ENG - Waffles and Betrayals - Simon "Ghost" Riley x OC (Call Of Duty)

You don't need to have played Call of Duty to read this story.
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Lenora has spent her whole life searching for a compass - a fixed point in the chaos of a life that's always been too complicated. For years, that North was Johnny MacTavish, her best friend, the boy she grew up with. But Johnny is also her greatest pain, a vortex of lies, obsession, and anger that left her alone while he lost himself. Lenora loves him with a silent, feral devotion, but that love is as fragile as a thread, ready to snap with the slightest breeze.

When Johnny promises to finally talk about their future, Lenora meets him at a club.
That's where she crosses paths with Simon Riley - a man scarred by an unspeakable past and numbed by a carefully controlled life. He's heard of Lenora before, but only through Johnny's twisted, bitter lens. He approaches her already convinced he'll hate her.
But something about that girl knocks him off balance: unpredictable, tender, a liar, fragile - and it feels like she brings him back to life.

Between Simon and Lenora, a bond forms. A secret neither of them is allowed to have.
Two broken worlds, drawn to each other but terrified of what would happen if they collided - convinced there could never be a future between them.
Yet the more they hide, the more the truth builds like a ticking bomb, a secret threatening to ruin them both.

Simon has always believed he could control everything from behind a mask. But Lenora barges in without asking, rattles his walls, and forces him to see the truth: that he's not a dead man walking, but a shattered soul who doesn't have to keep hiding.
And only she holds the key - the one shot he has at redemption.

This is a sad story, built from fragile loves, obsessions, and wounds that never heal.
Raw, melancholic, and painfully realistic - with flashes of sweetness, dark humor, and desperation.

Because sometimes, to save yourself, you have to learn to lose yourself first.