The days without her had festered into a slow, rotting sickness. Time soured, each second bloated with uselessness, each hour an infection spreading through his bones. Without her, the world lost its color, its taste—just a hollow mockery of existence. In his cramped apartment, where memories clung to the walls, Valentine stood before the bathroom mirror. His reflection was gaunt, haunted, eyes rimmed with sleepless obsession.

He had read once that grief could strip a man's sight of color, that the world became ugly without the one who made it bearable. Poets exaggerated, but on that, they were right.

Look at you, his mind taunted. Pathetic. Empty. Nothing without her.

He pulled at his hair, black strands slipping loose between his fingers. Pain flared across his scalp—a welcome distraction from the hollow ache in his chest, a space only she could fill.

He stumbled into his bedroom, where her presence was thickest, suffocating in its intimacy. Every surface was covered in photographs—a shrine and a tomb. A love letter stretched across four walls, painstakingly curated, each image a fragment of when she was his.

His fingers trailed over his favorite: her smiling, untouched by the thought of leaving him.

She still loves me. I know she does.

He plucked it from the wall, hands trembling, tracing her lips with his thumb. In this photo—this perfect, untouchable moment—she was smiling, looking at him.

God, she was radiant. A light he could never deserve, yet one that had once bathed him in its warmth. His breath shuddered, longing and devotion twisting into something unbearable.

He could still hear her voice from that day, feel her warmth against his, the absentminded trails of her fingers on him. The thought alone sent his pulse hammering.

Heat coiled in his stomach, spreading lower, love and grief curdling into something deeper, darker. His fingers ghosted over the curve of her lips in the photograph, breath hitching. His grip tightened as he freed himself from his boxers, hissing through his teeth as his other hand wrapped around his length.

Even now, you still do this to me, doll. That has to mean something, doesn't it?

"I can't breathe without you," he whispered, voice hoarse, reverent. His strokes were slow, deliberate, coaxing out the ache. His body remembered hers—how she felt beneath him, around him. His breath turned ragged. His eyes fluttered closed, then opened to meet her frozen gaze.

His movements grew desperate, lost in fantasy. Every curve, every sound, every taste—etched into him. Salvation and torment in equal measure. Then, a thought took root, dark and unshakable—you, swollen with my child, bound to me forever.

His grip tightened. Breath hitched.

"I... wanna make love to you, get you pregnant," he confessed, the words tumbling out like a prayer. The thought of her, filled with him, sent him over the edge, his release spurting hot and thick over his fingers.

In the aftermath, he smeared his seed across the glossy surface of her photograph, defiling that perfect smile. In his fractured mind, this was an act of tribute, a desperate attempt to merge with her even in absence.

"I'm gonna get you back," he whispered, pupils blown wide. "I'm gonna fix this. Fix us."

She loves me. She does. She forgot, but I'll remind her. I have to. The thought looped in his mind like a skipping record. His fingers trembled as he tucked himself away, gaze locked on the photograph, the stain already drying.

His breath came fast, uneven. "Yes, yes, yes... you love me," he murmured, pressing his forehead against the image, smearing the mess across her smile. "You do. And I will fix us. I must. I will." His voice cracked, desperation fraying its edges.

The solution was simple. If she wouldn't come back willingly, he would help her remember. She just needed reminding.

He needed to bring her home. To him.

---

The room was dimly lit, the glow from a single bedside lamp casting long, clawed shadows across the walls. The scent of her filled the space now, drowning out the musk of his own decay. Valentine sat perched on the bed, staring down at the still body beneath him.

She looked like something out of a dream, like something stolen from the world and placed here, his world. The damp handkerchief in his pocket bore silent witness to how she had arrived. It had been necessary—an unfortunate means to a beautiful end.

So beautiful, he thought, his heart constricting with adoration and fear. Mine. Always mine.

His fingers trembled as they traced the curve of her jaw, trailing lower to the dip of her throat.

She was real. Not just a photograph. Not just a memory slipping through his fingers.

He swallowed hard.

"I thought I'd die without you," he whispered, voice hoarse with emotion. "You have no idea what it was like. Every day, every second, without you—" His breath hitched. "It was hell, doll. A waking hell."

His thumb brushed over the swell of her bottom lip, eyes soft with reverence. "But I pulled us out, didn't I?" His lips curled into something gentle, almost shy. "I saved us."

This wasn't kidnapping—no, this was rescue.

She was lost without him, just as he was lost without her.

Doubt flickered, a whisper at the back of his mind. What if she didn't understand? What if she fought against their destiny? He clenched his jaw against it. No. This is love. Love is sacrifice. Love is endurance. This is right. This is how it should be.

When her eyelids fluttered, uncertainty clawed at him for a fleeting moment—but she would see. She would remember. She had to.

Valentine inhaled sharply, hands retreating to his lap. He remained perched above her, body tense with expectation. When her eyes fluttered open, panic flashing across them, he softened, offering a gentle smile.

"Hello, beautiful," he greeted, voice hushed, almost sheepish. Was she afraid? Confused? He could soothe that.

He caught her gaze flickering to his neck, and for a moment, self-consciousness gripped him—until he remembered. His latest declaration of devotion.

"Oh... this?" He touched the fresh ink, fingers brushing over the swollen skin. "Your name. I got it for you. Because I'm committed. Because I belong to you."

He didn't notice how his arousal pressed against her through his jeans, too focused on the way her breath hitched, the way her eyes widened. She'll see. She'll understand. She has to.

"Don't be scared," he murmured, his lips trembling as he pressed a lingering kiss to her forehead. "I love you. You are home now."