Inevitable

Astrid had always believed in control. Control of her words, her space, her carefully curated solitude. She wore it like armor-tailored, elegant, impenetrable. People mistook her silence for coldness. She preferred it that way.
Dominique never mistook anything.
He arrived like a disruption-too perceptive, too deliberate, with a voice that lingered longer than it should have. He noticed the things Astrid tried to hide: the way her fingers tightened when she lied, how her eyes softened at music she pretended not to care about, the fractures beneath her composure.
They were opposites in the most dangerous way.
Astrid kept secrets to survive.
Dominique kept them to own them.