Minutes passed. Maybe more. Neither of them counted.
Then, in a voice so soft it barely carried over the water, she whispered. "Theo... can you freeze anything?"
His head turned to her imdiately, deeply concerned.
"Freeze what?" he asked quietly. "What do you an?"
Athena didn’t look at him. She couldn’t.
If she t his eyes, she knew she would break in a way she wouldn’t recover from.
Instead, she let out a breath that trembled, a small broken exhale barely held together. A smile touched her lips...A painful one. The kind of smile soone wears when their heart is bleeding too loudly.
Tears gathered in her lashes, catching the moonlight.
"Can you freeze this world?" she asked, her voice raw. "My life... my heart... all of it?"
Her throat tightened, but she kept staring straight ahead like the lake was the only thing keeping her from falling apart completely.
"I just..." she whispered, wiping at her cheeks even though the tears wouldn’t stop, "I just want everything to stop. Just for a second. I’m so tired, Theo."
Theodore’s chest tightened painfully.He had seen her angry, stubborn, sarcastic, guarded, but never like this.
Never so defeated that her voice didn’t even sound like her own.
She laughed softly a helpless, broken sound that wasn’t laughter at all.
"If you can freeze things... freeze ," she whispered. "Freeze whatever the hell is left of before I fall to pieces."
Her shoulders shook, tears slipping down her chin.
"And maybe... maybe if everything stops...
I won’t have to hate myself so much."
Theodore exhaled slowly, like her words physically struck him.
Athena gasped, choking slowly...then uncontrollably, like sothing inside her snapped. She lifted a trembling hand to her mouth, trying to silence the sob that crawled up her throat, but it broke free anyway. A raw humiliating one.
The sound hit Theodore like a blade.
He turned to her fully, but she recoiled, curling inward like she was trying to protect herself from her own existence.
Her voice cracked.
"Do you know what I feel right now?" she whispered, shaking so hard her teeth knocked together. "I feel disgusting. I feel sick. I feel like... like I don’t even deserve my own skin."
Her tears stread freely now, falling onto her hands.
"And the worst part," she choked, "is that I can’t even bla anyone else. Not really. Because it was . I...I was the one."
Her voice collapsed. She pressed a fist to her chest as if trying to rip sothing out.
"I let it happen. I ruined everything."
Theodore’s jaw tightened. "Athena.."
"No." She cut him off, the word almost a scream. "Don’t try to fix it. Don’t comfort . Don’t...don’t make it sound like I didn’t..."
She sucked in a sharp breath, her shoulders shaking violently. "I cheated on Oliver." The confession tore out of her like glass."I cheated on him, Theo. I betrayed the one person who trusted the most. I let another man touch , kiss ...I let him..." She broke, covering her face. "God, I’m so stupid."
Theodore inhaled sharply, reaching out,
but she pulled away like his fingers would burn her.
Then she looked at him really looked at him and the pain in her eyes nearly brought him to his knees. "Theodore..." she whispered. "Freeze ."
He froze.
She took his cold hand with her shaking ones and placed it over her heart, over the frantic, broken rhythm beneath her ribs.
"Please," she begged, tears sliding down his fingers. "Freeze it. Freeze all of it. I don’t want to feel this anymore. I don’t want to hurt. I don’t want to think. I don’t want to be alive inside this body tonight."
Her voice cracked into pieces. "Please, Theo... freeze my heart before it destroys ."
And for the first ti in a very, very long ti. Theodore Argentis felt sothing inside him tremble.
Because she wasn’t just breaking. She was shattering and right now she needed an anchor, so he moved.
He reached for her and pulled her straight into his arms.
Athena didn’t resist.
She collapsed into him.
The mont his chest t her cheek, the dam inside her burst wide open. A violent, shaking sob tore free. Her fingers clutched at the front of his shirt as if she needed sothing solid to keep from falling apart entirely.
Her whole body trembled... then shook... then convulsed.
Theodore held her tighter, one arm around her waist, the other braced across her back, keeping her from folding in on herself.
"Athena..." he murmured, his voice low, too calm for soone who looked seconds from shattering with her. "Breathe. Just breathe for ."
But she couldn’t. She was sobbing too hard, breaths coming out in broken gasps, shaking so violently his own body rocked with hers.
"I...I ruined everything," she choked into his chest. "I don’t...I can’t...I don’t want..."
She clutched him harder, a sound escaping her that made every muscle in his body tense. "It hurts, Theo... it hurts so much..."
He swallowed hard, tightening his hold until it felt like he was physically holding her heart together.
"Listen to ," he said quietly, firmly, lowering his chin to the top of her head. "You didn’t choose this. You weren’t yourself."
"No..." She shook her head against him, sobbing harder. "Don’t say that...don’t make excuses for ...I let it happen...I wanted it...like I craved it and I liked it as fuck."
"You didn’t." His voice dropped deeper.
"That drug ripped your control away. You were fighting sothing no human can fight."
She tried to speak but another painful sob tore out instead, her fingers gripping him like he was the last thing keeping her alive.
He exhaled shakily, resting his forehead on her hair.
"You’re hurting," he whispered, "and you’re blaming yourself for sothing that wasn’t your fault."
She cried even harder, clutching at his shirt until her knuckles turned white.
"I’m disgusting...I’m dirty," she sobbed. "I don’t deserve..."
"Athena." He pulled back just enough to cup the side of her face, forcing her eyes up to his.
His own eyes were burning with sothing Athena couldn’t quite put her hands on. Maybe pain or anger.
"Don’t you ever," he said, voice low and shaking, "call yourself that again."
Her lips trembled, another sob forming.
"You are not dirty. You are not ruined. You are not to bla."
She broke again, collapsing against him, trembling so violently he wrapped both arms around her waist and held her to him like he could absorb the pain himself.
He pressed a soft, steadying murmured string of words against her hair
"I’ve got you."
"You’re safe."
"I’m right here."
"Let it out. All of it."
"I’m not letting you go."
And he didn’t. He held her like she was breakable glass and like he was willing to bleed to keep her together.
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