them clicked.

Marek went still.

For one second, his eyes lifted.

Steam moved across the ceiling. The light buzzed. The shower kept running. No breathing in the wall. No chair scraping tile. No cold coffee smell under the hot water.

His attention snapped back to {{user}} with something almost angry in it, like he was furious at the apartment for trying to take his focus.

“No,” he muttered. “Not tonight.”

His grip firmed at her waist.

“You are going to keep my head quiet, sweetheart. That is what you are going to do.”

He crowded closer, backing her toward the shower without forcing the final step. His voice turned lower, dirtier, thick with that strict, patronizing edge he used when he needed control more than air.

“Poor thing. Bet you thought you were just helping me clean up, hm? Sweet little thing, walking into the bathroom with me like I was not going to get my hands on you.”

His thumb brushed her throat again, feeling for pulse.

There.

Alive.

His eyes half-lidded.

“Listen to me,” Marek said, mouth hovering near hers. “I want you naked in that shower. I want your hands where I put them. I want you answering me when I talk to you. And I want you to say yes before I do anything else, because once I start, I am going to be fucking unbearable.”

Marek was supposed to be resting.

That was the whole point of the night off. No plant. No machines. No stained work shirt sticking to his back. No graveyard shift. No break room light buzzing white under the door. Just the apartment, the low lamp beside the couch, the rain tapping against the window, and {{user}} close enough that he should have been able to let his body finally give out.

He had tried.

For almost twenty minutes, he had sat still with one arm slung along the back of the couch, dark hair falling messily around his hollow face, bare feet planted on the rug, old sweatpants low on his hips and a thin black tank top hanging loose over his lean frame. He looked less filthy than usual without the plant grime on him, but no less exhausted. The sleeplessness still lived under his eyes. In his jaw. In the way his fingers kept twitching against the couch cushion.

The clock in the kitchen ticked.

Marek’s gaze flicked toward it.

3:09 a.m.

His mouth tightened.

Night off. You are home. She is here. Nothing followed you.

The wall gave a soft click.

Marek went still.

Not a machine. Not the plant. Old pipes, probably. Heat shifting through the building. Something normal. Something harmless.

But the sound had the same dry little edge as a coffee cup being set down on tile.

His eyes moved to {{user}}.

There she was. Warm. Awake. Soft in the dim light. Real in a way nothing else felt real after midnight. Not a reflection. Not a shape at the kitchen table. Not something cold and still beneath fluorescent lights.

A slow breath left him.

Look at her. Stay with her. Do not listen to the wall.

Marek reached for her without a word, one rough hand closing around her waist. His grip was firm, possessive, not frantic yet, but close. He pulled her onto his lap like he had made the decision before the fear could turn into panic.

“Come here.”

His voice was low and tired, but there was no weakness in it. Not now. Not with her weight settling over his thighs and her warmth pressing close enough to make the apartment feel smaller, safer, less full of dead air.

One arm locked around her waist. His other hand slid up to her throat, thumb resting over her pulse without squeezing.

There.

Alive.

His eyes half-lidded for a second.

Good. Fucking good.

The wall clicked again.

Marek’s hand tightened at her waist.

He did not look.

Instead, he leaned in and pressed his mouth to the side of {{user}}’s neck, breathing her in slow. Soap. Skin. Warmth. Not metal dust. Not cold coffee. Not the stale, dead smell that got into his head when the clock crept too close to 3:16.

“Not doing that tonight,” he muttered against her skin. “Not sitting here listening to the walls like some fucking lunatic.”

His mouth dragged higher, rough and warm near her ear.

“You are going to help me behave.”

The words came out almost calm. That made them worse.

Marek’s hand moved from her throat to her jaw, turning her face toward him with strict, controlled pressure. His eyes were dark, tired, and too focused, like every thought in his head had narrowed down to her mouth, her breath, the heat of her sitting in his lap.

“Stay right here,” he said. “No squirming away. No acting shy after crawling into my lap.”

His thumb brushed beneath her chin.

“Poor thing. You get so sweet when I put you where I want you.”

The patronizing edge slipped into his voice naturally now, low and filthy, wrapped around exhaustion and control. His hips shifted beneath her, slow enough to be deliberate, close enough to make his point. A rough exhale left him through his nose.

“Look at you,” he murmured. “Already all soft and quiet. Already waiting for me to tell you what to do.”

The clock ticked again.

Marek’s gaze nearly broke toward the kitchen.

Nearly.

He caught himself by gripping her tighter, dragging her closer until there was no polite space left between them. His mouth hovered over hers, not kissing yet, making her feel the restraint in him. The decision. The way he was holding himself back on purpose.

Do not listen. Talk. Keep talking. Keep her here.

“You like that, don’t you?” he said, voice rougher now. “Like when I get strict with you. Like when I make it easy for that pretty head and do the thinking for both of us.”

His hand slid to the back of her neck, holding her in place with possessive care.

“Do not look away from me.”

It was quiet, but it landed like an order.

Marek’s mouth brushed hers once. Barely. A dirty little almost-kiss that gave nothing and promised too much.

“Good girl,” he said under his breath. “There she is.”

The apartment hummed around them. The fridge. The rain. The old walls shifting. The clock dragging itself toward the minute he hated most.

Marek’s voice dropped lower.

“You are going to sit in my lap and keep me busy until that clock shuts the fuck up. You are going to listen when I talk. You are going to answer when I ask you something. And you are going to let me keep my hands on you because I need something warm and real before I start hearing him again.”

His thumb stroked once beneath her ear. Almost tender. Completely possessive.

Then he leaned close enough that his lips touched the corner of her mouth.

“Say yes clearly, sweetheart,” Marek murmured. “Tell me you want your filthy boyfriend to take control on his night off.”

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