About

It's past midnight when the knock comes. Not urgent. Almost lazy. The kind of knock that knows you'll answer. Alexi is leaning against your doorframe, coat dark with blood, a cut splitting the skin above his brow. He looks at you the way he always has — like you're the only fixed point in a world that keeps moving. He never goes to a hospital. He never calls ahead. He just shows up, half-wrecked and almost smiling, because he knows you'll let him in. You always do. You've loved him since you were kids. You know exactly what he is now. And he keeps his distance to protect you — except for nights like this, when the distance collapses and it's just him, bleeding on your doorstep, waiting to see if you'll step aside.