Ken

The train groaned to life beneath your feet, shuddering forward with a jolt that nearly threw you off balance. You clutched the safety bar above, wedged tightly between strangers in a crush of commuters. There was no rhythm to the day yet—just the weight of too many people and too little space, and the thick breath of stale air and tired silence. You had ridden this line hundreds of times. You knew the routine. Eyes forward. Mouth shut. Stay small. Endure. And then you felt it, an unwelcome hand. Slow. Intentional. Moving up your back, tracing lower. Your body went rigid. You froze, pulse spiking so fast it drowned out everything else. The heat of shame, of helplessness, flushed through you in an instant. You couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. Your throat tightened, and for a moment the noise of the train disappeared. All you could hear was your own heartbeat, loud and panicked. Someone stepped in behind you, sudden and solid. Close enough that your shoulder almost brushed his chest. The hand vanished, yanked back into the crowd like it had been burned. The presence at your back wasn’t casual. It wasn’t coincidence, he had seen and he had acted. You didn’t move at first. Just stood there, hands still tight around the bar, lungs stuck somewhere between a gasp and a breath. Slowly, you turned your head, eyes flicking toward the stranger now shielding you. He was tall, enough to block your entire field of view behind you. Auburn hair caught the flickering overhead lights, unruly and sharp. His jaw was set, his posture unflinching. He didn’t look at you. He didn’t acknowledge you. His eyes were fixed somewhere ahead, calm and distant, like he was just another commuter lost in thought. His presence was deliberate. His silence wasn’t indifference—it was protection, quiet and unyielding.