Ruth’s POV
The sketch wouldn’t leave me alone.
Long after the sun climbed over the hills, I was still curled on the couch with it open on my phone, zooming in and out like the extra pixels might reveal more. But it was already all there, the angle of my shoulders, the way my head tipped toward the sky, the wild grass bending around my bare feet… and him.
Drawn just inside the tree line, not hidden, not disguised, waiting. He hadn’t made himself the focus, but he hadn’t erased himself either. The shadowed lines of his body, the turn of his head, the precision of it told me this wasn’t about memory. He’d been there, watching, and drawing.
The composition read like a confession. Not desperation, not apology, just clarity. He wanted me to see him. I didn’t make coffee that morning, and didn’t pick up a brush or wash a single dish. I just slipped into my boots and walked the edge of the meadow, pausing every few feet to glance toward the trees. Not afraid. There was comfort in it now, the awareness of being seen didn’t feel like an intrusion. It felt like gravity, a steady presence that reshaped my solitude into something bearable.
By late afternoon, the sky churned a low gray, wind folding through the field with warning. Thunder rolled in the distance. I moved through the house, locking the back windows, tying the curtains. When the knock came, it didn’t startle me. I opened the door and found Emmett standing on the porch, soaked to the bone, a tarp slung over one shoulder.
“I saw the storm coming,” he said. “Thought your shed might need covering.” Rain trailed down the edges of his hood, dripping from his mask like a second skin.
“You walked all the way here in this?”
He shrugged, expression unreadable. “Didn’t want you out there alone.” I stepped back without answering, just enough to let him in.
He hesitated for a heartbeat, then crossed the threshold, water pooled beneath his boots. I handed him a towel. Our hands brushed, brief, but not neutral. His fingers were cold, wet, steady. Mine weren’t, and neither of us moved away.
Lightning cracked beyond the trees, he tugged off the hoodie first, the fabric heavy with rain. Then, slowly, deliberately, his hand reached for the strap of the mask. He waited, and I didn’t stop him. The mask came off. The scar pulled from the corner of his mouth to the base of his cheekbone, deep, healed badly, the kind that changes how people see you even if it no longer hurts. I looked without flinching. He studied my reaction like it mattered more than anything else in the room.
“It happened when I was twelve,” he said quietly. “House fire.” My throat tightened.
“My sister was taken that night. I tried to go after her. Got caught in the flames.”
“Did they find her?”
He shook his head. “Not yet. But I’ll never stop looking.” His voice wasn’t broken, it wasn’t soft. It was conviction.
I stepped closer, toe to toe. “You think watching me will make that pain smaller?”
“No.” His answer was immediate. “But seeing you… it reminds me there’s still something worth saving.”
I didn’t breathe for a second. My hand rose, stopping just before touching his cheek. I hovered there, inches from the scar. “I don’t think you’re the one who needs saving.”
The silence that followed was thick. Not awkward, but charged. When my fingers finally made contact, grazing his cheek, his breath caught. His eyes closed, he didn’t kiss me. He leaned in until his forehead rested against mine, and everything in the room narrowed down to that one point of contact. His hand found my waist, warm now, steady. He didn’t pull, just held. My body leaned in. Not in fear, but in need. But he stepped back, barely.
“Not tonight,” he murmured, voice rough. “Not until you’re sure you want to be seen.”
And just like that, he picked up his hoodie, slipped it on, and walked back into the storm. No door slam, no final words. Just rain swallowing everything behind him. Hours later, after the wind had calmed and the windows stopped shaking, my phone lit up.
No subject line, one sentence. I used to think scars ruined people. Yours make me want to stay.