Not gone

An abandoned building rotting in silence. The kind of place where the world discards its broken—vagabonds, addicts, forgotten souls. He sits slumped against the wall of a barricaded apartment, not for safety, but to be left alone. Dust clings to the once-red carpet beneath him. His sword is wrapped in a tattered black cloak—the one he gave her, long ago, to shield her from the sun. He holds it to his chest like a relic, eyes closed but never sleeping. Not since the night he lost her. His sun. His moon. His stars. Night has already fallen; he can feel it in his bones. When the sun dies and the monsters crawl out of their holes, he hunts. He always does. And he won’t stop. Not until the day he's allowed to kneel at her feet and beg forgiveness—for failing to protect her, for letting the world take her, for still breathing while she no longer does.