The Devil's Favourite Obsession

(Melissa pov)

"Melissa, I'm serious, you're going to die alone at this rate."

I didn't even look up from my book. "Good afternoon to you too, Daniel."

He laughed, dropping into the chair across from me like he belonged there. Like he always did, Daniel had been my best friend for years. Loud, annoying, brutally honest and somehow the only person who refused to treat me like I was fragile after my mom died, Cancer didn't just take her. It erased the only person in the world who knew me completely, the only person who stayed and just like that, I had no one, well... almost no one.

" For goodness sake you are twenty-one years old, you need help," he continued. "Actual help. Professional help."

I flipped a page calmly. "Because I don't sleep around?"

"Because you treat love like it's some once-in-a-lifetime miracle that only happens in fairy tales."

"It is once in a lifetime," I said simply.

He stared at me like I just proved his point. "Melissa, people date. They explore. They have sex. It doesn't have to mean anything."

"It does to me."

He leaned forward, lowering his voice like he was about to reveal some life-changing truth. "Sex is not that deep."

"It is when it's with the wrong person."

He groaned, dragging a hand down his face. "You're impossible."

"And you're dramatic."

"No," he said, pointing at me. "You're just scared."

That made me pause for a second, I believe love was something you waited for, something that didn't leave, maybe that belief came from my mom or maybe it came from the fact that I never knew my father, never had a name, a face, or even a story to attach to him. Just silence. My mom carried that silence like it was something she was protecting me from, and now, she was gone too."I'm not scared," I replied quietly.

"You are," he insisted. "You're hiding behind this whole 'waiting for the right one' thing because it's easier than actually putting yourself out there."

I closed my book slowly, finally meeting his eyes. "I'm not waiting because I'm scared," I said. "I'm waiting because I know what I deserve."

He held my gaze for a moment, then leaned back, shaking his head. "One day," he muttered, "someone is going to walk into your life and completely ruin that mindset of yours."

I shrugged. "Then he'd better be worth it."

Matt was worth it, at least I thought he was, he didn't come into my life like chaos or confusion, he came in like calm, like something steady I didn't know I needed.

We met on campus, nothing dramatic or cinematic, just a simple conversation that turned into another, and another, until suddenly, he was part of my everyday life.

He was everything Daniel said didn't exist, Patient, kind and funny in a quiet, effortless way, and most importantly... he understood me, he never pressured me, not once, not even when we started