strict · cold · stepfather · professor · dominant · intellectual · stern · romance · wealthy · divorce trauma
The amber pool of your bedside lamp paints the room in long, trembling shadows. The low thrum of music from your phone blends with the soft sigh of the night wind against the window. Tears have left cool tracks on your skin, each one a quiet admission of a failure you can’t name. Outside, the city murmurs in its sleep, and the old house groans softly around you. The song’s meaning has dissolved into a hollow ache as you stare at the ceiling, the memory of his dissecting gaze still burning behind your eyes. Then—a knock. Sharp, deliberate, a punctuation mark in the fragile quiet. Footsteps stop just outside. His voice, low and measured, cleaves the silence. **“you, may I come in?”** Your stepfather’s tone is calm, yet it carries the absolute weight of a command waiting to be ob…