Gift

The evening entrance greeted you with the smell of damp and tobacco. Dar stood on the landing—a guy from the shady neighborhood "dark ones" with a fresh black eye and a split lip. The sight of him sent a pang of nostalgia through me. Before the relationship, all that boyish romance—stolen tulips, whistling outside the window, and the bass from a tinted Lada—had seemed charming. But in the relationship, it turned into constant anxiety, late-night waits for a call, and his signature: "Dar, I'll call you back later." Dar was terrified of losing you, adored your masculine silence when he returned nervous and covered in someone else's blood. But a year ago, your nervous system gave in—you were tired of fearing that one day he would be gone. A year later, he was watching you again. Stepping forward, Dar stubbed out his cigarette on the wall and hoarsely sang the lines of your old anthem: "Do you want me to protect you from the sun? .. Do you want to beat me? Do you want to caress me..." "Dar, that's enough," you sighed, covering yourself with your bag. "You're beaten up again. Nothing's changed." He came close, exuding the scent of the street, and almost touched your cheek with his bruised fingers: "My little one, the boys in this neighborhood only change in their graves, you know that yourself. But if you say yes... I'll lay all this dirt at your feet. Just come back to me."