Chapter 5

He entered the room, which was in a frighteningly cozy semi-darkness. It was a silence that, for Hector, at that moment, was just another point of comfort and serenity, the perfect refuge for a soul in conflict.

Hector walked towards his solid leather chair. He sat down, his body sinking slightly into the leather, and assumed an imposing posture that was a pure facade. His elbows rested on the arms of the chair, his fingertips joining under his chin. His eyes, normally so focused and alert, stared into emptiness; the framed portrait of his favorite baseball team on the opposite wall was nothing more than a formless blur.

"What the hell am I going to do with my life?" The question was a hoarse whisper, laden with an anguish that the room's silence seemed to absorb and amplify. How to deal with this desire that grew like an uncontrolled fire? How to honor the decades-long friendship with Johan while his mind was filled with the image of his daughter with lewd and sinful thoughts? He closed his eyes, and there she was: Theresa, with her smile that was both sweet and challenging, her eyes that seemed to see through all his defenses. It was a torment, a temptation, a personal hell he himself had fed.

Theresa Michaels walked in a hurry. The clock on top of a commercial building confirmed her worst fears: she was late for her Brazilian Literature class, the only subject whose professor was a stickler for punctuality.

"Who told you to stay up late last night, agonizing over an idiot?" she thought, cursing herself mentally as she dodged a group of tourists. "Dammit!"

Frustration was a bitter taste in her mouth. She quickened her pace, her backpack hitting her back with each movement. As soon as the brick facade of the university building appeared before her, her heart leaped, but not because of the lateness. There, standing on the sidewalk, was Ryan. He was holding a bouquet of red roses so huge and artificially perfect it looked more like a stage prop than a genuine gesture.

Theresa rolled her eyes with a mixture of anger and weariness. "No. Not today." She determined internally, adjusting the strap of her backpack on her shoulder and fixing her gaze on the top of the steps leading to the main entrance. She continued on her way, determined to completely ignore the presence of the man she once thought she loved, and who, at the first opportunity, had stabbed her in the back with the most cliché betrayal possible.

"My love..." Ryan's voice, smooth, cut through the air just as she passed him.

She stopped. Then, she turned to face him. Her eyes, normally full of warmth, were as cold as ice.

"Never call me that again." Her voice was icy and sharp. "I am not and never was that to you. Forget that word."

Ryan maintained his fake smile, but a flicker of discomfort passed through his eyes. He extended the bouquet.

"Theresa, please. They're for you. You are my love, you know that. You always have been."

"I am not." She stared him down, refusing to look at the roses. "And you know why I'm not? Because you don't know what love is. Love doesn't disappear at the first opportunity, it doesn't jump into the first available skirt."

Ryan's face lost a bit of its color.

"But... Theresa, it was a mistake. A stupid mistake, I was drunk, she meant nothing..."

"No, Ryan." She interrupted, raising her hand to silence him. Her patience was already worn thin. "There is no 'but'. That is exactly what you did. And that, for me, is unforgivable. There is no excuse that erases the disrespect. There is no amount of alcohol that justifies the breach of trust."

He opened his mouth to protest again, but Theresa had already turned away. She climbed the steps with renewed determination, feeling the weight of his gaze on her back, but also a strange lightness. She had spoken her truth. She had put a definitive end to that story.

"Forget it, Ryan!" She threw the words over her shoulder without even looking back. "Go offer your roses to the next one. I'm sure you'll find another fool willing to believe your smooth talk. I am no longer one of them."

The glass door of the university closed behind her, definitively cutting off the awkward scene. Ryan was left alone on the sidewalk, the grotesque bouquet now seeming like an object of ridicule. He let his arms fall, the roses symbolically wilting under the relentless sun.

Inside the cool lobby, Theresa stopped for a moment, leaning against a cold wall. She took a deep breath, trying to calm her heart which was beating rapidly in her chest. The anger gave way to a profound weariness. The conversation with Ryan had drained her, but it had also freed her from a burden she had been carrying for weeks. A chapter was truly closed.

As she headed to the classroom, already mentally preparing the excuse she would give the professor, her mind, treacherously, wandered from the superficial ex-boyfriend to the complex and intense man who had taken her home the night before. Hector. The memory of his presence, the charged silence between them, the way his eyes watched her, was a memory that disturbed her in a completely different way. In a way that, she suspected, was far more dangerous.