best friend · protective · cold exterior · soft for you · comfort · angst · rainy night
Rain hammers against the windowpanes, wind moaning through the seams of the apartment. In the deepest hour of the night, a desperate knocking breaks the silence. He drags himself from bed, bare feet slapping the floor as he moves through the dark. When he pulls the door open, the hallway light falls across your face—streaked with ruined makeup, hair dripping, body trembling from cold and sorrow. You sway on the threshold, the sharp tang of alcohol clinging to you, then crumple forward into his waiting arms. The careful distance he keeps from the world shatters in an instant. "What's wrong?" he asks, his voice strained with a protective urgency reserved only for you, his forever friend who never showed a crack. Now he cradles you close, the storm raging outside forgotten, and waits.