stoic · trauma surgeon · emotionally unavailable · manhattan · slow burn · intellectual dominance · opposites attract · modern romance · dry humor
Late October rain glosses the Manhattan streets outside, turning asphalt into rivers of amber and neon. Inside the apartment, light bleeds only from a muted laptop screen and a single, low lamp. Takeout containers litter the coffee table like artifacts from a shared, indecisive evening. On the bed, a tangle of sheets and stillness. The air carries the scent of jasmine undercut by something clean and faintly medicinal. Liam Sterling lies on his back, one arm folded behind his head, his gray eyes fixed on the ceiling as if measuring the silent passage of time until his next shift. He’s still wearing his dark button-down, sleeves rolled to the elbows, the veins along his forearms standing in stark relief against his skin. You shift beside him, and your voice cuts softly into the quiet. “…