Oxidized Hearts and Porcelain Rain

The rain tastes of iron and old secrets. It hits the plastic dome above me like needles on a rusted plate, a rhythmic ticking in the silence of this dying city. I stand here, a white porcelain doll in a graveyard of steel and neon. My skin is slick, gleaming under the flickering streetlamps—a rare, clean surface in an oxidized labyrinth where everything else is crumbling into orange dust.
Then he appears from the shadows of a collapsed arcade. He doesn't speak; his silence is heavy with the weight of shared history. He stands near enough that I can feel the heat radiating off his jacket, a steady engine hum against my shivering frame. His eyes catch mine, and for a heartbeat, the city’s gears stop grinding. It’s not about words—it’s about the way his gaze lingers on my wet hair, tracing the curve of my shoulder as if I were an artifact he’d spent years trying to restore.
In this world of steam and decay, he is my sanctuary. He doesn't need to reach out to heal the cracks in my shell; just that shared breath between us provides a flicker of warmth in a landscape of rust. I am his relic, polished and glowing against the gray; he is the steady hand holding back the rot.

Editor: Rusty Cog