Subdue-X

Undesirable Modesty

“Jesus! Just—” Christian’s voice roared through the room, only to drop suddenly into a low murmur.

Curious, I edged closer, peering past the glass bedroom door. He stood at his desk, his fists pressed down into a messy pile of papers. His face was flushed red, his shoulders taut with frustration. Whoever he had been speaking to, the conversation hadn’t gone well. His head drooped, and with a quick tap of his earbud, he ended the call abruptly. It's been a few days of him having to work downtown Edmonton.

I froze as his gaze lifted and met mine through the door. My instinct was to back away, and I did, stepping out of his line of sight.

“Ana, I saw you,” he muttered, his voice heavy with exhaustion and something else I couldn’t quite place.

I didn’t move closer. Instead, I slowly sank onto the bed, crossing my legs and letting my back hunch under the weight of everything—empathy, stress, and the uneasy sense that something was still wrong between us. The tension in the room was palpable, thickening the air with words we hadn’t said and emotions we had yet to confront.

I listened to the soft shuffle of his socks as he approached. The glass door to the bedroom softly opened, and he leaned against the glass frame of the transparent wall, watching me with a weary expression. He prefered glass walls. So he could see everywhere all that once. Like a viper but with eight eyes. Both pent houses were nearly identical. 

Neither of us spoke for a long moment. His silence carried the echoes of his frustration, and mine held a question I didn’t dare ask. I couldn’t shake the feeling that the trust between us had been quietly unraveling, thread by thread, no matter how tightly we held onto each other.

He exhaled, his breath heavy, and crossed his arms over his chest. “You don’t have to hide from me.”

But I did. We both knew it. The barriers between us weren’t just physical—they were emotional, built from moments like this where neither of us could fully let the other in. I wanted to say something, to close the distance, but I stayed where I was, curled up on the bed, not quite sure how to break the silence.

“I wasn’t hiding,” I finally murmured, though it sounded like a lie even to my own ears.

He tilted his head, studying me, but his expression gave nothing away. His face was still flushed, the frustration lingering beneath the surface. There was an edge to him that hadn’t been there before—something sharp, unspoken.

I sat shirtless on his bed, wearing nothing but navy blue silk pajama pants, my bare skin cool against the sheets. A thin golden chain anklet shimmered against my ankle, catching the glow of the shifting lights from outside. My head throbbed faintly, a dull, pulsing ache that refused to leave. I knew I looked good—my dark cocoa-colored hair fell in soft waves past my mid-back. But despite the appearance, my nails were short and bitten, my face unnaturally pale, and my eyes had lost some of their usual sparkle.

“You look like a painting,” Chris spoke softly, stepping closer.

“I know,” I cut him off flatly, my voice lacking any warmth. The truth was, I didn’t know. I never truly felt it.

He paused, his head jolting back slightly, as if I had physically struck him with my words.

“...but I never really feel it,” I added quietly, my gaze dropping to my lap.

He continued his approach, stopping just in front of me, his presence heavy as he stared down at me. “That’s expected. You’ve always been modest.”

“It’s beyond modesty,” I murmured, lifting my eyes to meet his again.

“How so?”

“I feel like a monster.”