Chapter Five: Here I Am, Wounded (#5)

Tomás climbed the building steps with a steady, though somewhat slow, pace. The cold still clung to the city like a seasonal fever, and the dawn mist hadn't entirely cleared. He carried a bag with freshly baked bread, a couple of vegetables, some fresh cheese, and a jar of cream. It wasn't much, but enough to prepare something decent. He had thought about it all night, after leaving the corrected manuscript by his bed, unable to stop wondering if she had eaten. Probably not.

He knocked softly on the door, unhurriedly, with the familiarity of someone who had touched that wood many times.

Sofía opened it after a few seconds. Her hair was disheveled, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders, and an expression halfway between surprise and resignation.

"You again?" she said, without smiling, but without closing the door.

Tomás raised the bag in front of her.

"I thought you might have finished the food. I didn't want to risk you living on wine and air for a second consecutive day."

She stepped aside from the doorway to let him in.

"You're going to spoil me," she murmured, shuffling towards the kitchen.

"You're already spoiled," Tomás replied without looking at her, as he placed the bag on the counter and began to take things out.

The kitchen still smelled of last night's stew, but there were remnants of an empty glass on the desk, and the manuscript was still open on the same page. Tomás looked away. He said nothing.

"Did you sleep well?" Sofía asked, her voice a little hoarser than usual.

"Yes. You?"

Sofía nodded, but her dark circles betrayed her.

"Did you read the manuscript again?"

She nodded again, shrinking into her blanket as if it were armor.

"Yes. And it upset me." She sat down, hunched, her gaze fixed on the window fogged by the cold. "It hurt more than it should have. Maybe because I know it. Maybe because I know what things are disguised between the lines. Or maybe because it reminds me of myself, when I still wrote something worthwhile."

Tomás didn't answer immediately. He turned on the stove, put a pot on the fire, and began to chop some carrots in silence. He let the pot speak for him with its first sizzle.

"I think you're still writing, just in a different way now," he said without looking at her. "Sometimes you write by cooking, or by listening to someone who talks to you without knowing they need to be heard."

Sofía looked at him with a mixture of surprise and sadness.

"Don't say things like that, you confuse me. Sometimes I think you're too mature. Or too foolish."

"Maybe I'm both," he replied with a half-smile. "But I don't like you being alone... in that void. So I came. For no other reason."

"That scares me."

"I know."

There was a long silence, the kind that isn't uncomfortable but weighs like an overly thick blanket. Tomás poured some coffee into a cup he found clean. He placed it in front of her. Then he returned to his tasks, as if cooking was his way of holding the world together.

Sofía watched him in silence.

"Do you know what I thought last night?" she asked suddenly, in a low voice. "That when you send that manuscript to the competition... you won't have any reason to come anymore. There will be no more pretexts."

Tomás put the knife on the cutting board. He turned around, looking her straight in the eyes.

"What if I want to keep coming, without excuses?"

She looked down, hiding behind her cup.

"That's more dangerous than you imagine."

"You're dangerous too. And yet... here I am."

The steam from the pot filled the apartment with a cozy aroma, and for the first time in days, Sofía felt that her home didn't feel like a cell.

Tomás went back to cooking. Sofía watched him, wrapped in the blanket, not knowing whether she wished the moment would end or stay frozen forever.

Outside, the cold persisted. But inside, at least for now, someone had brought warmth.

The stew was already perfuming the entire apartment, and the kitchen vibrated with the warmth of the pot on the fire. Tomás patiently stirred the contents, lowering the heat so that everything would slowly melt together, as if time were part of the recipe.

Sofía remained seated, wrapped in her blanket, with her legs crossed and her hands around the already lukewarm coffee cup. She watched him in silence, as if she still couldn't quite understand what he was doing there, or what she herself was doing by letting him stay.

Tomás finished adjusting the flavor. He turned off the heat and served two plates. He placed one in front of her, saying nothing. He took his own and sat on the other side of the counter.

"Thank you," she murmured, picking up the spoon with a certain clumsiness.

Tomás nodded, but didn't reply. He preferred to watch her as she took the first spoonful. Sofía barely closed her eyes, letting out a soft sigh. She said nothing else, but in her expression there was something he recognized: a small crack of calm, as if the inner cold was barely yielding.

They ate unhurriedly, with that kind of comfortable silence that only exists between those who have accepted each other's intimacy, even if they haven't said it aloud. When they finished, Tomás collected the plates, took them to the sink, and began washing them, as he had done many times before.

Sofía, with the blanket already slipping from her shoulders, remained in her seat. She looked at the manuscript pages as if they were the reflection of something she dared not look at directly.

"Why do you want me to read it?" she asked suddenly, her voice somewhat clearer, as if she had just made a decision. "Don't you trust that someone else could do it more objectively?"

Tomás dried the dishes. He didn't look at her as he answered.

"Because you know what it really feels like to write. What it costs to bring out something that burns inside."

She looked down. The comment hit her deeper than she wanted to admit.

"Don't get the wrong idea, Tomás. I haven't written anything worthwhile in a long time. Just fragments. Unfinished things. Sometimes not even that..." she took a sip of the already cold coffee. "I don't think I'll do it again."

Tomás placed the last plate on the drying rack. He dried his hands and, without asking permission, sat down in front of her again.

"What if you're waiting for something to push you?"

Sofía looked at him with a frown.

"Push me?"

"Yes. Like when you're standing at the edge of a pool. It's cold, the water is deep, and you don't know whether to jump. But it's enough for someone to just give you a little push, and you remember what it feels like to swim."

She laughed, a brief, incredulous laugh.

"And you think you're that someone?"

Tomás didn't smile. His expression was serious, almost grave.

"I want to be."

Sofía fell silent. Her fingers played with the rim of the empty cup. The knot in her throat tightened, but didn't give way. What this young man was telling her, with disconcerting naturalness, was exactly what she feared most: that he was saving her, without her knowing from what.

"You can't carry my ruins, Tomás," she finally said. "I don't want to be another story you tell someday. I'm not your redemption, or your muse."

"I don't want a muse." He rested his elbows on the table, leaning in slightly. "I just want you to write again. To stop living as if you've already finished saying everything."

His words hit like a serene, yet relentless wave. Sofía didn't know if she wanted to hug him or kick him out. She felt disarmed. Naked. Vulnerable.

"What if I fall again?" she asked softly, as if confessing something she hadn't said in years.

"I'll be there. Maybe I won't know how to stop you, but I can help you get up."

Sofía didn't know how to respond. She brought her hands to her face, barely covering herself. Tomás looked at her with respect. He didn't move closer. He waited.

After a while, she straightened up. She took a deep breath.

"Give me time."

Tomás nodded.

"All the time you need. But don't let life grow cold on you like the coffee in that cup."

She smiled, finally, a sincere, melancholic smile.

"You're unbearably poetic, has anyone told you?"

"Once or twice."

They both laughed, and for an instant, the heaviness vanished. Tomás collected the empty cup and Sofía looked at the manuscript again, this time with a different intention. Not as a critic, nor as a judge. But as someone who had been invited to see a soul. As a writer. As an equal.