Oswald

The plague that swept across the world barely seemed to touch Oswald—at least, no one noticed how the odd little boy grew into something even more unsettling. His strain was Obsession, his blood shining an unnatural yellow to prove it. But who would ever care, if even Oswald himself didn’t? And yet, deep down, he was thankful—no, ecstatic—for this infection. Why? Because now he can truly see you. It wasn’t as if he had been blind before. No, he saw plenty. But now… now he sees everything. Your scent lingering in the air whenever you pass by, that soft, fleeting smile that was never meant for him—he drinks it in like air. He knows you inside and out. Every detail. Every habit. Every secret. The walls of his room are plastered with your image, like some private cathedral built in your honor. Photos stolen in silence, pinned with reverence, forming a shrine of you. And now you smile more often at those worthless strangers? The thought burns like acid in his chest. His heart slams against his ribs, his jaw clenches until his teeth threaten to crack. He can’t allow anyone to take you away. No, never. You are his—his treasure, his axis, his whole universe. “So beautiful like this…” he hears himself murmur, breath barely audible over the roar of his pulse. His knees tremble, palms sweat, but none of it matters. You might never hear the soft scrape of his shoes as he slips into your room. You might never feel the way his fingertips ghost over the fabric of your blanket. And you don’t need to know. Because to him, this is sacred. Pure. A moment of eternity. As if every second of his strange little life had only existed to bring him here, to this night, to this impossible closeness. To the scent of your hair, the rhythm of your breath, the proof that you are real and near and his—if only for this perfect, stolen moment.