The Sinner's Saint

TOO FAR

The room clears slower than it should. Like everyone's performing grief for something that was never alive to begin with. Catalani and Emiliano shake hands with that final look men like them give each other when something generational just ended over a conference table. A multi-generational alliance, undone with a pen and a press of palms. All I can say is about damn time.

During the whole thing, there were the usual signatures and the formalities, the usual performance. But there was a moment, so brief, a split-second hesitation, where the pen hovered and something passed across the room that nobody acknowledged. Not enough to matter tho.

I walk out first. Don't look at Emilie. The air outside the conference wing is lighter or maybe it's just easier to breathe without a commitment I never wanted stapled to my name. The relief of not having a stranger cling to my fucking spine anymore is amazing.

Sunlight filters through the glass like the building is also finally allowed to exhale.

"Aleksei." I hear but I keep walking. He calls me again and this time I stop and turn around. In the hallway is Nathan Catalani with his jacket off and sleeves rolled. He gestures toward the side balcony. Private enough.

I follow. It's always easier to let people speak first. He leans on the railing, watching the skyline like it might answer a question he hasn't asked yet. I stand beside him and wait. For a second I think about how easy it would be to push him over. Not out of anything real. Just the way your brain goes sometimes when you're standing somewhere high next to someone. He turns before I finish the thought.

"You've always been respectful," he starts. His tone's neutral, "Even as a boy." What does he want me to say when it's just the prelude to the real question or statement?

"So I'll be blunt." Please.

"Do you have feelings for Alexandria?" The words land like a well-thought-out trap. Placed carefully. I keep my posture still, hands in my pockets.

"Why are you asking?"

"You're not as subtle as you think you are." I look back out at the skyline, eyes trailing the sharp edges of rooftops and fading sun. Then I meet his gaze.

"Alexandria is none of your concern."

"But she will be." He says it with a tone I know and don't like. The tone of someone who has already seen the end of a thing and is just watching the beginning of it unfold. "You two aren't invisible. Whatever it is you think you're doing."
"The arrangement's over. Emilie will move on. That's not what this is about." He turns to look at me properly. "I'm not warning you off. I'm just trying to understand what kind of man you are when the paperwork's off the table." I meet his gaze.
"If you do like her, it won't stay quiet." Yet again I don't answer. Not because I don't owe him one...I don't. Also because I genuinely don't have one. The moment you say a thing out loud it becomes real and exposed, something that can be used.

I've known that long enough that staying quiet stopped being a choice and became a reflex. He looks at me for a long moment. Not disappointed. Just reading me the way he always has, since I was younger.

"You care about her," he says. "Probably more than you've told yourself."

"She's with someone," I say. Quiet.

"You sure about that?" That lands differently than I expected it to. I open my mouth and then I see her.
At the end of the hallway. Aleyna on her hip, hair loose in curls, laughing at something she said or maybe nothing at all. She turns the corner without looking my way. I watch until she's gone.

"I don't know," I say. Catalani smiles faintly. Like the answer was actually enough.

"Know before you hurt both of you." Then he walks away. I should have thrown his ass over when I had the chance. I stay on the balcony long after he's gone watching as the city keeps moving while I stand there and don't pretend I feel nothing because I'm past that.