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I Don't Know You
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2025-07-22 02:24:58The sun was already rising when Maya opened her eyes.
She lay still, her body half-curled under the covers. The room was quiet except for the low hum of the ceiling fan and the faint sounds of Lagos waking up outside her window—horns, radios, restless birds.
She didn’t move. Didn’t reach for her phone.
Instead, she turned her head toward the floor.
He was still there.
Elias lay on his back, arms crossed over his chest, eyes closed. The blanket she’d thrown down for him had slipped off sometime in the night. He didn’t look peaceful. Not exactly. But his face was softer in sleep. Less guarded. Like the man he tried not to be had surfaced briefly in the dark.
She watched him for a while, unsure of what to feel. He hadn’t touched her. Hadn’t come close. Hadn’t even looked at her when she climbed into bed last night and gave him permission to stay.
He just lay there. Still. Waiting.
She sat up slowly. The movement stirred him.
Elias blinked, eyes adjusting, and met hers.
“Morning,” he said, voice rough with sleep.
Maya nodded. “You didn’t snore.”
“I don’t sleep deep enough to.”
“You didn’t move all night.”
“I didn’t want to scare you.”
That sat between them for a second. Heavy but honest.
She slid her legs off the bed and stood, stretching. She didn’t feel rested, but she felt… better. Lighter, in a way she hadn’t expected.
He sat up too, but made no move toward her. That mattered.
“I made coffee yesterday,” she said. “Didn’t drink it.”
“I’ll make it.”
She looked at him.
“I remember how you take it,” he added. “One sugar. No cream.”
Maya walked to the bathroom, heart thudding. She didn’t know why that detail hit her so hard. Maybe because it made her feel real again. Seen.
And not just as a body.
When she came out, the apartment smelled like coffee. Not strong. But warm.
Elias stood by the counter, shirtless again, wearing the same jeans from last night. He handed her a cup without speaking.
She took it.
They drank in silence.
Then, finally: “You said you haven’t touched anyone else in years.”
He didn’t look up. “I meant it.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t want anyone else.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I don’t do half-connections.”
“You do sex.”
“I did sex,” he said. “Then I met you.”
She stared at her cup.
“Do you want to talk about what happened?” he asked.
“No,” she said. “But I probably should.”
“I’m listening.”
She leaned against the counter and let herself exhale. “His name was Theo. My ex.”
Elias’s jaw ticked, but he didn’t interrupt.
“He was perfect at first. Sweet, charming, patient. He said all the right things. Bought me flowers. Made me dinner. Told me I was his world.”
“Let me guess,” Elias said, his voice low. “That changed fast.”
“Not fast. That’s what made it worse. It was slow. Subtle. Like a leak in the ceiling you don’t notice until it collapses.”
She sipped her coffee. It steadied her.
“It started with jealousy. Then came the accusations. Then the long nights where he’d drink and cry and say he didn’t deserve me, but still wouldn’t let me leave.”
Elias stared into his own cup.
Maya’s voice softened. “The first time he hit me, I apologized.”
“Jesus.”
“I thought I made him do it. I kept thinking, if I could just be softer. Quieter. Easier to love. He’d stop.”
Elias said nothing. He just listened. Really listened. Like it hurt him to hear, but he wouldn’t look away.
“One night,” she continued, “he pushed me so hard my head hit the wall. I passed out. Woke up with blood on the floor and him crying over me like he was the victim. I left that night. Haven’t seen him since.”
Elias finally looked up.
“Thank you,” he said.
“For what?”
“For telling me. For trusting me with that.”
“I didn’t trust you. Not really. But I needed to say it out loud.”
He nodded. “Then I’m glad you did.”
She watched him a moment longer, then whispered, “You scare me, Elias.”
“I know.”
“But I also feel safer with you than I ever did with him.”
He closed the distance between them, slowly, cautiously. He didn’t touch her.
“I want to earn that safety,” he said. “Every day. If you’ll let me.”
“I don’t even know you.”
“Then let’s change that.”
They spent the rest of the morning in the living room.
No touching. Just talking.
He told her he liked to read when he couldn’t sleep. That his mother used to write poetry, though she never published anything. That he learned how to fight because his older brother taught him how to take a hit before anyone could land one.
He told her he went to prison for killing a man who tried to hurt someone he loved.
She didn’t ask who. She didn’t need to.
He didn’t say the killing was justified. He didn’t call himself a hero.
He just said it was done. That it ruined his life. That it still sits in him like a second heartbeat.
Maya sat with that.
“You’re not who I thought you were,” she said quietly.
“Who did you think I was?”
“A distraction.”
“And now?”
“Now I think you might be something I can’t handle.”
His eyes darkened. “Then say stop. I’ll walk.”
She didn’t.
By noon, he stood by the door, fingers curled around the knob.
“I should go,” he said. “You need space.”
“You’re probably right.”
He didn’t leave.
She walked to him slowly.
“I don’t want to be afraid of you,” she said.
“You don’t have to be.”
“Then promise me something.”
“Anything.”
“Next time I say no,” Maya whispered, “you don’t even hesitate.”
“I swear.”
“And if I freeze again…”
“I’ll stop.”
She nodded once. Then, in a moment of pure instinct, she leaned in and kissed his cheek.
He looked like it broke him.
She opened the door.
“I’ll see you soon?” he asked.
“Yes.”
He walked out without looking back.
And this time, she didn’t lock the door.
Latest chapter
Stranger at Her Door Thin walls
The silence between them wasn’t empty. It was thick, alive with everything unspoken.Elias didn’t try to touch her. Not after everything he’d just confessed. He sat beside her on the bed, legs apart, elbows resting on his knees, head bowed like he was bracing for a verdict.Maya had no verdict to give.She stared at her hands, resting in her lap. She could still feel the edges of the photo, the worn paper of the letter, the sharp coldness of the past she’d pried open like a forbidden tomb. Her chest felt too small for her breath. But she didn’t move. Didn’t run.“I’ll stay,” she’d said, her voice rasping in the quiet, and he’d looked at her like she’d split him open again—only softer this time.Now, it was past midnight. The apartment was dim, lit only by a small reading lamp Elias had moved to the living room. They hadn’t said much after that. He offered her tea. She declined. Neither of them touched the food he brought out. The air between them was fragile, like old glass.He gave h
Stranger at Her Door The Edge of Forgiveness
Maya didn’t move when Elias stepped into the doorway.The drawer was still open. The photograph rested in her lap. Her fingers gripped the edge of the paper like it might vanish if she let go. The letters were scattered, creased from her trembling hands. The document lay face up on the floor beside her, the bold black text bleeding into the quiet room.Neither of them spoke.She didn’t try to hide it. Didn’t fumble to close the drawer or scramble to explain herself. She just sat there, eyes glossy, lips parted, breath uneven.Elias shut the door with a soft click. He didn’t come closer.“I asked you to decide,” he said finally, his voice calm but low, strained. “Not to dig through my ghosts.”Maya looked down again at the photo in her hands. Two boys—one clearly Elias, a little younger, sharper around the eyes. The other… she didn’t know him, but the resemblance was impossible to miss. Same dark curls. Same jaw. But softer somehow. Kinder.“You didn’t tell me you had a brother.”Elias
Stranger at Her Door Pandora's Drawer
Maya stood at the threshold of Elias’s apartment, the key to the drawer burning a quiet hole in her coat pocket.The place was quiet, too quiet. No fire in the hearth, no lingering smell of his cologne. He’d left that morning with a kiss to her temple, a careful look in his eyes, and the same words echoing now in her chest:"Go if you want. Use the key. If you’re going to decide what you think of me, do it knowing the truth."She had promised herself she wouldn’t go. She had told herself it was a test—just another of his manipulations. But as the sun dipped past the skyline, shadows creeping through her small apartment like fingers, Maya had found herself pacing, restless, drowning in too many possibilities. And eventually, the key found its way into her hand.She stepped inside and closed the door behind her.It smelled like him in here. Woodsmoke and pine. Something darker underneath—leather and secrets. His jacket still hung over the chair, his boots left by the door like he’d just
Stranger at Her Door The Things we Lock Away
The sky outside her apartment was a dull, bruised gray, clouds thick with the promise of another storm. Maya sat cross-legged on the floor, sketchpad open in front of her. Her pencil had broken hours ago, but she hadn’t noticed. All she could see were the jagged lines—sketches of metal teeth and broken silhouettes of keys that didn’t fit.Her phone lay silent on the floor beside her. She hadn’t turned it off, hadn’t put it on silent, hadn’t touched it since walking away from Elias. But it hadn’t rung either.That silence felt louder than any argument they had ever had.She glanced at the time. It had been nearly twenty-four hours.Not a word.Maya’s chest felt tight. She hated the way absence hollowed her out. How it made her second-guess everything, as if love had an expiration date measured in hours without contact.She stood up abruptly, pushing the sketchpad aside, and moved to the kitchen. Coffee. Something warm. Something that didn’t feel like waiting.She had just set the kettl
Stranger at Her Door Beneath the Surface
Maya woke before him.The weight of Elias's arm was draped across her waist, heavy and warm. His body molded perfectly to hers, his breath slow and deep against the back of her neck. She should have been comforted. Safe. But the warmth that wrapped around her body didn’t reach the hollow ache behind her ribs.His words from the night before still pulsed through her mind.“It reminds us what we’re risking.”She didn’t know what she was risking. Not really. But she was beginning to fear it was more than just her heart.Quietly, she slipped out from beneath him, careful not to wake him. The floor was cold beneath her feet as she padded into the living room, grabbing one of his button-down shirts from the back of a chair and slipping it on. Her fingers automatically moved to the buttons, fumbling from habit, but her thoughts were elsewhere.The locked drawer.It tugged at her.Calling. Daring.Last time, she hadn’t gotten far before he’d caught her. But he had left her alone in his apartm
Stranger at Her Door The Fire Between Us
The sketchpad lay forgotten on the floor.Maya hadn’t moved in what felt like hours. The keys she kept drawing stared back at her, a hundred versions, all wrong. Elias hadn’t called. He hadn’t messaged. He hadn’t come.And still, she waited.By the time the knock came, it wasn’t gentle. It was firm, impatient. She opened the door without thinking, and there he was, drenched in rain, hair slicked to his forehead, eyes unreadable.“You left,” he said.“You locked me out,” she countered.Elias stepped in without waiting for an invitation, his boots leaving a trail across her floor. He shut the door behind him and turned to face her, his jaw set.“You were looking for something you weren’t ready to find,” he said quietly.Maya's arms crossed. “And you were hiding it.”He stepped closer, hands in his coat pockets. “We all have locks on our lives. Doesn’t mean we want them forced open.”There was silence. Electric. Tense.Then Maya said, “You said not to pretend to want to know you unless I
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