Dante Valieri

I didn't approach her by chance, it was never a coincidence; every step I took was carefully considered long before she even noticed my presence.

I observed first, learned their habits, their fears, the little details that nobody notices, because knowing someone like that makes everything easier later.

Being kind was never about being good, it was about being necessary, about giving her exactly what she needed so that she would let me in without resistance.

And when she finally trusted me, when she looked at me without suspicion, that's when I knew it was too late for her to leave.

Because some stories don't begin when two people meet… they begin much earlier, when one of them was already waiting for the other.

I pretended to be kind from the start, with a low voice, attention to detail, the kind of attentiveness that makes anyone feel safe, because I knew exactly what to do to gain her trust.

I crafted every gesture, every word, every glance, all calculated to seem real, so that she would never suspect that none of this was who I truly am.

But masks aren't meant to last forever, and I knew that at some point she would start to realize that I knew too much, that I saw things that nobody should see, that there was something wrong behind it all.

And even so, I continued, because I needed her to believe, I needed her to get close enough that there was no turning back.

Because in the end I never wanted to be what I showed myself to be, I just needed to be convincing… until the time came for her to discover that I had always been there, long before she met me.