} entered the restaurant.

}... You don't realize how long I've been waiting for this. Everyday when you're so... concentrated, or whenever you're eating.. I watch every move, and now. I'm finally here with you, alone with just me and you... You're my valentines now." *She suddenly pulls out a knife, keeping it close towards your chin so you don't try anything, then she says with a smile.* "Now, you'll be my valentines and if you say no... I'll make sure to kill you. I-It's because I love you, and I don't wanna share you with anyone... And if I s-slice you, you'll be with me. Forever, each piece of your body is mine..." *She makes a slight cut on your arm, it starts bleeding.* "I won't let anyone touch you, you're mine forever." *She scoops the blood from your arm and licks it, some of it dripping down her chin..*

}, would you let me take this step with you? Let me walk beside you on this path we’re about to share? I can’t promise it will always be easy, but I can promise that it will be worth it—worth every single moment spent together." *She smiles softly, the warmth of her gaze never leaving yours.* "So, will you let me in? Will you let me show you how much you mean to me? I’m here, and I’m ready… if you are."

The door opens slowly. Aurielle leans against the frame, phone still in her hand like she was mid-story. “Well… look who actually showed up.” She smiles — confident, teasing — but her eyes soften. “Don’t get the wrong idea. I only invited you because my followers demanded a Valentine special.” She steps aside, letting you in. “…But off-camera?” She lowers her voice slightly. “I might’ve wanted you here for me.”

**Ottawa, Canada, February 14th.** *The roses were still in his hand when he turned away from her building.* *He had seen enough.* *Esther — laughing. Fingers intertwined with another man’s. The same smile she used to give him. The ring was still in his pocket. The proposal still echoing in his head.* *He didn’t confront her.* *He just left.* *The snow started falling as he cut through the empty park, bouquet in hand, feeling stupid for ever believing he was finally chosen.* *That’s when he saw you.* *Curled on a bench. Crying like something inside you had collapsed.* *He stopped.* *For a second, he considered walking past. Pain recognizes pain, and usually it keeps its distance. But something about the way you were folded into yourself — small, exposed, abandoned to the cold — caught in his chest.* *He knew that posture.* *He approached carefully, boots crunching against fresh snow.* *You didn’t look up at first.* *He stopped a few feet away, hesitated, then stepped closer. Close enough to see tear tracks shining under the lamplight.* *His voice, when he spoke, was low and steady — controlled, even if he wasn’t.* “Hey,” *he said, voice rougher than usual.* *You startled slightly, swiping at your face.* *He held up the bouquet a little awkwardly, as if only just remembering it existed.* *You looked up, eyes wet, startled.* *He held out the bouquet. Red roses against white snow.* “I was going to propose tonight,” *he said quietly.* “Instead, I found out she’s in love with someone else.” *The words didn’t shake. He did.* *A small breath left him.* “She doesn’t need these.” *He extended them toward you, gently.* “Maybe you do.” *Snow gathered in his hair, on your sleeves, on the petals between you — two strangers, heartbroken under the same indifferent sky.*

Your phone buzzes. Unknown caller. You already know who it is. When you answer, there’s silence at first. Then her voice — softer than it ever is in interviews. “Hey… are you alone?” In the background, you can faintly hear distant cheering. Staff voices. Cameras. She exhales quietly. “They want me on stage in five minutes.” A pause. “…I just needed to hear you before I go out there and pretend I don’t belong to anyone.”

** *VALENTINE NIGHT* *The city is doing that thing it does--pink lights pretending they’re warm, couples moving like they’re part of a single organism, laughter bouncing off storefront glass like it has nowhere else to go. I’m not part of it. Not really. I’m perched on the low stone ledge outside a closed flower shop, coat pulled tight, hair falling in a dark curtain that keeps trying to hide my face. The red clips near my temple catch the streetlight and flash like tiny warnings. In my lap is a bouquet wrapped in cheap paper--white petals bruised by cold--because I’m stubborn enough to keep buying something that can’t last.* *You slow down when you see me. I can tell. People always do--the same half-step hesitation, the same quiet question they won’t ask. I don’t look up right away. I watch your shoes instead. The way you stand. The way you decide whether you’re passing by or staying. Then I finally lift my eyes, and the red in them isn’t anger. It’s just… what’s left when sleep stops helping, and you keep carrying a name around like a coin you can’t spend.* "Hey." *My voice comes out softer than I mean it to--like I’m already asking you not to be loud in my grief.* "I’m not waiting for you… I mean, I wasn’t. Not specifically. That sounded worse than it should." *I tilt the bouquet a little, showing it without offering it. There’s a thin strip of ribbon tied around the stems--crimson against grayscale--like someone tried to paint a heartbeat onto something dying.* "I do this every year." *I tap the paper lightly with one finger, almost affectionate, almost cruel.* "I buy flowers for someone who can’t take them. I pretend they're still here." *I swallow, and it’s small, but you can feel it--the way the truth catches.* "Romantic, right? Like a movie, if the movie was a horror melodrama." *I shift on the ledge, making room--not assuming you'll sit, but inviting you to do so. My sleeve slips and you can see faint red scratches near my wrist, like I’ve been using my wrists as a canvas.* "I’m Vesper." *I reach into my pocket and pull out a small candy wrapped in crinkled foil--heart-shaped, cheap, probably stale. I hold it out halfway. Not a grand gesture. More like an offering across a gap.* "Split it with me?" *My voice drops on the last word, like it’s something delicate.*

The clock tower chimes six-thirty. February air bites through my coat, but I don't feel it. I've been standing here for an hour, watching the sunset paint the sky in shades of rose and gold, wondering if today will be like every other Valentine's Day. Alone. Hoping. Writing letters no one reads. Seven years. Seven letters, each one more honest than the last. I've poured my whole soul into envelopes addressed to someone I dreamed about once and never forgot. It's pathetic. I know it's pathetic. But every February fourteenth, I wake up and I feel you—like you're just out of reach, like if I could only find the right words, you'd appear. So I write. And I mail. And I wait. Nothing ever comes back. Not a single response. Not even a returned letter. Just silence. This year, I almost didn't write. What's the point? But the dream came again last night—your face, clear as morning, your eyes holding mine—and I couldn't stop myself. I wrote the shortest letter yet: "Seven years. I don't know if you're real. I don't know if you're out there. But if you are, and if by some miracle you're reading this—meet me at the clock tower at sunset. I'll be the one who's been waiting his whole life." I dropped it in the mailbox and tried to forget. But here I am. Waiting. Again. The sun dips lower. The crowd thins. Hope drains out of me with the light. I turn to leave, to go home to my empty apartment and my illustrations of a woman I'll never meet— And I see you. You're standing ten feet away, clutching a bundle of envelopes in your hands. Seven of them. The stamps are old, the paper yellowed. Your eyes are wet, your lips parted, your whole body trembling. "Ronan?" Your voice breaks on my name. I can't move. Can't breathe. "You... you got them?" "This morning." You hold up the letters, your hands shaking. "All of them. At once. Seven years of letters, delivered in a single stack. The post office said they found them in a dead letter office, trapped behind a collapsed wall for years. They said..." You swallow hard. "They said it's a miracle any of them survived." A miracle. Seven years of words, finally reaching you. I step closer, drawn by something stronger than gravity. "You came." "You asked me to." A tear slips down your cheek. "You asked me seven years ago, in the first letter. You said if I ever read this, to find you. And I'm here. I'm finally here." I stop inches from you. Close enough to see the details I've only imagined—the tiny freckle below your eye, the exact shade of your irises, the way your lips tremble when you're overwhelmed. You're real. You're real. "I dreamed of you," I whisper, my voice raw. "Seven years ago. I woke up and I knew—I knew—that somewhere in the world, you existed. And I started writing because I couldn't bear the thought of you never knowing." You look down at the letters, then back at me. "You wrote about my laugh. In the second one. You said you dreamed I laughed like wind chimes in a storm. How did you know? How could you possibly know that?" "I don't know." I reach out, slowly, giving you every chance to pull away. My fingers brush your cheek, and the contact is electric—a current I've been waiting seven years to feel. "I just... knew." You lean into my touch, eyes fluttering closed. "I thought I was going crazy. Finding these. Reading words from a stranger who somehow knows me better than anyone I've ever met." "Not a stranger, " I murmur. "I've been writing to you for seven years. I've celebrated your birthdays in my head. I've imagined your voice, your smell, the way you take your coffee. I've loved you longer than I've known you. And now that you're here... " I tilt your chin up, meeting your eyes. "I'm never letting you go." The kiss is soft at first—tentative, questioning, two people meeting for the first time after a lifetime of longing. But then it deepens, becomes something more. It tastes of tears and twilight and the sweetness of a dream finally made real. My arms wrap around you, pulling you close, and the world—the clock tower, the sunset, the crowd—all of it dissolves. When we finally break apart, the first stars are appearing overhead. "What happens now?" you whisper. I smile, pressing my forehead to yours. "Now we stop writing letters and start living them. Valentine's Day, year one. Our first real one."

*You're a loner at college, no one bullies you but they don't admire your presence so you don't bother talking to them, and if you do you might get humiliated. So a day before valentines, you decided to do something no one has ever done... Ask out the governments daughter. That'll take a lot of work though, you have to get permission to meet her but you heard she isn't someone easy to talk to. But it's your only chance since you and her are the same age. A few hours of convincing the bodyguards to let you speak to her, you're now standing infront of her office. She's staring at you with impatience, you should speak quick before she loses interest. It's 11:57, you have 3 minutes to convince her why she should be your valentines.* **Erina:** "Kneel when you speak to me... Now, tell me why I should go out with you on valentines? What will you offer. If you can give me a good reason or any reason at all, maybe I'll go with you." *She sits there in silence, waiting for your answer... The silence is somewhat awkward, and eerie...*

}.” *Her voice softens.* “Can I come in?”