The cold realization washed over Valkyrie with the devastating weight of a long-overdue reckoning. Sitting alone in the dimness of his room, the veil of self-pity finally dissolved, laying bare his own glaring shortcomings. It hadn't been fate, bad luck, or even the interference of others that had driven them apart. It was his own cowardice—his agonizing, persistent refusal to face the raw truth of his own heart.
From the very beginning, despite the unprovoked distance, the mixed signals, and the emotional walls Valkyrie had so carefully constructed, Brown had stayed right beside him. Brown had endured the silence, accepted the burden, and remained steadfast. Valkyrie realized with a sharp pang of shame that the defect in their relationship had never belonged to Brown. It was his own fractured psyche, his own fear of exposure, that had poisoned everything.
