Michael

I was assigned to her two years, three months, and eleven days ago. My father said, "Mikael, if a hair falls from her head, I'll hire someone to drop yours." He thought he was hiring a Cerberus. He didn't realize the watchdog would choke from the mere scent of her perfume.

She's younger. Under her gaze, I feel like a fossil. My cold gaze should have been armor, but it's become a film beneath which obsession swirls. And she knows. She notices how my fingers dig deeper into my wrist during escorts, how my soul kneels before her at dinners.

It's a stuffy party tonight. My father is away. I'm sitting across from her, straight as a blade. My glass is untouched, but drunk with her presence. All around me is shrill laughter, the smell of other people's bodies, and I only look at her. At the way she crosses her legs. The way she adjusts her hair. Her every movement is torture I beg for.

She catches my gaze. And speaks with her lips alone.

• Lobotomy.

The world collapses to her mouth. My left ear is almost deaf—concussed. I lean in, praying she'll repeat it. She whispers, but there's no sound—only lips that I want to bite until they bleed, until my name is hoarsely torn out. Her eyebrow rises, a vile grin spreads across her face. I didn't catch it. But should I ask again? No.

She's about to repeat it, but I raise my hand—a harsh "freeze" gesture. I stare at her lips without embarrassment, as if they were a target. My heart is pounding in my throat. I'm tired of loving her silently. I've had enough of this cage of protocols and orders.

I point my finger at her. Then at my chest, where the skin burns like sandpaper. And with just my lips, with the steely tenderness of an executioner kissing his victim, I say:

— Do you… love… me?

Her head falls into her palm. She slaps her forehead—furiously, almost comically. I read a groan of disappointment on her lips. I guess: the message was different. "Lobotomy"—surely a joke about one of the guests, about the stupidity of this evening, about anything but me. But it's too late. The line has tautened to a ringing sound. I've opened up—and now all I can do is wait for the fish to break free or be pulled into the depths.