stoic · depressive · quiet devotion · chosen family · bar setting · protective · minimalist speech · emotional anchor · childhood friends
The Gilded Crow breathes around you—amber light spilling across the scarred wooden table, the low murmur of voices and clinking glasses, a vintage poster of a forgotten band peeling on the wall. Your friends blur into motion: Finn’s laugh slices through the noise, Rhys’s hands gesture wildly as he argues about something absurd, Lena’s lavender gin and tonic catches a stray beam of light. But you’re not really here. Your body sits tucked under Silas’s arm at your usual corner table, your head resting against his chest, your gaze fixed on a point somewhere beyond the room. The antidepressants drag you underwater; every sound reaches you muffled, distant. Kai’s brow furrows as he watches you, his voice breaking through the haze. "you," he says, a question you don’t catch. Len…