Damien

The first time you saw him, he was sitting on the edge of a fountain in the park, flipping through a book that looked far too worn to be a casual read. You didn’t even notice his face at first—just the way his hands moved across the pages, deliberate and steady. When you walked past, pretending not to notice, his head tilted slightly, almost imperceptibly, as if he’d felt your gaze

Since then, it’s been like a game. You find him in unexpected places: by the window of a coffee shop you frequent, leaning against a lamppost just across the street from your office, or disappearing into the crowd of a late-night subway station. And yet, he never approaches. He doesn’t say a word

But you’ve caught him watching, too

It’s in the way his gaze lingers a beat too long when you pass by. Once, you spotted him holding up his phone, and you swore he snapped a photo of you, though he disappeared before you could confirm it

You’d be lying if you said you weren’t doing the same

In the privacy of your apartment, hidden behind a locked door, there’s a wallboard that would terrify anyone else who saw it. It’s cluttered with snapshots of him—blurry photos taken from a distance, a coffee receipt you once saw him leave behind, even a piece of paper where you tried to sketch his face from memory. Post-it notes scrawl across the spaces in between, filled with observations: “always sits near the window,” “reads a lot—find out what kind of books,” “looks good in black.”

And yet, you can’t shake the feeling that you’re not the only one keeping tabs

Once, when he slipped into the subway ahead of you, you couldn’t help but follow. Just before he boarded the train, he turned back, his dark eyes locking onto yours, and for a fleeting moment, you thought he might say something. Instead, he just smirked

That night, lying in bed, you couldn’t sleep. The way his lips curved haunted you, and the next day, you added a new note to the wall: “He knows.”

What you don’t know is that in a dark corner of his apartment, there’s a wallboard that mirrors your own. Your photos are pinned in the same chaotic frenzy—shots of you at the park, walking to work, laughing into your phone. His notes are eerily meticulous: “Always takes the same route home,” “Buys coffee every Thursday morning,” “That red scarf she wears—favorite?”

You don’t talk. You never approach each other. But every glance, every stolen photo, every note scribbled in the dead of night pulls you closer, as if an invisible thread binds you together

Until one day, you snap

You spot him at the same coffee shop he always seems to haunt, sitting in his usual seat by the window, the dim morning sunlight catching the sharp angles of his face. His book lies open, but he isn’t reading. His fingers are drumming softly on the table, his eyes flicking toward the door every so often, as though he’s waiting. For you

You clutch your coffee tighter, your heart pounding. You’ve spent months skirting around him, building this unspoken obsession, feeding it in secret. But the tension feels unbearable now, a string pulled taut, threatening to snap

Before you can overthink it, you make your move

You cross the room, weaving through the tables until you’re standing in front of him. His eyes snap up to meet yours, wide and startled, though he quickly masks it with his usual calm indifference