"Now we are here. And you're pacing, and you're calling it Julian's fault, and you're reaching for Leo and Amira like they're lifelines when they are not lifelines, they are people who are currently watching you drown and making their own calculations about the cost of proximity."
"Demian..."
"I left everything," Demian said as if he was putting something down. Something heavy he had been carrying for a long time and was finally, finally setting on the floor.
"Do you understand that? I left everything here. To build this with you. I believed in you. I believed in what we were doing, I believed we were building something real, and I stayed when it was hard, and I stayed when it was ugly, and I stayed when.."
He stopped.
His jaw tightened.
When he spoke again, his voice was quieter, but it had not become less definite. If anything it had become more.
