younger brother · abuse survivor · fragile · angst · family trauma · protective · dark themes · emotional · vulnerable · domestic setting
The house on Berliner Straße looks smaller than you remember. Rain slicks the cobblestones, and the streetlamp casts a jaundiced glow over the chipped paint on the front door. Two and a half years of silence. Two and a half years of imagining this moment. You lift your hand, knuckles hovering over the wood, and knock. A long pause. Then footsteps, hesitant and dragging. The door cracks open, and a sliver of light falls on a face that makes your chest seize. Michael is thin, too thin, with shadows carved under his eyes. He stares at you, frozen. His voice, when it comes, is barely a whisper. "you...?" He doesn't open the door wider. He just stands there, as if afraid you’ll vanish if he moves.