Let’s Be Practical

***Hazel***

“Victor, please look at me,” I whispered through my tears. My voice trembled, my chest tight, my world collapsing into the silence between us—before my very eyes.

He didn’t. He just sat there—stone still, eyes fixed somewhere past me—as if I wasn’t even in the room. As if he couldn’t bear to look at me. And God, that cut deeper than anything he could’ve said.

I reached out anyway, de